Larry Woodworth comments

The only comment I'll make is the same one I made in November of 1999... The country has made their choice and now they'll have to live with it for four years. I pray that this time our decision doesn't result in a country being invaded for phantom "weapons of mass destruction".

In every instance posed by this article, the technology did exactly what it was supposed to. It was the humans who caused their own predicament. A better title would have been "Morons who don't know how to use technology get their just desserts."

"The theory of 'manmade climate change' is an unsubstantiated hypothesis." Dr, Leslie Woodcock

(professor emeritus of chemical thermodynamics at the University of Manchester in England, with a Ph.D. from the University of London, and served as a senior research consultant at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Laboratory in Ohio.)

I think I go with Prof, Woodcock and not with Al Gore or some Japan Today experts.

All Dr. Leslie Woodcock said was that "manmade climate change" hasn't been definitively proven, yet. He said nothing about whether it was a bogus hypothesis. In short, he said nothing we didn't already know. The force called GRAVITY is an "unsubstantiated hypothesis", but that doesn't stop the world from teaching about it.

To be honest, how would the US feel about Chinese or Russian aircraft, including surveillance aircraft, flying in close proximity to US ADIZ? The US would scramble the Ready-5 Fighters(armed) to intercept, that's how. SOP. This is a case of "OK for me, but not for thee" by the US.

Wrong. The U.S. didn't protest the intercept (it was international airspace so the fighter had just as much authority to be there as the recon plane did), what they protested was the unsafe aerobatics performed in close proximity to their aircraft. You cite the U.S. response to Chinese and Russian planes encroaching on U.S. airspace. Now tell us how many U.S. interceptors were performing aerobatics near the Chinese or Russian planes? You can't. How does that equate to "OK for me"?

Ahh, here it comes. When Google purchased YouTube for $1.2 Billion in Google stock, I wondered when the behemoth was going to turn the screws and recoup their money. Enter "YouTube Red" - red representing the blood squeezed out of their users.

Why are English members here giving thumbs down to U.S. fans if your team just lost to Japan? Wouldn't you want U.S. To win?

You're assuming they really ARE English... we really don't know what nationality they are unless they tell us. But for the people who were rooting for England in the tournament, it's natural to then root for the team that beat England because then you could say, "They beat us and they beat USA, so we really tied for second with USA."

It's almost a rule that cosplayers in the U.S. must have an unsuitable body-type for the character they're cosplaying. There's even a t-shirt you can buy at anime conventions that pokes fun at this pseudo-rule.

Does this mean the cosplayers are wrong for doing it anyway? No. They're having fun and they're not hurting anyone else, so que sera sera.

And for all those saying the line has to be drawn, and that thuggery is no answer, should be telling that to the police.

We do. Every time there is hard evidence of police misconduct - almost always supplied by citizens - they've came down on the officers involved. The key is "hard evidence". I forget the details, but there was an officer on horseback who arrested an individual saying he had assaulted the horse, but video showed no such thing happened. The officer was charged with false arrest and filing a false report. Things as minor as that all the way up to the infamous murder of Walter Scott. When there is hard evidence of the police acting improperly, municipalities DO do the right thing.

Regarding that guy who died while in a "choke hold" - there was too much grey area for there to be "hard evidence" against the cop. First of all, the video everyone says "proves" the guy was killed by the police was edited - leaving a heck of a lot of things (including why the police suddenly move in on him) off the video. Second of all, the guy obviously was not being choked because if so he would not have been able to call out "I can't breathe". There certainly could be other reasons why he couldn't breathe (for instance, the weight of the officer on top of him was preventing his lungs from fully expanding), but being choked was not one of them. So like I said there was a lot more uncertainty in that incident than the general public realizes.

The dude in Ferguson who was reaching into the cop car for the officer's gun? Please! His parent's need to be sued by the city for not teaching their son that assaulting a police officer will probably get you shot. In that case the forensic and autopsy evidence supported the officer's version of the incident and raised huge questions about the "eyewitnesses" truthfulness. So yeah, lots of grey area in that incident as well.

One a school PC?

The article doesn't mention who was the owner of the laptop.

I worked for a while part-time at a Best Buy in their Geek Squad department. We routinely had computers for repair up on shelves in the back room running diagnostic routines. We were all working on various computers when one of our female co-workers came around the corner, stopped short, and said, "UMMMMMmmmm...." We looked to where SHE was looking and found that one of the customers computers that was on a diagnostic run had kicked in the slideshow screensaver, which was pictures of the customer and (presumably) his wife/girlfriend performing all sorts of various acts of sex in the nude. Three guys jumping simultaneously to move the mouse was pretty funny.

