Sussing Out Abe's Next Move

Yesterday's resignation of Democratic Party leader Renho only days after a major DP victory in the Sendai mayoral election, together with the resignation of Cabinet-support sapping Inada Tomomi as Minister of Defense opens up to Prime Minister Abe Shinzo an opportunity to initiate what 24 hours ago would have been considered political suicide: dissolve the Diet and call a House of Representatives election. Indeed, this decision may already have been made -- it certainly makes the Inada resignation more comprehensible ("Why now? She is about to be let go in the Cabinet reshuffle!" was a natural, immediate reaction to yesterday's announcement).

As the results of the July 2 Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly elections have shown, the LDP's recent dominance has been all about the absence of a centrist opposition with a clear pathway to victory. Offer a ruthless alternative, one that leaps over the structural impediments and clientalism designed to return the LDP to power time after time, and the resentment of the voters will lift you to victory. Koike Yuriko, with her amazing ability to tear away the Komeito from its coalition with the LDP at the same time as dog whistling to the Tamogami Right (too quickly forgotten is her calculated dissing of the South Koreans) provided Tokyo voters with just such an alternative.

The obvious decision for Abe, who faces declining poll numbers and obvious factional maneuvering against him, is dissolve the Diet, proclaiming, "I am asking for the judgment of my performance from the voters" or something like that. With the DP leaderless and no national Koike party as yet, the chances are fairly good that Abe's LDP will march to another victory under his command. Perhaps one which fails to return a Constitution revision-capable 2/3rds majority in the House of Representatives for the ruling coalition -- but still a simple LDP majority (take that, Komeito!) in the lower house.

At least, that's the way it looks.

Tokyo Gubernatorial Election 2016 - A Last Look

In a few minutes voting starts for the governorship of the Tokyo Metropolitan District(1). Twenty-one names are on the ballot but only a few are worth mentioning. Even fewer have a chance at making a splash.

The prize is a heck of a job - essentially the presidency of the world's 16th largest economy -- the part of Japan that generates, rather than immolates, revenues.

At this writing it looks like Koike Yuriko's Big Decision -- to defy the Liberal Democratic Party's national and Tokyo establishments by offering herself as a candidate -- will pay off with a big electoral win. The Iron Butterfly - my name for her given her hardline realist security policy views and her penchant of flitting from party to party as political expediency dictates -- is leading in the polls. Her main rivals -- former newscaster Torigoe Shuntaro and former Iwate Governor Masuda Hiroya -- have been trying to keep up with on the one hand crippled and the other tepid campaigns.

One has to be appalled by the Torigoe situation. A last minute choice of the four party electoral alliance of the Democratic Party, the Japan Communist Party and micro-party twins the Socialists and Livelihood (made after an inexplicable second-to-last minute dalliance with Abe Shinzo critic and major fruitcake Koga Shigeaki) Torigoe's hopes for victory were immediately torpedoed by tabloid tales of his having seduced an innocent 20 year old a decade ago. Torigoe did what his lawyers told him to do -- say nothing, prepare to sue, threaten with a police complaint of obstruction of an election -- which made him look like he was trying to bury the story. He had an obligation to save himself from extortion and possible prosecutorial misconduct over an incident he thought resolved years ago. Trying to run for governor – and get others excited about his run for the governorship -- at the same time has proven a titanic struggle.

LDP and Komeito's candidate Masuda Hiroya is probably one of Japan’s top thinkers on local administration. He has competently run Iwate Prefecture, shaking off the influence of his mentor Ozawa Ichiro in the process. He has been Minister of Internal Affairs and Communications. His May 2014 report on immanent catastrophic population declines in rural areas shook off decades of complacency about the "genteel decline" of Japan exurban environment.

Which is why it is both terrible and wonderful that his candidacy has failed to catch fire even with The Establishment. Terrible in that of all the persons seeking the governorship Masuda is the only one with even an inkling of how local administration works, what it is good at, what it must abandon and what, if anything, Tokyo can do to help revive the rest of Japan. Wonderful in that failure will mean that the poisoned chalice of the Tokyo Governorship will not devastate the career and reputation of a third of Japan's reformers. The snakepit of Shinjuku Ward devoured and then spat out Inose Naoki and Masuzoe Yo'ichi for non-criminal financial indiscretions. Losing Masuda as well to local Tokyo's politics would be Brechtian farce.

Down the ticket, the Tokyo election has attracted this year more than its usual share of right wing nut jobs courting the Empire Should Strike Back vote (a not-to-be ignored and not insignificant constituency, given soon-to-be-felon General Tamogami Toshio's stunning capture 600,000 votes in 2014). Chief among these awful crackpots is Sakurai Makoto (not his real name) the former chairman of the anti-Korean, anti-Chinese hate group the Zaitokukai. One hopes (OK, I hope) the plethora of wacky alternatives and a cooling of Sino-Japanese tensions over the Senkakus (credit to both Abe Shinzo and Xi Jinping for this) keeps him below 100,000 votes.

Turnout is expected to be light. Normally, low turnout would favor the LDP/Komeito candidate, backed as he is by the political machines of both parties. Not even low turnout, however, looks to derail Koike Yuriko’s bid to become the first woman to lead Tokyo.



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1) a neologism - the actual English name of Tokyo-to is "the Tokyo Metropolitan Government." I will try to convince the new governor to change the name as calling a geographical area a "government" makes zero sense.

Now That's Revisionism!

Chief Liberal Democratic Party propagandist Koike Yuriko, who somehow managed to be at once female, an LDP Diet member, a noted hard liner, ally of Abe Shinzo and NOT PICKED for a cabinet or party top leadership position on Wednesday, quietly and without much of a fuss published an opinion piece with Project Syndicate that if is at all possible is even more outré than her shivving of Angela Merkel and Park Geun-hye (Link) of a month and half ago.

Ending East Asia's History Wars

TOKYO – Georges Clemenceau, who, as France's prime minister, led his country to victory in World War I, famously said that "war is too important to be left to the generals." Japan is now discovering that history is too important to be left to newspaper editors.
In the 1990s, the newspaper Asahi Shimbun caused a firestorm at home and in South Korea by publishing a series of articles, based upon testimony by the former Japanese soldier Seiji Yoshida, on "comfort women" – Koreans forced to provide sexual services to the Japanese Imperial Army during World War II. Asahi has now admitted that the soldier's confessions were unfounded, and has disavowed the core supporting evidence for the articles.

That retraction appears to be causing as much embarrassment – and diplomatic vitriol – in Japan and South Korea today as the original series did. But, at a time when both countries cannot afford to permit partisan or sloppy abuses of history to roil their bilateral relations, Asahi's careless work has turned out to be more than abysmal journalism; it has introduced a dangerous element into regional diplomacy.

[snip]

Japan and South Korea need to take responsibility for the future, not obsess about the past. A recent Japanese government white paper called South Korea the country "that shares the closest relationship with Japan historically and in areas such as economy and culture." No doubt, many, if not most, South Korean foreign-policy experts and strategists share that sentiment. But it will take committed leadership to transcend the history wars and tap the full potential of Japanese-Korean cooperation, something that both countries' key ally, the United States, strongly desires, as it seeks to draw China into a lasting and peaceful Asian order.

For too long, intemperate historical debates – often driven by biased newspaper accounts – have poisoned bilateral relations. Now, as another war of words heats up, Japanese and South Korean leaders need to step back, recognize where the real interests of their people lie, both today and in the future, and calmly begin to take the measures required to ensure durable reconciliation.

(Link)

Bravo, Koike-sensei, bravo. I have not seen such breath-taking leaps -- albeit from non-sequitur to false congruence to unsupported assumption to evasion of responsibility, and not from the flying trapeze -- since I went and saw the Bolshoi Circus this summer at Jingu.

My favorite, favorite, favorite line in the whole piece, however, is this one:

Of course, given that Japan and Korea have not fought a series of wars against each other, their relationship is not the same as that between Germany and France.

Lety us put aside the fact that there are hundreds of years of military conflicts between Korean and Japanese, including some full scale invasions, occupations and colonial rule. It is the "Of course" that gets me, like I am supposed to be able to agree with her a priori.

