Abe, Abe Uber Alles

No, this is not one of those childish comparisons of Abe to Hitler, complete with photo of Abe with a penciled in mustache.

No, this is a post praising Abe for succeeding in driving the country forward according to his plan and pretty much according to his schedule, with virtually zero political consequences.

Yesterday, the House of Councillors passed what was nominally the largest budget on record. True, passage came 9 days after the start of the new fiscal year, necessitating a brief bridge budget to keep the government offices open. Still considering that calling a December House of Representatives election blew the budget compilation process right out of the water...and furthermore considering that the opposition spent the last two months pounding away at the discrepancies, errors and dissimulations in the campaign finance declarations of members of the Cabinet, the dispute over the safety of nuclear reactor restarts, increasing economic disparities or the continuing strife in Okinawa, passing the budget only nine days late should probably be seen as something of a minor miracle.

While we are on the topic of the obstructionist tactics of the opposition, they ended up being an immense waste of time. The Cabinet's popularity stayed basically steady; the a-historially high levels of support for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party did not budge; and support for the mainstream opposition Democratic Party of Japan and the Japan Innovation Party stayed limited (5% to 8%). After expending two months of Diet time in attacks, the ruling party and opposition are pretty much where they were before the Diet session opened.

Opposition parties at some point will have to shake off the habit of chasing after minimal violations (like Minister Matsushima Midori's fans), admitting that these harrying tactics have never been more than facilitation of factional and individual fights within the LDP. Abe has outmaneuvered and marginalized every possible rival within his party sos plashing the PM with mud cannot raise the prospects of intra-party rivals to try to replace him.

Oh, what a lucky (or clever) party leader the PM is.

Even Abe's supposed Achilles' heel -- his revisionist views of history. Of the three East Asian leaders who set forth on the journey to consolidate their political base, it is Republic of Korea President Park Geun-hye who finds herself odd person out. China'x Xijinping and Abe have tranformed themselves into the unquestioned and popular (if we make the Abe Cabinet's popularity equivalent to Abe's personal appeal -- which I suspect it actually is not) leaders of their parties and their governments. Park has not.

We should not be surprised if we see a shift in the emphasis of Xi's diplomacy away from the presumably pliant but weak Park to the stubborn and difficult yet in command Abe.

Not surprising that the equities markets gave a cheer this morning, the Nikkei jumping above 20,000 for the first time in 15 years.

For like a colossus is our Abe, perhaps hollow inside but hard without, standing aloof and tall, way above all who surround him.

Damn.

Abe Shinzo's Incredible Tell

The Tokyo Shimbun's cartoonist extraordinaire Sato Masaaki had another great one up in Saturday's newspaper, lampooning the prime minister's reactions to last week actions in the Diet and at the Kantei.

In the first panel, Prime Minister Abe is looking down and Finance Minister Aso Taro is looking angrily annoyed in the House of Councillors Budget committee session. Both have good reason to be both subdued and pissed, as the prime minister came under withering opposition criticism for having provoked ISIL with less-than-fully considered comments in Cairo and a too feebly critical stance toward Israel during his visit there. (Link and Link J - video)

The side board reads: "As for the hostage incidents, day after day in the Diet, an exhausted countenance..."

w

But then, in the second panel, someone says the magic words "Revise the Constitution!" (let us just say it is Funada Hajime, the Liberal Democratic Party's project team leader on revising the constitution - Link) and sproing, the hitherto seemingly knackered PM leaps to his feet -- which is what he did in the middle of last week, figuratively, going on the offensive on constitutional revision at a time when one would have expected him to be a little more circumspect and reflective. (Link)

The caption at the bottom reads, "Still full of vitality after all!"

Guess constitutional revision is a big Abe favorite. Who would have known?

What I love best about the cartoon is the attention paid to Abe's body language. In the first panel, Abe is depicted holding his hands. Sure, everyone has to do something with his or her hands during the 6 hours plus he or she is sitting in the chairs in Diet Budget session (there is a lunch break after the three hour point). Some Cabinet members hang on to the armrests like they are trying to ride out a gale. Others grip sheaves of paper, some flippantly, some as if for dear life.

Abe, however, has a particular nervous habit. He grasps the three fingers of one hand in between the thumb and forefinger of the other, squeezing and wringing his fingers. He does this hand dance most frenetically when he is being put on the spot, like he was during last week's questioning about his actions and the actions of his government during the Yukawa/Goto hostage crisis.

Sato must have been watching last week's session on the NHK live broadcast. NHK's cameras lingered on the PM even when someone else was speaking, giving the pubkic an up close look at the PM's nervous "tell."



I am not fond of writers who use the word "should" when writing about the politics of Japan. However I would suggest to Prime Minister Abe that if any of the casinos that he has been eager to see built actually gets built maybe he should stay away from the poker tables.

The Eternal Sunshine Of Noda Yoshihiko’s Spotty Recollection

The DPJ's Gang of Six

Former Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko, who inexplicably called an election last December which led to his party's extirpation, is now doing P.R. for himself under the Bold, Mature and Sober labels.

Noda 'chose tax hike over being premier'
The Japan News

Former Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said in a recent interview that he placed more importance on raising the consumption tax rate than remaining prime minister when he decided last August to approve the increase.

As head of the then ruling party, Noda agreed with the then two opposition parties on comprehensive social security and tax system reforms, including the consumption tax hike.

[Snip]

Noda said he had intended to resign from his Diet seat if he could not pave the way for raising the consumption tax.

"At the time I thought I might have to choose between the consumption tax hike or my post as prime minister," Noda said. "After also considering that I would have to choose between the tax increase and my own party [many members of which opposed the increase], I said I was willing to bet my political life. I meant that I intended to resign as a Diet member."

During the meeting of the leaders of the three parties last August, Noda was urged by then LDP President Sadakazu Tanigaki to specify when he, as the prime minister, would dissolve the lower house. At the time, the LDP wanted the lower house election to be held soon as it expected to score a major victory in the election, while the DPJ leadership wanted to delay the election as much as possible.

Noda said he replied: "I'll use an abstract expression but in a way that is as clear as possible. Both 'in the near future' and 'sometime soon' are all right with me."

After Tanigaki said, "I prefer 'sometime soon,'" Noda agreed to use that expression to describe when his administration would call an election, he said in the interview.

About the meaning of "sometime soon," Noda revealed that he had been determined to dissolve the lower house by the year-end.
“The only choice was [dissolution] by year-end. That was the bottom line. It was better for the nation considering the effects on preparing and implementing the budget," he said.

(Link)

No.

No, no, no, no and no.

That Abe Shinzo with his assault on the Bank of Japan and his profligate budgets would be reviving the animal spirits of the Japanese economy in 2013 was not something Noda could even vaguely foresee in mid-2012. Abe Shinzo was not the president of the LDP at the time. Noda was negotiating with Abe's hapless predecessor Tanigaki Sadakazu -- a mark demanding a double cross* if there ever was one -- whose economic policies were as no more expansionist than the DPJ's were. "LDP president Abe" to whom Noda would ultimately surrender, was still only a gleam in the eyes of revisionist and fantabulist members of the business establishment.

As for the excuse Noda makes for a November dissolution followed by a mid-December election, it does not hold water. An orderly process of compiling a budget is important, yes. However, is a sideshow if the DPJ has, as it did, a majority in the House of Representatives. The Constitution makes it clear that whatever the hell else happens, Japan's budget cannot be held hostage to a minority (the relevant passages are in Article 60, in case you are wondering).

