Consider My Mind Blown

Just in case anyone is missing the significance of Abe Shinzo's sudden rush to meet with Donald Trump, try recalling who Abe is, or at least who is supposed to be according to his domestic critics and elements of the international news media and non-Japanese academia.

Come with me on a short walk-through what seems to be Ultimate Irony Town:

Abe Shinzo

Is traveling to the United States

To plead with the incipient leader of the United States

To foster and preserve a liberal, rules-based order in the Asia-Pacific

And ask him to not indulge himself in facile, nationalist posturing,

Lashing out based on a dated and embarrassing worldview.

Do you need to hear that again?

Abe Shinzo

Is traveling to the United States

To plead with the incipient leader of the United States

To foster and preserve a liberal, rules-based order in the Asia-Pacific

And ask him to not indulge himself in facile, nationalist posturing,

Lashing out based on a dated and embarrassing worldview.

Now some links to commentary by folks I admire:

On the Trump victory’s implication for American leadership in East Asia, Daniel Sneider

http://toyokeizai.net/articles/-/144829

On the importance of TPP, Mireya Solis

https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-trans-pacific-partnership-the-politics-of-openness-and-leadership-in-the-asia-pacific-2/

James D. J. Brown on the implications of the Trump victory for Japan-Russia relations

http://asia.nikkei.com/Viewpoints/Viewpoints/James-D.J.-Brown-Japan-s-Abe-eyes-Trump-factor-in-Russia-policy

On the Abe visit with Trump, Robert Dujarric

http://thediplomat.com/2016/11/what-should-shinzo-abe-say-to-donald-trump/

As I have been saying for a long while, though hardly believing it myself:

Abe Shinzo = liberal icon


Later -

I would endorse Funabashi Yoichi's op-ed for The New York Times but the judgmental "should" appears too often for my tastes. Perhaps others would benefit from reading it, nonetheless:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/16/opinion/the-trump-effect-on-tokyo.html?_r=1

On The Nishikawa Resignation

Ripple in still waters
Where there is no pebble tossed
Or wind to blow.

-- Garcia and Hunter, "Ripple" (1970)

Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Nishikawa Koya (House of Representatives, North Kanto Proportional) resigned yesterday, 173 days after he was appointed to the position. He was immediately replaced by Hayashi Yoshimasa (House of Councillors, Yamaguchi Prefecture) his predecessor in the post. (Link)

By picking up the unemployed Hayashi, Prime Minister Abe Shinzo has tried to limit the fallout from the loss of a third minister from his second Cabinet, this after his first Cabinet became the longest-serving team of the postwar era. (Link)

Dogged questioning of Nishikawa in Diet Budget committee had become a distraction. The committee's vital work of approving of the next year's budget, due on March 31st, is already seriously off-schedule thanks to the double whammy of a December House of Representatives election and a February start for the Regular Diet Session. With the Nishikawa questioning it looked like it was going to run completely off the rails. Final stage negotiations for Trans Pacific Partnership looked similarly imperiled.

The violations of campaign finance law in question were not huge -- one illegal campaign donation of 1 million yen (USD$8,400) and another of 3 million yen (USD$25,200). The violations were of a technical nature -- made before a legally mandated embargo of one year had expired -- and before Nishikawa became a member of the government. Nishikawa's office, which accepted the donations, had no practical way of knowing the donations violated the law. Nishikawa also had his office return the donations even while arguing he and his people had done nothing wrong.

The opposition would not let go of the issue, though. Questioners called Nishikawa up out of his seat so often, forcing him to repeat his explanations so many times, he finally had to throw in the towel, crying, "No matter how much I explain [the donations], those who do not understand will not understand." (Link - J)

What he probably wanted to say was "Those who do not want to understand will never understand" or better yet "Those whose paychecks depend upon their not understanding will not understand." Such would have been perceived as rude -- and Nishikawa needs no more trouble.

There were good, non-legal reasons why the prime minister had reason to accept, if not demand, Nishikawa's resignation.

First was the principle of equality of the sexes, i.e., "What is good for the goose is good for the gander." Last year Obuchi Yuko and Matsushima Midori had to tender their unprecedented twin resignations for campaign violations, and quickly, for what in Matsushima's case were violations of comically minute scale. Sticking by Nishikawa, dragging out budget deliberations when Obuchi and Matsushima were so easily jettisoned for far less important legislation threatened to raise hackles within the LDP.

Second, the torture of Nishikawa -- for torture was what it was -- caused a sudden and extremely inconvenient of eruption of The Bad Abe. On the 19th and 20th Abe, seated in the prime minister's chair, heckled DPJ members during their time, snapping, "Well, what about you? You take donations from the Japan Teacher's Union!" -- loudly enough to be easily audible, earning the PM a warning from Budget Committee chairman Oshima Tadamori. On the 23rd Abe apologized for making the remarks, asking to have them withdrawn from the official record of the sessions. (Link - J)

To be sure, Abe has had a rough time hanging on to his agriculture ministers. He had to replace three in his first, year-long stint in the premiership. The first of his ag ministers, Matsuoka Toshikatsu, indeed became the first cabinet minister to commit suicide while in office since soon-to-be-arrested-as-a-war-criminal Prince Konoe Fumimaro in 1945.

