Paul Arenson's past comments

  • 1

    Paul Arenson

    Toshiko, the people who defend Hashimoto claim that because S Korea also committed crimes in Vietnam, the women have no right to complain. you are right, this is about the women who were victims of a crime. South Korea as a government is not the same as South Korean victims. Governments do evil, but that does not excuse the countries which victimize women, no matter which country they come from. I agree with you.

    Posted in: Korean 'comfort women' cancel meeting with Hashimoto

  • 2

    Paul Arenson

    To the rightwing apologists who say, well the SK government also violated women in Vitetnam, that the US military has been involved in sexual exploitation in Okinawa historically...well these are all true. but what does it mean? Wormen Agaiant Violence in War, who sued Abe about 10 years ago or presuring NHK to alter a program on the war guilt of the Emperor, has pointed out that the sexual violence was not unique to Japan. Nor was the violence in general...we had our My Lai massacre, the fascist gov of South Korea massacred its own activists in Kwangjeu as it helped the US murder Vietnamese with agent orange, as Japan had its unit 731 and the Nazis the same thing. The difference is that unrepentant Japanese rightists still idealize the fascist regime and pretend it was about liber acting Asia. The US apologists for war and empire are a little different..they say it was isolated cases, that there was collateral damage, or outright lie and say that Okinawan civilians and US service folk were not exposed to agent orange. they wear a different hat, a more caring one, but war militarism is militarism, misogyny is misogyny. Are the govs of Korea or the Us being hypocritical in not looking at their own history? Yes. But it does not make the fascists like Hashimoto, who fires teachers who refuse to sing the anthem and participate in flag ceremonies, any nicer. They all deserve to be condemned for what they deny.

    Always the victims are the weak, the poor, the powerless. Always the women forced to satisfy the whims of men, men who themselves were brutalized by the military mentality so that they would feel no pain, whether in killing or in raping. Those at the top bear the greatest responsibility for forcing men to give up their humanity. My late friend Allen Nelson documented the brutality of the US killing machine in Vietnam and how it dehumanized him. It is the same for Japan's wartime fascists. We all kid ourselves and say it did not happen, or that if it did--like the incineration of Nagasaki and Hiroshima--that it couldn't be helped, or that we had god or a divine wind on our side. It is all a lie.

    Posted in: Korean 'comfort women' cancel meeting with Hashimoto

  • -1

    Paul Arenson

    Because that area is filled with narrow streets and closely caked buildings.

    Posted in: 2 perish in Tokyo apartment fire

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    Why is ths evidence of anything?

    "He tells of a man in his 50s who, 28 years ago, caused a fatal car crash. In the passenger seat was his sister. The man recalls an ascent from which he looked down upon what was happening on the ground. At a certain point his sister said to him, “It’s time for you to go back.” At that instant he woke up in the wrecked car. His sister lay beside him, dead. Later he told police what he had seen them doing from above. Police confirmed his observations.

    In other words, ****What****Did he tell police he saw and what did, they confirm? If nothing else, poorly written.

    Jim Poushinsky....maybe you DID have an OBE experience. While falling asleep you find yourself waking up high in the sky. Ok. But why could this not also be a dream?

    Posted in: Life after death? Yes, says one doctor

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    Maybe OBE is real, but if you think you had one, could it not simply be a dream?

    And the story makes no sense. When the driver woke up after his sister said to go back, the police supposedly confirmed his story? What did they confirm? That he had been hovering above the car? As written, it makes no sense.

    Posted in: Life after death? Yes, says one doctor

  • 6

    Paul Arenson

    It all has to do with illegitimate authority, obedience, and lies. Tepco lied, the US military lies about Agent Orange exposure, you forfeit your rights when you sign up to serve "your" country.....US blue collar soldiers, Japanese day laborers recruited through Yakuza to clean the plants, even long before Fukushima. Genpatsu gypsies they are called. And recently come to light is how the US military fudged the figures on radiation exposure of atomic bomb victims to make it seem that radiation induced illnesses were less than they were....it all serves to prop up Empire and the military industrial complex. The only way forward is to fight illegitimate authority. Uninformed wisecracks about people quick to sue play into the hands of those who want free reign to destroy the environment and people's lives as long as it is good for the nuclear industry and weapons makers and serves to reinforce the illusion that a strong military preserves the peace, while in reality keeping the world on a war footing increases profits for the likes of Lockheed and GE. Even assuming that some soldiers are just looking for a chance to get some free money, the real criminals in Tepco and METI get off Scott free. Another example of how confused things are is how a WHO report on cancers, tailored to avoid alienating their cohorts in the IAEA by citing a very low figure, get twisted by the Japanese gov, who portray even these conservative estimates as alarmist. It is all designed to keep the wool pulled down over people's eyes, with the help if a compliant media who get their advertising revenue from the likes of Tepco and its agency, Dentsu. So more power to anyone helping to expose the crimes of governments and corporations alike.