What Noda did achieve, through his sobriety and iron-willed determination, was the electoral destruction of his party, the upending of a two-decade long process of building up a two-major-parties-alternating-as-the-party-of-government system and the short-circuiting the redrawing of the House of Representatives electoral map so as to reflect the Supreme Court's rulings on disproportionate representation -- all this, into the dumpster, in order to get the LDP to vote in favor of an LDP policy manifesto item. Furthermore, by calling the election in December, Noda made sure that the DPJ would suffer a huge cut in its 2013 government subsidy, making the financing of a return to power any time soon all the harder. Had Noda simply waited until January 2 for his announcement, his party, even if it lost a lot of seats in the subsequent elections, would still be on a decent financial footing.

Noda did not twist the LDP's arm, they twisted his, and his mind too. Snapping the spine of the DPJ was their job and Noda did it for them. If, as Noda indicates in this interview, it was either win the LDP's and the New Komeito's support for raising the consumption tax or resign from the Diet, I can think of hundreds if not millions of persons ready to cry, "Why the heck did you not resign from the Diet then?"

Furthermore, the Democrats cannot rid themselves of their portly DINO. He won his district handily last December by a greater margin than in August 2009. In addition, of all the members of the so-called "Gang of Six" of neither-entirely-cooperative-nor-entirely-helpful center-right leaders of the party (Noda, Edano Yukio, Azumi Jun, Okada Katsuya, Gemba Ko'ichiro and Maehara Seiji - Link - J), only Noda was able to bask in the glow of a DPJ candidate winning a seat in his home prefecture this past July.

Since the Democrats (and the rest of us) are stuck with Noda, the least we can ask for is that news organizations assign reporters willing to corner him on his dunderheaded management of the DPJ.

---------------
* How hapless was Tanigaki Sadakazu? He could be lulled into a debate over whether the House of Representatives should be dissolved "sometime soon" or "in the near future" and into choosing one of the two alternatives, allowing him to walk out of the building thinking he had extracted a concession from out of Noda.

Original image courtesy: Sankei Shimbun

Sources On Politics - The Diet Committee Session Video Archives

Prime Minister Abe Shinzo answering the questions of Tokunaga Eri
24 April 2013

In case one should ever want to know what the prime minister or anyone else actually said in Diet committee, how the utterance was delivered, the mood in the room (Was there laughter or sharp applause?) and the questions that got the ball rolling, there are the video archives for both Houses:

House of Representatives: http://www.shugiintv.go.jp/jp/index.php

House of Councillors: http://www.webtv.sangiin.go.jp/webtv/index.php

Click on the date, then the committee, the name of the questioner if you want to, and voila! The unfiltered, unedited message from the mouths of the horses themselves.

(Favorite moment: Ishii Hajime, in his first Q&A appearance following his forced resignation as chairman over his overlong stay in the Philippines, reminiscing at the rostrum of his time as chairman: "I remember looking out from the chairman's seat, down at the members and thinking to myself, 'Damn there are some fine looking women on this committee.'")

In addition to the archives, the site offer live feeds. As I am typing this the House of Representatives Environment, Law and Economics Committees are in session and the plenary session broadcast is awaiting a gaveling. Over at the House of Councillors, the Budget Committee interpellation is in progress.

For those wanting to get a handle on the remarks that have been causing heartburn in the region, try the following dates and questioners:

The meaning of Yasukuni

April 10
House of Representatives, Budget Committee
Questions from Nakayama Nariaki (fifth on the list)

Murayama Statement ("What 'an invasion' means has not been established...")

April 23
House of Councillors, Budget Committee
Questions from Maruyama Kazuya (third on the list)

Yasukuni visits by Cabinet members ("We will not be threatened...")

April 24
House of Councillors, Budget Committee
Questions form Tokunaga Eri (sixth on the list)
(wherein one learns Senator Tokunaga gets her sense of the state of the economy from conversations with taxi drivers)

Image courtesy: http://www.webtv.sangiin.go.jp/

And In The End The Budget Passes Without Them

On April 9, Osaka City mayor and Japan Restoration Association co-leader Hashimoto Toru presented himself at the Prime Minister's Residence for a meeting with Prime Minister Abe Shinzo. During the meeting, the PM asked Hashimoto for JRA support of the Fiscal Year Heisei 25 budget bill.

As I pointed out yesterday morning, this request was superfluous and as such, rather peculiar.

The attempt to win the JRA's support was also, as it turned out, unsuccessful. The bill passed on the  greater-that-two-thirds majority the ruling coalition holds in the House of Representatives. The JRA and all the other opposition parties voted against the bill. (Link - J)

Housekeeping items of note:

1) No matter what the House of Councillors does with the bill -- and given yesterday's vote the chances are good that upper house will reject the bill -- the bill will become law on May 15 (see Article 60, Constitution of Japan).

This is the first time in 17 years that a budget bill will have been sitting in the Diet until May. The last time a budget kicked into gear this late was in 1996, when the Diet and indeed the country was torn asunder over the bailing out of the housing cooperatives (jusen) -- a battle over so little that was so bitter it delayed the much needed and much larger bank bad loan cleanup for half a decade.

No controversy so divisive prevents the Abe Cabinet and the ruling coalition from proceeding according to their needs -- indicating that the Abe II revolution, if that is what we are in, is not so much a movement as a dearth of movement.

2) Rather than seducing Hashimoto and the JRA into joining a winning team, Abe's odd courtship of last week seems to made them more ornery. Yesterday, the JRA joined the Your Party in offering a revised budget bill in plenary session -- the first time any party has tried that maneuver in sixty years. (Link - J)

The House of Representatives voted down the JRA-Your Party revised budget bill as well as Democratic Party of Japan's simple motion for a reconsideration of the budget.

Abe and the LDP can still pin their hopes on anti-liberal forces in the Diet joining hands in revisions of the Constitution. Hashimoto has been making all the right noises about a melding of minds on that score. (Link - J video)

However, Hashimoto's program is one of comprehensive and expansive revision, going after not just Article 96 and Article 9 -- Abe and the LDP's big bugaboos -- but also Article 59 (Hashimoto wants a unicameral legislature or at least a change of the 2/3rds majority requirement for a House of Representatives override - Link - J) and most if not all of Chapter VIII ("Local Self Government"). (Link - J)

Hashimoto tends to be a "my way or the highway" absolutist, making the prospects for LDP-JRA cooperation dim even after the dust clears following this summer's House of Councillors elections. A fragile Ishihara Shintaro (yesterday a Diet staffer helped guide Ishihara's hand toward the right ballot collector) will likely not be much of a restraint on Hashimoto's uncompromising love of the totality of his own ideas.

Us And Them

"Although I have made this blog one of my daily reads, I still do not quite understand the purpose of some of the points you make.

What is the purpose of this post, other than to troll?"

- Anonymous commenter to "Eleven Party Leaders: By This My Hand Revealed"

A journalist once told me, "There is only way to look at politicians...and that is down."

Such a view puts one in a perilous position. One is likely to fall and hit the ground hard.

However, the journalist's quip does point somewhat in the right direction: when dealing with politicians, one should certainly not look up. Keeping the subject at a level with oneself is safest. If a politician in his or her insecurity finds equal treatment demeaning, that is his or her problem, not the critical viewer's.

An individual's pursuit of a position of power in a free and democratic society carries with it an implicit bargain: in order to be respected by the people, the power-seeker must be respectful of the people. He or she cannot just do or say whatever he or she wants, expecting the people to nod and bow in respect for the office or the seriousness of the issues.