The open question is whether the Nishikawa resignation represents a significant violation of the unwritten rules of the Diet. One of the most preposterous and yet durable concepts in Japanese politics is misogi -- "ablution" -- whereby a politician or a party in trouble with the law (OK, OK, an LDP politician or the LDP) is cleansed of the stain of scandal by reelection in a general election. (See these Okumura Jun posts making mention of the concept)

The thought that opposition parties and public prosecutors would actually play along with such a LDP-serving concept is hard to swallow. However, one finds misogi references sprinkled throughout the literature.

Nishikawa was already the target of opposition criticism in the fall extraordinary session. He should, logically, have been let off the hook by the 14 December 2014 House of Representatives election.

However, Nishikawa did not actually win the public's approval in December. He lost the contest for his Tochigi district seat, albeit by the tiniest of margins (46.54% vs. 46.69% of the vote). He returned to the House of Representatives and the cabinet via the proportional "zombie candidate" route.

So in a formal sense Nishikawa was not in line to claim retroactive immunity through a misogi of voter approbation.

However, it would be unwise to put too much stock in misogi restraining the opposition from tying up the Abe government into knots over the rest of this session. The Tanigaki Sadakazu-led LDP's scorched earth tactics during the Kan and Noda administrations (where the LDP would not vote for legislation delivering on LDP campaign promises) dug a nearly bottomless well of ill-feeling in all of the opposition parties save perhaps the Japan Innovation Party. The opposition will be drawing on that resentment for years to come, harassing Abe cabinet members and Abe himself on the most piddling of deviations from absolute rectitude.

The future -- especially a future where one of today's opposition parties takes power -- be damned.

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

For a sense of the spectrum of indigenous opinion on what has just happened:

A "This is just the beginning of the discussion" editorial - from the Mainichi Shimbun (Link)

A "Nothing to see here, folks. Let's all move along" editorial - from The Yomiuri Shimbun (Link)

The truth is somewhere in between.


Later - The proposed decapitation of JA-Zenchu figures into the decision to accept Nishikawa's resignation. Since I think the reform of Japan Agriculture is bogus, or at least misrepresented, I am going to just let the whole matter slide.

Later still - The Japan Times has checked in with a report that seems to confirm the Mainichi's view of the current political climate as the more correct one. (Link)

On The TPP Negotiations And Abe Shinzo's Sense Of America

Friend Stephen Harner finds much to harrumph about regarding the purported proposals on the steps the government of Japan can take to increase the sales of U.S automobiles in Japan made during this most recent round of talks on the proposed Trans Pacific Partnership by the U.S. negotiating team. (Link)

And yes, Harner's post does not even touch upon the anachronistic and preposterous U.S. light trucks tariff, or the ridiculous U.S. suggestions as to a timetable for its abolition.

My only quibble with Mr. Harner's piece is his ending. I am reluctant to believe Prime Minister Abe Shinzo is willing give away much to secure a deal with the U.S. on TPP. Abe probably believes that pushing hard on the construction of a Futenma Replacement Facility at Henoko in Okinawa and some sort of increase in the capacities of the Self Defense Forces to participate in international security affairs are together more than sufficient for him to pick up the big pencil and check off the "Took Care Of The Alliance" box. Making positive noises about TPP helps maintain international investor interest in Japan, particularly in the all-important Japanese equities markets. However, the decision to have Japan participate in the TPP was made by the now much-maligned Prime Minister Kan Naoto of the Democratic Party of Japan. The negotiations have dragged on -- but as a legacy, not a core, Abe Cabinet economic initiative.

Furthermore, as Tobias Harris sagely noted, TPP is, for Abe Shinzo, a part of the "second" opening of Japan (Link -- not the third one, as Prime Minister Kan insisted the trade partnership would be. (Link)

That little bit of contemporary revisionism on Abe's part tells a grand tale of his willingness or not to kowtow to America.

Yeah, It Is A Golden Week, For Him

"You know, for some reason, I just feel this belongs around my neck."


Last week, Abe Shinzo got U.S. President Barack Obama to say the magic words: the Japan-U.S. Security Arrangements cover the defense of the Senkakus. (Link)

He hosted the president (OK, His Majesty was the nominal host, it being a state visit and all) in a visit without a hint of public acrimony and even a little warmth in between the two leaders. (Link)

His negotiators went nose-to-nose with their American counterparts in Trans Pacific Partnership talks...and when those negotiators did not see on the table a deal they wanted, they asked for a break, leaving the Americans at once flabbergasted and unable to express their frustration in public. (Link - J)

When President Obama made a strong statement in South Korea criticizing the treatment of the comfort women, Abe found it in himself to express his own, heartfelt sorrow (No coughing back there! You hear me? I mean it, no coughing!) at the suffering of the women. (Link - J)

The Liberal Democratic Party and New Komeito-backed candidate won the Kagoshima District #2 by-election, completing what seems to be the LDP's and the Abe Cabinet's Immaculate Extrication from the Tokuda family's systematic and flagrant violations of election laws. (Link)

And to top off the weekend, the pro-Henoko base LDP-New Komeito-Democratic Party of Japan-backed candidate in the Okinawa City election defeated his anti-Henoko rival, demonstrating that not even the humiliation of the local LDP chapter over the Henoko base and/or the pressure put on ailing Okinawa governor Nakaima Hirokazu could defeat the ruling coalition's punching power. (Link - J)

If the equities markets do not go into free-fall this morning over the delay in any sort of deal on TPP -- which they probably will not, given that no one wants to mess up his or her Golden Week holiday plans -- the PM is likely to be in an insufferable state of smug satisfaction all the way to May 7.

