Ryu-1inOH comments

Practically, I wonder if he has considered insurance to get a - at least partial - refund in case of a temporary malfunction? Because she really is not that hot...

Something about 'former occupation forces' and 'r*ping locals' touched a nerve :-)

Anywhere in the world you would expect kids and teens to be excited about such a pop band

Ever heard of the Spice Girls? I couldn't go to the supermarket in Oxford without hearing their infamous first song...

I am most often a US advocate although I will not condone everything they do. As for this kind of attitude, it is pure irony that it would lead them to call others 'ethnocentric'. Most of the time it comes from a simplified vision of the world where they are in possession of the 'universal' truth and anything that deviates from that is wrong. I say just a lack of perspective...

The South Korean president's favorite past time seems to be island hopping

Asianhometown: how many civilians were killed at Nagasaki and Hiroshima? Will the US government ever come to terms with it? The West telling the Japanese what they should or should not do at home is called neo-colonialism. Pretending to know what the Chinese or Koreans feel is a modern day 'divide et impera' in a disguised form. It just stinks...

OTOH, Mao killed many Chinese, and it is the business of the Chinese victims and their descendants to reckon with >this history, and NONE of your business.

Interesting thinking indeed. So your government may kill many more of your people, torture them because they're of a different religion ot different ethnicity and it's no one's business but whatever shrine the Japanese visit is your business? Are you aware that it is what makes your claim ridiculous? The same principles that are used to define 'war criminals' are the ones your government run afoul of on your own people.

Of course China won't engage in a military conflict of equals or against an enemy superior in strength. No one would doubt that. As for the old business between SK and Japan, notice they've also stirred some old business between them and SK (http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2012/09/26/2012092601283.html). And I need to wonder whether Taiwan realize that they're toast if the PRC have their way in the Senkaku issue. And again, the economic card is a double edged one isn't it. Japan is seeing the short term effects but medium to long term ones will be felt on the Chinese side. Wait a few months and look at all indicators again. Now do you believe that these issues will be resolved based on what some actresses or British (ugh) journalists think?

You seem to be so concerned about what 'other's might think of China but do you realize that the PRC's acts speak louder than anyone's words. Take a quick look at this article for cross reference

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443537404577578953575891264.html

centrist35:

I am more than willing to believe than they did not represent the majority of the population. I am less ready to believe the Chinese government cracked down on them - can't be that naive.

Sure! So if all of those islands were 'stolen' from China which owns them ';legally' then there is no need to use military power - or underhanded tactics like stirring your brainwashed mobs up - to assert your ownership right? All you have to do is present the case to the ICJ? It's easier to brainwash your own people than the rest of the world.

Seems to me that if they just do some introspection and look at how many of their own people they persecuted and killed during their 'Step Forward' and 'Cultural Revolution' they'd realize they had better go after their own communist leaders.

Farmboy

So what is the next logical passive-agressive step? Practicing the removal of hulls of shattered boats from the >beaches?

Next step is to practice altogether: China practices taking one island and Japan and the US practice taking it back. How about that...

On the other hand China stole the Spratlys, Paracels and was trying to steal Scarborough Shoal from Vietnam and the Philippines. And I heard even some rocks from South Korea. All of that within the last few years. Amazing how some people have selective memory

Complaining about those at Yasukuni is at best hypocritical for Westerners. China's motives are different; they know the US shortened war crimes trials in Japan after the war because they needed to rebuild the country into a bastion of anti communism.

Are they asking for apologies too? Or for people to buy their 'music' ? Or both maybe?

Indeed the Chinese should just ignore this. This is a country's internal affairs. Or do the Chinese have double standards when criticizing the US, accusing us of meddling into another country's internal affairs and turning around and doing that exact thing (wouldn't surprise me) ? This shrine just honors the people who died for their country (I went there myself). As for war criminals, it's not like we in the US didn't welcome a host of them into our own research programs (see Operation Paperclip) so we too, should stop before being called out as hypocrites.

