tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post3783134500999084764..comments2023-10-20T18:03:01.821+09:00Comments on GlobalTalk 21: BBC Fails Mightily with Its Evaluation of the Aso CabinetJun Okumurahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00291478225274759649noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-42205577013144940052008-09-26T18:44:00.000+09:002008-09-26T18:44:00.000+09:00Do we have a case of parallel evolution here?Do we have a case of parallel evolution here?Jun Okumurahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00291478225274759649noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-52991335266380570162008-09-26T10:23:00.000+09:002008-09-26T10:23:00.000+09:00"Baikingu ryori is a popular form of cheap all-you...<I>"Baikingu ryori is a popular form of cheap all-you-can-eat buffet meals featuring very poplura dish conceivable and then some. Plus beer and other assorted beverages. Any resemblance with “Viking” food is rare and purely coincidental."</I><BR/><BR/>Well, let's see... Large volume of fatty foods; a number of smaller dishes rather than one single dish; heavy on salt and spices to compensate for not-so-great quality ingredients; all washed down with plenty of beer/mead. <BR/><BR/>The name is coincidental, but it fits very well.Jan Morenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06834641501438709866noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-26737531549401897192008-09-25T22:55:00.000+09:002008-09-25T22:55:00.000+09:00Anonymous:I would very much appreciate it if you c...Anonymous:<BR/><BR/>I would very much appreciate it if you could show me where Mr. Nakasone “advocates ideology in education over increased funding” before I take the time to address the rest of your argument. But I won’t insist. Instead, let’s get his ideological credentials out of the way by conceding that Mr. Nakasone is a flaming right-wing nationalist and counterbalancing him with China/South Korea-friendly Akira Amari. And now that we’ve got that out of the way, how does anything that you tell us say anything about my point about substituting the sins of Mr. Nakasone’s father’s purported sins for honest journalism?<BR/><BR/>You do agree, don’t you, that <I>BBC</I> substituted insinuations and plain-vanilla falsehood for research when it wrote this report, don’t you? And you wouldn’t pay good money for a broken clock, would you—no matter that it looks pleasing to your eyes?<BR/><BR/>Thank you. Now that we are provisionally in agreement on the main thrust of my original post, let me leave everyone still reading this with the following observation: The Aso adminstration looks very much the <I>chankonabe</I> adminstration that I talked about <A HREF="http://son-of-gadfly-on-the-wall.blogspot.com/2008/09/taro-asos-chankonabe-administration.html" REL="nofollow">here.</A> That, in fact, has been the secret of the LDP’s 50-odd years of success. The DPJ, under the leadership of the ur-LDP Ichiro Ozawa, has been trying to copy that formula. So, let’s call this the <I>chankonabe</I>/<I>baikingu ryori*</I> election.<BR/><BR/>* <I>Baikingu ryori</I> is a popular form of cheap all-you-can-eat buffet meals featuring very poplura dish conceivable and then some. Plus beer and other assorted beverages. Any resemblance with “Viking” food is rare and purely coincidental.Jun Okumurahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00291478225274759649noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-63377371405078933142008-09-25T18:45:00.000+09:002008-09-25T18:45:00.000+09:00Well, if there is to be a litmus test on right-win...Well, if there is to be a litmus test on right-wingers, how many members of the Aso Cabinet are members of Nihon-Kaigi? Several Japanese have used this as a standard for determining if a Cabinet is right-wing or not. BTW, I read Nakasone's blog, and his views on history, like Nihon-Kaigi, seems to be revisionist at best. In other words, reform of education in Japan is not to be found in increased funding (Japan ranks last in the OECD, right?), but ideological reform. This is very clear in Nakasone's blog...blames GHQ for taking the "spirit" out of Japanese education. So, shouldn't you rate Nakasone a right-winger who advocates ideology in education over increased funding?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-67302347259105025912008-09-25T14:42:00.000+09:002008-09-25T14:42:00.000+09:00I graded the BBC report, Vincent, not the Aso Cabi...I graded the <I>BBC</I> report, Vincent, not the Aso Cabinet. Even a broken clock gets it right twice a day, but you wouldn't pay good money for one, would you? More generally, I look at the world from two perspectives: my view of the facts, and my values. They are not always easy to distinguish, but I try. And I assume that the visitors to my blog are more interested in and benefit more from the former than the latter.<BR/><BR/>BTW, if you really want to play the numbers game, Mr. Nakayama would be more than canceled out by METI-holdover Toshihiro Nikai, the faction leader who wanted to <I>put a statue of Jiang Zeming (yes, that Jiang Zeming) in every Japanese prefecture</I>. I think that he's worth a Nakagawa. Mr. Nakayama is a nice match-up for Shigeru Ishiba, though.Jun Okumurahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00291478225274759649noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32776756.post-80306865950946511932008-09-25T08:05:00.000+09:002008-09-25T08:05:00.000+09:00And Nariaki Nakayama? According to Reuters the man...And Nariaki Nakayama? According to Reuters the man 'who heads a group of ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) lawmakers that denounced the 1937 Nanjing Massacre as a fabrication'. Grade A, I think.vincenthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08274123286037340428noreply@blogger.com