-----------
Photo image courtesy: Abe Shinzo official Facebook page.

Size Matters

Finally, an article in the vernacular press explaining, at least partially, how Japan's vehicle markets can be so resistant to imports.

Are Japan's Minicars a Trade Barrier?
Nation's Preference for Ultrasmall Autos Poses Hurdle for Foreign Auto Makers

TOKYO—Japan's auto market, once a global trend setter, has become one of the most disconnected from markets elsewhere, putting it at risk of becoming irrelevant, say executives here.

More than 90% of cars sold in Japan are Japanese brands. A third of them—ultralight minicars—are sold nowhere else. Originally developed to fill Japan's need for cheap cars after World War II, they are too small or too expensive for other markets.

The country's singularly strong appetite for fuel-efficient cars means car makers have developed a series of advanced technologies, such as hybrid cars, that don't necessary translate easily elsewhere.

Japan has no tariffs on auto imports. Japanese auto executives say the country's unique tastes are a big reason for global auto makers' failure to thrive in the world's third largest auto-buying country, after China and the U.S. Foreign auto executives say the country's preferential tax treatment for minicars and its unique safety and environmental regulations are nontariff barriers that protect the country from foreign competition...

(Link)

Had the author added brand loyalty based on regional and keiretsu ties to his reasons why Japanese consumers and business customers buy what they buy, he would have covered all the bases.

The ruling coalition is set to try leveling the playing field in terms of the tax advantages of minicars. The Liberal Democratic Party's tax committee has recommended lowering the acquisition tax for full-size vehicles and raising the annual taxes minicar owners pay by 50%. (Link). Minicar manufacturers and their suppliers screamed in protest when the proposals came before the committee.

Minicar makers, particularly minicar-motorcycle manufacturers like Suzuki and Yamaha, seem to have little traction or connection with Abe Shinzo and his allies, however. Daihatsu in theory might have been able to bend the ear of the LDP tax committee, corporate parent Toyota Motors being seen as a vital member of Team Abe thanks to President Toyoda Akio's obsequious praise of Abenomics.

Daihatsu, is, however, the outcast problem child of the Toyota family. Toyota Motors would really want to have Daihatsu customers buying the group's more profitable full-sized cars. That Daihatsu did not take a lead in fighting the tax changes, leveraging the Abe-Toyoda relationship into influence upon the committee's deliberations, is not surprising.

Raising the taxes on minicars goes partway into answering the charges of U.S. automakers that regulations plays a role in closing Japan's auto markets to foreign manufacturers. The tax changes can therefore be seen as one facet of the political show Japan has to put on in order to consolidate its position inside Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations on vehicle tariffs -- where the white whale of Japanese trade policy, the U.S. 25% tariff on light trucks (a.k.a., minivans), lurks.

The still far off tax rise (the tax changes would only affect vehicles purchased after March 2015) on minicars does carry a political price. Minicars are seen as "people's cars" (Ja, ist Japonishes Volkswagen!) and everyday life vehicles (seikatsu no ashi - literally, "livelihood legs"). They are particularly important for rural households, which generally have lower than national average incomes yet which need a vehicle for each adult family member for both personal transportation and ferrying goods. Raising the costs of owning a minicar, or two or three or four as is often the case, is a rude slap in the face to rural voters. Coupled with the recently announced plan to phase out the gentan rice subsidy program over the next five years (Link), it looks as though the LDP is double-crossing the rural voters who remained loyal to the LDP even during the party's years of decline and banishment to the political wilderness.

Thinking that the demographic trends in agriculture and the rural areas make the minicar tax rise a safe bet for the LDP -- a "So long and thanks for the votes, you losers" -- ignores the reality that younger consumers are also big fans of minicars. Ticking off youth, folks who will voting for a long time to come, seems dumb, strategically. The young, however, are s numerically small proportion of the current electorate who do themselves no favors by furthermore not showing up at the polls on election day. (Link - J)

So minicars go to it, despite their extreme popularity.

Is Nothing Sacred?

And the world and the world and the world.
The world drags me down...

- The Cult, "She Sells Sanctuary" (1985)

Here is an item for filing in the "Surprises That Come As No Surprise" file:

Japan may opt to give up 'sanctuary' on TPP items
Yomiuri Shimbun

The government and ruling parties will begin considering whether tariffs on five categories of agricultural products that have been regarded as a “sanctuary” can be removed in tariff negotiations of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) multilateral trade initiative, in which 12 countries, including Japan and the United States, are participants, according to sources.

The government and the ruling parties have treated five categories of products—rice; wheat; beef and pork; dairy products; and farm products that are used as sweeteners, such as sugar cane—as key product categories for which tariffs should be maintained.

