Looking At The Opinion Polls And The DPJ's Short To-Do List

It pains me to say it. It pains you to hear it.

Results from the first post-dissolution announcement public opinion polls are out. They are from Kyodo News, the newswire jointly owned by the nation's local newspapers -- which trends hard anti-Abe -- and The Asahi Shimbun, which despite the reputation of its editors being congenitally and irrationally anti-Abe, trends in the middle of the pack, at least in terms of its public polling results.

In the crucial "Which party will you vote for in the proportional part of the ballot?" the numbers are:

Kyodo News poll (11/19~20)

LDP 25.3%
DPJ 9.4%
Komeito 4.9%
Communist 4.2%
JIP 3.1%
Socialist 0.9%
Life 0.3%
Next Generations 0.1%
Other 0.2%

Undecided 44.4%

(Link - J)

The Asahi Shimbun (11/19~20)

LDP 37%
DPJ 13%
JIP 9%
Communist 6%
Komeito 4%
Socialist 1%
Life 0%
Next Generations 0%
Other parties 2%

Undecided 30%

(Link - J)

The results are pretty supportive of a comfortable LDP/Komeito victory in the election. Winning even only a third of the 180 proportional seats puts the coalition on course for well over the 266 they need for "total control" of the Diet, the number of seats where ruling coalitions members chair all committees and the ruling coalition enjoys 50%+1 member voting majorities in all committees.

For the Democratic Party of Japan, the numbers are unimpressive. In pre-2009 days, the DPJ typically received twice the percentage of the final vote as was indicated in pre-vote polling. Assuming that this trend reemerges, the DPJ still polls well behind the LDP -- which means while it may claw back some seats from its disastrous 2012 showing, they will not be taken from the ruling coalition. Instead they will be taken from the JIP, Life and Next Generation.　The latter two parties, the remnant vanity projects of the two tired anachronisms Ishihara Shintaro and Ozawa Ichiro, will mercifully wink out of existence.

The large number of undecided voters and The Asahi Shimbun poll's head snapping first finding of a drop of Cabinet support below the non support number (Supporting the Abe Cabinet 39%; Not supporting the Abe Cabinet 40%) means the DPJ's chances of making Abe Shinzo and the LDP look like the losers of the election are not beyond reach. Indeed to claim the mantle of the credible opposition to the LDP, the DPJ would need to do only two things:

1) Stop party leader Kaieda Banri from speaking

Kaieda (pictured above) seems a nice, educated guy. However, and there is no kind way of putting this, he has a black tongue. Anything he talks about turns to dirt. Just hearing two sentences from him on matters of policy sends one scrambling for the mute button.

Demoralized DPJ members and conniving conservatives within the party lofted Kaieda into the leadership position for one purpose only: to resign in remorse after the party's pre-determined poor showing in the 2013 House of Councillors. In a testament to his political deafness Kaieda failed at failing, refusing to fall upon his sword at the appointed moment, insisting peculiarly that his having been elected leader means he is a leader.

If Kaieda remains the face and voice of the DPJ in this election, the party will fail to capitalize on the Abe administration's troubles.

2) Talk about the transfer of the nation's spending power

The DPJ cannot talk about the crushing of the economy from consumption tax rise because a DPJ government proposed and passed the legislation mandating the rise. The DPJ cannot dismiss Abenomics outright because it has no alternative plan other than managed, precipitous decline.

What the DPJ can and should do is ask Mr. Abe and the ruling coalition how, after having realized a huge transfer of wealth from the common citizens to the corporate sector* through the devaluation of the yen, the ruling coalition intends to get that money back.


[Many thanks to Corey Wallace (@CoreyJWallace) and Michael Penn (@ShingetsuNews) for the first reports on Twitter linking to the above opinion polls.]


------------------------
* And not the whole corporate sector either. The Tokyo Shimbun reported yesterday in a front page story that in the mid-term reporting season of the 1381 companies listed in the Tokyo Stock Exchange First Section 50.5% of the profits declared came from the reporting of just 30 companies. Making matters worse, with all the help that Abenomics is supposed giving the corporates, 122 companies of the 1381 in the First Section booked losses.

Original image courtesy: Kobe Shimbun

The Only Popularly Elected National Leader

It's that time of year again, when the fan election for the "president" (sosai) of girls megagroup AKB48 (Link) and its affiliates confuses the algorithms of Google News, causing the AKB story to be displayed in the #1 position in the Japanese-language Google News / Politics feed.