“It was a hellish frenzy, absolutely horrible. People were just jumping into the canals to escape the inferno,” said Kase, 89. He said he survived because he didn’t jump in the water, but his burns were so severe he was in and out of hospital for 15 years.

The article doesn't explain the seeming contradiction of Kase's comment. He survived because he DIDN'T jump into the waters of the canal. The reason is, the fire was so intense on both sides of the canals that the water was quickly heated to boiling. Anyone in the water was boiled alive. The rivers had more space between the sides and the odds of surviving were much higher.

Were these Japanese soldiers ever punished for these war crimes?

Possibly, though it would require someone who was there at the time to identify who ordered the execution. The war crimes trials after the war DID try IJA and IJN officers for killing POWs. Most of the officers on their list, however, were not brought to trial because they had died during the war or could not otherwise be located. So IF there was someone who could identify who ordered the executions and IF the officer giving the order survived the war and IF the officer was found, then he was probably tried for murdering the prisoners.

Don't you think that the reason these Africans aren't working in "real" jobs in Japan could be related to skin color?

Ah yes... the "poor ethnic people are forced into shady activity because they look different" excuse. Sorry, I'm not buying that. These "oh-so-unfortunate" people managed to fly to Japan and find a paying job. These guys were not dressed like homeless people so they're making at least enough for wardrobe upkeep. A "real" job pays a wage or a commission. The only "non-real" jobs are internships. I highly doubt these guys are interns. Spare me your crocodile tears for a group of people who spent all that time learning a foreign language, yet somehow missed out on learning what the word "no" means.

It's so easy to lecture from middle to upper class point of view, but there are some people in the world who have fewer choices and sometimes end up in less than desireable lines of work.

So? I'm supposed to feel sorry for someone who INTENTIONALLY enters into shady work in a foreign country? Not happening. It's basic right and wrong, Bucky. You take a job on the "wrong" side and I've lost all interest in your circumstances and flat-out reject any attempt you make to justify YOUR decision to go down that road.

Other foreigners do the same thing in Japan, wheeling and dealing trying to make a buck and there is nothing wrong, and sometimes they do it in dubious ways and not always in the most ethical way, but at least these people are not sitting on their butts waiting for a handout.

No, they're physically accosting pedestrians on the sidewalk and trying to strong-arm them into their place of employment. What sort of twisted parents brought you up to think "there is nothing wrong" with that sort of behavior?

The key to whether an ambassador has done a good job is the answer to the question: "Has the ambassador done anything to embarrass the host country or the ambassador's country?"

As far as I know, Ms. Kennedy has not embarrassed anyone, so she is doing an excellent job.

funny how GM is having huge recalls of its models and class accident lawsuits for the deaths cause be faulty switches. nothing like a bit of Japanese auto bashing to help the American auto industry

It doesn't really help GM. This article says there MAY have been issues with Honda's reporting of defective cars causing accidents. That's quite different than the internally documented safety issue GM let slide for years. I think what we're seeing is the NHTSA is smarting a bit after the GM fiasco, so they're cracking the whip on ALL the car manufacturers to see if there are any other "ignition keys" that car manufacturers are hiding.

Why when the focus of an issue is faced with shame or blame people here always have to bring in the US!

Well, the article is about the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's investigation into a possible reporting deficiency, so (in this case at least) it's natural to "bring in the US".

Owner Riichi Kondo had told Fairfax Media after that win he might consider pulling the Tomoyuki Umeda-trained stayer out of the Melbourne Cup if he was penalised with an extra half a kilo of weight.

The weight a horse carries INCLUDES the jockey NOT in addition to what's allotted.

OK, I admit I'm not a fan of horse racing and therefore not familiar with common practices. Am I reading this right? Horses that do well in previous races are penalized with additional weight they have to carry in subsequent races? If so, why bother trying to raise a racing thoroughbred if the fast ones get hobbled so the slow ones have a chance?

A labor shortage exacerbated by the siphoning of workers away from the disaster zone to build commercial facilities for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games has slowed reconstruction.

This should shame every nihonjin who supported placing an Olympic bid so soon after the disaster. It should, but it won't. In the grand scheme of things, a two week international sporting event trumps the basic needs of their own citizens. For SHAME, Japan! For SHAME!

Now tell us the FULL story, JT.

This long article only contains bits of it.

Reuters wrote the article, not JT. JT is merely reprinting it.

People forget that gasoline (petrol) in vapor form is HIGHLY explosive. If the vapors from this spill started to waft through the sewer lines (which already has a buildup of methane gas at times) and there is a spark somewhere among the sewage pipe, the results are obvious.

