Newsweek 08/10/2018

1969 An otherworldly cover—literally. Weeks after Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the moon, on July 20, Newsweek published the color photographs he snapped on the lunar surface with his 70 mm camera, including this image of Buzz Aldrin. “Truly, these are great leaps for mankind,” declared the article, which predicted that the U.S. might land a soft probe on the surface of Mars by 1973 (it happened in 1976). Twelve years later, on August 1, 1981, MTV adopted moon landing images for its debut broadcast. 1945 “The man in the Kremlin held the keys to Potsdam, and its consequences to the new peace,” reported a story on Josef Stalin, one of the “Big Three” (with Harry Truman and Winston Churchill) who met to discuss how to administer Germany after…

Firefighters on July 24 battle the country’s worst-ever wildfire, with a death toll that surpassed 100 people, including dozens of children. Cars were melted and villages wiped off the map. This as record heat devastated Europe, Asia and America: In Japan, at least 80 people died and thousands were hospitalized after temperatures reached 105 degrees in parts of the country. In California, a fire encroaching on Yosemite National Park had burned 56,659 acres as of July 30—one of over 90 large wildfires then raging throughout the United States. Michael Mann, a leading professor of atmospheric science at Penn State, joined a chorus of international peers in identifying such events as “the face of climate change.”…

“Democracy is dead in this election and is totally a sham.” LAST NOVEMBER, IGOR RUDNIKOV WAS AT HOME in his apartment in the tiny Russian region of Kaliningrad when he received some unexpected visitors: masked FSB security officers. They accused Rudnikov, an outspoken opposition lawmaker and newspaper editor, of trying to blackmail a senior law enforcement official and arrested him. Rudnikov’s paper, Novye Kolyosa, built its reputation on exposing government corruption, and it had recently published a story questioning how the public official, Viktor Ledenyov, a general on Russia’s Investigative Committee, which answers only to President Vladimir Putin, had come into possession of a lakeside luxury home. Rudnikov denied the charge that he had demanded $50,000 from Ledenyov to stop publishing stories about him. During hours of interrogation, he says, investigators beat…

THREE DECADES INTO THE RULE of Prime Minister Hun Sen, Cambodians went to the polls on July 29 to give the strongman another five-year term. The win was predetermined. Not only had Hun Sen’s cronies terminated his main opposition, the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), but he had the support of a colossal and deep-pocketed ally: China. Under Hun Sen’s rule, billions of dollars in Chinese investments have helped Cambodia become one of the fastest-growing economies in the world. The financial influx has been part of an aggressive Chinese strategy to win power in Cambodia after years of U.S. influence. By 2017, China became Cambodia’s largest trading partner, with total trade volume reaching $5.8 billion, up 22 percent from 2016. With this move toward China, “Hun Sen has explicitly come out and…

“The Monozukuri philosophy does not only mean manufacturing, but rather everything that surrounds it: design, material control and service”Toshihiro Kuriyama, President, ALPS Electric For centuries, Japan has been renowned for its superior level of craftsmanship in manufacturing. The forging of a samurai’s sword was considered a sacred art, and today the ancient spirit and philosophy of monozukuri (the art of making things) lives on in Japanese companies, both large and small. But in today’s world, these companies are not only concerned about beauty, functionality and quality; sustainability is also an important consideration. This has led to a green manufacturing revolution, which has coincided with the advent of the fourth industrial revolution. As we approach the third decade of the 21st century and the beginning of this new era of manufacturing, Japan wants…

“For the clothing industry, immigration is a positive development for it brings customers and workforce. At Caitac, we like to make our products in America and sell our products to America”Masaji Kaihata, President, Caitac Corp. From fashion to design and onto food, Japanese brands in the food and lifestyle industry have gained market share throughout the world, and are seeking to expand their businesses globally, particularly in the U.S. market, in response to a dwindling domestic market in Japan, a result of its aging and shrinking population. One such company is fashion clothing manufacturer Caitac Corp., which aims to take its jeans business from the domestic market exclusively to the American one over the next decade, according to president, Mr. Masaji Kaihata, who points out that Japanese citizens own 0.5 pairs of…