If this election is any way historic, it is in the depth and height of the violations of the implicit bargain the political classes have with the populace. Never before have politicians treated the voters with greater contempt, thinking them stupid and easily swayed by slogans. Never before have the politicians offered a greater amount of policy choice without policy substance.

As Michael Penn and Okumura Jun have pointed out, the only political alliance with a sensible partner in it and a certain majority in both Houses of the Diet is a Liberal Democratic Party/Democratic Party of Japan coalition. Nevertheless these two parties are ripping each other to shreds on the campaign trail, diminishing the popularity of both and making their joining hands post-election improbable. Even if the politicians agree amongst themselves to put the election campaign behind them, the poisonous atmosphere they have created will make it difficult for the public to accept LDP-DPJ collaboration.

The chances of a workable government emerging out of the December 16 election are further clouded by the imminence of the 2013 House of Councillors elections. Even if a government with even a smattering of commonality in between its variegate parts emerges from out of the mess left on December 17, the clock immediately begin ticking for the start of the campaign for the July 2013 election.

When do the parts opt out of cooperation -- with the passage of the budget and its enabling legislation? That would be what, April?

All of the above would be bearable if there were, amongst the leaders of all the various parties, a single person with whom one could trust with the premiership. When a duplicitous serpent with funny ideas about the sex slaves of the Imperial Forces is the best of the bunch, however, one has to wonder why bother voting.

Which brings up the non-existent problem of the undecided voters. In elections held in democratic countries, the undecided voter is usually the idiot voter – a person who either does not know what he/she wants or has been too lazy to find out which party or politician promises what he/she wants.

In this election, with the party manifestos having been compiled in a rush and not one leader with a shred of credibility, being undecided with two weeks to go is a mark of distinction, not failure. A person who is aware of the issues and in possession of a modicum of intelligence should be asking, “How can I vote for any of these clowns and superannuated children?”

And they are asking, if the senryu (topical comic verse) submitted to and published by my hometown rag are guides:

出馬せず
出馬するより
喜ばれ

Shutsuba sezu
Shutsuba sure yori
Yorokobare

Not running for office
More than running for office
Brings joy

前貼った
ポスター今日も
貼り直し

Mae hatta
Posuta kyo mo
Hari naoshi

I pasted up just now
The poster that
I have to replace

公約は
ちゃんぽん候補者
じゃんけんぽん

Koyaku wa
Champon kohosha
Jankenpon

The manifesto
A plate of chopped up vegetables—candidates
Decided by “Rock, Paper, Scissors”

The first senryu needs no explanation. The second is a reference to the bewildering formation and merging of parties which has now, with today's opening of the official election season, come to a merciful, if temporary, close.

The last one plays on the rhyme words champon -- which is a dish of soup stock and chopped up vegetables, used as derogatory metaphor for all kinds of things that do not belong together all mixed up and piled on top of one another (such as champon nihongo – Japanese that is a mix of traditional words and pretentious loan words) – and jankenpon, the name for the hand game "rock, paper scissors." This latter word is a reference to Japan Restoration Association leader Hashimoto Toru's infamous offer to Your Party leader Watanabe Yoshimi to come to a decision on which of their candidates will run in a district by the two of them playing "rock, paper, scissors."

The ultimate message of the last poem is clear: we will begin to take you seriously when you begin to take us seriously.

Later - This post has been edited to fix a kanji error at the suggestion of a reader.

A Political Mystery

Only a few lines today due to an illness.

The other day I noted the Democratic Party of Japan boycotted a sudden emergency meeting of the Administrative Oversight Subcommittee of the House of Representatives Committee on Audit and Administrative Oversight. (Link)

The excuse the DPJ gave for boycotting this unusual out-of-Diet Session subcommittee meeting -- and for ordering ministry bureaucrats summoned to stay at their posts -- was that the party secretariat had not yet selected a Ranking Member for the subcommittee, which is chaired by a Liberal Democratic Party member.

However, the story behind the sudden call for a subcommittee hearing is not frivolous. It turns out that the supplementary budget drawn up to fund the recovery of the Tohoku region and Fukushima was crammed with pork, projects that could not be justified in the regular budget but suddenly became vital parts of the recovery effort.

The rightist press outlets have been all over this story, as can be expected. However, they have been taking their cues from the leftist and progressive press. The Tokyo Shimbun, a left-leaning paper and an avowed enemy of the Prime Minister for his having championed a rise in the consumption tax, has been plastering its front pages with nearly daily exposés of questionable items in the recovery budget, including:

- 7.2 billion, to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to support its Japan-East Asia/North America Network of Exchange for Students and Youths

- 2.3 billion to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, to support pelagic research whaling overseen by the Institute of Cetacean Research

- 40 billion, to the Defense Ministry, for the acquisition of fixed wing transport and cargo aircraft

- 1.2 billion to the National Tax Agency, for maintenance on 12 of their dormitories

- 330 million, to the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, for earthquake retrofitting of the National Stadium in Shinjuku

- 47.7 billion to the Ministry of Infrastructure, Land, Transport and Tourism for water control projects, only 30% of which are in the disaster zone

- 3.4 billion, to MLIT, for construction of national highways in Okinawa

and in what can only be the greatest of ironies,

- 10.7 billion to MEXT for the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, an agency promoting the use of nuclear energy. The budget outlay includes 4.2 billion for Japan's continued participation in International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER)

Now just why all these questionable items are becoming political hot potatoes now, as opposed to several months ago, is a mystery. Of course, the compilation of a new budget and a new recovery budget, with the ministries putting forth their requests for the next fiscal year, may have stimulated the news media to ask, "And what exactly has happened to the money you already received?"

However, how was it possible that the uncovering of all these funny budget items seems to have been left to the national broadcaster NHK (Link), the mildest-mannered of the news networks? Why was the no stink made when the recovery budget was initially compiled?

Guesses...surmises...

1) So the new media outlets could put on their best Captain Renault act (Link), shocked at what was promoted as a budget to help the Tohoku being instead a minor festival of pork barrel projects? What country do they think they are operating in?

2) The LDP, in order to force the resignation of Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko, called up their contacts in the news media with juicy bits from the recovery budget's internal working documents just when the government was about to enter into delicate negotiations with the major opposition parties about the extraordinary Diet Session?

3) Prime Minister Noda and the Cabinet, after ostensibly allowing the bureaucracy to run rampant in a bid to win its loyalty, instead gave the bureaucrats enough rope to hang themselves?

I have no clue.

The Four LDP Candidates At The FCCJ (Continued)

Of the four candidates present, Ishiba Shigeru seemed to be most confident.  At the initial four-way handclasp, his was the broadest and most assured of the smiles.  In his answers he was precise, eschewed generalities and tied current hot button issues to the underlying history of the policies involved.

A reputed wonk's wonk who actually is one, unlike the man he wants to succeed.

The only time he lost his cool was when one questioner (whom I respect immensely) asked the four candidates whether they will continue to follow the Tanigaki Line on the bond issuance bill -- i.e., the current Liberal Democratic Party strategy of refusing to approve of the issuance of new bonds to cover the costs of the budget, threatening the government with a shutdown as early as October.

One after the other, the four candidates repeated the party line that the Democratic Party of Japan-led government's budget was full of pork-barrel projects, so that the LDP was merely exercising a bit of ex post facto fiscal prudence. Furthermore, the survival of the current government was intolerable, so any act pressuring Noda into dissolving the Diet and calling elections was worth the risk.

After giving this stock response, Ishiba leaned away from the mike and grimaced.