Given that the next electoral test of the nation's actual political parties are the unified local elections of next spring -- which, contrary to their name, are not unified, the terms of local offices having been spread all over the calendar by deaths and resignations (WIGFTL*) -- and that the next Diet elections do not have to be held until 2016, the election of the 2014 leader of AKB48 leader election perhaps should be the top story on the politics page. After all AKB48's sosai is the only national leader chosen in a direct vote by the people -- and the only national election of any kind save the reaffirmation votes on the justices of the Supreme Court, which happen only together with the first House of Representatives election after the appointment of the justice in question, then every 10 years thereafter (Article 79, Constitution of Japan).

The story encircled above? The news that for the fifth year in a row the thick electoral guide to the AKB48 leadership election is the highests-selling book (All Categories) in mid-May.

----------------------

* "Which Is Good For The LDP"

If You Do Not Think Like Me Then You Are Crazy

Prime Minister Abe Shinzo said something peculiar in the Diet yesterday.

He was responding in House of Representatives Budget Committee to a question regarding the Liberal Democratic Party's plans to amend Article 96 of the Constitution. Article 96 mandates that any alteration of the Constitution be ratified by 2/3rds of all sitting members of both Houses, followed by a national referendum. Prime Minister Abe and his party want to lower the threshold in the Diet votes to 3/5ths or even lower.

When asked about the reason to amend Article 96 and lower the threshold, the Prime Minister replied, "It is just common sense for a person to think it strange that if just slightly over 1/3rd of Diet members are opposed to something then we cannot amend the Constitution."
(Link – J)

When the Prime Minister says "strange" (okashii) what does he mean? Strange as in wrong or unfair? Strange as in unbalanced and threatening? In everyday usage okashii is dismissive and has a strong association with sickness or a wrong having been done.

And what are we to make of the laying of the mantle of "common sense" (joshiki) upon what is no more than the Prime Minister's personal opinion?

One can understand the statement "Requiring a 2/3rds majority in both Houses is stupid." Saying that it is inefficient is also comprehensible.

However, a dismissive dumping of the nation's basic law as odd and contrary to regular thinking? Based upon what standard? What is the "normal" against which one should measure the offending article?

The PM would probably want to short-circuit a discussion of why requiring a 2/3rds majority in both Houses is such a bad thing. For regular Diet business having a 2/3rds or even a 60% majority requirement would indeed be nuts. For amending the Constitution, however, it seems a reasonable hurdle.

Of course, the PM does not like the Constitution, most deeply because it was drafted by Occupation staffers, demoting the Emperor and enshrining a defense-only military posture -- but also because it stands in the way of his running the country as he sees fit.

That Abe Shinzo the man and even Abe Shinzo the Diet member should not like the Constitution is acceptable, if a bit lacking in reflection in the latter case ("I hate this Constitution that gives me my job!").

However, the standards of behavior for a leader of a democratic country are a bit higher than for the simple member of the legislature. Mr. Abe seems somewhat confused about the responsibilities inherent in the position he is occupying -- and on the importance of a nation's leader having an open mind.

Hiroshima Unconstitutionality Ruling - Links

Jiji Press

Court rules lower house poll invalid / Vote disparity in Hiroshima 'too wide'

HIROSHIMA --The Hiroshima High Court ruled Monday that the results in the No. 1 and No. 2 single-seat constituencies in Hiroshima Prefecture in the December 2012 House of Representatives election were invalid due to wide vote-value disparities.

This is the first ruling in the postwar period that has invalidated the result in an election for the lower house or the House of Councillors.

Presiding Judge Junko Ikadatsu also ruled that the wide vote-value disparities in the Dec. 16 lower house election were unconstitutional. If the ruling becomes final, elections will have to be held again in the two electoral districts.

Ikadatsu said the ruling will come into force on Nov. 27, 2013, depending on developments...

(Link)

Kyodo News

Hiroshima court rules Dec. election invalid over vote disparity

HIROSHIMA -- The Hiroshima High Court ruled Monday that the results of last December's general election in Hiroshima's No. 1 and 2 districts were invalid due to significant disparities in the weight of votes.

The court is the first in Japan to declare an election result void among a series of lawsuits over vote disparities.

The election results, however, will not be invalidated immediately if the local election board appeals against the latest decision.

Earlier this month, six other high courts and a high court branch in Japan found that disparities in the value of votes of up to 2.43 to 1 in the election were either unconstitutional or close to a state of unconstitutionality...

(Link)

Wall Street Journal

Hiroshima Court Rules Election Invalid

By Toko Sekiguchi -- In a landmark ruling Monday, a Hiroshima court ruled the results of the December lower-house election invalid in two districts due to the disproportionate weighting of votes in those districts.