Tokyo's storm drains are not isolated from their sewage lines?

JT! Please change the spelling of whiskey in the headline!

As has been quoted previously, Japan uses the Scottish spelling of "Whisky". Us Americans apparently had to add the "e" so that we didn't try to pronounce it "whi-skai".

While I don't condone tossing litter to the ground, perhaps there would have been less of it on the ground had there actually been trash receptacles anywhere in the vicinity that could have been used? Japan's virtual outlawing of public trash containers is just as much at fault as the people who got tired of carrying their trash and tossed it to the ground.

As it was explained to me, public trash cans were outlawed after the 1995 sarin attack on the Tokyo subways- which used sealed trash can bags to hold the liquid. I must admit I'm not following the logic of why that would require the virtual banning of public trash cans.

If you think Shibuya was messy this time, just wait until the Olympics are held and the international community descends on Tokyo. They're only going to carry their trash for so long before they drop it in frustration - and it won't just be Shibuya that's affected.

In the US, traditional Halloween is celebrated by children in costumes "Trick or treating", going to houses or stores collecting candy. Does this even remotely sound like what's happening in Shibuya?

Actually it does. I'm not a young man (as evidenced by my avatar), but even when I was a youngster, I remember the parents walking their kids around carrying a shot glass and instead of saying "trick or treat!" they would say "trick or drink!". Adults and teens in the US have been celebrating Halloween with parties and dances as long as I can remember. The rose-colored glasses may be removed now.

I stepped off the train in Shibuya last night too get a bite to eat and stepped into mayhem. The closest thing I can compare it to would be New York Times Square on New Years Eve. Despite what the article says the revelers seemed to be able to move okay. Vehicular traffic, however, was a different story because the revelers would not clear the scramble crossings when they were supposed to. THAT'S where the police had their hands full.

The link is to a 360° panorama I took at the Hachikou scramble crossing with my smartphone:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/59191044/2014-10-31%2021.55.46.jpg

Exhausting work with small chances of locating someone. Kudos to the men and women on the volcano searching for the missing. May they beat the odds and recover all the victims.

Yes, while most are sleeping, they would surely notice. Those stationed there would also be under orders not to disclose any info either. Some non-military islanders claimed to have seen a plane, though.

There are a LOT of planes there and even some commercial airliners under contract to ferry personnel on and off the island. While there may be orders not to talk about what happens at Diego Garcia, the UCMJ specifically provides for servicemen to be able to blow the whistle on illegal or immoral acts by their command. The hijacking and kidnapping of hundreds of civilians would definitely fall under this category.

And probably the biggest reason your comment is ignorant: If, for some unknown reason, the U.S. needed a plane for a covert operation, they could quietly take one of their own and remove all identifying marks. There's no need to cause an international firestorm by hijacking a civilian airliner full of passengers for the job.

As a form of entertainment, the mangaka was on firm ground UNTIL he titled it, "The Truth About Fukushima." Unless he has documented cases of an unusually high number of nosebleeds in people from there, he's going to be facing some heat on this.

A low-cost airline is going to have low salaries and minimal benefits. That's pretty much a given.

The Ronald Reagan was monitoring the radiation and in fact had to relocate farther away from shore because the carrier's commander was uncomfortable with the readings he was seeing. So these sailors are claiming... that they believed TEPCO over their own command? Not friggin' likely.

U.S. lawmakers are not that much different to Koreans thinking about the name change. If U.S. gets his way, the Gulf of Mexico will become the “Gulf of America.” And the French want to change the name of English Channel to Anglo French pond. And the Arabian Seas? Maybe India wants to change the name to "Middle East Seas"?

I can't say I've heard ANYBODY in the U.S. lobbying for the Gulf of Mexico to be re-named the "Gulf of America". This appears to be a bit of fantasy created by non-Americans. Somebody else mentioned the Gulf of California. Considering that "the Gulf of Mexico" is already taken and the Gulf of California has the Mexican states of North and South Baja California making up one entire side of the gulf, "Gulf of California" makes perfect sense. If Mexico decided to rename those two states, then the name of the gulf would probably change as well.

While not retroactive, can parents in the US not refile for custody regardless of time tat has passed? Would Japan then not have to deal with these kids that were taken?

Not according to the Hague Convention treaty. The treaty applies only to "wrongful removals or retentions occurring after its entry into force in those States." In other words, all abductions or "retentions" by Japanese spouses that occurred before Japan signed the Hague treaty are not covered and Japan has no reason to act on them.

Read about this in the Washington Post last week. They ended up the article that this was ALSO a convenient way for stalkers to keep tabs on their target.

Police are following the paper-trail of the crime.