At first I thought Ishiba was furious at the questioner. Upon reflection, he was more likely disgusted with himself. Back when his candidacy was just a notion, he was a thorn in the side of the Tanigaki-Ishihara leadership group. He would argue that the party leadership's policy of just saying "No" to everything, refusing to release the membership to vote for vital bills unless the prime minister promised to quit, was short-sighted, borderline unpatriotic and stupid.

Now that Ishiba was a candidate, however, he had had to tell a lie -- that he would continue the policy of pushing for elections, unconstitutional as he most likely knows they would be, even at the cost of the government of Japan's credibility.

Having to lie did not kill him...but it left him pretty darn ticked off.

So The Budget Passes. Now What?

Since Sunday the government of this blessed land has been operating without a budget, an embarrassing state of affairs which happens from time to time (the last time was 14 years ago). For reasons that escape me for the moment, the Democratic Party of Japan's floor leaders managed to demonstrate an alarming inability to count backwards 30 days from April 1, alarming in that it is both simple to do and also reminiscent of the inability of the floor leaders of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan to count backwards 60 days during that party's final years in power.

With the budget bill set to become law today thanks to the 30 day rule written into Article 60 of the Constitution (seemingly the only article of the Constitution that is worth a damn), the opposition-dominated House of Councillors, ever ready to prove itself more than just a place to take a good nap, roused itself yesterday to vote the budget down. This triggered the rigmarole of the formation of a joint committee of both Houses which, amazingly, after long minutes of hard bargaining, found itself in an irreconcilable deadlock on the bill, meaning that the budget bill automatically became law.

On the surface, the 2012 budget is smaller than the 2011 budget, the first year-on-year nominal drop in six years. Add on all the special accounting for the recovery and reconstruction efforts resulting from the triple disaster of 3/11, however, and the budget is the largest ever. (J)

Just getting the budget passed is not much to write home about. The hurdle is the budget enabling legislation (yosan kanren hoan), primarily the approval of the issuance of bonds to pay for the items in the budget. With all the attention that has been focused on the bill raising the consumption tax, which is the sexier story due to the internecine battle it has spawned inside the DPJ, the Diet fight over the enabling legislation has been ignored.

However, passage of the enabling legislation is the real make-or-break fight for the Noda government. Last year Prime Minister Kan Naoto, in a fantastic bit of legerdemain, forced the LDP and the New Komeito to vote for the enabling legislation by threatening that if they did not, he would not resign as prime minister*. Prime Minister Noda, who has no intention of resigning, will have to find his own lever for prying a "Yes" vote from out of the hands of the LDP and the New Komeito.

One of the strategies proposed is keeping the Diet in extended session until the opposition parties just give up. I am not sure how the incentives are supposed to work here, unless the plan is to freak out Tanigaki Sadakazu over his trying to win reelection as LDP President whilst leading his party in a do nothing strike in the Diet, obstreperous behavior that will earn the LDP a serious lashing by the mainstream press (all except by the Nippon Terebi network, which has proven to be even more pro-LDP than its owner the Yomiuri Shimbun). The Diet session is going to be extended anyway due to the number of controversial bills the government has submitted for Diet approval (J). In terms of atmospherics, it will be difficult to disentangle which part of the extension is being carried out in order to complete Diet business and which is meant to drive the opposition parties nuts.

Working out a quid pro quo between the ruling coalition** and the opposition parties would be an option, if this blessed land's political classes could consider Houses of the Diet being controlled by different parties a natural state of affairs. However, the political classes are united in considering such a division unnatural, calling it a "twisted Diet" (nejire kokkai). The quid that the opposition parties want the ruling coalition to pro quo is a dissolution of the Diet in return for a yes vote on the enabling legislation and the bill raising the consumption tax. Since the DPJ is neither suicidal (assuming recent poll numbers are correct, the party would be demolished were elections held this summer) nor unaware that the current Diet district seat apportionment system is unconstitutional, the LDP and the New Komeito are making offers that the DPJ can do nothing but refuse.

So the stage is set for a lengthy stalemate.

Whatever the supercomputers of the Japan Meteorological Agency may be predicting, it is going to be a hot, hot summer.

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

* The essay is "Kan Won" in Reconstructing 3/11: Earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown - how Japan's future depends on its understanding of the 2011 triple disaster available from Amazon.com. (Link)

** Yesterday, Shimoji Mikio, the erstwhile secretary-general of the possibly still extant People's New Party ostensibly fired his superior, Kamei Shizuka, replacing him with Financial Services Minister Jimi Shozaburo (J). Kamei, as one can imagine, does not accept his being fired by his subordinate. At present we seem to have two PNPs: one composed of Kamei and his distant relative, the other of the six MPs who say that the PNP has not withdrawn from the ruling coalition.


Later - Critical minds think in parallel: today's Tokyo Shimbun has a lead editorial on the above subject. (J)

The Tokyo Shimbun's editors seem to be of the opinion that it is worthwhile to remind the legislators that ultimately it is the citizens who will be deciding their political futures. Somehow this reality, of which the legislators have heretofore been seemingly been ignorant, will entice them into turning away from their petty, immediate obsessions and instead stir them to provide leadership for the country.

While the editors are at it, they might as well wish for ponies for everyone as well.

Politics And Society In Comic Verse – Senryu of March 3, 2012

Haiku has a bastard cousin, senryu. If haiku takes a moment and seeks to make it poignant and timeless, senryu takes a subject, comments on it in the present time, then gleefully evaporates into nothingness.

Relentlessly topical, senryu have a lifespan of about two weeks, or sometimes even less. There are no schools or traditions to follow. Authors, invariably non-professionals with a gift for word play and a brazen willingness to tell bad jokes in public, take the basic 17 syllable verse unit – with some leeway as to how one defines 17 syllables — and run with it. Punning, rhyming, assonance and slipping parentheses are applauded, as are references to popular culture and most importantly, politics.

You can probably guess which poetry form I prefer.

Here is a selection of senryu from the Tokyo Shimbun of Saturday, March 3.

日本丸「八策」よりも「金策」急
Nihonmaru
hassaku yori mo
kinsaku kyu

The Japanese ship of state
Rather than the "Eight Proposals from the Ship"
Has to hurry up with "the scramble for cash"

Here the apposition is between the policy program of Hashimoto Toru's Ishin no kai which the proto-party has pompously called the “Eight Proposals from the Ship” (hassaku) in reference to Sakamoto Ryoma’s reform proposals of the same name — and the grubby search for revenues, including seizing dormant bank accounts, currently gripping the government (kinsaku). Both hassaku and kinsaku have the same second Chinese character. "Nihonmaru" is here used both as a common metaphor for Japan and specifically as a ship reference, as Sakamoto composed his eight proposals while onboard a vessel.

お馬鹿キャラクイズに弱い防衛相
Obakakyara
kuizu ni yowai
boeiso

Our idiot role-player Minister of Defense
Who is weak at quizzes

or

Our Minister of Defense who is weak
At even quiz shows for idiots

Minister of Defense Tanaka Naoki has been an absolute disaster in parliamentary committee meetings. He has been constantly providing laughable interpretations of law, misunderstanding questions, pathetically stalling for time and coming back from gaffe after gaffe with apologies for either providing false information or no information. In this he is like an obakakyara, an archaismic version of the obakatarento, the “idiot celebrity,” the likes of whom have been infesting the airwaves en masse since five years ago. These are individuals, usually pretty young women, who have absolutely nothing in between their ears. Their abject stupidity is their charm. They are popular guests on certain quiz shows, or at least get booked on them, precisely because the answers they concoct are so idiotic.