    Posted in: 126 U.S. military members to sue TEPCO

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    SB is trying to make it appear that the movt against the bases is somehow controlled by China, that otherwise the people of Okinawa are fine, or at least not upset by the bases. He or he does not know, or does not want people to know why the bases are there, does not know or want people to know that the US is not benevolently looking after their well being. This "tirade" then is to show that the US presence has very little with keeping the peace. It is not just rapes and crimes, the whole reason the US is here is to maintain its hegemony. But the Japanese right and US military industrialists use disinformation in order to persuade people the bases are a force for good. And outright bribery in the form of economic incentives...keep the people poor, or at least economically dependent on the unwanted bases.... No bases, no jobs....like the way the nuclear mafia builds libraries and sporting facilities in towns that host their reactors. Okinawa and Tohoku are two of the poorest parts of Japan, abandoned by the state, or perhaps the word is sacrificed. Not off topic....it is not about the bad Chinese eavesdropping on the good US. They all do that. The real question is why they have these massive bases here in the first place and whose interests they serve.

    Posted in: Okinawa's off-base housing may suffer infestation of Chinese bugs

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    The US has killed in those nations. It and it's proxies in El Salvador, Chile, etc. saw thousands upon thousand of disappeared, a democratically elected Socialist Pres Allende assassinated on Sept 11. China, N Korea are no bargain, but their belligerency is facilitated by US attempts to paint their presence in Japan as protection from these supposedly treacherous evil nations. The US wants to see the that belligerency as the raisin d'être for the presence of its troops, but this is an excuse to persuade citizens that they are here for them, rather to further US empire.

    As long as it succeeds in maintaining the image of a dangerous NK, for example, it bets that people will at least reluctantly accept the stationing of troops and equipment. But these are used directly and indirectly to kill civilians in The Middle East, and to even allow under so-called liberal Obama for targetted assassinations of US Citizens without due process. Sure many want the bases as they are the only way for the economy to survive, but this just illustrates how the weak are being screwed by the military and politicians, and given a history of discrimination or apathy by mainland. Japanese toward their Okinawan fellow citizens, they are in a bind.

    The Us calls N Korea unpredictable, but it has in reality come very close to dropping nukes on that nation a number of times and broken promises. As the worlds most famous democracy, it uses the media to manipulate public opinion so that it sees the threat as one sided, and many people do not understand that the real threat comes from ramping up zon tensions on purpose. To create a permanent need for the military industrial complex to embed itself. Meanwhile napalm bombs dropped by troops stationed in Okinawa killed millions in Vietnam, AgentOrange disabled perhaps a similar number, and the US according to recent investigations has lied about the exposure of GIS and Okinawan citizens to it as well.

    Yeah, my country is a democracy, so long as you do not challenge its lies too closely. When it says it does not torture, for example, it fails to tell you that it outsourced extraordinary renditions and torture to others countries--even Syria. So full of lies, and assuring t he Japanese that it is here to protect them is the baldest one. the Okinawans remeber when the US stole their land at gunpoint and have about as much regard for the US as they do for the nationalist Jpanese politicians who sacrificed them during WWII, whose descendants just happen to be the likes of PM and his fascist associates.

    Posted in: Okinawa's off-base housing may suffer infestation of Chinese bugs

  • -1

    Paul Arenson

    So, if you are so well informed (laugh-like JCP supposedly being one and the same as the Chinese, please show us your significant data showing origin control of Okinawan anti base groups.

