{"id":21269,"date":"2011-08-25T08:25:22","date_gmt":"2011-08-25T12:25:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/?p=21269"},"modified":"2011-08-25T08:34:39","modified_gmt":"2011-08-25T12:34:39","slug":"wit-life-179","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jetwit.com\/wordpress\/2011\/08\/25\/wit-life-179\/","title":{"rendered":"WIT Life #179: Japan in Transition, Yet Again"},"content":{"rendered":"

WITLife<\/strong><\/em><\/a> is a periodic series written<\/strong><\/em> by professional Writer\/Interpreter\/Translator <\/strong><\/em>Stacy Smith<\/strong><\/a> <\/em>(Kumamo<\/a><\/strong><\/em>to-ken<\/a> CIR, 2000-03). She starts<\/strong><\/em> her day by watching Fujisankei\u2019s newscast in Japanese, and here she sha<\/strong><\/em>r<\/strong><\/em>es s<\/strong><\/em>ome of the interesting tidbits and trends together with her own observations.<\/strong><\/em>\"\"<\/p>\n

Yesterday’s NYT featured two articles relating to Japan’s financial<\/a> and political<\/a> situations.\u00a0 The first discusses how Moody’s lowered Japan\u2019s credit rating by one step to Aa3, the fourth-highest grade (Standard & Poor’s had brought them down to AA back in January, putting them on par with the U.S.).\u00a0 The second recounts Vice President Biden’s recent trip to Japan, including a stop-off in of Tohoku.\u00a0 He served as a source of encouragement to some of the survivors he met in the disaster area.<\/p>\n

Biden’s visit came at a time of great political turmoil, as it is forecast that Prime Minister Kan will be stepping down next week.\u00a0 A partywide ballot to decide a new party leader is expected on Monday, with the new leader being appointed prime minister on Tuesday.\u00a0 Kan indicated his desire to remain in power until two major bills were approved by Parliament, one related to increasing government bond issuance and the other promoting renewable energy (His other condition was passing a bill on supplemental spending, which happened last month).\u00a0 It is unclear how this shift in power, the 6th Japanese PM in five years, will affect the country and its recovery, but in a recent poll 75 percent of respondents said they want\u00a0the next administration to stick to Mr. Kan\u2019s policy of phasing out nuclear power.<\/p>\n

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WITLife is a periodic series written by professional Writer\/Interpreter\/Translator Stacy Smith (Kumamoto-ken CIR, 2000-03). She starts her day by watching Fujisankei\u2019s newscast in Japanese, and here she shares some of the interesting tidbits and trends together with her own observations. Yesterday’s NYT featured two articles relating to Japan’s financial and political situations.\u00a0 The first discusses […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[378,18,36,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21269","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-earthquake-tsunami","category-translatinginterpreting","category-wit-life","category-writers"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t