再建に記憶絞れよエルピーダ
Saiketsun ni
Kioku shibore yo
Erupida

In restructuring
Let's extract some memory, shall we?
Elpida

The word play is in the phrase "extracting memory" (kioku shibore) since Elpida, which filed for bankruptcy last week, is a memory chip maker. The writer is hoping that Japan's powers that be learn something from the experience of trying to cobble together and prop up a national champion manufacturer in an industry where Japan has no clear national competitive edge.

言うだけの番長やがて腰くだけ
Iu dake no
bancho yagate
koshi kudake

The gang leader who just talks tough (iu dake no bancho)
Has at last had to take a fall

On the 23rd of last month, Maehara Seiji, the Democratic Party of Japan's policy research chairman, took the extraordinary step of banning from his press conferences the right-wing national Sankei Shimbun. The Sankei had it coming, as it is, to be polite, a "fact-challenged" newspaper. The Sankei raged, the other newspapers tut-tutted, but Maehara stood firm. Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko, when asked what he thought of the brouhaha, did not say that he supported the action. He did say, however, that he would leave the matter up to Maehara. After five days, Maehara let the Sankei back in. When the Sankei reporter asked his first question — "Why did you ban us?" – Maehara shot back, "You wrote things not based on facts. As the questions and answers you had in your text never took place, I refused you entry." (J)

What is interesting here is the author takes the Sankei's view of the incident – which is all the more interesting as the Tokyo Shimbun is a card-carrying lefty paper. He (and it is a he, as the names of the authors along with the towns they live in are listed alongside the verses) says that Maehara had to bend at the hips and fall (koshi kudake) which, given the broadside Maehara shot off at the Sankei reporter (which all the other papers dutifully and merrily reproduced) is a very idiosyncratic interpretation of the outcome. He also uses a slightly modified version of the Sankei's personal epithet for Maehara, the "gang-leader who just talks" (iudake bancho) which is itself a near homophone of a famous manga series Yuyake bancho (You Tube video). The first four syllables of the poem (iu dake) also rhyme with the last three syllables (kudake).

Here is one for the Japan-U.S. alliance fans, one which is also blessedly straightforward:

普天間と辺野古動かぬ千日手
Futenma to
Henoko ugokanu
sen'nichite

Futenma and Henoko
The endless series of non-moves

Sen'nichite, according to my dictionary, is a term from shogi describing "a potentially endless repetition of moves leading to a draw." Which, 15 years into the process, is a damn accurate description of the Futenma mess.

If you have persevered this far, time for some serious play.

ハシズムもいつかはシズム時がある
Hashizumu mo
itsu ka wa shizumu
toki ga aru

Hashism
Will also have its time when
It will sink

or

Hashism will also have its time

Those skeptical of or antagonistic toward Osaka City mayor Hashimoto Toru’s blend of enforced patriotism, browbeating opponents and lacerating bureaucrats deride his political program as hashizumu (“Hashism”) a play on fascism (fuashizumu).

The joke in this poem is in the way shizumu, “to sink” is written in katakana, rather than in kanji and/or hiragana,. It follows the topic marker wa, written as it should be with ha of hiragana. Together, the wa and the shizumu together become hashizumu, repeating the first word.

Then there are the senryu that, try as I might, I am at a loss to understand.

原発は嫌とムンク「叫び」たり
Genpatsu wa
Iya to Munku
"Sakebi" tari

Ok, we have the reference to Edward Munch's "The Scream." We have folks screaming that they hate nuclear power plants. How it all fits together, seeing as how there are only six syllables in the middle line, defeats my meager powers of interpretation.

Anyone willing to have a go at it?

Then Again, It Could Be...

On Friday, I was wondering what Noda Yoshihiko, Prime Minister and leaders of the Democratic Party of Japan was doing meeting with Tanigaki Sadakazu, the president of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan. Since the two parties are rivals and talk of a "discussion dissolution" (hanashiai kaisan) was out of the question due to the immanent and now existing state of unconstitutionality of the system used to elect the House of Representatives and talk of a coalition government cutting out Ozawa Ichiro and his supporters in the DPJ could conceivably split the DPJ in half.

The simple answer, in retrospect, is that Noda has counted up the number of the members of the DPJ willing to follow him over the wall on the raising of the consumption tax and found that he does not have the votes to get the legislation passed. Ozawa Ichiro, who has been running rampant ever since it became clear he has almost no chance of being convicted in the illegal campaign fund accounting trial against him,is marshalling the disparate forces within the DPJ who either hate or are terrified of raising the consumption tax, despite warnings from the party leadership to cease and desist. (J)

If Ozawa is feeling pretty sure of himself, he perhaps needs to be a little more careful. Yes, he is almost certain to be exonerated when the judge hands his decision in mid-April. Yes, he will be reinstated to his full rights as a DPJ member immediately afterward. Yes, a huge number of DPJ Diet members, not just Ozawa's and former Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio's adherents but many nominal followers of members of the current government and party leaders could be induced to jump ship if the Noda government persists in pursuing a rise in the consumption tax. Yes, the prime minister has been robbed of his most potent weapon, a dissolution of the Diet and a House of Representatives election -- an election in which most of Ozawa's followers would be swept away into oblivion -- by the unchallengeable unconstitutionality of the current electoral map.

However, all that the Prime Minister needs to do is go across the aisle to the LDP and the New Komeito with a multi-step proposition:

1) The groups of lawmakers loyal to the present government and leaders of the party cooperate with the LDP and the New Komeito to pass the LDP's bare bones reform of the Diet -- the so-called +0/-5 plan -- with no reduction of the number of House of Representatives elected from the proportional list, the latter being the private terror of the New Komeito (all of its current members of the House of Representatives were elected from the proportional lists).

2) In return, the LDP and the New Komeito vote for the national budget, the budget enabling legislation and the rise in the consumption tax -- which is no big stretch for the LDP as the raising of the tax to 10% is a promise made in the LDP's 2011 election manifesto.

3) In return, with the electoral map fixed so as to pass constitutional muster, Prime Minister Noda dissolves the Diet and calls an election.

And in this snap election, Ozawa and his troublesome followers, as Horatio would say, go to it.

A bit of a song-and-dance -- but not entirely unlikely, given the trouble that Ozawa has been stirring up and his half-endorsements of Hashimoto Toru's (no, I cannot seem to write a post nowadays without mentioning him) radical populist Ishin no kai movement -- the still immature but clearly deadly enemy of both the DPJ and the LDP. Both the major parties have an incentive to hold a snap election now before the Ishin no kai transforms itself into a national movement through its yet-to-be-opened training school for politicians. (J)

So the super-secret conversation on February 25 could have been about an early election. Discussion on trans-party cooperation any other subject else would have infuriated a huge number of LDP members and led to calls for Tanigaki's immediate resignation. That no such outburst has occured seems to indicate that everyone who is anyone in the LDP was au fait to the fact that an early election was what was on the table.

The Japanese Tea Parties

Not another political party!

Well, not exactly a party. Unlike the old boys club"Sunrise Party" (that's the new English name of Tachiagare Nippon! - why is it that this new translation set visions of the last scenes of Paul Schrader's Mishima dancing in my head? ) the Nippon Soshinto (the "Japan Regeneration Party"?) lacks the requisite five sitting members of the Diet to win official approval as a political party. Until such time as it does (it is not likely to) it will carry out its activities as a political organization (seiji dantai), meaning it will be campaigning without public funding.