    Posted in: Okinawa's off-base housing may suffer infestation of Chinese bugs

  • 1

    Paul Arenson

    Sorry, Samurai blue..I am a long time activist involved with these groups. Even the Okinawa branches of the conservative parties are far to the left on the base issue. The manipulation is done by the US....disinformation specialist. The activists are of all stripes, but outside countries parties are not manipulating people. Some of those who are less anti base are only so because they worry about the military economy and are afraid as in other quasi colonies of economic loses.T his is the same reason people in other impoverished areas are kept on the leash by the gov in order to build up the nuclear industry or other lethal enterprises. in the US some of the greatest violations of environmental safety are on the Mexican border...poor people everywhere are at the mercy of the military and the corporations. no B movie plots about communist infiltrators please....we had enough of that during the red scares.

    Posted in: Okinawa's off-base housing may suffer infestation of Chinese bugs

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    Samurai Blue

    The JCP has relatively poor relations with the CPs of China, also former soviet. This is an indigenous movt, do not plant the idea it is foreign influenced. You betray your ignorance of j social movements. The converse is true...us uses excuse of foreign interference threat to justify its presence, which is all about war making for oil and hegemony, and profits for Boeing and Lockheed.

    Posted in: Okinawa's off-base housing may suffer infestation of Chinese bugs

  • -2

    Paul Arenson

    Shame on you. This is not the time for an article on cultural tourism about guns.

    Obviously the writer was going to do it anyway, so he stuck a line or two to refer to the tragedy.

    Posted in: No guns at home, so Japanese shoot 'em up in Guam

  • 1

    Paul Arenson

    The Mayo Clinic is just making a comment,not conducting research, which looks at, among other things, weight gain in people who use artificial sweeteners. While not conclusive, the research should raise a red flag---especially when we have so many obese people living on the sweeteners daily and NOT losing weight. Weight gain is, in and of itself, a risk factor in high blood pressure. It also depends on what people eat--since refined carbohydrates have their own effect on blood sugar.

    Some research:

    "Artificial sweeteners activate sweet taste receptors in enteroendocrine cells, leading to the release of incretin, which is known to contribute to glucose absorption. Recent epidemiologic studies in Circulation (2008;117:754-761) and Obesity (2008;16:1894-1900) showed an association between diet soda consumption and the development of obesity and metabolic syndrome "(and other studies mentioned here http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/704432

    And "The problem with non-nutritive, noncaloric sweeteners is that the body senses them through the same mechanisms used to sense sugar," said Tim Osborne, professor of diabetes and obesity research at Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute in Lake Nona.

    Our bodies not only have sweet-taste receptors on our tongues, but all through the gut and even in the pancreas, he said. "These receptors detect sweetness and tell the brain and body to get ready for something sweet."

    When these sweet receptors get tripped, studies suggest, they turn on a mechanism that causes the body to absorb more dietary sugar and potentially convert more of that energy to fat, Osborne said."

    as well as

    "Researchers at Purdue University found that rats fed yogurt sweetened with saccharin gained more weight than rats fed yogurt sweetened with glucose (or simple sugar). The saccharin group also ultimately consumed more calories, had bigger appetites and put on more body fat, according to a pair of studies, the most recent of which appeared in April in Behavioural Brain Research.

    Susan Swithers, who co-authored the studies, hypothesized that the sweet foods give the body a strong clue that it's about to get a lot of calories. The body gears up, but when false sweetness isn't followed by lots of calories, the individual is driven to eat more.

    "That might explain in part why obesity has risen in parallel with the use of artificial sweeteners," she said."

    IN

    http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2012-08-29/health/os-artificial-sweeteners-201208291artificial-sweeteners-blood-sugar-metabolic-syndrome

    You say:

    "Until there's scientific evidence of a mechanism by which artificial sweeteners cause weight gain, diabetes, etc. then articles in the mainstream media like these are highly misleading and even dangerous. They're based merely on correlation, along the lines of, "People who wear purple neckties are 3 times the chance of having heart attacks. Thus purple neckties cause heart attacks.""

    Not so---the food industry has a big stake in this, and like the Diet drug makers, they are not interested in your health, only in selling you a product.

    So bottom line is, read the research, observe what you eat, including total carbs and fat, monitor your blood sugar, monitor your weight and blood pressure, take your meds if they have been prescribed, but talk to your doctor about how exercise and Diet change might help. They might enable you to decrease the dosage of insulin, for example Again, under medical supervision only. If you MUST have sweeterners, maybe you can cut back on the amount or frequency, since the sweet tooth is something that may play a part in the vicious cycle. In other words, yes, you CAN experiment, you do not have to be beholden to the food industry. Of course you should not believe that any one study is conclusive,but studies often offer insight into why some people do NOT do well on sweeteners.

