THE MANHATTAN Project that created the first atomic bomb was a great success — and, in the eyes of many, a cautionary tale about the dangers of technological proliferation.

 I jump back in after a few days rest and the first sentence makes me want to cry. Nothing can justify calling the program that led to those monstrous pair of unnecessary war crimes a success in my opinion. Blow up a couple of bombs to show the Russians, because we let them keep the emperor anyway.  Of course, we had already firebombed and destroyed so many Japanese cities by that time in the war.

The best way to forget such complicated lessons of the past is to pretend they never happened.

 Reading that sentence is surreal coming out of the endless staged and scripted "events" coming from my TV and newspaper.

Members of the US House of Representatives who voted down a proposed national park that would preserve and link together sites in three states involved with creating the atomic bomb ought not to forget that insight.

Representative Dennis Kucinich, an Ohio Democrat, and others argued that any official recognition of the places where the Manhattan Project did its work would be celebrating violence and nuclear destruction. But this argument is shortsighted.

 (Blog editor frowns, although he should expect such a thing from the war paper now)

Many advances in science and technology have deadly uses as well as peaceful ones, and sometimes the deadly ones help to keep the peace.

 But you must give up that gun, American! And Iran can't have medical isotopes to treat cancer.

The questions that could be raised at the proposed Manhattan Project National Park are exactly the ethical quandaries that contemporary students — and lawmakers — should be confronting.

 How about the editorial boards of blind spot newspapers?

Heather McClenahan, director of the Los Alamos Historical Society, explained in a recent interview with National Public Radio that, far from a celebration, information at the proposed park would be organized to ask questions: “Why did we do this? What were the good things that happened? What were the bad? How do we learn lessons from the past? How do we not ever have to use an atomic bomb in warfare again?”

 Is that really such a hard question to answer? Is it a question that should even be asked?

Proponents of the bill intend to bring it up for a vote again, maybe even by the end of the year. They should, and the House shouldn’t make the same mistake twice.

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 That's what they are working on, or what the Globe would like to see them working on in Congress, 'eh? I thought we had budget problems, but.... 

"Caroline Kennedy in line to become ambassador to Japan; Would be first woman to hold high-profile post" by Bryan Bender  |  Globe Staff, April 01, 2013

WASHINGTON —Bloomberg News reported several weeks ago that Caroline Kennedy, the 55-year-old New York lawyer, author, and only surviving child of slain President John F. Kennedy, was expected to be named to the post, and the Washington Post reported it again Monday, triggering a flurry of fresh reports.

 Related: Bloomberg News a Cover For Spying Operation 

 Now you know how they got the story.

White House officials would not confirm the news Monday but did not issue any denials, which was telling.

Her potential selection came as a bit of a surprise to some close observers of the Kennedy clan.

“She’s been reluctant to be in public life in a full-throated way,” said historian Robert Dallek, a JFK biographer. “She’s never run for anything. It is a little surprising. What is her connection to Japan?”

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Dallek noted that serving as a diplomat would carry on a different sort of Kennedy family tradition.

Kennedy’s grandfather, Joseph P. Kennedy, was President Franklin Roosevelt’s ambassador to Great Britain from 1938 to 1940, and her aunt, Jean Kennedy Smith, was US envoy to Ireland for President Bill Clinton.

“There is a kind of dynastic tradition here,” said Dallek.

Others, meanwhile, saw her possible elevation to the post as marking the beginning of a more active role in public life — perhaps even leading in the future to elected office....

Another factor in the timing of Kennedy’s potential nomination may be the departure of Hillary Rodham Clinton, who stepped down as secretary of state in January.

Kennedy disappointed Clinton’s supporters when she endorsed Obama during the bitter presidential primary battle in 2008.

The endorsement, along with that of her uncle, the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, lent a much-needed boost to the then-Illinois senator’s quest to capture the Democratic nomination.

“I have never had a president who inspired me the way people tell me that my father inspired them,” she said of Obama in January 2008. “But for the first time, I believe I have found the man who could be that president.”

 Four years later, he's a failure.

If she is confirmed to the post, her boss would be Secretary of State John F. Kerry....

While seen as a plum post, the job of US ambassador to Japan is not considered easy.

At the top of the list of concerns, said former vice president Walter Mondale, who was ambassador to Japan from 1993 to 1996, are security issues and threats of renewed conflict with North Korea, the unpopular US military presence in Okinawa, the rise of China, and the sluggish Japanese economy....

 Related:

Gee, they really helped her out on that last one.

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 And about that economy:

"Deflation-weary Japan gets more aid; critics skeptical" by Nelson D. Schwartz and Hiroko Tabuchi  |  New York Times, January 23, 2013

Another central bank, another round of unconventional monetary policy.

Following the lead of their counterparts in the United States, Japan’s central bankers announced Tuesday what they called a groundbreaking effort to reinvigorate the country’s long-moribund economy and defeat deflation.

 No wonder Japan is in horrible shape.