Filling Mr. Abe's New Cabinet

With the record for the longest-lasting lineup in history firmly under its obi, the constipated release of two excruciatingly unsatisfying plans for change (Third Arrow structural economic reforms and reinterpretation of the constitutional ban on collective self-defense) making its days darker, ministers making apologies to the citizens for having voiced inconvenient truths (Link), the first significant death (Link) and languishing poll numbers(Link) Abe Cabinet 2.0 is starting to look stale. Prime Minister Abe delivered what sounded pretty much like a nationally televised hail and farewell speech last night -- sweeping through and over what the current Diet session and the Cabinet have achieved, giving no inkling of what is on the agenda for the autumn Extraordinary Diet Session.

The Yomiuri Shimbun yesterday predicted that the Prime Minister will shuffle his Cabinet in the beginning of September (Link) -- which, based on the PM's press conference, sounds about right. Today the paper has printed an article on the thicket of numbers Abe and his close confidants will have to hack through on the way to that new Cabinet.

First is the faction strength numbers. Now, the factions are not what they were in terms of the grooming of candidates and guides for the approximate number of cabinet seats apportioned from each faction's list of eligible candidates. Still, the Prime Minister has to at least pay some grudging respect to the legacy of the factions -- meaning that each faction will supply at least one member of the Cabinet, with the second place Nukaga Faction, the historical rival of the Prime Minister's Machimura Faction, at least two seats. As for Machimura, he has demanded that the faction honor its most senior underachiever -- a sad sack member with 8 elections to the Diet without ever serving in the Cabinet -- with a cabinet post.

Liberal Democratic Party Factions, number of members

Machimura Faction 92
Nukaga Faction 54
Kishida Faction 44
Aso Faction 38
Nikai Faction 29
Ishihara (Nobuteru) Faction 14
Oshima Faction 13
NO FACTION 127

That last number, 127 members still unaffiliated 18 months after an election, indicates of how far the factions have fallen as institutions. Until the Postal Reform election of 2005, only a handful of Liberal Democratic Party members were independent-minded or obnoxious enough to resist being recruited into a faction. Today, the non-faction faction is far and away the largest faction.

For the Yomiuri, the top candidates for Cabinet posts are party members with at least 5 elections to the House of Representatives (the old standard was 6 elections) or 3 elections to the House of Councillors -- and no previous Cabinet service. Unfortunately for Mr. Abe and his circle of advisers, the interregnum of three Democratic Party of Japan-led cabinets has created a huge backlog in the list of these purportedly worthy candidates. Currently 59 (43 HoR, 16 HoC) Diet members meet the Yomiuri standard -- a major headache for the PM, who wants to keep the number of Cabinet members fixed at 18. With the Chief Cabinet Secretary spot reserved for its current placeholder Suga Yoshihide, the number of Cabinet posts in play is really only 17.

A lot of broken dreams on tap here.

Abe has a few standards of his own he will want to enforce. He will want to have a larger cohort of women in his next Cabinet in order to preserve the appearance of his support for greater women's empowerment. He has raft of heavyweight candidates to chose from: Koike Yuriko, Noda Seiko, Takaichi Sanae are the first to come to mind. Unfortunately all of them have previous Cabinet service -- meaning that appointing them will make no dent in the ranks of the unfledged candidates.

Abe will also want to employ some of his friends and fellow travelers. Takaichi fits the bill in this department. So does of Shisaku favorite Seko Hiroshige -- who has the requisite number of elections to the Diet but heretofore no (Why is this in no way surprising?) Cabinet appointments on his resume.

Abe and his confidants have a long hot summer of thinking ahead of them. The process of selecting a new cabinet will probably involve, if anything, a lot of golf games under a blazing hot sun.

Look for a toasted Abe announcing a new cabinet lineup ahead of the opening of the Extraordinary Session, with a brand new State Minister for Regional Revitalization post enlivening the festivities.


Later - Yomiuri's English-language The Japan News has an article out making many of these points. (Link)

What Could Have Been - The Tokyo Governor's Election Edition

Campaign flyers for Tokyo Metropolitan District Governor's election. Left: Hosokawa Morihiro. Right: Tamogami Toshio. Click on image to open in large format.

Well let me tell you 'bout the way she looked
The way she'd act and the colour of her hair
Her voice was soft and cool
Her eyes were clear and bright
But she's not there.

- Rod Argent, "She's Not There" (1964)

This morning, election morning, the residents of the Tokyo Metropolitan District will be waking up to a city covered with a record-breaking but rapidly melting mass of snow. Fitting is it that a brief, intense and yet somehow empty gubernatorial campaign season ends with the metropole stuck beneath in a cold, damp white blanket.

Former Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare Masuzoe Yo'ichi seems guaranteed victory. He managed to campaign without controversy, on what seemed to be the unchallenging proposition, "Yes, I am good enough." And "good enough" seems indeed good enough to prevail, if enough of the electorate tramps out in the snow to the election centers.

Former Prime Minister Hosokawa Morihiro ran on the premise of "Utsunomiya Kenji, the anti-nuclear candidate, is too uninspiring to win" -- which might be true. However, Hosokawa turned out to be even less inspiring Utsunomiya or indeed any reasonably animate human being. Despite the electric jolt of having former prime minister Koizumi Jun'ichiro as buzz creator, Hosokawa's campaign was pretty much dead on arrival. As Okumura Jun pungently put it, "at least the Vasa sailed 1300 meters before it sank, much better than Hosokawa's candidacy." - Link).

Utsunomiya Kenji's candidacy needed more time. This seems weird for a candidate who did not stop running for the governorship even after losing to Inose Naoki in a landslide. In the year after finishing a distant second, Utsunomiya made 130 public appearances, as if he knew he was going to get another shot at the governorship soon. Of all the candidates, only Utsunomiya was ready from the git-go, his posters appearing in my mailbox the first day of the campaign season. As the campaign season progressed and voters could take a look at him his candidacy became more credible -- especially in contrast to Hosokawa's.

However, the presence of two strong anti-nuclear candidates, one supported by the traditional left parties, one not, divides the progressive and nuclear-phobic vote, meaning Utsunomiya seems destined to finish second again.

The candidature of former Air Self Defense Forces Chief of Staff Tamogami Toshio has been a travesty from beginning to end. The man has no business running for a local assembly seat, much less the governorship of the world's mightiest megalopolis. The news media, which should have buried him on the first day under a mountain of ugly facts about him and his followers, instead have at times seemed gleeful enablers of his candidacy. He will end up with an entirely revolting number of votes, most of which will come from voters who know next to nothing about him.

The voters of Tokyo, of course, have a right to feel robbed. In the build up to former governor Inose Naoki's resignation, the parties and the news media speculated about a whole raft of potential candidates, pretty much any of whom could have prevailed against the current core quartet. On the Liberal Democrat Party side, the potential nominees included Environment Minister Ishihara Nobuteru (whose home was literally around the corner from mine way back when in Suginami-ku), Education Minister Shimomura Hakubun (like he would ever give up that portfolio), former Finance Ministry bureaucrat/Koizumi assassin/Mr. Masuzoe and self-image train wreck Katayama Satsuki and former multiple Winter and Summer Olympian Hashimoto Seiko (I am sure Senator Hashimoto much prefers being where she has been, marching at the head of the Japan delegation at the Sochi games). On the Democratic Party of Japan side there was discussion of nominating of Nagatsuma Akira, the bureaucracy's bête noire.

Of December's would be candidates, there was one potential matchup that would have really sizzled. If only the Abe Shinzo LDP had put its reputation on the line by following up on the rumors and nominating Koike Yuriko to be its champion, with the Democrats responding in kind with Ren Ho. That would have been a battle for the ages, pitting sharp looks with sharp minds and even sharper tongues -- and one worthy of the prize that is Tokyo.

Inose's Fall And After

Tokyo Governor Inose Naoki today announced that he has informed the head of the municipal assembly of his intention to resign his office. Inose's move comes at the end of weeks of nearly incessant calls for his resignation. Inose accepted and never declared a personal no-interest, no-expiration-date loan of 50 million yen from the family owners of the Tokushukai medical empire, currently under investigation for massive violations of the nation's voting laws in last December's House of Representatives election. (Link)

Inose has, as yet, not been charged with any impropriety in accepting the private loan -- or for having returned the money in haste after the executives of the Tokushukai were rounded up and arrested. A citizens group has filed an official complaint with the Tokyo Prosecutors' Office asking for an investigation into Inose's possibly failing to declare the loan as a political donation. The prosecutors are obliged to look into the case but are unlikely to file charges. With Inose no longer in office it is possible the matter will end there. However, the citizens group can continue to hound Inose for years via the out-of-control Committee for the Inquest of the Prosecution system of citizens' indictments.