But now that the talks are facing difficulties, the government and ruling parties have to consider whether tariffs on some products in the categories can be removed.

Koya Nishikawa, chairman of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s committee on the TPP, said Sunday he would consider removing items during his visit to Bali, Indonesia.

"We have to consider whether [some products in the five categories] can be removed [from subjects for maintaining tariffs]," Nishikawa told reporters.

Akira Amari, state minister in charge of TPP affairs, said Sunday in Bali, "It's helpful that our party will hold discussions," indicating that the government will start considering the issue in step with the LDP’s review.

In response, LDP Secretary General Shigeru Ishiba told reporters Monday morning at the LDP headquarters, "Unless we put individual items into consideration, we will not be able to lead the negotiations to our advantage..."

(Link)

Who would have ever guessed that up unto and through the July elections, where rural district votes outweigh urban and suburban ones at ratios up 5 to 1, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party would swear eternal protections for Japan's beautiful agriculture, only to turn around post-election and offer up those protections as a sacrifice in order to win a deal improving Japan's negotiating position in a trade pact Japan's large multinationals and major business lobbies see as crucial?

Who would have guessed at this treachery?

It is as if Abe Shinzo were beholden in some way to big business interests for his return to power (Link) -- and as if Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party were preparing for the possibility, however remote, that agriculture's inordinate and disproportionate influence on national affairs might be undone by a blow from on high.

An aside - while reversing course on the sanctuary status of agricultural products may hurt Prime Minister Abe Shinzo and the LDP in the long run, in the short run, the person in pain is Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Hayashi Yoshimasa. It is Hayashi's job to protect the interests of Japan's primary products producers in the Cabinet -- and he is clearly failing as champion.

That Hayashi would be hung out to dry does not come as much of surprise: he did run against Abe for the post of party president last year. Abe punished him for his temerity, giving him a portfolio destined to make him either decidedly unpopular or a laughingstock.

Hayashi's predicament is not exceptional: the other LDP presidents-in-waiting who had the misfortune of running against Abe are in similar straits. Ishiba Shigeru, who defeated Abe in the first round of voting but did not gain the majority necessary to become president, received the consolation prize of the party secretary-generalship -- only to be shackled with the chaperoning of two women (and thus undismissable) sanyaku who detest one another other. At the same time the Cabinet and the Prime Minister's Residence have been surreptitiously gobbling up powers, instigating without announcement a more Westminister-like system of policy and party management, diminishing the importance of party leadership posts.

As for Ishihara Nobuteru, Abe appointed him Minister of the Environment -- and no one has heard from or seen Ishihara since.

Later - What I have to guess is Tamzin Booth of The Economist has checked in with a fleshed out Banyan post on the Abe government's perfidity. (Link)

As for Ishihara Nobuteru, no sooner do I declare him missing-in-action but he turns up in Kyushu, at a most interesting United Nations conference. (Link)

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

Photo image of axe-wielding Hayashi Yoshimasa courtesy Yomiuri Shimbun

Cut And Pastiche

According to the conventional wisdom, Prime Minister Abe Shinzo has been blessed with a new set of more adept and aware English-language speechwriters, making Abe II a much easier international sell than Abe I was.

For those who have had the pleasure (?) of reading his book, though, in either of its versions, New Abe retains many of the defects of Old Abe. He is still offering the regurgitation of rote memorized bullet points, without bridges in between the points themselves. What is new about New Abe is the presentation of a broader topic list -- the offering of a greater variety of monochomatic sketches of potentially attractive subjects. New Abe also delivers his points and anecdotes with vim and vigor, rather than the hangdog look of haughty contempt of six years ago.

An honest desire to appear interested in what listeners might be interested in, however, cannot compete with the Prime Minister's unwillingness or inability to satisfy the human need for a defensible architecture of thought. Further crippling is the lack, even at this late date, of Mr. Abe having a sense of the kind of country he intends to craft via the Third Arrow of Abenomics.

The result, as can be judged from the text of his speech to the New York Stock Exchange (Link) is earnest, trivial, bewildering, winding and embarrassing rhetorical chaos. The smart money will applaud (because it is the smart money) but will note in the aide-mémoire only "Structural reform/YES, TPP/YES, More women/YES. Substance? NOTHING -- jury still out."


Later - The Mainichi Shimbun checks in with a report that a cool reception awaits the PM from within the Liberal Democratic Party in response his eager beaver rhetorical flourishes in New York. (Link)

Later still - Over at The Diplomat, Jonathan DeHart derides the speech as "a barrage of pop cultural references" and highlights the blowback from at least one of the PM's metaphors. (Link)

Parallel Problems Among The Princelings

Japan has no bumiputera policy of ethnic favoritism. Otherwise, the East Asia Forum essay "Domestic interest groups haunt Najib’s TPP campaign" on the political barriers looming in front of Prime Minister Najib Razak as regards Malaysia's participation in the Trans Pacific Partnership is a word-for-word description of the barriers before Abe Shinzo as regards Japan's participation. (Link)

My own sense is that Abe's and the Liberal Democratic Party's big tent policies transform Japan's  participation in TPP negotiations into a stopgap measure, a way of keeping Japan's options open as the world's trade negotiators rush around from conclave to conclave, each fruitlessly trying to win a "best of a bad lot" deal for his or her country from out of a jumble of acronyms. (Link)

I look forward to Abe & Co. proving me wrong.

