On Friday, January 20, 2012 7:00:15 PM UTC+9, band beyond description wrote:
> CL <flo...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > On 01/19/2012 10:43 PM, Declan Murphy wrote:
> >> What do you think of this case? Must be more to it than just a few
> >> critical/negative blog posts...
> >> http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2012/01/japans-immigration-control
> > 
> > According to at least a couple of people who claim to know him, the guy
> > is something like a junior double under-sub assistant
> > fuku-henshucho-dairi at Daily Gomiuri and has been doing Japan on a
> > tourist visa for almost two decades ... three months in Wa, 36 hours in a
> > foreign port, and back.  So, I guess that might tend to piss off the
> > Immigration people just a tiny bit ... if the tax guys didn't get him
> > first.  But, it has given Debit a new lease on his miserable life.
> 
> 
> never knew him as a Japan "journalist," let alone to have a Yomiuri
> association (Yom would never tolerate someone with such a sketchy visa
> track record); FWIW, googling his name & Yomiuri brings up an "Asia Times"
> tag, however.
> 
> beyond previous discussion, there is this:
> 
> http://www.japanprobe.com/2012/01/20/christopher-johnson-under-fire-for-gaijin-gulag-article/
> 
> and his blog does have some extremely limited examples of "journalism,"
> often just blog-like, amateurish, rife with typos and in dire need of a
> decent editor—but none to be confused with material *anywhere* near on a
> par with the New York Times or Pulitzer-worthy:
> 
> http://globalite.posterous.com/
> 
> also he's on twitter at @cjinasia if it matters...

His original article on his blog (which my dyslexia kept insisting was called "preposterous.com") has been revised umpteen dozen time since it has been
pointed out that he has been claiming a lot of things that simply beggar belief.
I read perhaps the first draft of it and I only managed about 3/4s of the
way through it.  As a "journalist", his writing style leaves a LOT to be
desired.  As you say, he is in dire need of an editor which is why I think he
crowd sourced it to the world in general and now, for some reason, is getting
a bit aggro that people are questioning the veracity of it.

Some of the long commentary about it can be found here:

http://tepido.org/dont-put-your-finger-in-my-ass/629

While I think some of the things may have happened, a good portion of it has
been embellished by his own anger and hyperbole that it really isn't worth
listening to.  That reminds me of someone ...  I just can't recall who ...