We have seen this movie too many times. An individual bubbles up from out of the murk, offering a chance to shake up the way the country operates. He then makes a mistake, or pushes too hard in trying overturn the Establishment -- and the investigators suddenly arrive. A credulous and craven media complex rushes in, broadcasting or publishing every rumor as fact, as though it were damning evidence of a criminal enterprise -- camouflaging all the while the sources whose assertions would not pass the smell test if their identities were known. The public, confused by the reporting and by inculcated and reinforced biases against rabble rousers, or desiring only that everything in life be quiet and unthreatening, abandons the previous crowd darling. Horie Takafumi, Murakami Yoshiaki, Ozawa Ichiro -- all toppled by nonsense accusations or perjured testimony. Now Inose Naoki, the most assiduous administrator the Tokyo Metropolitan Government has ever had and likely will ever have, joins the list.

That Inose's political position had become untenable became crystal clear when the Democratic Party of Japan came out against him. If there were any party or group that had a philosophical or ethical reason to call a timeout on the scrum against governor, it would be the party whose own term in power was hobbled and then cut short by the obscenely thin charges filed against the secretaries of its leader Ozawa and against Ozawa himself in 2009-11. In what is evidence of the DPJ's total lack of sense of what it stands for, the party jumped into the fray with both feet, with Assembly Member for Fuchu City Koyama Kunihiko turning in an almost hysterical performance at Tuesday's committee meeting. Party Leader Kaieda Banri, who as a protégé of Ozawa should know better, responded to news of Inose's plan to resign by saying, "Those voters who supported Inose are now forced to grasping at huge disappointment. Given that he came under a cloud of doubt, he should have resigned sooner." (Link - J)

The monumental stupidity of Kaeda's statement -- repudiating due process of law and the presumption of innocence -- reinforces the belief that the DPJ is doomed failure as long as he is the head of it.

As to why the Liberal Democratic Party and the New Komeito, which supported Inose's candidature in 2012, should so suddenly turn against him, the answer is two-fold. First, by going after Inose for accepting Tokushukai money the LDP is making a bold bid to have the public forget that the money men in this affair, Tokuda Torao and Tokuda Takeshi -- were both LDP members of the House of Representatives. It is insane to believe that skewering Inose would cover up the LDP's fingerprints on the 50 million yen -- but goodness, it seems to have worked.

The other reason why the LDP wanted Inose gone is, unsurprisingly, money. Not paltry 50 million sums from the Tokudas -- real money. The hundreds of billions of yen that will be spent on Olympics-related construction and events preparations over the next six years. Inose rose to influence though penning books on the horrible waste inflicted by government budgets and the countryside by the construction industry, working at that time hand-in-glove with the LDP. If there is an eminence grise or noire in this drama, it is the members and supporters of the LDP's Road Tribe, who have long sought a means of wreaking vengeance on Inose for having turned the country against them.

With Inose the skeptic and critic out of the way, replaced with a more pliant successor, the Olympics can become the cover story for a thousand sins and abuses.

As for who will run in the by-election to elect a new governor, several names are being bandied about. Media types and Nagata-cho hallways rats have been flogging former Health Minister Masuzoe Yo'ichi as one likely to toss his hat in the ring. The resignation of Higashikokubaru Hideo from the Diet a week ago already initiated a burst of predictions he would be in the race.

The Sankei Shimbun, which has few scruples as to accuracy or plausability, has floated the names of LDP communications director Koike Yuriko (a Shisaku favorite legislator), Abe Shinzo's body double Hagiuda Ko'ichi and dark lord Minister of Education Shimomura Hakubun as potential candidates. (Link - J)

The hapless DPJ, which has a real opportunity to score points against the LDP in the aftermath of the publicly scorned passage of the Special Secrets Protection bill, has no idea whom it might nominate (Why am I not surprised?). Some in the DPJ are reportedly thinking the party should nominate Ren Ho, the House of Councillors member who heretofore has always been the bridesmaid in all big time political post guessing games.

Having the half-Taiwanese, sharp-tongued, whippet smart, media savvy, gorgeous and still youthful Ren Ho as the governor of Tokyo would send a plethora of positive messages to the world. Domestically, however, it would be a recipe for disaster. Prime Minister Abe's most consistently applause line when in conservative circles is an sarcastic echo of Ren Ho's famous question to government-supported supercomputer scientists who worked for 10 years without building an actual machine because they could never guarantee the machine would be #1 in the world. Incredulous that the geeks had consumed hundreds of millions of yen in government subsidies without producing anything, Ren Ho asked the project administrators, "What was wrong with being #2?" [So whenever Abe talks rouses the faithful with a "Let us pledge to be #1 in the world!" he is not riffing on Ezra Vogel; he is mocking Ren Ho.]

If the DPJ was smart, which it is not, it would nominate former Tottori governor and former Minister of Internal Affairs Katayama Yoshiro. The good professor actually knows and cares about administration and has a decent respect for the people's intelligence. Admirable qualities, those.

Why the race for governor matters, of course, is not that Tokyo is the most populous city in the country, that it is host of the national government or even that it will host the Olympics in 2020. It is that Tokyo Metropolitan Government is a fabulously wealthy local government, second only in economic/political significance to the U.S. states of California and Texas.

To sit behind the governor's desk inside the Tocho is a hell of responsibility. It needs a hell of a person.

Three Disquieting Items On The Sideboard

Today is a no newspaper day in Japan, the result of the one day a month the country's newspaper reporters and editors ostensibly are allowed off the merry-go-round.

In the absence of a morning paper one can hold in one's hands, a trio of depressing news stories you may have missed from the past two weeks:

1) Somehow I Don't Think That That's The Lesson

From Center for a New American Security expert Patrick Cronin, in a post for the War on the Rocks blog, an anecdote in relation to China’s recently declared air defense identification zone. It slaps a question mark on the judgment of Koike Yuriko, the Liberal Democratic Party's multilingual and multifaceted main communications officer:

...The logic of where this air superiority contest is heading can be illustrated by a chilling anecdote related last week at the Center for a New American Security by Japanese Parliamentarian Yuriko Koike. Representative Koike, who was national security advisor to Shinzo Abe during his previous stint as Prime Minister, recounted how she missed her Libyan Airlines flight from Tripoli to Cairo on 21 February 1973. That flight strayed into Israeli-controlled airspace and was shot down by Israeli F-4 Phantom II fighters, killing 108 people.

Reflecting on her near-miss with death, Representative Koike said the incident taught her what it means to protect one's airspace, implying that any country serious about air sovereignty must be willing to act as decisively as the Israelis did 40 years ago over the Sinai Peninsula. But whereas former Minister Koike was recalling a personal vignette, the Chinese government was enunciating official policy…

(Link)

One hopes that Dr. Cronin misunderstood Ms. Koike's point. A normal person, having missed a commercial passenger flight that ended up being shot down by fighter jets, would probably not come away from that brush with death with increased admiration for the fighter pilots and their political masters. A normal person indeed would ask, "How we fix the world so as to prevent such a tragedy ever happening again?"

Then again, Dr. Cronin is quoting Koike "The Iron Butterfly" Yuriko. Maybe she really did come out of a near death experience with increased appreciation for those who have killed innocent civilians by mistake. Or on purpose, I don't know.

2) These Are The Alternatives? Really?

Catherine Traywick has a report out for Foreign Policy on America's role as a supporter of the new Special Secrets Protection Act. The piece, checking in with folks who know, offers a fairly decent rundown on the positive reasons why the Abe government and the Liberal Democratic Party felt compelled to put passage of the new law on the front burner. It underplays the level to which the new Act is a simple aping of American statutes and practices as regards secrecy, ignoring the qualitative and cultural differences in between the two country's bureaucracies and jurisprudence.

What is really disturbing about the piece, however, is the concluding comment from Denny Roy of the East West Center in Honolulu. Trying to put the Act into perspective, where it is a vital element in the aggrandizing of the Japan-U.S. military alliance, Mr. Roy offers this choice:

"Would you rather have Japan as a friendly dictator able to go to war with you -- even if it doesn't live up to your democratic values -- or would you rather have a pacifistic Japan that has limitations in terms of military ability?"

(Link)

The answer to this question of course is, "The latter! The latter! The latter! Or, possibly, neither of these two! Pray that we may never be offered this choice!"

Given the vagaries of journalism, Mr. Roy may have been quoted improperly or out of context. If the above Hobson's Choice ever even enters into the minds of U.S. policy makers, though, then everyone should pretty much forget about the U.S. being a benign power that learns from its mistakes.

