Nicholas Kristof’s heart is always in the right place, but his mind is usually slightly off center.
In this well-meaning op-ed, he compares what he considers to be the relative lack of success (actually his perception thereof; but I’ll come to that later) by modern, elected female heads of government and state in comparison to historical female leaders, who in his view were disproportionately successful compared to their male colleagues. He brings up what he calls his “pet theory” to explain this, and uses a study of Indian village council leaders to back it up.
But the Indian study shows that the female leaders were more successful than the men, and that the problem lay with the lower perception of female, relative to male, performance. It also shows that the bias disappeared over time with familiarity. If the Indian study is true, the female leaders of democracy should be successful from square one but the perception thereof should be low, but such perception should improve over time.
Once in power, the female leaders in South Asia that Mr. Kristof gives as examples have tended to stay around for a long time; or have taken turns in power as rivals, mother and daughter, or both. However, it is hard to dispute that they also tended to have mixed records when it comes to results. Of course the story is different if you think that staying in power is the measure of success, but that’s not the point of the Indian study, and it’s not what he has in mind either.
Another flaw in his reasoning is that his examples are anecdotal and merely illustrate, a flaw that appears to be congenital to journalists. Unless you draw on comparable groups of leaders, there’s no way that you can make a meaningful argument about the relative success of female versus male, modern versus historical. Just think, how many successful male leaders in South Asia can Mr. Kristof name? How many successful Third World leaders from the sixties to the eighties, never mind the gender?
Besides, how can he call Indira Gandhi “mediocre”?* She had serious flaws and made many mistakes. But she enjoyed military success against Pakistan, maintained as much of the international prestige that Nehru had enjoyed as the times would allow, and bowed to democratic principles when the chips were down. How many of her male contemporaries could have made those claims? Her economic policies were a failure. But again, that was the legacy of Nehru as well as the common flaw of so many Third World leaders, all but a few male.
Mr. Kristof writes best when he writes straight from the heart. His op-eds on Darfur, for example, are moving. It’s when he starts thinking that he has problems. There is definitely a double standard when it comes to female politicians. But it is a line that he fails to illuminate.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Headline from Japan-China Finance-Ministers Bilateral
The following is an actual headline from the Sunday Sankei, which you remember has a special place in its heart for poisoned Chinese dumplings:
“Chinese Dumplings”: Agreement on Investigation and Preventing Recurrence － Japan-China Financial Ministers Meeting
(「ギョーザ」 究明と再発防止で一致 日中財務相会談)
The following is a translation of an excerpt from the official interpreter's memo. (Trust me.)
Listen, Xie Xuren, give us a break on the East China gas fields, and I’ll tell you what we really said about you at the G-8…
ADD (February 11): Whoa, Yomiuri has more or less the same headline:
Japan-China Finance Ministers Meeting: Agree to Cooperation in Solving the Case of the Chinese Dumplings
日中財務相会談、ギョーザ事件解明に協力で一致
Here are two guys sitting on the two biggest (and growing) piless of US Treasury Bonds on the planet, the global financial market is tanking; and all they have to talk about are the poisoned Chinese dumplings?
“Chinese Dumplings”: Agreement on Investigation and Preventing Recurrence － Japan-China Financial Ministers Meeting
(「ギョーザ」 究明と再発防止で一致 日中財務相会談)
The following is a translation of an excerpt from the official interpreter's memo. (Trust me.)
Listen, Xie Xuren, give us a break on the East China gas fields, and I’ll tell you what we really said about you at the G-8…
ADD (February 11): Whoa, Yomiuri has more or less the same headline:
Japan-China Finance Ministers Meeting: Agree to Cooperation in Solving the Case of the Chinese Dumplings
日中財務相会談、ギョーザ事件解明に協力で一致
Here are two guys sitting on the two biggest (and growing) piless of US Treasury Bonds on the planet, the global financial market is tanking; and all they have to talk about are the poisoned Chinese dumplings?
Bank of Japan Governor Succession as Good as Done
Ichirō Ozawa was in Chiba City, where some comments he made during a press briefing had the media playing a guessing game. Namely, did Mr. Ozawa give the nod, however tentative, to Toshirō Mutō, the Fukuda administration’s choice as the successor to Toshihiko Fukui, the next Governor of the Bank of Japan? The Governor must receive the approval of both House of the Diet, but the ruling coalition does not command a majority in the Upper House. Since the Communists and Social Democrats will never vote in favor of the government’s candidate and there is no supermajority override available, the Fukuda administration needs the DPJ’s consent in order to make the appointment.
Mr. Fukui’s term ends on March 19, but a reappointment was never in the cards after he nearly lost his job in 2006 due to his investment in the Murakami Fund. The dip in the global stock market and the concomitant economic uncertainties triggered by the subprime loans crisis has lent an added urgency to the swift resolution of the succession.
