tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post2148081239104876393..comments2023-10-20T18:03:01.821+09:00Comments on GlobalTalk 21: Ozawa Drops a Political Financing Bomb on the LDPJun Okumurahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00291478225274759649noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-9054533333773775212009-03-20T17:35:00.000+09:002009-03-20T17:35:00.000+09:00Anonymous: You flatter me, but I’m not an expert. ...Anonymous: You flatter me, but I’m not an expert. Expert bloggers are people like the proprietors of <A HREF="http://www.armscontrolwonk.com/" REL="nofollow">Arms Control Wonk</A>, who are willing to share their professional expertise with the general public for free. I mostly use publicly available information and mix it with an outlook developed through my life in the bureaucracy and its environs. With that caveat of sorts, I wrote <A HREF="http://son-of-gadfly-on-the-wall.blogspot.com/2009/03/why-ichiro-ozawa-is-target-my-take.html" REL="nofollow">this post</A> as a response.Jun Okumurahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00291478225274759649noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-57684082626137677972009-03-20T10:44:00.000+09:002009-03-20T10:44:00.000+09:00I've been meaning to ask your expert opinion on th...I've been meaning to ask your expert opinion on this, if you have the time, interest, and patience to respond. <BR/><BR/>It appears, to me at least, that Ozawa genuinely believes: 1) he is innocent; 2) the prosecutors have a political mission that goes beyond 'getting a badge' as I think he put it some weeks ago. The first we obviously cannot make a judgment on. (Although Ozawa was never good at pretending about anything, so I tend to believe him.) <BR/><BR/>But, if the latter is indeed his belief - indeed even if it is not - how significant is the fact that he is willing to even make the argument that the political manipulation of the police authorities is plausible in Japan? It strikes me as an outlandish claim, but then stranger things have occurred in Japanese politics and probably will do so again. Do you have any read, or have you read anything that has a read, on whether there has been any evidence of this kind of thing occurring in the post-Occupation period? Nothing comes to mind, but then, I don't know as much as I should.<BR/><BR/>Signed, <BR/><BR/>- someone who doesn't want to be anonymous but probably shouldAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com