Blog Prompt 8: Former U.S. Envoy Critical of Japan's Nuclear Crisis Response

The current affairs article can be found here: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-japan-fukushima-diplomat-20110820,0,28751.story

Personally, I feel that Japanese leaders seems to be lacking leadership as they are a bit careless in handling situations from the news article. It was said that Prime Minister Naoto Kan's government did not manage the nuclear coastal plant in Fukushima Daiichi well, causing it to have partial reactor meltdowns after the earthquake and tsunami. After that, they also did not do anything to help solve the crisis as they only took action after Tokyo and Washington launched a joint task force and allowed officials at Tokyo Electric Power Co., the utility that runs the crippled plant, too much leeway in handling the situation. This is unacceptable because the consequences of having a reactor meltdown is dire, it may lead to deaths and health damage to others due to radiation. They are thus not putting the people in Japan's health at interest. Since they are not willing to care for the citizens, they should not be leaders in the first place. They are bad examples.

Even though Japan did not handle the nuclear crsis well and delayed the relocation of an American military base on Okinawa, Kevin Maher, the former director of the State Department's Japan Office should not have made the insulting comments on public. This will definitely hurt the Japanese' feelings and may hurt bilateral relations, resulting in lesser partnership between both countries in the future. In worst cases, a fight may break out and a war may slowly be starting. Therefore being outspoken may not be a good thing at times, disregarding the feelings of others.

In conclusion, both Japan and Maher are at fault, Japan for being too slow in handling emergency situations and Maher for critisizing Japan about heir leadership publicly.

Blog Prompt 6: The Rupert Murdoch Phone Scandal

Recently, there was a phone scandal regarding the chief executive officer of News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch. The then editor of The News of the World, Rebekah Brooks helped Rupert Murdoch to bring The News of the World to fame. But now the truth is out. The reason why The News of the World was brought to fame was becuase Rebekah Brooks carried out phone hacking on royals and celebrities, even on murderers to get as much information as possible out of them. But the worst thing was, now everyone can become a phone hacking victim.


I feel that the news media should partly be blamed for the unhealthy paparazzi culture and going to the extremes for sensational news. Indeed, the news media did not care about the feelings of others and tried to use despicable means such as phone hacking just to get the juicy news out of them and let their newspapers sell well. But this is not the way to succeed in selling newspapers. They are being selfish. To get a big profit, they invaded others' privacy and this makes them feel vulnerable and scared because the things they do in their daily lives are being known by others and they may get exposed anytime.


But all the fault should not be blamed entirely on the news media. The people who first started the phone scandals should be blamed too. If not for their wrongdoings, why would the news media be bothered to know more about their daily life? The news media are actually also doing their part because by publishing their unruly acts on news papers, the people who were involved would feel ashamed and learn their lesson. So all in all, both the news media and the people who started the scandals are to be blamed for the unhealthy paparazzi culture and going to the extremes for sensational news.