By all accounts, Mr. Mutō is a fine candidate for the assignment. He has kept his nose clean as Deputy Governor since his appointment in 2003, and is generally well-regarded in most quarters. In fact, the only serious DPJ objection against Mr. Mutō is that he is a former Administrative Vice-Minister of Finance. For the DPJ regards his promotion as a violation of “”zaisei-kinyū bunri no gensoku (the principle of separation of fiscal and financial [policies])”.
This was the situation under which the press popped the question to Mr. Ozawa, and the media recorded more or less the same words. However, they chose to spin it in different directions. And for once, they do not arrange themselves along ideological lines, or according to their proximity to the administration. Look at the headlines:
Asahi: BOJ Governor Appointment Decision “Blank Sheet”, Will Respect Decision of Party Subcommittee(日銀総裁人事「白紙」、党小委の判断尊重 民主・小沢氏)
Mainichi: BPJ Governor: Does Not Disavow Mr. Mutō (日銀総裁：武藤氏の昇格否定せず…民主党・小沢代表)
Yomiuri: DPJ Chief Ozawa Leaves Door Open to Mr. Mutō’s Promotion to BOJ Governor (民主党の小沢代表、武藤氏の日銀総裁昇格に含み)
Sankei: “Completely a Blank Sheet” Mr. Ozawa on BOJ Governor Appointment (「まったくの白紙」 日銀総裁人事で小沢氏)
Actually, it’s a done deal, even if they don’t realize it yet. There’s little more than a month to go, so it’s too late to come up with an alternative. No serious bank is going to cough up its successful president at short notice to assume the top spot at BOJ. The best it could do would be to offer its chairman － largely a ceremonial post － or a vice-president who is slated to be on the way out anyway. That is not a good message to be sent to the market. And that’s assuming that he passes the rigorous vetting process. That leaves Kazumasa Iwata, the other deputy governor. Now Dr. Iwata is a fine economist and appears to favor an expansionary monetary policy, so it’s plausible. But he’s a lifelong academic, though he did spend his first 14 years after university as a government economist**. Mr. Mutō is the guy that the establishment wants, and the DPJ has little to gain and much to lose in terms of political credibility by pressing this case without a publicly compelling reason; a surprise nomination at this point is a highly remote possibility at most.
* The former Economic Planning Agency. The best and brightest at the EPA tended to leave as soon as they could land a tenured (associate) professorship at a prestigious university. Dr. Iwata landed in Tokyo University. He did return to his old haunts (now merged into the Cabinet Office) in 2001 to take charge of state-of-the-economy and economic-policy analyses until he was appointed to his current job in 2003.
(Pre-post ADD) I often let something that I’ve written lie until the next day. Some of them never get posted, saving me a lot of embarrassment. This was another one that I put away as a draft yesterday, and what do you know, the media reports from Seoul tell me that Yoshihito Sengoku, former DPJ Policy Research Council Chairman, pushed back on Mr. Mutō’s putative appointment, crfiticizing the BOJ, saying, “Are there (other) central banks buying 1.2 trillion yen worth of state bonds every month?”* With regard to Mr. Mutō, he said that “if you evaluate (the financial policy taken in the five-years under Governor Fukui), logic does not lead to elevating [Mr. Mutō] to Governor.”* By this logic, Dr. Iwata, or any other of the current board members for that matter, would be inappropriate.
Mr. Sengoku is not just any other DPJ Diet member. He is the head of the DPJ subcommittee that vets candidates for appointments subject to Diet approval, and Mr. Ozawa was clearly referring to that subcommittee when he stated that the decision would be made in the appropriate department. Moreover, Mr. Sengoku hails from the old Socialist Party, and does not see eye to eye with Mr. Ozawa. Could he use the vetting process to force Mr. Ozawa away from any thoughts of collaborating with the Fukuda administration?
But does this change the overall trajectory? Should I rewrite my narrative above the line? Not at all. There have been a string of news reports over the past week suggesting that the LDP was in the process of putting the final touches on Mr. Mutō’s candidacy and that Mr. Ozawa was opening the door to Mr. Mutō’s acceptance. The media had no choice but to pop the question; and Mr. Sengoku had no choice but to answer negatively, if only to preserve his prerogative. Mr. Sengoku may or may not be ill-disposed to Mr. Mutō, and he may or may not wish to undermine Mr. Ozawa**. His critique of Mr. Fukui’s steerage is a common, if not accepted uncritically, one. However, a wholesale disqualification of banking officials associated with Mr. Fukui’s steerage would paralyze the BOJ. I do not believe that Mr. Sengoku can take his statement to its ultimate conclusion. He will extract his pound of flesh when he cross-examines Mr. Mutō. But the potential reception of the financial market and the resultant damage to the DPJ’s reputation will be such that the usually reasonable Mr. Sengoku will acquiesce with time to spare before the March 19 deadline.
