A guide to Japan’s general election
1 month ago
Marginalia on Japanese politics and society
JPN Education Reform Watch - D. McNeill article on Shinto organizations shows the fastest route to moral power is through being certifiably nuts http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/11/23/national/politics-diplomacy/back-to-the-future-shintos-growing-influence-in-politics/#.VHPU64uUe30So the father of the current Shinto Seiji Renmei chair was the chief priest at Yasukuni. I had no idea. Kind of undermines the excuse sampai apologists always toss out that Yasukuni is an independent religious corporation unconnected to the national management organizations for the shrines.
Trying this again - check out Rikki Kersten's sharp look at the Dec 14 JPN House of Reps election http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/11/21/Shinzo-Abe-risks-ire-of-disaffected-voters.aspx via @LowyInstitutePuts the matter more succintly and acidly than anyone else so far
Japan Diplomacy Watch - I cannot wait to read actual texts of the query put to the Abe Cabinet and the Cabinet's reply on the non-agreement with China http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2014-11/22/c_133807413.htm
Japanese voters see no way of expressing disastifaction with Abe gov't (J) http://www.nikkei.com/article/DGXLASFS23H1W_T21C14A1PE8000/ but you knew that…
In Japan's one bastion of mildly violent feudal obesity, a Mongolian giant now shares record with a half-Ukranian giant http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0001741205
Japan Nuclear - Why must it take until next summer for LDP to proposed a best energy mix for the country? (J) http://www.nikkei.com/article/DGXLASFS23H13_T21C14A1PE8000/
JPN Labor Watch - terrible half-article on under-supervised foreign trainee program. Problems serious; article not http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/11/23/national/japan-sanctioning-mass-slave-labor-via-foreign-trainee-program/#.VHPWU4uUe30Dr. Mireya Solis writes a strong essay on two main competing free trade areas for the Asia-Pacific. The final attempt to rouse Americans from their torpor on the Trans Pacific Partnership seems misplaced, though: if China is interested in free trade and pushes its agenda in its region, where’s the negative? The U.S. should not have to be and should not be on the forefront of everything.
Fractured Ito Masami article on limits of Abe's Womenomics demonstrates difficulty of framing abstract with concrete http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2014/11/22/lifestyle/can-women-really-shine-abe/#.VHIZiSGChtQ
China flexes its muscles at APEC with the revival of FTAAP - http://goo.gl/updtDU
"Will Abenomics go forward? Will it come to a complete stop? That is what this election is asking. Are our economic policies mistaken? Are they correct? Is there some other choice? That is what I wish to ask the voters."
LDP 25.3%(Link - J)
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%
LDP 37%(Link - J)
DPJ 13%
JIP 9%
Communist 6%
Komeito 4%
Socialist 1%
Life 0%
Next Generations 0%
Other parties 2%
Undecided 30%
This time...you've gone too far
This time...you've gone too far
This time...you've gone too far
I told you, I told you, I told you, I told you
- Peter Gabriel, "Digging in the Dirt" (1992)
The Capitalism of the Mizuho no Kuni
[...]
From ancient times unto the present, this country called "Nippon" has been a place where one rises early in the morning and cultivates one's fields and rice paddies, sweat streaming. When the Autumn comes, together, with the Imperial Family at the center, we pray at the Festival of the Five Grains. This is the "Mizuho no Kuni." It is based upon self-reliance and self-help. If by some ill-chance a person should fall ill, all of the inhabitants of the village would help [the ill person]. This from ancient times unto the present has been the social welfare system of "Nippon." It is bound up in the DNA of the Japanese people.
I believe there is a capitalism of a Mizuho no Kuni that is appropriate for a Mizuho no Kuni. However, while having an emphasis on an economy where there is free competition, it is not the capitalism that takes, as its motive force, greed, the type that has emerged out of Wall Street to take the world by storm. Emphasizing ethics and rules (dogi) and with a sense of what real wealth (makoto no yutakasa) is -- a form of market-based ideology in the Mizuho no Kuni that is appropriate for the Mizuho no Kuni.