3) It's An End of the World As We Know It Party

The extraordinary session of the Diet has ended in confusion and rushed action, with items on the legislative calendar left undone, a last minute extension and an unsightly near midnight vote on the most sweeping and regressive piece of civil liberties legislation in decades.

At a point in the legislative calendar when the attention of Diet members was worth, in Mark Twain's words, "four dollars a minute" one would hardly expect that the prime minister and 400 of his closest friends, including 200 member of the Diet, would take the afternoon off to throw a party celebrating the coming of a new, more patriotic and traditionalist Japan.

Well, they did. On November 26. In the middle of the afternoon.

Don't bother looking for a description of the party on the Prime Minister's Residence web page. Or on Prime Minister's Facebook page. Or on the home page or Facebook page of Minister of State for Regulatory Reform (and Administrative Reform and Civil Service Reform and "Cool Japan" Strategy and the "Challenge Again" Initiative) Inada Tomomi -- though she most certainly was there.

One has to go to the home page of Abe/Kishi family retainer and Chairman of the National Public Safety Commission Furuya Keiji to find mention of the conservative pow-wow (Link - J). Furuya, who has a habit of documenting his most Sisyphean endeavors in great detail, posts a pair of photos from the shindig, including a quartet shot of him with Hyakuta Naoki, the author Prime Minister Abe recently appointed to the board of governors of NHK in what is the crawling coup d’etat against that entity's independence and balance.

To be fair, Prime Minister Abe spent only 12 minutes at the Sosei Nippon study reunion (kenshukai) -- a really a short span of time when one considers that he is the chairman of Sosei Nippon.

What is Sosei Nippon? There is a home page (Link) but oddly, in this supposed new era of openness and internationalization, the group's home　page is only in Japanese.

For a description of the organization in English there is Matthew Penney's guide to the revisionist organizations boasting Cabinet ministers as members. Therein Sosei Nippon ("Japan's Rebirth") is described as:

A Diet group formed in 2007. Members pledge to "protect Japanese traditions and culture", "rethink the postwar order", and "protect Japan's national interests and make Japan a country respected by international society". They have hosted lectures by rightist pundits and authors such as Sakurai Yoshiko and Fujiwara Masahiko. After the ouster of the LDP from power, the group publically accused the Democratic Party of manifesting "socialistic and totalitarian tendencies". They pledged to stand against DPJ proposals to allow husbands and wives to have different surnames – something that the group argued would undermine "family togetherness" – and moves to allow permanent residents to vote in local elections, part of a larger pattern of assertions by conservative lawmakers that foreigners in Japan are neither loyal nor committed to the Japanese state and undermine the social order. The group has a limited web presence and seems to have had difficulty establishing a clear identity as many of its assertions on history, culture, and contemporary society are already covered by more focused Diet member groups.
(Link)

The November 26 event did not go entirely unnoticed by the news media conglomerates. The Sankei Shimbun published the following account (translation by MTC):

At Sosei Nippon Gathering, Prime Minister Says, "I Will Take Us Back To A Japan of Glory"

Sosei Nippon, the cross-party league of Diet members which has Prime Minister Abe Shinzo as its chairman, held, on November 26, its study reunion inside the Diet Members #1 Office Building. By declaring, "This is only the start of our taking Japan back to glory," the PM demonstrated his desire to press forward with a politics deeply rooted in conservatism.

At the reunion there about 400 persons, including members of the Diet and local assembly lawmakers. Journalist Sakurai Yoshiko and novelist Hyakuta Naoki gave speeches. Chairman of the National Safety Commission Furuya Keiji called out to the group, "The role of [this league] is to enracinate real conservatism deep in the earth." State Minister for Administrative Reform Inada Tomomi put forth the appeal, "What I want to realize is the casting off of the postwar regime."

(Link- J)

Nothing terribly weird that we have never heard before from the featured speakers in the above, of course. But why hold the reunion in the midst of the hectic last days of the Diet session? Furthermore, whenever I see the word "glory" (hokori) rear its ugly head -- I start looking for the exit.

Follow Up On Koike Yuriko

A week ago, in a post about the Official Secret Bill (Yes, someday I will write about something else) and Koike Yuriko, the Liberal Democratic Party's top public information honcho, I wrote that:

"Publishing in English via Project Syndicate, she has disseminated anti-Democratic Party of Japan and pro-Abe Shinzo propaganda worldwide underneath the radar of the local representatives of the foreign press."

As luck, or the simple passage of time, would have it, Koike has clocked in with one of her stomping propaganda pieces:

Reinventing a key security institution in Japan

Shinzo Abe's second term as Japan's Prime Minister began with a laser-like focus on economic revitalization. That policy, almost instantly dubbed "Abenomics", comprises what have been called the three "arrows": bold monetary policy, an expansionary fiscal stance, and structural reforms to stimulate private investment. Hosting the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2020 has added a fourth arrow to this quiver in the form of increased infrastructure investment and tourism revenue in the years up to the games.

To be sure, after 15 years of deflationary recession, revitalization of the Japanese economy remains far from complete. Nonetheless, the effects of Abe's reforms are becoming visible in areas such as equity prices and exchange rates.

But Abe also confronts a security environment in Asia that is every bit as brittle as Japan's economy was before his government took office last December. Indeed, he confronted many of the same issues during his first administration seven years ago. His efforts back then were halted by his own resignation, and he is now making a second attempt to establish a national security governance system to meet Japan's needs—and those of its allies—in 21st century Asia.

In a speech to a plenary session of the lower house of Japan's Diet on 25 October, Abe emphasized that, given the current security situation in Asia, "It is essential to strengthen command functions for implementing the Prime Minister's national security policy." Now that split control of the Diet's upper and lower houses has been resolved, with Abe's Liberal Democrats in strong control of both chambers, a Bill to modernize Japan's national security governance is certain to pass.

The Bill that Abe has submitted aims to establish a Japanese National Security Council (NSC), based on lessons from the successes and failures of similar institutions in other countries, such as NSC in the US. The Security Council of Japan—something of a stopgap measure created to provide advice from relevant cabinet members to the Prime Minister in times of crisis—will now be reorganized as a formal institution.

The new NSC's membership will be limited to the Prime Minister, the cabinet secretary, and the foreign and defence ministers, with relevant ministers added on an ad hoc basis. A permanent National Security Secretariat, headed by a person with abundant diplomatic experience, will be established in the Prime Minister's office, with 60 security specialists from various fields laying the policy groundwork for medium and long-term national security strategy.

(Link)

First, compliments where deserved. The text is both in straightforward, colloquial English and makes sense, in any language.

Second, Koike-san, cool it on the clapping-for-oneself-in-the-North-Korean-manner adjectives and adjectivals ("laser-like," "bold," "abundant") will ya?

Third, how much shorter would the work day of Prime Minister's Residence journalists be if Koike were given the job of official government spokesperson? Chief Cabinet Secretary Suga Yoshihide, who is as good at his multi-tasking nightmare job as anyone ever has been, nevertheless leaves folks drooling with strings of rhetorical questions rather than clearcut assertions or denials.

If Koike were wrangling the journalists, the daily press conference would be, "Here's the news -- so listen up, you idiots."

The essay is interesting for its detour into self-indulgence, with Koike venting once again about the Prime Minister's Schedule, her pet peeve, her discussion of which caused the government angina last week. That an international audience would not understand a single thing about whatever it is about the Schedule that puts Koike into such a snit (not that domestic audiences can either) does not bother her in the least, evidently.

Koike Yuriko Sets The House Secrecy Debate On Fire

Former Minister of Defense (briefly), former Chairman of the Liberal Democratic Party General Council and head of the LDP’s Communication Division Koike Yuriko has a reputation as a savvy media manipulator. A former television newscaster, she holds a degree in sociology from Cairo University. Thanks to her Arabic and English skills, she is a fixture in international circles. Publishing in English via Project Syndicate, she has disseminated anti-Democratic Party of Japan and pro-Abe Shinzo propaganda worldwide underneath the radar of the local representatives of the foreign press.

Despite a warm and inviting appearance, Koike holds hardline views on security and is seen as very much a kindred spirit of the prime minister's. Part of her hard defense posture may have developed out of her interaction with and study of the U.S. security community.

