PSA - Bad News for US Fans?

Million Star · November 19, 2010

James Fallows at the Atlantic is reporting that Japan Post will no longer accept packages for the US that weigh more than 1 lb.

>>Apparently the conditions for shipping packages via air to the United States have now become so restrictive that the Japanese Post Office has announced that, effective Nov. 17, it will no longer accept any packages weighing over a pound for shipment to the US by any method that involves air transport (including EMS, airmail, and SAL). Except for large corporate mailers, everything over a pound must apparently now come by sea. Asahi Shimbun is reporting that the Japanese equivalents of FedEx and UPS have followed suit. I assume that airmail service remains in effect for the remaining 200 countries across the globe that have not lost their collective minds.
I do read/speak Japanese and regularly use it in my work, but it was actually my Japanese-speaking wife who brought the news to my attention through her cries of anguish when she read the news: This effectively cuts off her supply of dry goods, books, and magazines; ruins Christmas for our daughter (at least from the Japanese side of the family); and means we'll not be getting any mochi for o-shougatsu. Having spent sixteen years in Japan (though currently living in the US), one of my basic guiding principles is that if your procedures are too burdensome even for the Japanese to bother complying with, you've probably gone a bit too far.

Between the new, "enhanced" TSA procedures and this story, I've lost any hope that our leaders know where to stop when it comes to reacting to terrorist threats.<<

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2010/11/security-theater-the-ripples-spread-to-japan/66542/

Edited November 19, 2010 by Million Star