The Abe family has its roots in Nagato City, from long ago the township of Yuya. There are terraced rice paddies there. They face the Sea of Japan and when they are filled with water, in each one there is a reflection of the Moon, the reflections of the lights of the distant fishing boats. It is so beautiful as to take one’s breath away.
The labour productivity of terraced rice paddies is low. From the point of view of economic rationality they are nonsense, perhaps. But precisely because there are these terraced rice paddies, this is my ancestral home. Furthermore, because we have these rural vistas, is this not why a graceful and lovely Nippon exists? Amid a market-based ideology, tradition, culture and regional difference can still be emphasized. I want to go forward thinking about the means to an economy appropriate to a Mizuho no Kuni.
[Unofficial Translation by M. T. Cucek]
News of possible election law and political funding violations forced the resignations last week of Abe's justice and trade ministers, both among the five women who had just taken office in the early September Cabinet reshuffle that showcased Abe's commitment to stronger roles for women in leadership.
"It's a serious setback. So much of the Abe Cabinet's shine was due to its aura of invincibility and inevitability," said Michael Cucek, a Tokyo-based analyst and fellow at Temple University Japan.
Troubles over campaign funds and related issues have long contributed to Japan's famous "revolving door" politics. Abe's first term as prime minister, in 2006-2007, ended when he was driven from office by scandals and health problems after just a year.
Abe got a rare second chance when his Liberal Democrats regained power from the Democratic Party in December 2012. Since then, the LDP's coalition with the Buddhist-affiliated Komeito, or Clean Government Party, has established majorities in both houses of the parliament.
This time around, Abe has cultivated a confident, relaxed style of leadership, repeatedly declaring "Japan is back!" while his chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga endeavors to keep their gaffe-prone allies more or less in line.
"Until this crisis it looked pretty certain he was just going to cruise," Cucek said. "Now that politics as usual has returned we could see the same sort of decay that we've seen in the past," he said.
Obuchi's portfolio includes authority over the nation's nuclear power plants and her softer image—a young mother, after all—was expected to soothe public anxiety over plans to restart the reactors. Obuchi is the daughter of former Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, who ran Japan from July 1998 to April 2000, and had even been touted as a possible successor to Abe somewhere down the road. But the close scrutiny that comes with a Cabinet appointment exposed her as a political lightweight and a product of the LDP machine, says Michael Cucek, a researcher and author of a respected political blog in Tokyo. "She represents someone who vaulted into prominence by the death of a sitting prime minister, taking over the family business without ever knowing much about how the whole machine works," he said.Obuchi's admission at her press conference that she trusted and did not check up on persons working for her whom she had known since childhood and Thursday's raid by prosecutors of the home of former Nakanojo mayor Orita Ken'ichiro and the offices of Obuchi support group (link) seemingly justified a rather testy set of exchanges I fell into on Twitter regarging Obuchi's credentials:
(Link)
@hobson_c All right. Aside from the brief, unremarkable service as Vice Minister of Finance, Obuchi's other credentials were?
— Michael Thomas Cucek (@MichaelTCucek) October 21, 2014
@hobson_c Obuchi's appoinment to Aso Cabinet was pure electoral tokenism, as that Cabinet was created for a snap election.
— Michael Thomas Cucek (@MichaelTCucek) October 21, 2014
@hobson_c She is going under because of resentment against her selection based upon birth and gender, and a dearth of meritocratic criteria.
— Michael Thomas Cucek (@MichaelTCucek) October 21, 2014
@sonicviz @hobson_c No, but life is unfair like that sometimes.
— Michael Thomas Cucek (@MichaelTCucek) October 21, 2014
@sonicviz @hobson_c After the ordeal she still has wealth, inherited status and a supportive family -- and all that was by chance too.
— Michael Thomas Cucek (@MichaelTCucek) October 21, 2014