It was a vulgar and distasteful joke. The French make a lot of those without really meaning any harm and they're not too aware how things are 'global' these days. Politically Correctness is an American export that meshes well with Japanese politeness and reserve but it is still something foreign to them. Apologies were made quickly; all this deserves now is to be forgotten or ignored.

Aren't those Geely's the cars that repeatedly failed to meet emissions and safety standards in the US? They obviously don't even know how to use Volvo technology yet. The guy who had his Nissan destroyed and replaced by one of those coffins on wheels but be feeling shortchanged.

They've got a point though. I have one of those pre-IOS/Android windows for mobile-based smartphones that look like a Blackberry. It was just desktop Windows transposed to mini-me devices and the user experience was nowhere close to what you have on iPhone with their gesture-based + touchscreen system. All of a sudden it became pleasant to use maps on my phone - which I heard is not the case anymore with iOS6 :-)

Robert Dykes

Bullet proof vest is not illegal. Nor is fi retardant pants. A bullet proof vest has not metal in it depending on the material >used to stop bullets so it would not set off a metal detector.

Indeed there was nothing much he could have done until he got his luggage in LA. Even TSA don't verify every single checked-in luggage. What I'm really curious about is what he was intending to do in the US with all that gear

Not quite sure about that. They've been on a downward spiral since Ballmer took over from Gates. The times of licensing software a la Microsoft is over with cloud computing taking off. People don't really need to buy the software and a few servers to run it on, they can just subscribe to a SaaS-type of provider. On the other hand on the mobile computing side, Amazon and Google are already providing their own hardware platforms so it was natural that Microsoft would follow suit, especially considering they have the required experience with xBox...

Very much agree with all of the above.

I was particularly impressed when going through the metal detector at Narita, my shoes triggered it. Someone brought me a pair of slippers, took my shoes to the scanner and I was thanked for my patience! Can't imagine TSA in Chicago doing that...

Also, best French cuisine ever outside of France. Might even compare very well with what you find in France...

And those Tokyo girls can definitely dress classy and understated at the same time...

Better sell as many as possible before Obama hits them with another WTO case or blocks another government-run Chinese company from getting infrastructure contracts in the US...

Huawei was founded and has been run since by a Peoples Liberation Army officer and military technology researcher. It was never publicly traded in the US or Hong Kong because it would have to do extensive financial disclosure. Wouldn't that already set off a couple of warning with everyone?

As a the NY Times wrote: "It basically reflects what I think is a growing challenge for Chinese companies as they seek to expand globally: they are bumping into a glass ceiling — how the Chinese government behaves and is perceived internationally.”

How it is perceived internationally? Well Japanese companies had a taste of it the past few weeks. Need one say more?

“We’ve also received data concerning this via the CIA,” says the aforementioned security source.

With all the hate the Chinese have been spewing as well online as everywhere else, knowing that even before those territorial issues escalated, Chinese products were already a major safety concern, wouldn't you err on the safe side? The previous cases showed that even the Chinese government had little control over the quality of what their companies sent out to the world. How difficult is it to imagine that someone will come up with a 'oops, my hand slipped...'. Besides if someone had read their CIA reports before 9/11 things might have gone differently...Just saying.

I thought Skymark had been around for a while already...

Even before the dispute over the Senkakus, safety was already a chief concern with Chinese products. The US and the EU learnt it at their own expense. Read this article if you've never heard about it

http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2008/january/tradoc_137533.pdf

Raonic's forehand is in many ways similar to Berdych's so if Nishikori san is as much of a counter puncher his quarter final match suggests, this could be a really interesting championship match

blackrock: Exceedingly rare to bump into a fellow KOR fan nowadays :-) I remember Maison Ikkoku was running at pretty much the same time but Ayukawa had to be the most fascinating and best developed character of the time imho... That manga store is apparently still around if you ever get the opportunity...I'm thousands of miles away now so I can't really check on it... Madoka 25 rue Faidherbe 75012 Paris 01.43.73.01.35