Part, however, arises from her political instability. She flitted during the first years of her political career from one political party to another, finally landing in the LDP. Her colleagues have labeled her a wataridori-- i.e., "a migratory bird" -- and were not complimenting her in doing so. She gained prominence under the sponsorship of maverick Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichiro, becoming the most visible and valuable of his "assassins." Under his encouragement, she moved from her fairly safe Hyogo district to challenge and eventually defeat postal rebel Kobayashi Koki in his Tokyo fiefdom.

Without roots in her district, her patron departed from active politics, her choosing to lean ever harder into militancy has made eminent sense. Her hardline views on defense, together with her earlier mobility prompted me to label her "the Iron Butterfly."

Yesterday, in Diet session examining the Official Secrets bill, the Iron Butterfly crash landed in spectacular fashion:

"Japan is a country stupefied by peace which has pretty much lost any appreciation of top secrets...Every day the newspapers are without fail printing at what o’clock, how many minutes, who it was that went in to see the prime minister and when they left. Doesn’t this transcend the [Public's] Right To Know?"

(Link - J)

The Prime Minister's Schedule (Shusho dosei, also called Shusho no ichi nichi) is an institution of Japanese life. Printed unobtrusively in every day's newspaper (page 6 on the bottom of my own daily paper this morning) it details, with extraordinary thoroughness, the prime minister's schedule of the previous day. With most of the machinations of Japanese government enwreathed in bureaucratic fog and shielded by the press clubs, the Prime Minister's Schedule has been one of the few means the public has had of getting even a glimpse of whatever the hell is going on.

From a security standpoint, Koike's objection to this time-honored practice would make sense if the Prime Minister's Schedule revealed the prime minister's intended movements. However, the Prime Minister's Schedule (I am not going to use an acronym, for obvious reasons) only details whom the PM met the day before. Since Japan has a defense-only military posture, foregoing warfare as a means of solving international political disputes, and the government generally does not engage in nefarious activities, there is little reason for the PM to hide the identities of the person he is meeting.

And the Prime Minister's Schedule already hides the identities of some of the persons the PM is meeting. Very often, only one or two names are listed, followed by a ra) ("and folks like that..."). It is almost certain that the PM's handlers only need to go over to whichever member of the press club is keeping the schedule that day and say, "Look, of those whom you just saw going in, can you keep quiet about Mr. X and Ms. Y? Thanks."

When the head of the LDP's press relations division takes aim at a small but important traditional news media window into the PM's actions, using the loaded terms kimitsu ("top secrets") and heiwa boke ("stupefied by peace") she sets off a red flashing light for a news media already deeply sceptical of if not adamantly opposed (Link) to the Official Secrets bill. If one wanted to create an atmosphere reinforcing the warnings of the critics of the bill, who have been claiming that the reach of the bill is unlimited, then attacking one of the new media's cherished prerogatives is a good way to start.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Suga Yoshihide, in with his usual diffidence, has said that the government has no plans to follow up on Koike's suggestion. "What the various news organizations are making public knowledge regarding the Prime Minister’s movements, these are not within expectations of what would be items of special secrecy under the Special Official Secrets Law."

Suga was trying to tamp down concerns. However, his use of sotei ("expectations"), a term strongly associated in the public mind with the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster (and the cynical question "you say what happened was outside of expectations but it really wasn't, was it? And the worst did happen, didn't it?”) indicates a deteriorating awareness of the press and the public's growing opposition to the Official Secrets bill. (Link - J and Link - J).

The news media has been extremely circumspect or even supportive during these first 10 charmed months of the Abe administration. The quiet, acquiescent press environment has indeed been one of the most striking differences between Abe's first term as prime minister and the current term.

Blunderbuss threats to press freedom -- the submission of the Official Secrets Bill and extraordinarily ideological moves against the management of national broadcaster NHK (Abe wants to appoint who to the management committee? The author who every so often interviews Abe for the revisionist magazine WiLL and the PM's childhood home tutor? Oh, you have to be joking -- Link - J) are testing the ceasefire. It may be that the Abe crowd is feeling its oats, believing that coalition majorities in both Houses of the Diet making it impervious to whatever an independent press thinks anymore.

Later - In addition to the translated Mainichi editorial linked to above, The Japan Times has editorialized against the official secrets bill. (Link)


Later still - The Mainichi Shimbun has published an English-language translation of its take on the story. (Link)

About The Other Sovereignty Day Commemoration

[The below is a draft post, with sections left incomplete.]

The first official return of sovereignty day commemoration ceremony, complete with the presence of their Imperial Majesties, was held on April 28, the 61st anniversary of the end of the Occupation.

The official ceremony garnered attention worldwide, much of it not appreciative.

Despite the domestic and international temperatures raised by this event, the ceremony itself passed relatively smoothly.

There was only one unscripted moment, dutifully ignored by all the major broadcasters except the center-left TBS network. One of the attendees started shouting, "Tenno heika banzai!" ("May the Emperor live 10,000 years!"). Much of the rest of the audience soon joined in, causing the Imperial Couple, who had been leaving, to freeze like two deer caught in the headlights. (Link – J video)

Chief Cabinet Secretary Suga Yoshihide, when asked later about the banzais, responded that they were an impromptu and natural occurrence. (Link -J )

A trio of banzais probably should not be seen as a harbinger of world's end. Given that the attendees were the cream of the nation's revisionist political class, a little off-script self-described loyalist enthusiasm should have been expected.

In terms revisionist theater, the official ceremony in the morning was a strictly amateur production.

The professionals made their appearance in the afternoon at People's Assembly For Return To Sovereignty Day (Shuken kaifuku kinenbi kokumin shukai) at the Hibiya Kokaido -- a general overview of which has been provided to us by Channel Sakura. (Link – J　video)

The above linked video has just about everything one could hope for:

- A "materials-bought-at-the-100-yen-store" studio set

- The organizer Ijiri Kazuo (former columnist for the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, adjunct professor at Takushoku University, member of Sakurai Yoshiko’s Fundamentals think tank and member of the New Textbook group) boasting of filling up the lower tier and half of the upper tier (How thrilled is Ijiri about the turnout? He insists on going over it twice with the announcer.)

- The Amazon event hostess (yes, the tall lady in the denim tube skirt and the sandals in this shot who runs the non-profit that cleans up beaches, is a Channel Sakura announcer and a member of the Self Defense Forces Reserves.)

- The complete hash made of the singing of the Kimigayo (It takes a special kind of impatience to mess up a performance of the world's shortest national anthem.)

And that is what you get in the first 2:50 of the Channel Sakura digest, before any of the featured speakers opens his or her mouth.

And who were the featured speakers?

Based upon the videos uploaded to YouTube, about 20 VIPs were on the schedule, with one would be speaker, the one with the highest government office of the group, having his brief greeting read out by the hostess.

I present the speakers and links to their speeches below in what I believe is the proper order, with the names of active members of the National Diet in bold:

Kobori Keichiro – emeritus professor of comparative literature, Meiji University. Studied German literature at Tokyo University alongside Nishio Kanji), member of the New Textbook group. (Full Speech – J)

Noda Takeshi - Chairman of the Diet Members' League for a Return of Sovereignty Day, Chairman of the LDP House of Representatives delegation, chairman of the LDP's Tax Committee, former member of the Liberal Party. (Full Speech – J)

Shindo Yoshitaka (in absentia) – Minister of General Affairs and Telecommunications, member of the House of Representatives, grandson of Kuribayashi Tadamichi -- the commander of the defense of Iojima. (Read Message - J)

Takaichi Sanae - Chairman of the LDP Policy Research Council, member of the House of Representatives, leader of the Diet members delegation visit to Yasukuni on April 23 (Link), seated at the right hand of Abe Shinzo when Abe was elected LDP president (Link - Amari Akira was to his left), graduate of the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management, former aide to U.S. House of Representatives members Patricia Schroeder (Full Speech - J)

Hiranuma Takeo - Acting Representative of the Japan Restoration Association, member of the House of Representatives, former leader of the Sunrise Party, leader of the postal rebellion against Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichiro, adopted son of convicted Class A War Criminal Hiranuma Kiichiro. (Full Speech - J)

Kiuchi Minoru - Parliamentary Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs, Hiranuma disciple, former postal rebel (successfully fought off Koizumi candidate Katayama Satsuki), former Ministry of Foreign Affairs bureaucrat. (Full Speech - J)

Yamatani Eriko -member of the House of Councillors, deputy chairman of the LDP committee on security and terrorism, former special advisor to the prime minister on education revitalization, former editor in chief of Sankei Living, originally elected to the Diet as a DPJ proportional seat candidate. (Full Speech - J)