* The quotes have been reconstructed from Asahi , Yomiuri (hard copy only), and Sankei articles.
** In fact, he was in Seoul as part of a multiparty delegation to South Korea led by two left-center LDP leaders, Taku Yamazaki and Kōichi Katō. According to the Yomiuri, some people in the DPJ take the trip as a sign that Mr. Sengoku may be plotting against Mr. Ozawa. Whatever the truth of the matter may be, you don’t go on a bipartisan junket and use the occasion to undermine the LDP on the BOJ appointment.
Mr. Fukui’s term ends on March 19, but a reappointment was never in the cards after he nearly lost his job in 2006 due to his investment in the Murakami Fund. The dip in the global stock market and the concomitant economic uncertainties triggered by the subprime loans crisis has lent an added urgency to the swift resolution of the succession.
By all accounts, Mr. Mutō is a fine candidate for the assignment. He has kept his nose clean as Deputy Governor since his appointment in 2003, and is generally well-regarded in most quarters. In fact, the only serious DPJ objection against Mr. Mutō is that he is a former Administrative Vice-Minister of Finance. For the DPJ regards his promotion as a violation of “”zaisei-kinyū bunri no gensoku (the principle of separation of fiscal and financial [policies])”.
This was the situation under which the press popped the question to Mr. Ozawa, and the media recorded more or less the same words. However, they chose to spin it in different directions. And for once, they do not arrange themselves along ideological lines, or according to their proximity to the administration. Look at the headlines:
Asahi: BOJ Governor Appointment Decision “Blank Sheet”, Will Respect Decision of Party Subcommittee(日銀総裁人事「白紙」、党小委の判断尊重 民主・小沢氏)
Mainichi: BPJ Governor: Does Not Disavow Mr. Mutō (日銀総裁：武藤氏の昇格否定せず…民主党・小沢代表)
Yomiuri: DPJ Chief Ozawa Leaves Door Open to Mr. Mutō’s Promotion to BOJ Governor (民主党の小沢代表、武藤氏の日銀総裁昇格に含み)
Sankei: “Completely a Blank Sheet” Mr. Ozawa on BOJ Governor Appointment (「まったくの白紙」 日銀総裁人事で小沢氏)
Actually, it’s a done deal, even if they don’t realize it yet. There’s little more than a month to go, so it’s too late to come up with an alternative. No serious bank is going to cough up its successful president at short notice to assume the top spot at BOJ. The best it could do would be to offer its chairman － largely a ceremonial post － or a vice-president who is slated to be on the way out anyway. That is not a good message to be sent to the market. And that’s assuming that he passes the rigorous vetting process. That leaves Kazumasa Iwata, the other deputy governor. Now Dr. Iwata is a fine economist and appears to favor an expansionary monetary policy, so it’s plausible. But he’s a lifelong academic, though he did spend his first 14 years after university as a government economist**. Mr. Mutō is the guy that the establishment wants, and the DPJ has little to gain and much to lose in terms of political credibility by pressing this case without a publicly compelling reason; a surprise nomination at this point is a highly remote possibility at most.
* The former Economic Planning Agency. The best and brightest at the EPA tended to leave as soon as they could land a tenured (associate) professorship at a prestigious university. Dr. Iwata landed in Tokyo University. He did return to his old haunts (now merged into the Cabinet Office) in 2001 to take charge of state-of-the-economy and economic-policy analyses until he was appointed to his current job in 2003.
(Pre-post ADD) I often let something that I’ve written lie until the next day. Some of them never get posted, saving me a lot of embarrassment. This was another one that I put away as a draft yesterday, and what do you know, the media reports from Seoul tell me that Yoshihito Sengoku, former DPJ Policy Research Council Chairman, pushed back on Mr. Mutō’s putative appointment, crfiticizing the BOJ, saying, “Are there (other) central banks buying 1.2 trillion yen worth of state bonds every month?”* With regard to Mr. Mutō, he said that “if you evaluate (the financial policy taken in the five-years under Governor Fukui), logic does not lead to elevating [Mr. Mutō] to Governor.”* By this logic, Dr. Iwata, or any other of the current board members for that matter, would be inappropriate.
Mr. Sengoku is not just any other DPJ Diet member. He is the head of the DPJ subcommittee that vets candidates for appointments subject to Diet approval, and Mr. Ozawa was clearly referring to that subcommittee when he stated that the decision would be made in the appropriate department. Moreover, Mr. Sengoku hails from the old Socialist Party, and does not see eye to eye with Mr. Ozawa. Could he use the vetting process to force Mr. Ozawa away from any thoughts of collaborating with the Fukuda administration?