    Posted in: Light sodas may hike diabetes risk

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    not so flawed...just not conclusive, but we already know that aspartame has a similar effect on blood glucose levels. plus sugar has been oversimplified as the main cause of type 2 diabetes when we know It is more complex, has much to do with sedentary lifestyle, total diet....

    the food industry would like you to keep consuming their junk, and the safety alone of some of the additives has not been confirmed. meanwhile, I have watched obese relatives and friends stuff their faces with fat-laden, high carb (pasta, etc) food in copious amounts, washing it all down witha Diet Coke and maybe adding a non sugar ice cream for dessert.

    clearly the body is conditioned that it needs all this bombardment, and the fact that most people I know count a walk to the refrigerator as their only exercise other can getting out of bed, it is no wonder that diabetes is a growing problem.

    no, the study is not necessarily flawed, just incomplete. we also need to know what helps people who are already type 2 diabetics. meanwhile, we do know the benefits of moderation and exercise. that we expect quick fixes by food conglomerates who usually work hard to addict us to salt, sugar, and fat--much as the tobacco industry industry worked to addict people to their products--is part of the problem. and there is also some evidence that the artificial sweeteners work much as sugar does to encourage us to eat more.

    Posted in: Light sodas may hike diabetes risk

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    correction.. Japan's far right....wants a REmilitarised Japan. Not demilitarized.

    Posted in: China accuses Japan of smear campaign over radar incident

  • -5

    Paul Arenson

    Good guy, bad guy crap.We tend to favor our own side. Propaganda accepted without question. China does it, Japan does it, US does it. Legally, Japan may well be in the right in terms of ownership---almost all parties from the left to the right in Japan have produced documents to that effect. But, Japan has some pretty dangerous politicians around who sought to provoke China, from Ishihara on down. The US and Japan are looking for any excuse to maintain a justification for US bases and weapons, never mind that the primary purpose is for the US to maintain readiness to fight its wars. The weapons makers want this too. Japan's far right, descended from the per war imperial forces and kept in place by US occupation forces/SCAP, wants a demilitarized Japan. They also want to whitewash history textbooks ((Abe himself persuaded NHK in he early 2000s to censor a program about Hirohito's war responsibility. Ishihara is a racist; Hashimoto is a fascist wannabe. These are the forces of good versus China's Darth Vader evil?

    In short, there is no right or wrong. Territorially yes, perhaps. But do you want Japan to go to ar over these rocks, just so Abe can destroy Article 9 of the constitution and then go on trying to remake Japan into a country with even worse history books than now, propping up Keidanren and building more nukes, while US military industry is not to displeased, while civil liberties are curtailed....whether or not Japan has a valid territorial claim--and it looks like they do-using that as a justification for war does not benefit the people who live here....

    The real problems go unsolved as another capitalist, profits before people regime is emboldened by China's stupidity. Northern Territories? Same thing. The indigenous people do not benefit one way or the other whether Soviet/Russian hegemonists or Yamato land grabbers own thei land. Korea and Japan--the nationalists n both sides can scream at each other over who owns those rocks. The follies of nation states do not benefit those who live in them, who are asks to defend politicians' prnouncements with their taxes, and with their lives when the military machine calls them up to defend the homeland.

    It is all bullshit. Military refusers in Vietnam knew this. Iraq veterans know this. Bradley Manniing knows this. In Israel too there iis a solid movement of refusers and Ex soldiers. Anywhere supposedly democratic countries use the deception that the other side is communist or terrorist or whatver the current key word for enemy is.Manwhile inequality and child mortality, lack of jobs and healthcare thrive in much of the US. Meanwhile Palestinians are virtual prisoners behind "security walls". Meanwhile the US kills kids in Yemen and even legally justifies assassinations of Amecan citizens without having to prove that the targeted person is guilty of anything.