It was the first time a Japanese court ruled election results invalid on such grounds. It is seen as a victory for constitutional rights activists, who have long argued disparities in the weighting of votes in different districts violates the constitution. The ruling ups the ante on lawmakers to fix the system.

A string of past court rulings has found that the current electoral system doesn't uphold the principle of “one person, one vote,” as prescribed in the constitution. Still, the rulings acknowledged the validity of the results — until now.

Yet neither of the winning candidates in the two districts — including Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida — will need to immediately worry about their jobs.

According to local media reports, the ruling stipulates that the nullification of the election results takes effect only from Nov. 26. That gives Hiroshima's board of elections time to appeal to the Supreme Court. The Internal Affairs Ministry says even if the Supreme Court upholds the ruling, it won’t necessarily mean new polls...

(Link)

Me, myself, I...

For Al-Jazeera six months ago, back in the days when I believed former prime minister Noda Yoshihiko had a backbone:

Will Japan's government disappear?
A Supreme Court ruling in Japan could shake up the political landscape of the country.

A pop quiz: Name the country in East Asia where national elections are illegal. In fact, holding a national election would be unconstitutional.

The answer: Japan.

Not the answer one would expect. However, on October 17, the Supreme Court of Japan ruled unconstitutional the current electoral districts used to assign seats in the House of Councillors. This complements the Supreme Court ruling of March 2010 [sic], which found the district boundaries of the House of Representatives to be also unconstitutional.

In both instances, the Court ruled that the elections selecting the current membership of the Diet were unconstitutional. This means that every single member of Japan's current parliament is occupying his or her seat illegally. In both cases, however, the Court wisely decided that what's done is done, and that having no Diet was worse than having an illegal one.

Creating a new Diet

Having ruled that the electoral districts of both Houses of the Diet are unconstitutional, the Supreme Court has set the stage for a titanic contest of wills in between Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko and his Democratic Party of Japan and the main opposition alliance of the Liberal Democratic Party and the New Komeito...

In the East Asia Forum, published on the day of the problematic election.

Japan’s ‘nothing’ election
December 16th, 2012

[snip]

To make matters worse, the failure to implement a redrawing of the electoral district map based upon the +0/-5 solution means the election has been carried out using an electoral district map the Supreme Court finds unconstitutional. The Supreme Court on 28 November showed its traditional deference to the decisions of the legislative branch, a panel of the justices refusing, on procedural grounds, to halt the 16 December election. However, the Court has no qualms with lawsuits filed after the election. A crusading group of lawyers is ready to file lawsuits in 60 jurisdictions on 17 December, seeking to invalidate the election’s results.

(Link)

And here, ad nauseum:

http://shisaku.blogspot.jp/search/label/electoral%20system%20reform


As to the issue of when the Hiroshima decision goes into effect...Justice Ikadatsu has given the Diet up to one calendar year from the first convening of the meetings of the commission on electoral boundaries (a commission under the umbrella of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Telecommunications) to come up with a plan meeting constitutional muster.

The commission met for the first time on November 26, 2012.

As to what "constitutional muster" means, both the Tokyo High Court and the Sapporo High Court found the egregious +0/-5 reform passed on the last day of the previous Diet's existence a risible solution contrary to the Supreme Court's intent.

Expect more trouble on this issue.

Hashimoto Toru Says No

One of Abe Shinzo's main selling points, if not his only one in the Liberal Democratic Party presidential election, was his purportedly having mesmerized Osaka City mayor Hashimoto Toru. The conventional wisdom was that if any one of the five candidates in presidential contest was going to work out an entente with Hashimoto's Japan Restoration Party, it was going to be Abe.

Post-House of Representatives election, maybe. Pre-election? No.

Hashimoto went out of his way yesterday to tell a grand lie on Abe's behalf, saying that he was a trustworthy politician:

"I have great expectations for him. I believe him a politician in whom one can place one's trust. I would like to for him to pull the LDP in his wake."

(Link - J)

He also noted that in terms of reform of the constitution, he and Abe were on the same page.

Unfortunately for those in the LDP who were hoping that the 42 year-old Hashimoto would defer in awe to his 58 year-old senior, Hashimoto also noted that the JNR's commitment to the Trans Pacific Partnership and the phaseout of the use of nuclear power were at odds with the LDP's positions on these issues.

As for the all-important matter of election cooperation, Hashimoto dumped a bucketful of ice water on the concept, saying that JNR, which formally begins operations on Friday, will run a candidate in every district possible, irrespective of the LDP's candidate in that district. (J)

Ostensibly Hashimoto's promise means that the JNR could field a candidate in Abe's Yamaguchi #4 district -- not that that would be a very wise move in terms of a post-election bargaining position.