Trying to campaign without a dollop of money from the public coffers fits in rather well with the basic ideological stance of this new autonomous conservative political organization. Founded by Suginami Ward mayor Yamada Hiroshi, former Yokohama mayor Nakada Hiroshi and Yamagata Governor Saito Hiroshi (in the abscence of an official name, Ethan Chua referred to the incipient party as "the Hiroshis") the Nippon Soshinto is dedicated to fighting the Democratic Party of Japan, which, in emulation of its predecessor the Liberal Democratic Party, is blowing out Japan's national budget though baramaki ("rose strewing") public works projects and indiscriminate social welfare spending. From the past utterances of its founders, the party will have a strong nationalist aroma (check out the photo of the press conference) -- Suginami Ward, for example, is one of the very few municipalities whose public schools make use of the controversial Fusosha New History textbooks.

In its combination of attacks on fiscal stimulus spending and a strong conservative nationalist cant, the Nippon Soshinto shares elements of the Tea Party movement in the United States. Both are growing out of a climate of fear, responding to the uncertainty after the election of a more liberal party to power, a shift in government spending priorities as a result of that election and an increase in fiscal deficits as governments try to counteract the depressive effects of the Great Crash of 2008.

However, the voters being targeted by the Nippon Soshinto are not the defiantly ignorant rural astroturf rubes of the U.S. Tea Party movement. Indeed, the projected Nippon Soshinto voter is very nearly the social opposite of the Tea Partier: he/she is an urban or near-urban, upper middle class, highly educated individual. Indeed its policy mix seems directed at managerial, Nihon Keizai Shinbun reading commuter with few emotional ties to the countryside. Its macroeconomic stance is typically corporate - what can save Japan is unemotional, strictly-by-the-numbers government belt-tightening - or more colloquially, the "I got mine Jack, you have to fend for yourself" view.

Rolling into the House of Councillors election this summer, the voters now have the opportunity to choose from amongst three different flavors of non-LDP micro-party conservatism. The DPJ-led ruling coalition member People's New Party will appeal to social conservatives in the rural areas, the party offering wistful, even maudlin, depictions of a traditional Japan of several decades ago combined with trans-Keynesian levels of public borrowing and fiscal profligacy. The Sunrise Party will appeal to the somewhat paranoid nationalist voter, with party ideologues Hiranuma Takeo and Ishihara Shintaro banging on about how the DPJ is handing control of Japan to the South Koreans and the Chinese. In terms of economic policy, Yosano Kaoru will continue his Ahab-like pursuit of a solution to the burgeoning of the national debt, meaning the Sunrise Party will be running on the electorally poisonous promises of cuts in government spending and higher taxes.

[This, by the way, explains the reason why the mild and reasonable Yosano has joined forces with Hiranuma: it is not Hiranuma trying appear more reasonable by hanging out with Yosano, it is Yosano searching for voters whose fanaticism is intense enough to makes them willing to swallow the harsh medicine of higher taxes.]

Finally there is the Nippon Soshinto offering a "liquidate the farmers, liquidate labor, love the nation" plan for the nation's reconstruction in the hopes of captureing the attention of the members of middle-aged urban/suburban managerial class and their spouses (cue the devilishly handsome new party secretary-general Nakada Hiroshi).

In short, in the House of Councillors election, conservative voters have a choice between Shabby Socialist (PNP), Bad Tasting (Sunrise) and Organization Man (Nippon Soshinto) flavors of ex-LDP Japanese conservatism.

It is a fine plan...and it is worth the fighting for

After weeks of relentless bad news, the Fukuda Cabinet woke up to a some cheerier public support numbers today. In a poll conducted on Friday and Saturday by the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, the Cabinet's approval rating actually rose 3 points from the low recorded three weeks ago. A still pathetic 24% of those polled support the government. However, this uptick marks the first rise in the Cabinet's popularity since it was sworn in eight months ago .

The Cabinet's better numbers did not boost the fortunes of the Liberal Democratic Party. The percentage of voters saying that they support the LDP sank another 3 points to 31%, opening up a 5 percentage point deficit between itself and the Democratic Party of Japan, which earned the support of 36% of those polled.

Though the results are likely to provoke a nervous tic in the denizens of LDP headquarters, the ruling coalition would do iteslf a hell of a lot of good if it could send the message "Don't Panic" out to the Diet rank-and-file. From what was broadcast on Sunday morning's NHK Nichiyō Tōron, the ruling coalition is going to have a very decent couple of weeks ahead defending what has heretofore been a lead weight for the government: the new over 75 eldercare system.

Considering how the new plan was demonized in the buildup to Yamaguchi #2 by-election, one might think that having to defend the plan would have a deleterious effect on the ruling coalition's popularity.

While there are superficial resemblances between the upcoming struggle over the eldercare system to the fights over the extension of the Indian Ocean dispatch, the gasoline levy and the road construction bills, there are some significant dissimilarities as well--ones which bode ill for the opposition.

First, the opposition has no alternate plan other than reverting to the old system. In the Indian Ocean dispatch reapproval and the road construction bills, the opposition could argue it was fighting for a new approach, a reimagining of the nation's policies. In this instance, however, all the opposition has promised to do is put off change--despite the smoldering public sense that the previous system was doomed.

Second, the opposition is not stopping the imposition of the new system--only its reform. The new system is ongoing--the funds are being withdrawn directly from the pensions of the enrollees; the per-visit fees have already fallen to 10%. What the opposition can stymie or even reject is fiddling so as to make the system fairer, such as the proposal to lower the deductions of the very poorest seniors to 10% of the standard deduction.

Third, the new system offer a good, incentives-based compromise solution to the questions posed by created by medical advances leading to increases in lifespan. The debate on Nichiyō Tōron exposed the intellectual vacuity of the opposition's alternative visions for handling a complex set of competing social and economic goals.

In a nutshell:

- the Democratic view is that all Japanese are equal, ergo, all Japanese should all have the same health insurance system;

- the Communist view is that Japan has a lot of rich individuals and they should simply be forced to pay higher taxes to keep the current system solvent;

- the Socialist view is that women live longer so they will be paying more into the system in total, there are fewer doctors in certain areas and certain specialities, costs keep rising every year and we need this all to stop;

- and the Japan New Party...thinks that putting "ne" and "yo" after every statement makes that statement into an argument (seriously, it was excruciating).

If this is going to be the debate, then this is one that the ruling coalition wants to take place at length, under the cameras, in the House of Representatives committee chambers. Not only does the coalition have the better plan but they have Health, Welfare and Labour Minister Masuzoe Yōichi, the Cabinet's most popular minister, as the point man.

Finally, the original system and the reform bill are bitter medicine that in the end benefits no one but the public.

Contrary to the beliefs of the gopher-brained in the ruling coalition, the public respects the making of hard choices, once the reasons for the reform are explained to them. That was the miracle of "Koizumi magic" - the rapid switchover in public support numbers for tough, mold-breaking reforms once Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichirō and his subordinates began explaining why a reform or a decision was important.

As for what made Article 59 passage of the Indian Ocean dispatch reapproval and the road construction bills so damaging was the perception, correct as it turned out, that the primary beneficiaries of the passage of this legislation were, in order

1) the military establishments of other countries, and

2) rural district LDP Diet members and LDP member local government officials.

Not the Japanese public.

The new eldercare system is perceived, by contrast, to be electoral poison--with no identifiable client-patron rationale--and for that reason, gives the Cabinet and the ruling coalition a chance to win something they most desperately need: a reputation of being courageous.