    The thread that binds all these seemingly disparate topics is that PO many of us buy into the good guy, bad guy notion, that god (or right) is on our side. We can look at the Senkaku issue and use China's stupidity as a justification for our own stupidity. We lap without question at the chance to defend our own side, just as they do. But you and I are not the beneficiaries of any benevolence fom those we rush to defend. We are pawns in their game. For the current rightist leadership of Japan, their goals are quite transparent. They are looking for any chance to ditch the pace constitution. No higher morality on the Chinese side--we are all guilty. But ask yourself why Japan, bombed twice with nuclear weapons, always votes WITH the US in opposing true denuclearization. It is because Japan is still a vassal state, a US colony. Someyimes its rightist tendencies are such that they even urk US bureaucrats, who prefer a more nuanced approach to China, for example. But it stills plays into their hands to have a pro business, pro base stance. No morality here. No reason to condem one side and not the other.

    In short,

    Posted in: China accuses Japan of smear campaign over radar incident

  • -1

    Paul Arenson

    My friend Allen Nelson, a US Marine in Vietnam said it best, that the US military trains you to become desensitized to killing. Yes, to be a murderer. Was this man a murderer?Were those he helped also murderers? Yes, to both questions. But they are also victims...in the military for whatever reasons..because they believed they were defending their country, because it was the best chance to get an education, in Allan's time because they were drafted and had no choice. Was their PTSD real? You bet. They are victimis who also played the role of victimizer. And Allan realized the reality, he suffered from PTSD. He spent his last years talking peace. He succumbed to cancer just a few years ago, and he was courageous in confronting the monster that the military turns you into. He said to me that he was trained to shoot people in the leg, not the heart, so they would scream and writhe in pain, so they could attract others--civilians, suspected "Viet Cong"--and then shoot them in cold blood. It is not either/or. The killers we become in service to empire leaves us violated as well. Maybe he was doing a real service for these traumatized ex soldiers, but being proud of what he did in the war, that to me shows a serious flaw...one that the military was no doubt grateful for--a soldier who could inflict death and not be afflicte with self doubt. PTSD is a same response to what these soldiers were forced to go through. And they are not ultimately culpable...it is those who put them in harm's way. Those who concocted the plans to drop atomic bombs, napalm, Agent Orange (produced by our beloved Monsanto, with their GMO seeds), those who turned it into a safer game with their drones, where the stench of death....whether "enemy" or child ("collateral damage")....is undetectable from so far away....those are the ones who are getting away with murder, while the hired hands do the killing and then have their own lives turned inside out by guilt and PTSD.

    Posted in: Famed American sniper killed at Texas shooting range

  • -1

    Paul Arenson

    Another problem is that the use of contracting companies is illegal. You did mention these companies, but it should be pointed out they are external to the program(. Some boards of education are trying to circumvent the law here. This is being fought by several labor unions.

    Posted in: Is the JET Program really necessary for Japan?

  • 0

    Paul Arenson

    Yuasa.

    I know someone involved in another field of micro-electronics, and he made the point of telling me that he avoids this particular company's batteries because of higher failure rates than other companies. So it may be a question of quality control, but then who is ultimately responsible, Yuasa, or Boeing, who should be aware of any problems within supplying companies.

    Maybe the larger problem is outsourcing.

    Posted in: U.S. officials defend handling of Boeing 787 mishaps

  • 1

    Paul Arenson

    Suicide is an easy way? Face up to your problems? Sounds like the same tough love mentality behind the militaristic browbeating that kids get. And also behind the neoliberal ethic since Koizumi and Takenaka that blames the weak, the poor for their own predicament--if you fail, it is your own fault. I work with the poor and see how their treatment mirrors that given to all the weak in Japanese society. No different from the Scrooge mentality where Dickens has him saying that it would be better if the poor died so as to decrease the surplus pollution. Not strictly a Japan disease, we can see it in other societies as well, where survival of the fittest distorted Darwin. These thugs who pose as educators are accepted by a society which has been conditioned partly by culture but mostly by neoliberal "philosophy" which infects every segment of society. Thus when a Kita Kyushu public official rejected a welfare recipient 's plea for public assistance and told him to keep searching (the same policy seen in Tokyo's Taito-ku treatment of the poor, where I worked), he gave up and starved to death. The lines between the tough love drill Sargent and the heartless welfare official are clear-you live or die by your own effort, and if you fail, your effort obviously wasn't sufficient. The public has short memories, and the slick talking Koizumi who advocated such policies which destroyed the social safety net was seen as a maverick, just like Hashimoto. But when it is your kid who is murdered by this mentality, maybe you begin to realize what a grand deception it was.

    Posted in: Hashimoto apologizes to parents of student who killed himself

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