With no more room left to cut interest rates and previous steps unsuccessful, the Bank of Japan is taking a page from the Federal Reserve’s playbook and will pump trillions more yen into the economy by directly buying government bonds and other assets.

 Oh, so now the dollar and the yen will be worthless. Central banks destroying western economies one at a time.

It also doubled the country’s official inflation target to 2 percent. The action came after months of intense pressure on the Bank of Japan from the country’s audacious new prime minister, Shinzo Abe, to take more aggressive action to bolster the economy.

But as in the United States, there are doubts about just how much of an effect the move will have in Japan. Three rounds of asset purchases since the onset of the financial crisis have successfully headed off deflation in the US economy but failed to generate the kind of growth necessary to return employment to prerecession levels.

Japan’s move is also likely to further devalue the yen in the long term — causing some to worry about a possible round of competitive devaluations as countries weaken their currencies to bolster growth in exports.

 Someone ay race to the bottom (while the wealth flows up top)?

On Tuesday, however, the yen actually rose against the dollar and the euro amid disappointment that the Bank of Japan’s efforts had not gone far enough.

 That's the short term. 

Traditionally, curbing inflation, not worrying about deflation, has been the principal task of central bankers. But when economies enter prolonged periods of slow growth, or even contraction, other concerns come to the fore....

 We haven't really seen any even with the fluctuating price of gasoline.

Given the scale of the efforts in the United States and Europe, many experts were disappointed by the Bank of Japan’s action because the expanded asset purchases will not begin until 2014. They complained that was a waste of valuable time in turning around an economy whose descent into deflation has become a test case of the effects of doing too little in the face of an economic slowdown.

To make matters worse, the Bank of Japan’s new plan to purchase 10 trillion yen, or $112 billion, in assets each month sounds more aggressive than it actually will be, said Gustavo Reis, senior international economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. That is because many of the securities the Bank of Japan will be purchasing are in the form of short-term debt that will quickly mature, so the additional purchases will equal about $112 billion a year — not a month — beginning in 2014.

‘‘The Bank of Japan should be more aggressive,’’ Reis said. ‘‘It’s a step forward, but given where their economy is, they need to do more.’’

 It is now my belief that more debt to help you get ou of debt is not a good thing.

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Also see:


Yeah, okay, whatever.

How about the politics?

"Tokyo governor quits post, would launch nationalist party" New York Times, October 26, 2012

TOKYO — Shintaro Ishihara, the firebrand governor of Tokyo whose obsession with a set of disputed islands prompted Japan’s latest spat with China, declared Thursday that he was quitting local politics to start a national party, a move that could escalate the territorial dispute and shift allegiances in Japan’s soon-to-be-called elections.

Ishihara, an 80-year-old nationalist politician, who has said that Japan should develop nuclear weapons and abandon its pacifist constitution, has scarce hope of building a party big enough to form a government. But with polls suggesting no clear winner in elections that must be called by August, even a small upstart could use a swing position to punch above its weight and to wreak havoc with foreign policy.

Ishihara said at a news conference in Tokyo that he intended to join forces with two other small nationalist parties — including one recently formed by the populist mayor of Osaka, Toru Hashimoto — to challenge what he characterized as feckless politicking by the governing Democratic Party and its main opposition, the Liberal Democratic Party....

 Keep that other mayor in mind for later.

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 Related: Japanese minister resigns over past ties to organized crime

 Government has become organized crime.

"Japan’s voters set to change leaders" by Malcolm Foster  |  Associated Press, December 16, 2012

TOKYO — While many voters remain undecided — reflecting widespread disillusionment with any party — polls suggest that the electorate will dump Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda’s ruling Democratic Party of Japan three years after it swept to power amid high hopes for change.

 People are feeling that every where, and every time they make change it fails them.

The DPJ’s inability to deliver on a string of promises and Noda’s push to double the sales tax have turned off voters, who appear to be turning back to the Liberal Democratic Party. The LDP ruled Japan almost continuously since 1955 until it lost badly to the DPJ in 2009.

 Is it really any surprise overtaxed populations have had it?

If the LDP wins Sunday, it would give the nationalistic Shinzo Abe, who was prime minister from 2006-2007, the top job again. His hawkish views raise questions about how that might affect ties with rival China amid a territorial dispute over a cluster of tiny islands claimed by both countries....

 Does anybody really want war over some rocks, or is it the minerals underneath?

A win for Abe and the LDP would signal a shift to the right for Japan. 

 People of the earth are going left if right, right if left, and still the same old $olutions.

The party calls for a more assertive foreign policy and revisions in Japan’s pacifist constitution that would strengthen its military posture.

 Asia's Israel?

The controversial proposals include renaming the Self-Defense Forces to call them a military — taboo since World War II — and allowing Japanese troops to engage in ‘‘collective self-defense’’ operations with allies that are not directly related to Japan’s own self-defense.

 That means globalist allies want access to Japanese troops.

With Japan’s economy stuck in a two-decade slump, the Liberal Democrats also call for more public works spending.

 Yikes, America, is that what you are looking at?