Now ever since last year around this time, perhaps ever since the readmission of the postal rebels in late December 2006, the ruling coalition has offered not the slightest sense that it understand the public mood...or that it knows how to handle a legislative calendar.

Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo's and his Cabinet's eulogies have already been composed. However, the LDP and the Komeitō may have at last sunk so low that the members may be willing to go against their better political instincts and trust the public--rather than pandering to elements of it--and may, after having suffered the consequences of a year of atrocious calendar management, realized that getting bills passed on time after sufficient public debate is a part of being the normal functioning of a Diet.

If they have, then the battle over the reform of the eldercare system gives the ruling coalition a chance to halt the slide in its popularity and electability. The gains may be temporary--looming in the fall is the debate over the legislation formalizing the transfer of the gasoline levies to the general fund.

But dead and doomed are the Cabinet and the ruling coalition ?

Not if they argue the case for the eldercare system on the merits.

Light Blue for Boys, Pink for Girls, Yellow for Flashing Warning Lights

Chihō bunken - "decentralization"-- the verbal smokescreen deployed by those advocating pseudo-reforms that eviscerate citizens services while failing to increase transparency or stamp out fraud and waste. See "shell game" and "horse manure."

According to today's Yomiuri Shimbun, the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Labour is considering relaxing national minimal standards on the facilities and grounds for day care centers (hoikuen) in favor of allowing local municipalities to set their own standards.

Uh-oh. A problem nobody thought existed is about to be solved by the tempting local municipalities to skimp on childcare facilities.

Niwa Uchirō, the chairman of general trading giant Itochū and the Chairman of the Commission for for the Promotion of Government Decentralization (Chihō Bunken Kaikaku Suishin Iinkai) presents the planned relaxation of national standards of the sizes of rooms and playgrounds as responding to the regional (environmental?) variation:

"Having a single standard from Hokkaidō to Okinawa is bizarre. There is no scientific basis for it."

But Niwa-san, the proposed revision is not about the maximum size of facilities, of the area of open space, indoors and outdoors, per child. If we were talking about taking advantage of regional differences, the ability to expand the beyond the minimum grounds would make sense--as land is abundant in all but a few areas.

The Yomiuri correspondent dutifully repeats the canard that this sudden plan to hand off to the local municipalities the ability to set the standards for child care facilities is necessary because relaxing the standards would make it possible to enroll more children in non-standard facilities, eliminating need for children to be on waiting lists.

In the example in the Yomiuri article, municipalities with children on waiting lists but insufficient open land to build a center to national standards could convert a floor of an office building near a train station into a day care center. Impoverished rural communities could convert old, unused elementary or middle schools into day care centers.

Now color me stupid, but this slide in the Ministry's own March 2008 Powerpoint presentation on Japan's day care facilities indicates to me that the Commission seems a little too eager to fulfill its mandate of promoting decentralization.

Slide #8 tells me the number of children on waiting lists to get into day care centers is 17,926.

You read that right: fewer than 18,000 children are on a waiting lists nationwide. At the same time, some 2.11 million children are currently enrolled in day care--meaning that over 99% of the children seeking immediate entry into day care centers are enrolled in facilities operating according to the current national standards.

There is no waiting list crisis.

What is more, the number of children on waiting lists has fallen by 31% over just the last five years, from 26,000 children in 2002 to under 18,000 in 2007. Given the decline in the number of children nationwide, this seems to a problem that is going to solve itself.

Furthermore, as the right graph shows, 70% of the children on waiting lists today are from 74 municipalities--with the remaining 30% coming from an additional 294 municipalities.

A small fraction of the country's total number municipalities

Now it may be the case that these municipalities are hard cases--chronically incapable of providing a sufficient number of open spaces at facilities that meet the minimum national day care center standards. Perhaps these hard-pressed municipalities need flexibility in terms of the minimal facilities so that they help their young parents.

But is the problem facilities? Some 70% of the children on waiting lists are under three years of age. The size of the facilities are usually not the issue for such children--the limiting factor is almost always is the number of caregivers that must be employed to watch over them. Under national guidelines, one caregiver can watch over 3 infants under 1 year of age or 6 toddlers of either 1 or 2 years of age.

When children turn 3 years of age and ratio of children to caregivers drops from 6:1 to 20:1--the number of kids on the waiting list falls.

The waiting list problem seems more likely an employment issue than a facilities issue.

So what is this about, this handing off of standard setting on childcare facilities to the local municipalities, having the municipalities set their own lower minimum standards for facilities, replacing the minimal standards first established in 1948 when the country was dirt poor?

Could it have anything to do with local officials possibly noticing that

a) young adults in the childbearing years vote too infrequently

b) children cannot vote at all

c) the number of children is falling

d) the number of the elderly is rising

e) young working parents (for the children to be eligible for the day care centers both parents must be working) are grateful for whatever childcare they can afford

f) the elderly, who also put heavy demands on government services, vote at the highest rate of all

g) in an era of limited resources something, somewhere has to give, doesn't it?

Of course, this is an exceptional case. One almost certainly could not find another example of decentralization encouraging the possible rationing of services out to special interest groups within the electorate.

Sunday's Listening In

It is hard to type away about the foibles and failures of Japan's political classes at the time when a tragedy of immense proportions is befalling the people of Myanmar. Not an entirely avoidable tragedy...but certainly one that need not have been so murderous.

I will nevertheless try.

Depending upon one's tastes, this morning's Nichiyō Tōron on NHK was either an utter waste of time or a useful, succinct introduction to why Japanese Diet politics has become moribund. Through an inexplicably bad decision, the parliamentary affairs chairmen (kokkai taisaku inchō) of the major parties were brought together to debate the hot sujets du jour: the road construction bill--scheduled for a ruling coalition override in the House of Representatives on Tuesday--and the implementation of the over-75 elder care system.

Now, as a general rule, one does not want the parliamentary affairs chairmen slanging each other at close range in front of cameras. These are men (and they are all men) who are supposed to get together and work out the schedules of bills, the terms under which bills will be debated and the corralling of one's own party's worst elements and tendencies--this in order to have the parliamentary process move along with some sense of decorum.

The parliamentary affairs chairmen need to be able to understand what the other chairman are thinking, what their pressure points are, where the others are capable of compromise.

Sniping at the other side, listing all the reasons the other side is to blame for the breakdown of Diet proceedings is the responsibility of the party general-secretaries, or at worst, the party research council chairmen. Having the diet affairs chairmen passing the buck around was tawdry--and screamed, "We need an election! Or at least a leadership shakeup!"

"A waste," thought I as the six parliamentary affairs chairmen merely quoted their party lines--which consists of little more than "It's their fault!" '" No, no, it's their fault!"--when they should have been considering what happens in the Diet after the train wreck of Monday's rejection of the road construction bill in the House of Councillors and Tuesday's override of the rejection.

The issue that was worthwhile debating--"What kind of country do we want to have?"--was never addressed.

Some might say, "of course" belongs somewhere in that previous sentence...but I am not so cynical.

Interestingly this broadcast has taken place after House of Representatives Speaker Kōno Yōhei called LDP Secretary General Ibuki Bunmei and LDP Parliamentary Affairs Chairman Ōshima Tadamori to his office to read them the riot act over the deterioration of relations between the parties in the Diet, particularly the LDP's response to the blockade of the Speaker's Office on April 30. On that day a phalanx of Democratic Party of Japan legislators had prevented Kōno from making his way from his office in Diet Building to the House of Representatives chamber where he was to gavele opent the session where the ruling coalition was to use its two-thirds majority to override House of Councillors inaction on the bill reviving the temporary gasoline tax levy. DPJ members blocked the door to Kōno's office for an hour in what was a symbolic final act of protest against the use of the override provision to pass the unpopular bill. After an hour passed, Kōno made his way to the House of Representatives chamber and the vote took place.