Martin Wolf Drops The Other Shoe...

...and it lands on Paul Krugman's head.

This is one of my posts on Abenomics.

If your daily bowl of rice depends on your organization's convincing trusting savers to invest their money in shabby assets, you might want to click off.

Two months ago I expressed relief that Dr. Krugman took a moment to explain his support for Abenomics -- or at least the deliberately irresponsible monetary and fiscal policies that are all we are likely see of the three arrows of Abenomics, welcome party speeches notwithstanding.　(Link)

The explanation that Krugman provided in February was that the Japanese economy, even at zero nominal interest rates, fails to generate a demand for investment capable of consuming all available savings (Link). By creating inflation and inflationary expectations, the government and the central bank drive real interest rates into negative territory, bringing savings and investment into line.

There was always a bit of legerdemain in the Krugman treatment, failing as it does to provide the bridge in between interest rates and investment. "Invest in what?" is the question that always came to ignorant, non-arithmetic minds minds like mine. "What is this investing by Japan's consumers and corporations that current real interest rates have been preventing?" *

Martin Wolf, in his column for the Financial Times last week, provided what should have been a sobering answer: no such investment exists. According to Wolf's argument, stagnation in the Japanese economy is not the result of failure to reach an equilibrium in between investment and savings. Instead, it is the product of the double whammy of high rates of retained earnings and idiotically low returns on existing investment. In Wolf's view, unless there are reforms creating huge disincentives for corporate savings – an extremely unlikely event, in light of the multi-year effort of the Japan Business Federation (Nippon Keidanren) to justify a lowering of corporate income tax rates – the boost from the debasing of the currency will be temporary, at best. (Link)

Wolf and Krugman are not in opposing ideological camps. They are both interventionists, seeing actions by governments and central banks as crucial to altering the contours of economic events.

However, as regards Abenomics, either Wolf or Krugman is right. Of the two columnists, Wolf presents the more convincing story.

The problem is that the success of the Abe government's program is predicated on Martin Wolf being wrong. Abenomics works only if Krugman's right...or if inflation's soaking up of excess savings is not the engine, then some other inflation-induced growth mechanism kicks in increasing consumer spending and lowering the dependence on government debt-fueled economic activity.

The keys to sparking economic growth (and here I am exposed to the slings and arrows of those who truly do know better, like Alexander Kinmont and Peter Tasker**) have always been structural reforms -- and not the ones the Trans Pacific Partnership is promising. What are necessary -- for both in terms of political viability and fairness -- are counterbalanced reforms, one example of which would be the removal of restrictions on the firing of workers (a recommendation of members of the Industrial Competitiveness Council - Link) paired with a ferocious enforcement of limits on working hours.

Unfortunately, given the almost purely political and not-just-seemingly-but-actually irresponsible nature of the changes being instigated under the banner of Abenomics, the outlook for real reform and thus durable increased economic return is poor.

As for Professor Krugman, he is in the United States, which is the actual subject of his Japan postings. His recent virtual victory lap (Link) is a bit unseemly, given the uncertainty (check out the number of times Wolf uses "might" and "could" in his article) of a positive outcome from the Abe government's policies.


Later - For a worthwhile defense of Abenomics, read Okumura Jun's posted crib sheet for a panel discussion on Chinese state radio.

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

* I have a similar problem with the "part of what Japan's economy needs is greater participation of women in the workforce" statements. My impertinent response is, "Doing what, exactly? What safe, rewarding, decently remunerated jobs are left begging for workers?"

** My suspicion is that Chris White is the smartest of this incredibly smart group -- for the very simple reason that he has to my knowledge never written about investment.

The Young Are Not Always The Agents Of Change

I do not like writing about the Trans Pacific Partnership. I know too little about it to appreciate shifts in details. I know just enough about it to be revolted by the cynical avoidance strategies, preposterous PR campaigns and pressure politics.

Nevertheless, here is a little TPP item worth looking into. The Mainichi Shimbun, in its most recent public opinion poll (16-17 March 2013) asked voters whether or not they supported the Abe government's announcement of Japan's formal participation in TPP talks. The poll found that 63% of all respondents supported the government's plans.

When the Mainichi broke down the respondents into age cohorts, however, it found the very youngest voters, those in their twenties, were not very enthusiastic about the plan to join TPP talks. Only 50% supported the government's move. The newspaper guesses that these younger voters are concerned over potential job losses resulting from accession to the TPP. (Link - J)

Perhaps the Mainichi or some other news gathering organization will follow up, finding out exactly why relatively more of the very young in this blessed land are opposing the TPP, or, conversely, why more of their elders are for it.

Up, Up And Away

The Abe Cabinet numbers continue to soar (Link - J) and the Liberal Democratic Party is running away in the projected voting for the House of Councillors elections in July. (Link)

As to why the 72% of respondents find the Abe Cabinet worthy of their support, 34.9% of respondents said it is because of the expectations as regards economic policy.

That's all I know, as none of the survey data is in my morning dead tree news delivery device...because of the system breakdown at Kyodo (Link - J) perhaps?