Araki Kazuhiro – Professor of International Relations at Takushoku University, member of Sakurai Yoshiko’s Fundamental think tank, former Ground Self Defense Forces officer, GSDF Reserves member. (Full Speech - J)

Sugihara Makoto – Chairman of the New Textbook group, publisher of works on war responsibility, member of the Advisory Committee of the Society for the Dissemination of Historical Fact. (Full Speech – J)

Nishida Shoji - LDP member of the House of Councillors, vice chairman’s of the parliamentarian’s league promoting visits to Yasukuni. (Full Speech – J)

Uto Takashi - Deputy chairman of the House of Councillors Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, LDP member, graduate of the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management, former Air Self Defense Forces fighter pilot. (Full Speech – J)

Akaike Masaaki – Guest professor at Meiji University, former LDP member of the House of Representatives, graduate of the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management, former principal of the Japan Aviation High School. (Full Speech – J)

Nishioka Tsutomu – Professor at Tokyo Christian University, chairman of the national association for the aid to those abducted by the DPRK. (Full Speech - J)

Koike Yuriko - Chairman of the LDP Public Affairs Division, member of the House of Representatives, member of the board of directors of Renault, former chairman of the LDP General Council, former minister of defense, former minister of the environment, successful Koizumi candidate in 2005, former member of the Liberal Party, former television announcer, graduate of Cairo University, English and Arabic speaker (Full Speech - J)

Yamada Kenji - member of the House of Representatives, director with Societe Generale Private Banking, former employee of Mitsui Sumitomo Bank, seconded for a while to the Ministry of Economics, Trade and Industry. (Full Speech


[snip]

Tamogami Toshio – Chairman of Hang Tough Japan! All Japan Action Committee (Ganbare Nippon Zenkoku kodo iinkai), the former Chief of Staff of the Air Self Defense Forces who was relieved of his command and forced into retirement for composing a controversial essay (Link) exonerating Japan's pre-1945 government of war guilt. (Full Speech – J)

[snip]

-

"But wait. This event took place at the Hibiya Kokaido? Isn't that the hall where...?"

Yes, the hall where this happened (video has a viewer discretion warning).

Grotesque and utterly inappropriate?

Yes and no.

Perversely, along with Asanuma Inejiro, the hopes of Japan's revisionists were felled on that day 52 years ago. Asanuma's televised assassination delegitimized the ultra-patriotic and the revisionits, condemning them to a political Siberia from which they were to not to emerge for 45 years. Asanuma's 17 year-old assassin hanged himself in his cell a few weeks after the killing, seemingly sorry not for robbing a man of his life, but for having caused trouble for his comrades.

[The phrase the assassin scratched on the wall of his holding cell wall before taking his life? "I would give up life seven times more for my country. Tenno heika banzai!"]

In retrospect, Japan's Left probably never had what it took to push the revisionists and ultras back. The deniers had to, and did, do themselves in.

Now, after a half-a-hundred circuits about the Sun, we face perhaps a new reality.

If the above video of General Tamogami does not sate your craving for fulminating resentment, you can catch him live tomorrow (May 3). He will be participating in a panel discussion in Iwakuni (where the U.S. Marines base is) at the Iwakuni Shimin Kaikan.

"So who's on the panel with him?"

Funny you should ask that. One name: member of the House of Representatives Kishi Nobuo.

"You mean?"

Yes. The prime minister's younger brother. (Link – J)

Springtime for Japan's revisionists: one does not have to exaggerate, construct tenuous connections or issue paranoid prognostications.

The story writes itself.

Representing A Foreign Presence

Just a few days ago someone asked me what former Defense Minister and Liberal Democratic Party General Council Chair Koike Yuriko (7 elections to the Diet) was doing these days.

Ostensibly, she's...

...serving her second stint as bureau chief of the LDP Public Affairs Bureau...

...representing Tokyo District #10 again, after a cycle in the proportional section...

...and getting appointed an outside director to Renault. (Link - J)

Sacré bleu!

In the United States of America the incipient appointment would be seen as so very likely to be illegal that no company would give it half a thought, even without remuneration or transportation subsidy -- the conditions under which Koike says she will serve.

In France and in this blessed land? Taking in the officials of ruling political parties as advocates of the interests of shareholders? Obviously not so much of a problem.


Later - For an English language report from Kyodo News via The Japan Times, click here.

Later still - The Wall Street Journal's always excellent JapanRealTime blog catches up with Koike. She tells JRT she has little idea why she has been invited to join the Renault board. (Link)

On Fanaticism

A few weeks back University of Melbourne professor Richard Tanter wrote a Nautilus report on his attempt to shake the resolve of Koike Yuriko, the water carrier in Abe Shinzo's and the Liberal Democratic Party's efforts to promote women and women's issues.

Tanter's posting is deeply personal, which makes it a very hard read. (Link)

The hook is Koike's final brush off and the light her throwaway departing line shines upon fanaticism.

It seems that a fanatic, when confronted with an incovenient truth, finds solace and stability in confusing cause with effect.

Women, Population and Work - Another Look

The other day I introduced the interesting reversal in trends in attitudes regarding women and work to be found in the "Survey on Social Participation of Men and Women" (Danjo kyodo sanka shakai in kan suru yoron chosa) released on December 17. For the benefit of those who were unable to find the graphs in question, I reproduce them below, with links to the original pages.

"The husband should be outside working; the wife should keep house"

(Link - J)

"It is all right for women to continue working, even after they have children"

(Link - J)

In both cases, we see the onset of a wave of young fogies, where youngsters in the 20-to-29 years of age cohort have attitudes toward the roles of women, marriage and childrearing resembling those of persons 60 years of age and older, rather than their immediate superiors.

This is a new phenomenon. In previous surveys the youngest cohort has been among the most comfortable with wives working or women staying in the workforce.

Why the sudden reversal? The survey does not ask the respondents why they feel the way they do. I called the cohort the "echo boomers" -- the counterpart of the children of the baby boomers found in population pyramids for the United States. It would probably be better to call the current cohort of 20-to-29 year olds the Bubble Babies -- those born when Japan's rise in GDP and climb up the per capita income ladder were topping out, when families could live comfortably on but a single salary.

The 20-29 age cohort is struggling. In part this is because of the depressed economy, which has reduced the capacity and willingness of companies to hire large numbers of permanent workers.

The youngest cohort may also be struggling due to a lack of education. Today's 20-29 year olds are the first age cohort is to have all its members educated under yutori kyoiku ("easy-going education") system. The lowering of academic requirements and the decrease in the number of class hours may have left this cohort far less prepared for independent life than the cohorts that preceded it.

An aside - the yutori kyoiku reforms were repealed for elementary school children starting in 2002. The last children educated under the loosened system will graduate from high school in 2014. So when you find "strengthening the education system" in a political party's manifesto, the party in question is not really talking about improving education. That train left the station long ago. "Improving education" is a smokescreen for foisting more patriotism and officially traditional mores upon children and breaking the backs of teachers' unions.

As for the role of women in public life, two pictures from yesterday:

President-elect Park Geun-hye celebrating her victory in the South Korean presidential election.

Former Defense Minister Koike Yuriko at an unserious danpatsu event. Koike had sworn she would not cut her hair until the Liberal Democratic Party had retaken power. Yesterday she let 64 friends and supporters take a snippet from her uncharacteristically shoulder-length locks.

The advent of an LDP government is predicted to lead to one improvement in the atmospherics of government: women in prominent cabinet roles. Whereas the purportedly liberal Democratic Party had only token appointments of women--prime minister Kan Naoto's and prime minister Noda Yoshihiko's cabinets having but a single woman in them -- the incoming Abe Shinzo cabinet may have as many as five women members. Koike Yuriko and Takaichi Sanae (one of the rare women to have graduated from the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management) are almost certain to be named to prominent posts.

Conservative parties -- the pathways to power for women in East Asia.

----------------------
Image courtesies:
Top photo: Wall Street Journal
Bottom photo: Yomiuri Shimbun

Goodbye, Detritus

In decidedly minor political news, Kobayashi Koki, one of the total wastes of human skin Ozawa Ichiro brought into the Democratic Party of Japan for possibly no reason other than to make himself look better by comparison, has declared he will vote for the pending no confidence motion and leave the DPJ. He has found intolerable the party's having submitted a bill raising the consumption tax. (J)

Koba-chan, your train left the station over a month ago.