In retribution for the telegenic brouhaha, the LDP-dominated Disciplinary Committee began punitive action against Democratic Party of Japan Representative Mikazuki Taizō, a leader of the blockade.

According to the Yomiuri Shimbun, Kōno told Ibuki and Ōshima on Friday to issue a cease and desist order to party members leading the persecution of Mikazuki. The young lawmaker had apologized to the Speaker in person. As far as he (Kōno) was concerned, there was no need for further punishment.

"This kind of skirmish happened because you guys are fumbling around. I want the parties talking to each other."

spake Kōno unto the pair from the LDP.

Those who may have been disturbed by the physicality of the blockade might wish to note that Kōno did not invite Hatoyama Yukio or Yamaoka Kenji or any of the other secretary generals or parliamentary affairs chairmen to the meeting.

Just his own party's men.

Makes you wonder where the ostensibly neutral Kōno thinks the greatest fault lies.

Then again, "let's all just get along" is a popular message among those far from the LDP's centers of power. Yosano Kaoru and Aso Tarō, who aside from both being on the outs in the party also are charter members of the "Persons-Less-Illustrious-Than-Their-Grandparents" Club, are coming out with a joint article in Bungei Shunjū calling for a collective LDP-DPJ formulation of next year's budget.

Sort of a "Well, gosh that was unpleasant...but don't give up on us just yet!" kind of appeal to come out and play one more time.

Funny thing about this call for comity though...if I were in the DPJ, I would be thinking that working out a budget together was what the LDP should have been inviting the DPJ to do last year.

Better late than never, I guess.

One More For The Road

While the global financial system is going to hell*, I am still obsessing about the governments's gasoline levy bill in support of road construction, a piece of legislation which, according to today's Sankei Shimbun, the ruling coalition finally admits is unsalvageable.

Still, I cannot let a day go by without a dip into the bottomless cesspit of the offspring of the old Construction and National Land ministries.

The front page of Sunday's Mainichi Shimbun featured the results of an investigation into 50 corporations affiliated with the Ministry of National Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. The 50 corporations had 7288 employees and 1063 members of the board of directors, a pretty rich 7:1 employees-to-directors ratio.

However, looking more closely, the median was a lot richer. Indeed in 16 of the 50 corporations, the number of members of the board of directors outnumbered the number of employees. The most absurd skewing was found in the National Land Policy Research Council (Kokudo Seisaku Kenkyūkai), an organization boasting 16 directors and 1 employee. Other magnificent organizations included the Tour De Hokkaidō Association (Tsūru do Hokkaido Kyōkai) with 17 directors and 6 employees; the Road Development Promotion Center (Dōro Kaihatsu Shinkō Sentā) with 21 directors and 8 employees; and the Hokkaidō Auto Resort Network Association (oh, I give up) with 24 directors and 6 employees.

Did anyone say anything about amakudari positions? A check of the 16 directors of the National Land Policy Research Council found that 9 were retired bureaucrats. Ouch.

Here is the original article.

Of course we also have today's report that the DPJ is asking questions about the 2.3 billion yen paid out over the last five years though the MLITT's "special road equipment account book" (道路整備特別会計) for taxi tickets for ministry employees traveling to and from the Ministry's eight regional equipment centers.

As much as the revision of the Constitution, as much as a reinterpretation of the ban on participation in collective self-defense, the attempt to wrestle down the road construction beast is a struggle over the identity of Japan. If the road lobby can be killed or restrained, much of what has been "Japan" and the "Japanese way of doing things" will cease to exist. Certainties will crumble...and many things considered "difficult" will suddenly become "possible."

Every little of light shone upon the monster weakens it. Every pinprick is making it bleed a little more, slowing it down.

-------------------------------
* The void is filled by a depressed and angry Nihon Cassandra posting up a philippic from London.

Nagata-chō's Other Game of Chicken

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

The DPJ-led House of Councillors' smacking down the Mutō Toshihirō nomination for Governor of the Bank of Japan yesterday does not end the mutual face-slapping over the management of the movement of legislation through the Diet.

Sadly.

In an unfortunate compromise worked out after the July 2007 election between the Democratic-led majority and the LDP-Kōmeitō ruling coalition, the Liberal Democratic Party received the chairmanship of the Budget Committee. That chairman, on orders from party central, is now tying up the passage of the budget and budget related bills. He is insisting that the government's versions of the budget and ancillary bills, including the infamous renewal of the gasoline levy for road building only, be first on the committee's schedule. The Democratic Party and its allies, eager to demonstrate their ability to promote legislation as well as kill it, are fighting to have a rival DPJ-crafted gasoline levy bill, one that would direct revenues into the general fund, debated first.

In the end, no budget-related bills may make it to a vote in the House of Councillors before the April 1 start of the new fiscal year, unless the DPJ-led majority can figure out a way of opening up an alternate route for legislation to escape via the Finance Committee, which has a Democrat as its chairman.

If no budget bills get through:

1) the gasoline levy disappears - vaya con Dios, arrivedercci, kwaheri - even for use in the general fund, and

2) the budget will go into effect without the legislation necessary to fully fund outlays.

This is high stakes chicken.

The LDP is throwing everything it can muster at bringing the DPJ to heal, on the one hand negotiating toward a deal of some kind regarding Mutō's candidacy...

(a) Why did the ruling coalition not negotiate before sending Mutō's appointment to the House of Councillors?

(b) Is it constitutional to submit a person's name as a candidate for a post twice in the same Diet session?

...and on the other with a railroading of the absurd 10-year, 59 trillion yen mid-term road construction plan through the construction committee of the House of Representatives.

Lawmaking is all about pride and position, it seems.

Drawing The Short Straw

"Yes, I'm tired. No, I don't give a damn anymore. Well, maybe I do. Why do you ask?"

Prime Minister Fukuda Yasuo struggles to stay awake
while waiting for a House of Representatives
Budget Committee session to resume
February 28, 2008

Image courtesy: Tokyo Shimbun

Later - The House of Representatives will be passing the budget and ancillary legislation today, one day later than House of Representatives Parliamentary Affairs Chairman Ōshima Tadamori's goal of February 28.

Since there is no agreement about any adjustment of the temporary gasoline levy or the 10 year, 59 trillion yen mid-term road construction plan, the bills now go the House of Councillors as crafted by the anachronistic bits of the ruling coalition.

The opposition coalition will tear the legislation to pieces, then leave it to die of exposure.

The budget will automatically go into effect in 30 days (Constitution of Japan, Article 60) just slipping under the wire for the April 1 start of the new fiscal year.

* * *

The Fukuda Cabinet and the four top LDP leadership posts are chock-a-block with faction leaders. These were the guys (and yes they are all guys) who were purported to have the juice within the party. They would twist arms and wring necks to get things done. As moderates, at least more moderate than the Abe Shinzō-Nakagawa Shōichi-Aso Tarō crowd, the current crop of ministers and party executives were supposed to be able to work with members of the Democratic Party of Japan to move legislation throught the Diet.

None of the above has happened. The ruling coalition is reduced to carrying out the country's business via the autopilot mechanisms built into the Constitution.

The LDP and Kōmeitō have run out of gas.

Do they know it?