For those still a bit giddy over Prime Minister Abe Shinzo's feat of stomping out of Washington with the acceptance in principle of Japan's participation in Trans Pacific Partnership talks without Japan's having made making a prior commitment to tariff abolition (a jiggle that will come back to haunt both governments when it comes time to confront the United States' 25% tariff on light trucks) some more good news: 64% of the respondents in the Kyodo poll approve (to a greater or lesser extent) Japan's participation in the talks. As for the reasons why Japan should be in talks as soon as possible, the top two responses are...slightly different in the Japanese- and English-language Kyodo reports.

#1 reason, with 59% of agreeing

English language version:

"It is essential for Japan to join the Pacific Rim initiative so it can benefit from the global expansion of free-trade deals"

Japanese language version:

"Trade liberalization is the way of the times, so is it mandatory that Japan take part for its own good"


#2 reason, with 43% agreeing:

English language version

"It would increase exports and allow Japanese companies to better compete with their global rivals"

Japanese language version

"The opportunities for export for Japanese companies would increase　and [Japan] could better compete with global rivals such as South Korea."


Ah, the South Korea prod...

The Abe Cabinet's Ratings Continue Their Climb

Oy!

Link - J

Link - video - J

With support for the Abe Cabinet above the 70% line, Washington will not likely seeing a pliant or self-critical Abe Shinzo next week -- despite Abe's having no gifts to pull out of his travel bag

- no progress on the construction of a replacement facility for the Futenma Marine Corps Air Station

- no change in Japan's relationship with South Korea

- no meaningful promise regarding participation in the Trans Pacific Partnership.

Indeed, one should expect the Abe stance vis-a-vis the Americans will be, "You may think you know what you want. However, you do not know what you want. What you really want is what I want."

A New Union Of Forces Of The Left

The slapdash creation yesterday of the Japan Party of the Future (Nippon Mirai no To) in part answers the heretofore burning question, "Where is the umbrella party of the left, the correlate of the Liberal Democratic Party as the umbrella party of the center-right, now that the ruling Democratic Party of Japan has effectively expelled all of its anti-consumption tax, anti-nuclear power and anti-Trans Pacific Partnership members?" (Link)

Funny how political realignment, which was assumed was going to result in urban, free-market, multilateralist, liberals facing off against rural, crony-capitalist, bilateral relations and traditional social policy conservatives has become a four-way fight between parties and close allies with market socialism, social conservatism, activist foreign policy, regressive social policy, patriotism, fiscal rectitude, loose monetary policy, subsidies and education reform all in a jumble.

Considering how many parties have formed and disappeared over the last two weeks, it is not out of place to wonder whether the voters will be given enough time to discern what the various electoral alliances stand for.

The whole mad process of creating viable electoral groupings should end on December 4, when the final party lists are announced. Politicians have become so addicted to rebranding, however, that they may still be redefining themselves during their last speeches in the final hours of December 15.

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.

He Just Keeps Getting Better And Better

Over at Japan Security Watch and the search-engine-optimization-hostile σ1, Corey Wallace takes a grand tour of East Asia and the pitfalls looming in the massive wave of government changeovers this fall.

READ IT. (Link)

Mr. Wallace hedges in his final paragraph, describing the post's viewpoint as as "mostly cynical."

You can relax, Mr. Wallace: no one has ever lost any money on "mostly cynical" -- ever.

Energy And The Future Of The DPJ

There have been so many issues raised that have been purported to be the mark of death for the Democratic Party of Japan at the polls.

The first and least plausible was a lousing up of the Japan-U.S. alliance over the government taking a less antagonistic stance toward China and rethinking the Futenma-to-Henoko plan -- a plan which at present looks deader than the Okinawan Sho Dynasty.

The second was the raising of the consumption tax from 5% to 10%. Prime Minister Kan Naoto's simply talking about the tax was supposedly a main cause of the DPJ's poor (but not horrific performance) in the House of Councillors election of 2010. The explanation might be plausible had former Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio and Ozawa Ichiro not handed Kan a severely skeptical electorate, enervated by both Hatoyama's inability to know his own mind and Ozawa's putting on a show of seizing dictatorial control of the nation's policy making apparatus -- neatly fitting into narratives of DPJ amateurishness cultivated by the party's enemies in the bureaucracy, the press, the permanent commentariat and the opposition alliance of the Liberal Democratic Party and New Komeito.

In any case, the collapse of consumer spending after the imposition of the first step toward 10%; the opposition of Ozawa Ichiro, Yamada Masahiko and others in the DPJ leading to a schism of the party; the violation of the campaign pledge to immediate take a tax rise to the voters to seek their approval -- any and all of these were to doom the DPJ at the ballot box.

The third spine breaker was supposedly Kan's enthusiastic support of the country's becoming early participant in the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a program taken up, as in all things, wearily by his successor Noda Yoshihiko (seriously, is therei nothing that Noda does with zest out of joy, rather than out of what seems a resentful sense of duty?). Trying to play catch-up on the TPP is a supposedly transparent attempt to curry favor with the still pro-LDP Nippon Keidanren, Keizai Doyukai and the multinationals at the expense of Japan's parasitical farmers and protected insurance and healthcare giants, with those groups joining to paint entrance into the TPP as the end of Japan as we know it. Hysteria whipped up by these presumed losers in a post-TPP accession economy would doom the DPJ in rural areas and among elderly voters, ensuring a wiping out of the party.