So long you Tokyo University Faculty of Law graduate, former Ministry of International Trade and Industry bureaucrat, former Liberal Democratic Party district seat holder, expelled from the LDP by Koizumi Jun'ichiro for opposing postal reform and stripped of your seat by Koike Yuriko, only to be returned to the House of Representatives as a proportional list seat winner for the DPJ -- you will most certainly not be missed.

Hi, My Name Is Tanaka Naoki And I Do Not Know Anything

It was cruel. It was theater.

On the one side was Koike Yuriko, the Iron Butterfly, attack dog of the Liberal Democratic Party in the non-Japanese media.

On the other was Tanaka Naoki, the Minister of Defense, about whom not much of substance can be said.

Koike - "What is the strategic goal of 'AirSea Battle'"?

Tanaka - "We welcome the new strategy of the United States...but as far as what has been said so far, I don't really understand it."

Koike - " Uhhh...I am at a loss for words...but seriously, in the ABCs of defense, this is 'A'."

(Link - J)

***

What was he thinking? The "he" in this case being Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko, who plucked Tanaka out from well-deserved obscurity to take over for the disastrous Ichikawa Yasuo, he of the "I am an amateur in defense matters...but this is the very essence of civilian control [of the military]" fame. The guy who did not know about the 1995 child rape case that set off the frantic rounds of Japan-U.S. discussions resulting in the plan to move Marine Corps Air Station Futenma to Henoko. The guy who was censured by the House of Councillors for his embarrassing lack of knowledge of defense matters.

Noda should have known the knives would be out for his next minister of defense. He should have known he would have to pick a sharpie to meet the onslaught from the opposition.

So what does the PM do? He picks his new minister of defense based on the number of times the man in question has been elected to the House of Councillors...because the cabinet needs to have a balance of members from the House of Representatives and from the House of Councillors.

It has been a raining snafus ever since.

- The promise to "begin construction at the Henoko site by the end of the year." Huh? Anyone tell the governor of Okinawa about this? (E)

- Confusing the weapons usage restrictions placed on Self Defense Forces members when they are assigned to peace-keeping operations with Japan's three principles on arms exports. (E)

- Upon visiting the city of Ginowan, where the operations of helicopters in and out of the Futenma base are viewed as a threat, particularly since one fell on a nearby university in 2004, Tanaka remarked to his aide, "There don't seem to be so many [helicopters flying about]." (E)

- When asked what country's forces will be cooperating with SDF personnel in a PKO in South Sudan, Tanaka responds, "That has not been decided yet." His senior vice minister pipes up, "The request has been put to a Bangladeshi construction battalion." Tanaka is forced to apologize. (E)

- Leaving the committee room from the same questioning session without informing the chair, Tanaka brings the session to a halt. When he returns 15 minutes later to cries of "Where have you been?" he apologizes for disappearing, saying that since his nose had been running uncontrollably he had gone to his office to get some cold medicine. (J)

- So frustrating the LDP's Sato Masahisa with his answers that the former SDF colonel and commander of Japan's forces in Iraq blurts out, "Gibberish! Trying to debate policy with an unqualified individual like you just drives one out of one's mind!" (J)

In an essay published by the East Asian Forum last week, I described Defense Minister Tanaka Naoki as a defense naïf. In my first draft, I had used the phrase "defense ignoramus." On the advice of friends, I softened my remark.

Possibly a bad instance of self-censorship.

The irony in all this? Prime Minister Noda's father was a career SDF man...a fact not lost on former colonel Sato:

"Prime Minister Noda's father was an SDF soldier. In his heart, the PM must be thinking, 'I would hate to have had my father working under this man.'" (ibid - J)

Koike Yuriko Embarrasses Herself

Koike Yuriko, the former newscaster, Defense Minister (veeerrrryyy briefly) and official attack dog of the Liberal Democratic Party in the English-language press has produced a "thought piece" on the political situation in the DPRK (Link). Having been warned by Janne Morén on the use of quotation marks, I nevertheless think them absolutely warranted here, as under no circumstances was Koike's brain ever actually engaged in the production of "North Korea's Samurai Rules." I was tempted to produce a post on "The Literary Crimes of Koike Yuriko" in an homage to Mark Twain's incomparable takedown "Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses" -- but frankly Koike's piece is not worth the effort. It would take hours to go through the errors, misrepresentations, mistaken notions, inconsistencies, self-defeating assertions and vain hopes populating this brief essay. My only hope is that some mean-spirited soul produces a Japanese translation of this exercise and disseminates it widely.

I will limit myself to a single scream of frustration: even a seven-year old knows that Hojo Masako was the wife of Minamoto no Yoritomo, not his daughter-in-law!

To think that this nonsense is to be reprinted in media outlets all over the globe makes the mind reel and stumble.

Tip o' the hat to Corey Wallace for posting the Koike piece on Facebook, where it has earned not a single "like" or comment.

The latest Kyodo poll numbers…

...in an initial glance tell me perilously close to nothing.

But let us take a longer look anyway, shall we?

As has seemingly been the case with every prime minister since time began, or since Koizumi Jun’ichiro, the top line number of support for the Cabinet fell from its initial reading.

Numbers are percentages. The previous month’s readings are in [ ].

Do you support the Cabinet or not?

Support 54.6 [62.8]
Do Not Support 27.8 [18.1]
Don’t know/Don’t care 17.6 [18.1]

There is has been a slight drop (30.0 to 23.5) in the number of respondents who say they support the Cabinet because they trust the prime minister. By contrast, there has been a big rise in the number who say they support the Cabinet because they see no one else as appropriate as prime minister (32.2 to 47.5).

It is this latter number that Policy Research Council Chairman Maehara Seiji has to worry about if should he seek to challenge Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko in the next Democratic Party of Japan leadership election, scheduled to be held next September. The basis of Maehara’s potential leadership run is his popularity with the public. The more Noda is accepted as the only real candidate for the job of prime minister, the harder it will be for Maehara to convince his peers that he is the leader the party needs to prevail in the next House of Representatives election.

This is an an aside, but Maehara also has to worry about being lulled into fealty to Noda through Noda’s expansion of the powers and influence of the position of Policy Research Chairman. Maehara has to keep reminding himself, as the months click by, “I am being bought off. I am being bought off…”

As to the all-important numbers of support for the parties, the numbers for the two main parties have not budged at all. There has been a slight tick upward in the number for the party of cynics and smartasses Your Party and for the Communists – but not so great as to say that voter dissatisfaction with the status quo is rising.

Which party do you support?

DPJ 27.1 [27.2]
LDP 23.2 [23.6]
Your Party 5.7 [4.9]
New Komeito 4.0 [3.5]
Communist 3.2 [2.2]
Socialist 0.9 [0.8]
PNP 0.4 [0.1]
Sunrise 0.2 [0.6]
Other 0.3 [0.1]
Support no party 33.8 [35.7]
Don't know/Don't care 1.2 [1.3]

As for the big news of the weekend (at least it was big news inside the confines of Nagata-cho) – that the Liberal Democratic Party’s factions, which had been rather dormant, rose up to lop off a few heads in party’s executive offices – it has scarcely entered the public’s consciousness:

LDP President Tanigaki Sadakazu retained Secretary-General Ishihara Nobuteru, but named Motegi Toshimitsu Chairman of the Policy Research Council and Shionoya Ryu Chairman of the General Council. Do you have any expectations of this new LDP party executive?

Have expectations 32.1
Have no expectations 60.6
Don’t know, Don’t care 7.3

Replacing the human quote machines Ishiba Shigeru and Koike Yuriko (to be fair, having the Iron Butterfly as the head of the General Council did not make much sense, considering the number of parties she has been in. But absent the ability of giving her a cabinet post, how else could Tanigaki put her in the spotlight?) is a risky move for Tanigaki, as he is cringeworthy when cornered by the cameras. Faction leaders Machimura, Koga and Nukaga could not be denied having their own representatives in the power positions, however.

Overall, Prime Minister Noda should be pleased with the results of the poll. The index of public testiness, the date at which the prime minister should dissolve the Diet and call an election, has receded into the haze of the distant future:

When do you think that the next dissolution of the Diet and House of Representatives election should take place?

This year 15.6
Next year 33.2
In 2013, when the term of the present Diet ends 46.6
Don’t Know, Don’t care 5.2


Later - I thought the questions about the supplementary budget and tax rises were idiotic, as they did not ask the respondents, "What would you do if you were in the prime minister's position? What mix of taxes, budget cuts and bond issuance would you propose?" Instead, the respondents were asked whether or not they "value" or "appreciate" (hyoka suru) the proposed third supplementary budget or the proposed tax rises.