They are generally more supportive of nuclear energy even though most Japanese want atomic energy phased out after a disaster at Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant last year.

Prime Minister Noda, meanwhile, has sought to cast the election as a choice between moving forward or going back to the old politics of the LDP....

Surveys this past week showed about 40 percent of people were undecided, reflecting a lack of voter enthusiasm for any party, as well as confusion over the emergence of several fledgling parties that have popped up in recent months espousing a wide range of views.

The right-leaning, populist Restoration Party of Japan, led by former Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara and Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto — both outspoken, colorful politicians — is calling for a more assertive Japan, particularly in its dealings with China. But their forceful leadership styles and views on nuclear power have raised questions for voters....

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 Related:

Conservatives retake power in Japan
Abe vows to revitalize Japan’s economy

 First thing you have to do is get rid of that central bank.

 Also see:

Japanese man, 80, becomes oldest climber to conquer Mount Everest
Five climbers feared dead after mishap during mountain descent in Nepal

NEXT DAY UPDATE: 80-year-old says he nearly died on Everest descent

Related:

Mountain of Glass
Finally, a Post About Fukushima

 And quickly forgotten, one of the most important events of the early 21st-century. Too much war propaganda and other things to peddle on a daily basis, I guess.

 Also see: Japan's Top Pimp

"‘Comfort women’ cancel meeting" by Martin Fackler  |  New York Times, May 25, 2013

TOKYO — Two South Korean women who were forced during World War II to provide sex to Japanese soldiers canceled a meeting Friday with a Japanese mayor who had caused an uproar by appearing to defend the system of wartime brothels.

 While not wanting to appear insensitive, that was during the last century, right?

Earlier Friday, the Cabinet of Japan’s conservative prime minister, Shinzo Abe, passed a resolution to support a 1993 apology that Japan made to women forced into sexual servitude during the war. The motion was apparently aimed at appeasing anger from other Asian nations that Japanese leaders may be seeking to whitewash the country’s past....

 Hey, we do it over here, and we have a sexual assault problem in the military. 

The two women decided that the mayor, Toru Hashimoto of the western city of Osaka, was just trying to use the planned meeting to repair his image and was not seriously showing remorse, the women said.

 Probably true; he is a politician.

Hashimoto, 43, who is also a leader of a populist party, angered South Korea and other Asian nations by saying last week that the comfort women were necessary to provide relief to soldiers.

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"Japanese politician recasts views on sex slavery" by Hiroko Tabuchi  |  New York Times, May 28, 2013

TOKYO — Seeking to quell an uproar over his recent comments suggesting that sexual slavery was a necessary evil in Japan’s imperial past, a populist party leader said Monday that he had not meant to justify wartime brothels or deny the women’s suffering at the hands of Japanese soldiers. 

 Like, there is sexual abuse and slavery now, and they have said they are sorry. I suppose another apology couldn't hurt.

But Toru Hashimoto, who heads the opposition Japan Restoration Association and is mayor of Osaka, Japan’s third-largest city, also argued that Japan was being unfairly singled out for its use of so-called comfort women. 

 It does look that way to me in a sense, because all wars contain elements of abuse and rape. The other oddity is the U.S. won't apologize for use of the horrific weapons, and hell, the paper wants to memorialize it!

Hashimoto said other nations needed to examine the mistreatment of women by their own militaries before pointing the finger at Tokyo....

 Yeah, right back at you.

Some historians estimate that 200,000 women were rounded up from across Asia to work as comfort women for the Japanese military. Other historians put that number in the tens of thousands and say they served of their own will. Japan formally apologized to the comfort women in 1993.

But Hashimoto, speaking to overseas journalists at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan, charged that the United States, Britain, France, Germany, and the former Soviet Union were guilty of similar violations of women’s rights in World War II.

 Yeah, when you look back on it no one was clean in the "Good War."

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 UPDATED:

“If I caused misunderstanding, I’m sorry. But I don’t think what I’m saying is wrong. I still believe what I’m saying is right,” Hashimoto said, referring to his comments about Japan’s wartime practice that forced many Asian women into prostitution for Japanese soldiers." 

 Time to move along.

"Japan extends loan to Myanmar" Associated Press, May 27, 2013

YANGON, Myanmar — Japan’s government on Sunday extended its first loan to Myanmar in 26 years and canceled the remainder of the Southeast Asian country’s debt, as Tokyo looks to reestablish strong economic ties with the former pariah nation.... 

 I'm not saying that is wrong; however, as a Japanese citizen I would be questioning this blatant geo-political move when your economy is in the tank and the environmental costs from the ongoing Fukushima mess are damn near incalculable.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe arrived in Myanmar on Friday on the first visit to the country by a Japanese leader in 36 years, a major part of Tokyo’s effort to reassert its position as a top economic partner after decades of frosty relations with the previous military regime.

Abe met with Myanmar democracy icon and lawmaker Aung San Suu Kyi in the main city of Yangon on Saturday....

The loan is Japan’s first to Myanmar since 1987.

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