However, what is going to kill the DPJ -- or appears to be killing it -- is none of the above but an entirely new and unexpected phenomenon: a mass rejection of the restart of Japan's idled nuclear power plants. The prefectural governments are up in arms (as I noted in passing, the government of Shiga and Kyoto prefectures had severe reservations regarding the restart of the Oi reactors. Yesterday, they made their demands public (J). Local communities are in seemingly unflinching opposition; the DPJ is split (E - did I not say that everything Sengoku Yoshito touches turns to mud?) and the electorate has switched to being largely for it to being largely against it - by a margin of nearly two-to-one. (J)

As a result of the nation's new nuclear antipathy, the popularity of the Noda Cabinet and the DPJ have plummeted into the Death Zone, with support for the Cabinet dropping over 5 percentage points over the last month (J). The entity most likely to profit from these falls are not necessarily the current opposition the LDP but the Ishin no Kai, which, along its pie-in-the-sky political program is likely to absorb the anti-nuclear power plant restart stance of its leader Hashimoto Toru. (E)

All of which is of particularly morbid interest as Japan's power and energy positions are likely not nearly as dire as the conventional wisdom holds. Todd Kreider of Kanazawa University, who can be "difficult" in discussions, has a crushing April 13 post to the NBR Japan Forum claiming that contrary to the hype, energy-security-wise, this blessed land is in pretty good shape. (E) *

Ironic it would be for the DPJ to go to its Waterloo over a problem that might not even exist.


Later - The raw results of the Asahi Shimbun poll on energy attitudes are what most everyone is talking (J). Interestingly, the Asahi poll gives support levels for the DPJ double those of the Jiji Press poll above -- and more importantly for the DPJ's fortunes, above those for the LDP.

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* As for all links to individual NBR Forum posts, if you cannot access the page directly, go to the main page, scroll down to the "Join the Forum" section and click on the link "Visit the Japan Forum's online message archive."

So Far, No Disaster

Just give me what I want
And no one gets hurt.

- U2, Vertigo (2004)

So far the release of Hashimoto Toru's Ishin no kai's radical campaign manifesto has not seriously damaged the credibility of the proto-party. So far the number of defections from the front of allies, friends and wannabee friends has been limited.

Hiranuma Takeo of the Sunrise party, who has been discussing with Tokyo Governor Ishihara Shintaro and People's New Party leader Kamei Shizuka the founding a new, broader-based "true conservative" alternative to the Liberal Democratic Party, said the document demonstrates "a lack of sense of the nation." Hiranuma continued, "This requires all kinds of changes to the constitution; I had been wondering whether or not he [Hashimoto] really thinks this way, a thing I sensed."

Perhaps more painful for Ishin no kai's spiritual leader is the loss of the former unswerving support of former bureaucrat and prolific author Sakaiya Taiichi. Sakaiya's appearances at Hashimoto's side has given Hashimoto's brute populist movement a sheen of intellectual legitimacy. Sakaiya has shaken his head in wonder at the manifesto's radicalism, calling it a plan for the distant, distant future. As for the promise to abolish the House of Councillors, he has called it "incredible." (J)

However, Hashimoto still has on board some important allies and potential allies. By showing a thumbs up signal on the Ishin no kai manifesto, Your Party leader Watanabe Yoshimi kept sensible members of his party from voicing any skepticism over the document. Ishihara has stayed fully in support, making such encouraging statements as, "There are parts with which I am totally in agreement" and "As for the other things, they resemble the kinds of things I myself was saying long ago, so they are really all right." (J) Kamei has remained silent about the manifesto, even though it declares support for Japan's participation in the Trans-Pacific Partnership and a rise in the consumption tax, two Kamei no-nos.

An aside, but all of the above prompted a senior member of the LDP to remark that if the planned party led by Hiranuma, Ishihara and Kamei goes forward and links up with Ishin no kai, the result will be "an unholy alliance." (J)

No polling data yet exists to show whether the manifesto has affected the public's view of Hashimoto and the Ishin no kai as standard bearers for a viable political movement. The relatively low-level coverage of the Ishin no kai manifesto's contents on television, however, indicates that the release of the document is not seen to be a front burner issue. We will have to see if coverage picks up after all the brouhaha over the emperor's bypass surgery dies down.

If the more radical elements of the manifesto are brushed off as adolescent blowing off of steam, as Ishihara would want us to do, and the Hashimoto-led populist movement still represents a looming threat to the established political parties, then we can expect more cooperation of the sort we saw on Friday, when the policy research council chiefs of the three major parties signed off on an agreement to pass a bill cutting the salaries of national bureaucrats by an average of 7.8% (J). The bill was drafted by the New Komeito and was opposed by the Rengo national labor union organization, the political ally of the Democratic Party of Japan (J). However the cutting of the cost of government is an essential building block for the DPJ public relations effort to swing the public opinion on the divisive and unbeloved bill raising the consumption tax - a bill the prime minister wants passed in this Diet session.