Others thought these questions and their answers newsworthy.

The LDP Decides Success Is Killing It

"If you blunder, don't give up fighting. After getting the advantage, your opponent may relax and let you escape."

- Bruce Pandolfini, from "The Ten Commandments of Chess"

Could someone please explain to me, in simple terms, so that I can understand it, what the heck has gotten into the Liberal Democratic Party these last two days?

First, LDP Party President Tanigaki Sadakazu shakes up his core leadership group, dumping Ishiba Shigeru as the chairman of the Policy Research Council, Koike Yuriko as the chairman of the General Council and Aizawa Ichiro as the Diet Affairs Chairman. He replaces Ishiba with Motegi Toshimitsu, the Harvard Kennedy School of Public Policy grad, former McKinsey man and former Waseda University Graduate School prof (OK, we get it: he's no dunderhead - Editor). Koike, the fireball who regularly plunks the Democratic Party of Japan in foreign newspapers without the DPJ ever knowing about it, he replaces with Shiotani Shionoya Ryu, another U.S.-educated member, though nothing nearly so high powered as Motegi. Aizawa, Prime Minister Noda's classmate in the first graduating class at the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management, he replaces with Kishida Fumio, whose claims to fame are having served a five-year stint in the Long Term Credit Bank before becoming his father's secretary, eventually inheriting his father's seat (ja).

It was true that Ishiba and Koike lost an internal argument with Ishihara Nobuteru, the LDP's Secretary-General over how much the LDP could cooperate with the DPJ in responding to the nation's myriad problems. Ishiba and Koike, being rational, could not get their heads entirely wrapped around Tanigaki's wish to simultaneously "confront and cooperate with" (taisaku to kyoryoku) the DPJ.

Aizawa seems to have been dumped specifically because he is a Matsushita Seijuku grad, making him suspect when so many of his fellow alumni are serving in the Cabinet and the DPJ's secretariat.

Tanigaki was also under a great deal of pressure, it seems, from the old men in the party to appoint an executive more reflective of LDP traditions, that is to say, one major post for each of the main factions. Motegi is from the Nukaga Faction, Shiotani Shionoya from the Machimura Faction (the largest faction) and Kishida from the Koga Faction.

We will see how all these men do in their new posts. From the outside, this looks like change for change's sake, with some slight hint that the LDP might shift gears and cooperate more with the government.

Meanwhile in the House of Councillors, all hell is breaking loose in between the chairman of the House caucus Nakasone Hirofumi and a majority of the LDP's members in the upper house. Mistrusted Nakasone appointee Kosaka Kenji has been forced to resign as the LDP's House of Councillors Secretary-General and a slate of officers including Konosuke Yoshitada, Nakasone's anointed replacement for Kosaka, was rejected by a vote of the party's House of Councillors membership. In a power play similar to what has taken place around Tanigaki, the Machimura, Koga and Nukaga factions are pushing their own candidate to replace Kosaka (ja).

Unsurprisingly, the focus of the fight is now shifting away from the replacement of Kosaka to the unseating of Nakasone as the party's leader in the House of Councillors.

Former Prime Minister Kan Naoto must be wondering right now, as he is looking up from his reading on alternative energy sources,"Why couldn't they have fallen back into their old backstabbing ways during my tenure? What effect does Noda have on them that I could not have?"

Not Content Within the Confines of a Little Pond, Evidently

Damn, is she in a hurry.

Former Environment and briefly Defense Minister Koike Yuriko (literally "Little Pond Lily Girl") --whose possible candidacy for the prime ministership has been labeled a media fantasy by former Prime Minister Mori Yoshirō -- seems nevertheless to be preparing for a possible sloughing off the LDP in yet another immaculate political ecdysis*.

Koike, whose career has given "rapid shifts of party allegiance in Japanese politics" a whole new meaning, is doing an astoundingly rapid build out of the interesting meeting of April 9 where she dined with former Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichirō, Motegi Toshimitsu and others--the precursor of the projected monthly meetings being organized by former Toyota Chairman Okuda Hiroshi .

Last night, following a speech on the environment, Koike had a very interesting comment about her "buddies" (nakama) that bears translation:

私は日本新党出身なので自民党にも民主党にも仲間がおり、分かれていても日本を変えなければならないという方向性は同じ。大人の対応ができるような舞台回しの役割を果たせれば...

"Me, I'm originally from the Japan New Party. I have buddies in the LDP and the DPJ. Though we are apart, we are pointed in the same direction: we must change Japan. If we fulfill our role turning of events around (butai mawashi) in the manner of adults, like we know how to do..."

She also purportedly complimented her former colleagues as individuals who could put aside political gamesmanship (seikyoku) in favor what is good for the nation.

The Japan New Party...hmmmm...oh, the memories...an LDP-busting center-left party that snatched 35 seats in the historic July 1993 House of Representatives election, propelling its leader Hosokawa Morihiro into the prime ministership and pulling Koike out of the sleepy political parking lot that was the House of Councillors.

Anybody of that party still around, now that Hosokawa has switched his energies over to the production of ceramics?

Well, let uss ssssseeeee here.

There is Koike and

Motegi (LDP) who is the chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Health, Labour and Welfare

and, oh

Minister of the Environment Kamoshita Ichirō (LDP)
Special Advisor the Prime Minister Itō Tatsuya (LDP)
former Democratic Party Leader Maehara Seiji
Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Audit and Oversight of the Administration Edano Yukio (DPJ)
Speaker of the House of Councillors Eda Satsuki (DPJ - currently in suspension)...

Looks like a decent bunch of well-respected centrists whose loyalty to their respective party leaders is...uncertain?

Couple this with former Prime Minister Koizumi having purportedly "ants in his pants" (oshiri ga muzu muzu shite iru)--at least according to Koike (no tittering from the peanut gallery, please) about the way his successors have mishandled reform--I would not be too sure that Koizumi will be willing to help out the LDP candidate in the Yamaguchi #2 election.

[That the kind of help several in the LDP want Koizumi to extend is to become the lightning rod for anger at the start of the automatic pension deductions for elder care--at a time when the government is underpaying many seniors through having lost track of their pension accounts--is another reason I think it unlikely he will trek on down to the Iwakuni area this week.]

I would also, if I were in a position of power in the LDP right now, be very suspicious of Koizumi's advice. I would also not be taking at face value the nodding agreement of Koizumi fellow travelers Nakagawa Hidenao and Takebe Tsutomu that passing the gasoline tax bill using the override provision is a simply smashing idea.

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* The use of the word "ecdysis" in this post is dedicated to Coco Masters's use of the word "micturition" in a TIME general interest article on Japan last week.

Telegraphing Realignment Or Just Hanging Out?

If you are infatuated with, and some people are, the idea that the Liberal Democratic Party and the Democratic Party of Japan are destined to sort themselves out into ideologically coherent parties, with reformers banding together into a new political force--then you are going to love the new meeting of minds being set up by Special Advisor to the Cabinet Okuda Hiroshi, the former chairman of Toyota Motors.

According to today's Nihon Keizai Shimbun, sometime after the Golden Week holidays a gang of folks will start getting together on a regular (teikiteki) basis to talk about...well, gosh, what could they be talking about?

From the LDP
Former Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichirō
Former Minister of Defense/the Environment Koike Yuriko
Former McKinsey consultant and Harvard M.A. holder Motegi Toshimitsu
Tōdai Law graduate and former aide to U.S. Senator Willian Roth Hayashi Yoshimasa
Tōdai Law graduate and holder of an M.A. from the Maryland School of Public Policy Nishimura Yasutoshi

(Nota Bene - are we talking considerable experience in either work or study abroad here, or what?)

From the DPJ
Former Party Leader Maehara Seiji
Tōdai Law graduate and the Socialist Party's go-to guy on legal issues Sengoku Yoshito
Deputy Policy Research Council Chairman Fukuyama Tetsurō
Former Deputy Secretary-General Genba Kōichirō

(Maehara, Fukuyama and Genba are all products of the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management political finishing school)

From the corporate sector
Rakuten founder Mikitani Hiroshi

and others.

I ask again, what would these folks have to talk about, meeting on a regular basis?

For some odd reason I think that neither "above all loyalty to party or one's organization" or "in order to make Japan great again we must lead a revival of traditional values" will be major themes.