Hashimoto's promise also means that old wine LDP and fresh face JNR candidates could split the right-leaning vote, allowing the centrist Democratic Party of Japan candidates to sneak away with the districts.

Not a pleasant thought for the LDP membership.

As for fresh faces, the JNR secretariat is looking at capping the number of Diet members allowed to flee to the party at around 15 (J). JNR leaders are aware that the party can hardly present itself as an insurgent movement if its ranks are stuffed with retreads from the LDP, DPJ and Your Party. Nine current members of the Diet sat in on the JNR's most recent policy roundtable. These nine are slated to be introduced as party candidates at Friday's unveiling.

JNR leaders are also aware that the party relies on its early converts and those who enrolled in Hashimoto's juku for both ground forces and funding. With the party refusing corporate and union donations, and ineligible for public funding until April of next year, it needs to dangle candidacies as rewards for the sacrifices party workers and supporters must make.

LDP and DPJ Leadership Elections

Corey Wallace has written a dense and comprehensive post on the Liberal Democratic Party presidential election, handicapping the race and examining the ramifications of the elections of any of the main three candidates.

I would only have two caveats to what Mr. Wallace writes:

- I think he goes way too far in downgrading the abilities of Ishihara Nobuteru.

Ishihara has had to fight a battle with both hands tied behind his back, having to serve as the loyal lieutenant to Tanigaki Sadakazu, the least capable leader the LDP has ever had (Ed: worse than Mori Yoshiro? Wow!). So perversely attached are the members of the LDP to service to one's superior that voices in the LDP have been calling Ishihara the Akechi Mitsuhide of the Heisei Era. (Ed: Tanigaki Sadakazu is the current LDP's Oda Nobunaga? Double wow!!)

Speaking of wild tales of betrayal, not only has former prime minister Aso Taro -- the only serving LDP secretary-general to succeed a living party president since Takeshita Noboru took over in consensus-based transition in 1987 -- been the most vocal of Ishihara's attempt to make the same move, he is also campaigning on the behalf of Abe Shinzo, the man whom he drove over the edge over the course of August 2007.

Abe must really have no memory of his last weeks in office.

- There is no chance for an LDP-Democratic Party of Japan coalition for at least a calendar year after the next House of Representatives election.

The DPJ has had it with the LDP. The LDP's inability to comprehend even the most basic aspects of being the loyal opposition over the last three years has the DPJ in a "Don't call us; we won't call you" mode.

The DPJ also has the benefit of knowing what being a junior coalition partner to the LDP has meant for the party cutting the deal on forming a government. It has not been a pretty last 20 years for those who have joined hands with the LDP.

Furthermore, the DPJ has a perfectly reasonable response to LDP entreaties and Yomiuri Shimbun browbeating into joining the LDP in a coalition:

"We have had an election and the voter have delivered their verdict. They have found us wanting. We have been relegated to and deserve to be in the opposition."

Privately, DPJ members can tell their LDP counterparts, "Your automatic nay-saying to everything we did and incessant calls for an election fueled voter dissatisfaction with both our parties and energized the regional parties, particularly the Osaka Ishin no Kai. You indeed sponsored Hashimoto Toru in his run for governor of Osaka Prefecture. He is your baby -- you form your government with him."

All this, of course, will be moot if Noda Yoshihiko pulls a rabbit out of a hat over the next few months and leads the DPJ to the position #1 party in the House of Representatives following an election. Currently such an outcome seems farfetched. However, we have months ahead of us before this blessed land can hold an election that is not constitutionally suspect. That is a lot of time.

Noda will win the DPJ leadership election taking place today. He has locked down the votes of 220 of the DPJ's 336 Diet members. While this represents only 440 of the 617 points he needs to win reelection in the first round, it is an automatic win in a second round of voting, in which only the members of the Diet are voters.

We Can Have Elections!

Well of one kind. And only with regrets. And they are not the elections everyone is talking about.

Quietly, and without very much fuss, it seems that Ishikawa Yasuo, the disgraced former minister of defense (Mister "I am an amateur in defense issues and that is the epitome of civilian control" to you and me), now secretary-general of the Democratic Party of Japan's House of Councillors delegation, has crafted a simple plan to rectify the disparities in that House that the courts have ruled unconstitutional. The plan has the agreement of the Liberal Democratic Party and the New Komeito and the disappointed acquiescence of the rest of the opposition parties. In contrast with the reform of the House of Representatives districts, which has the various parties talking past one another, the Ishikawa Plan has an excellent chance of being converted into law by the end of this extended regular session of the Diet.