Keeping the main national political parties in a state of terror promotes Hashimoto's immediate goal of transforming Osaka Prefecture into a metropole like Tokyo. Hashimoto needs revisions to the laws concerning municipalities before his vision can be realized. He will need the cooperation of the parties currently dominating the Diet to pass these revisions. Since members of the Diet would under normal circumstances either tell Hashimoto to go take a hike or let the revisions die in committee from neglect, the fear factor the Ishin no kai engenders will encourage the national political parties to pass the required revisions and thereby keep the man-in-an-awful-hurry happy.

Or so the national parties hope.

Image courtesy: The Sanyo Shimbun

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).

Plenty O' Nothin'

Way back in the distant past -- three days ago -- Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko was scheduled to pay a formal visit to Washington in early January, sometime prior to his policy speech opening the regular Diet session. Then came word yesterday that the prime minister's visit would be postponed (E), something of a pattern for this prime minister all of a sudden (E). Now we have word that Kurt Campbell in Washington has hopes the PM will come in April, during the time the cherry trees on the Tidal Basin are blooming, in celebration of the hundredth anniversary of Japan's donation of the trees -- and expressed this desire to, of all people, the visiting Ishihara Nobuteru (J), the Secretary-General of the Liberal Democratic Party, who wants to shut down the government, force the downfall of Noda and the calling of elections in March (J).

Well, we can dispense with the official explanation of the postponement of the Washington visit -- that the two sides could not find a way to mesh the schedules of the two leaders. After all, the Noda government had been planning on the trip, at least until two days ago -- so something had been in the works for a long time.

Let us try to imagine, however, how a conversation would have gone between the two leaders, had the meeting taken place in early January.

************

O – "So now that the cameras are out of the room, what's going on with Futenma?"

No – "Wow, you just jump right into things, don't you? Can't we start on something simpler, like playful banter on which city is colder right now, Tokyo or Washington?"

O – "No."

No – "Oh."

O – "Seriously, what progress has been made?"

No – "Progress? Well, I can honestly report that to my knowledge, no one in the Defense Ministry has behaved as stupidly as Tanaka Satoshi or Minister Ishikawa did in the closing weeks of the Diet's extraordinary session (E)."

O- "And that's progress?"

No – "Given that Tanaka has been dismissed and Ishikawa has been censured by the House of Councillors, yes."

O – "OK, how about something simpler. Tell me about the progress made on the beef importation issue."

No – "Progress…well that is tricky. You see…in Japan…we have…what is the phrase I am searching for…it's two adjectives, an adjectival infinitive and a noun…"

O – "Xenophobic, paranoid, science-hating idiots?"

No – "Precisely the phrase I was searching for! How do you know about such things?"

O -– "You're kidding, right?"

No – "Oh, sorry. I forgot for a moment to which country's president I was speaking. Anyway, I would not be hoping for any movement on that issue in the immediate future. You see, I have a minister of consumer affairs who has absolutely zero credibility as a consumer advocate (E)."

O – "So get rid of him…or her."

No – "It's him. And I can't because I have an Ozawa problem."

O – "What does that mean?"

No – "Well, it's like your conservative majority on the Supreme Court problem. One gets to thinking sometimes that nothing is going to really change until someone is…I believe you say, 'Caught in flagrante delicto' or 'Sent to the hoosegow.' Not that I would ever dream of wishing such things on a person, of course. I cannot speak for other members of my party, however."

O – "I think I get it. Nice use of the vernacular idiom, by the way."

No – “"Not at all. I am famous for both my silver tongue and my humble, down-to-earth style."

O – "Let's try something even simpler. What do want to do about the TPP?"

No – "I want you to have your staff to quote me completely and without error. No deletions or paraphrases based on a compilation of public statements I may have made about the TPP. That is for starters."

O – "Oh, forget about the TPP. Since your government came in so late, you haven't an icicle's chance in hell of getting in on the rule making phase of the process anyway."

No – "Icicles? Does this mean we will be having our playful banter about the weather after all?"

O – "No."

No – "Oh."

O – "Tell me, because for some reason I am more patient than a lump of granite, what progress your government has made in loosening of its export rules on military technology our two countries have co-developed, so that the resulting technology may be sold to U.S. allies."

No – "None."

O – "None?"

No – "Mr. President, Japan is a peace-loving country. The renunciation of war and the promotion of peace are written into our constitution. If we were to allow the sale of these systems to other countries, they might actually be used. In war, you see."

O – "First, we are talking about sales of defensive systems. And second, from our intelligence community I know that the Nissan Pathfinder remains the transportation choice of half of the world's known terrorists*…and that from news photos half the Toyota trucks in Africa seem to have a machine gun bolted to the cargo bed."

No – "That is sooo unfair."

O – "This conversation is sooo over."


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* Not an actual statistic. C'mon, this is satire.

TPP In A Strategic Context

Corey Wallace has published a long thought piece on the confusion among the major players in the parties over the strategic implications of Japan's participation or non-participation in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (E). The key takeaway is that the TPP does not detract from Japan's options as to strategic alignment but adds to them, forcing other actors within the East Asian drama to be cognizant of Japan's more varied ecosystem of strategic choice.