Bibi will fuck it up before the 60 days are up and we'll be back to square one again. Trump has zero control over him.
What a stupid, stupid idiot you folk in the US elected (twice!). Israel's been trying to pull the US into this mess for decades and no other president was dumb enough to take the bait until Trump.
From the live updates of the war on the NYT 11 minutes ago and around 15 mins after you wrote this:
“””Mideast Live Updates: Iranian Forces Say They Closed Strait of Hormuz
Iran’s military command blamed the U.S., saying it failed to prevent Israel from violating the cease-fire in Lebanon. Mediators in Pakistan said “technical talks” between the U.S. and Iran to end the war would be held on Sunday.”””
Trump's mishandling of the Israel-Iran war will be a great case study in international politics. But blaming Trump for Netanyahu's derangement is ill-thought. Even a Democrat President wouldn't have been able to reign him. In fact, once Biden / Harris allowed him to massacre the Palestinians in Gaza (remember, Biden publicly supported Netanyahu by announcing to the world that there is "no genocide in Gaza" - https://www.politico.com/news/2024/05/20/biden-gaza-not-geno... ), the US had already lost the plot to Netanyahu's mis-adventurism. I think at one point he was making his army fight in 7-8 fronts! Under him, Israel's army is now considering occupying territories in Gaza, Syria and Lebanon when their military resources and personnel are already overstretched (Israel has what 9-10 million population?). If you read Netanyahu's history, you will discover that he has been progressively getting radicalised in his political views - a brilliant man ( Professor recalls Netanyahu's intense studies in three fields - https://news.mit.edu/1996/netanyahu-0605 ), he started out as a moderate-right, who increasingly turned to conservatism when his political ideas didn't receive the reception he desired. And now finally, the pressures of the criminal charges and security failures of the now infamous Hamas attack (which he and his government is responsible for) has now fully radicalised him into a full-blown religious fundamentalist fascist as the ongoing genocide in Gaza, West Bank and Lebanon testifies to it ('Angel of destruction': What made Benjamin Netanyahu? - https://www.middleeasteye.net/big-story/israel-who-benjamin-... ).
I don't believe any US President can "manage" him now ... he is self-destructing and taking Israel down with him.
It covers a lot but in our situation we had to throw Flake8 into the mix to be fully compliant with our style guide (the industry I work in is stricter than most here). There were Ruff rules which would've worked in 95% of cases, but there was no scope for configuration to get it all the way there. Last I checked you also couldn't add your own rules.
As someone who's lived in Tokyo for 10 years it's largely met my expectations. My living situation is far more modern than the western country I'm from, even if my suburb looks a bit plain (my only real complaint is that there's too much concrete and not enough trees).
Would even go as far as to say many comments about the place being trapped in the 80s or 90s don't match reality. For instance, the only time I've ever been asked to use a fax machine was by a US company.
The decaying rural areas of Japan would probably love to be stuck in the 80s if they can. Too late, now they have hollowed out and everyone young is moving to the same cities most tourists stay at.
Every time you read a story about some Japanese town offering people, even foreigners, money to move there and occupy an abandoned house, keep in mind this is a gesture of desperation, not gratitude,
Decaying rural areas happen in every country, throughout history, throughout time. It’s just how the world works.
The only reason it recently reversed in the US was due to COVID.
Second, many countries are modern in some ways and backwards in some other way. To label a country as modern or not is silly.
Here how it works: I build a porch today and my neighbor builds a pool. In 30 years, he builds a porch but I build a pool. If you cherry pick porches, I look outdated and he looks modern, but it’s reversed if you cherry pick pools!
Japan has seen millennia of huge cultural shifts. Its strength is its ability to adapt and survive with some measure of continuity, even while embracing the new reality. Go watch some Ozu films. They're all about the "hollowing out" of traditional small-town lifestyle and culture. It isn't so much a problem as a feature of the landscape that reminds people about how transient their reality can be.
The people you're probably thinking of are working in finance or Japanese mega venture/US tech companies. They make up a vanishingly small percent of foreigners working in Japan.
Needing a fax machine was something from 1998-2005 ish. The USA and Europe had switched to email. Japan was behind.
If you want examples, unless something has changed, if you run a business (for example consulting) and you make a new contract, you must register the contract with the tax office in person. The Japanese government apparently made moves to fix this type of "must be done in person" stuff because of covid. I haven't registered a contract since 2019.
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