The plan is a minimal, hair-splitting solution to the Supreme Court-mandated reform of the disparities in the House of Councillors. Kanagawa Prefecture, which currently suffers from the fewest Senators per capita, will be bounced from six senators to eight. Osaka Prefecture, which is the next in line in terms of underrepresentation, will be similarly bounced from six to eight.

To supply these four new Senate seats, someone will have to give up seats. Those someones will be Fukushima Prefecture (great timing!) and Gifu Prefecture, both of which will drop from four senators to just two.

This is a quick and dirty solution. The highest level of disparity in the country, currently 5.11 to 1 in between the voters in Kanagawa Prefecture and those in Tottori Prefecture, will drop to 4.75 to 1 in between those in Hyogo Prefecture and those in Tottori. This slips below the court-mandated maximum of 4.99 to 1, allowing for a legal election to take place on schedule in July next year. (J)

While the Ishikawa Plan seems unremarkable for what it contains, what it does not contain makes it interesting. Gone, for example, is any hint of the DPJ's manifesto promise to cut 40 seats from the House of Councillors. This is a huge concession on the part of Ishikawa, a reputed Ozawa Ichiro toady. Also absent from the plan is any hint of an attempt to accommodate the New Komeito Party's and the Democratic Socialist Party's desires to replace the d'Hondt proportional seat distribution system with the Additional Member System. The minor parties have been asked to wait to have their desires answered prior to the 2016 electoral cycle, ostensibly in order give everyone time to think about the proposal.

In the absence honoring the promises of massive seat cuts made in the DPJ's 2009 manifesto, reform of the House of Councillors was always relatively simple. This is due in part to the greater level of disparity allowed -- 4.99 to 1 as opposed to 1.99 to 1, the standard set by the Supreme Court for the House of Representatives districts.

Another contributing factor is, perversely, the knowledge that the House of Councillors had all the constitutional sense wrung out of it decades ago. Designed to be friendly to independents, and thus a brake on party mob rule, it became partisan battleground through the 1982 introduction of the awarding of proportional seats from party lists. The takeover of the House by parties failed to upend the relationship between the two Houses thanks to the persistence of the 1955 System, whereby the LDP retained dominance in the House of Representatives and the country and the Socialist Party played the part of an opposition while being the dominant party's tacit accommodators. However, in the 1990s the concorde collapsed, half after the breakup of the LDP in 1993 and half in the Socialists' committing ideological suicide from 1994 onward.

The person who really cracked the nut, however, was, unsurprisingly, Ozawa Ichiro. First through the New Frontier Party and then later through the DPJ, Ozawa capitalized on the perversion of the the House of Councillors' original purpose and status to make it, and not the House of Representatives, the fulcrum point in politics.

That the minority parliament in the Diet can now, through control of the House of Councillors, hold the rest of the apparatus of government hostage, was never the intent of the writers of the Constitution. The Ishikawa Plan's meagre reforms will make no dent in this anomalous situation.

The resolution of the unconstitutionality of the districts in the House of Councillors sets up a huge battle over the reform of the districts of the House of Representatives. It will not be resolved, as the LDP desires, with a simple abolition of the five smallest electoral districts. The DPJ rank-and-file will demand an Armageddon over House of Representatives redistricting.

Expect them to get one.

And Then There Was One

As noted in comments to a previous post, nine members of the Democratic Party of Japan's House of Representatives delegation have submitted their resignations from the party (E) in protest against a number of policies the government has recently rammed down the party's throat.

In a "let's all take a deep breath and wait before predicting the deluge" post at Global Talk 21, Okumura Jun noted that no House of Councillors members had headed for the exits (E).

Well, guess what? A few hours ago House of Councillors member Yokomine Yoshiro offered up his resignation from the DPJ (J).

Now Yokomine, the father of the golfer Yokomine Sakura, has been a huge pain for the party, being involved in a series of mishaps and ethical lapses since he was picked as a proportional seat candidate by party leader Ozawa Ichiro. His resignation from the party for what his political secretary called "personal reasons" may have nothing to do with the current party distress over the proposed rise in the consumption tax, the Yamba Dam restart declaration and the prime minister's hair-splitting and ultimately undone solution to winning party support for Japan's entering into discussions on joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

But the timing of Yokomine's resignation is, if not suspicious, then still bad for the image of the prime minister.

I am not going to say that I warned that that fission could happen...but I warned that fission could happen.

What I got wrong was the timing: I did not think the breakup would begin before the New Year.

Later - Over at σ1, Corey Wallace goes into some particulars as to why it is appropriate to think that "this time, it's different" (Link).