LOS ANGELES -- Iwao Takamoto, the animator who designed the popular cartoon character Scooby-Doo, died Monday of cardiac failure at a hospital in Los Angeles, the Associated Press reported. He was 81.

By BEN HAMAMOTO
Nichi Bei Times

The pretrial hearing for Lt. Ehren Watada, who refused deployment to Iraq to fight in what he calls an illegal war of aggression, began on Jan. 4 in Fort Lewis, Wash.

Watada, 28, is charged with missing movement and four specifications, or counts, of conduct unbecoming an officer.

BERKELEY -- The late U.S. Congressman Robert T. Matsui's papers, including documentation of legislative efforts surrounding the North American Free Trade Agreement, welfare reform, base closures and Japanese American reparations, will be donated to the University of California, Berkeley's Bancroft Library, campus officials announced on Jan. 2.

SEATTLE -- Complete collections of the Manzanar Free Press and Minidoka Irrigator -- two newspapers produced in wartime American concentration camps for those of Japanese descent -- are now available online in the Densho Digital Archive (www.densho.org/archive).

Dear Editors,

I am sending an old press release regarding the Buddhist Churches of America's Ministerial Association taking a unanimous stand in support of gay and transgendered people and their right to marry. This is not a timely news release but got little coverage at the time and is, perhaps, a relevant fact in considering the excellent cover article, “Lesbian, Gay APIs Find a Place in God’s House” (Nichi Bei Times, Dec. 28, 2006 to Jan. 3, 2007) by Ben Hamamoto. These folks always had a place in Buddha's house and we would love for a larger number of gay and transgender people to know that.

By BEN HAMAMOTO
Nichi Bei Times

In March of 2006 the Center for Asian American Media kinda declared it the year of the Asian man at their film festival. They had a James Shigeta retrospective, a panel dedicated to discussing Asian American masculinity, Eric Byler’s film “Americanese” which deals with those issues in its subtext, and Jeff Adachi’s documentary “The Slanted Screen,” which deals with them explicitly.