But does this change the overall trajectory? Should I rewrite my narrative above the line? Not at all. There have been a string of news reports over the past week suggesting that the LDP was in the process of putting the final touches on Mr. Mutō’s candidacy and that Mr. Ozawa was opening the door to Mr. Mutō’s acceptance. The media had no choice but to pop the question; and Mr. Sengoku had no choice but to answer negatively, if only to preserve his prerogative. Mr. Sengoku may or may not be ill-disposed to Mr. Mutō, and he may or may not wish to undermine Mr. Ozawa**. His critique of Mr. Fukui’s steerage is a common, if not accepted uncritically, one. However, a wholesale disqualification of banking officials associated with Mr. Fukui’s steerage would paralyze the BOJ. I do not believe that Mr. Sengoku can take his statement to its ultimate conclusion. He will extract his pound of flesh when he cross-examines Mr. Mutō. But the potential reception of the financial market and the resultant damage to the DPJ’s reputation will be such that the usually reasonable Mr. Sengoku will acquiesce with time to spare before the March 19 deadline.
* The quotes have been reconstructed from Asahi , Yomiuri (hard copy only), and Sankei articles.
** In fact, he was in Seoul as part of a multiparty delegation to South Korea led by two left-center LDP leaders, Taku Yamazaki and Kōichi Katō. According to the Yomiuri, some people in the DPJ take the trip as a sign that Mr. Sengoku may be plotting against Mr. Ozawa. Whatever the truth of the matter may be, you don’t go on a bipartisan junket and use the occasion to undermine the LDP on the BOJ appointment.
Saturday, February 09, 2008
The Meaning of Habatsu
There must be hundreds of books written about the LDP, all of which surely have something to say about the habatsu, the party factions, for which it is justly famous. This post is for people who are too busy to read any of them, written by someone who is too lazy to.
You have been forewarned.
The 1993-94 electoral reforms that put first-past-the-post, single seat districts at the heart of the Lower House electoral system have steadily eroded the power of habastsu, the political factions in the LDP. The state subsidies to political parties, also part of the 1993-94 reforms, loosened the faction leaders’ financial grip over the rank-and-file. So are we going to see, as some people expect, a shift from the faction politics based on personal loyalty toward more policy- and ideology-consistent alliances, eventually leading to a realignment of the major parties? Not so fast.
Once upon a time, factions as a rule served as the vehicle for the political ambitions of their chiefs. No longer. The three most recent Prime Ministers have not been faction chiefs*, and the future does not look too promising for faction chiefs either. Of the current nine chiefs, only Sadakazu Tanigaki and Tarō Asō have run for the presidency of the LDP and by extension the Prime Ministership**, and Mr. Tanigaki will merge his micro-faction into the larger Koga faction later this year and give up his top faction role at least partly to enhance his chances for the top LDP job (but more on that later). And Nobutaka Machimura is the only other faction leader that has a credible shot at the LDP Presidency. In fact, faction leaders are increasingly looking like the political version of the stereotypical salaryman-manager presidents of Japanese companies.
The deterioration of the factions has been evident in the behavior of the individual Diet members. More LDP Diet members elect to stay out of factions and work as free agents. And the ones that remain are increasingly able to marching to their own music, as some of them openly defy the wishes of their respective faction leadership to vote for the party presidential candidate of their own choosing. The power of the faction leaders to punish the deviants is limited. I’ve already mentioned the money angle; and the party leadership has wrested much of the control over the selection of party candidates for Diet seats, and Junichirō Koizumi showed that a Prime Minister could get away with disregarding the wishes of faction chiefs and the imperatives of seniority in picking Cabinet members.
But the trend appears to have peaked with the election of 83 new Diet members, the so-called Koizumi Kids, in the 2005 election, the vast majority coming in as independents. Since then their ranks have been steadily depleted by defection, as it were, to one faction or other, until today, only 23 Lower House rookies remain as independent operators.
It’s not just rookies either. Nobuteru Ishihara, the hawkish son of Shintarō Ishihara and friend of Shinzō Abe, with two Cabinet appointments and a Big Three party post under his belt at the callow age of 50, fell in line under Taku Yamazaki, the Mother of All Doves, only last December. Kunio Hatoyama, of the Hatoyama clan, a 10-term Lower House member currently on his third (or fourth, depending on how you count) Cabinet appointment, joined the Tsushima faction, also last year. So what gives?
In fact, there are still some very good reasons for factions to prevail.
One good reason: Because it’s there. That’s the way they’ve conducted business. Old habits are hard to break. Institutional change, the informal ones at least, comes slowly. In the meantime, they’re a saving on transaction costs. Example: Imagine you’re a Prime Minister and you or your trusted deputies have to figure out how to choose all those political appointees － the Senior Vice-Ministers and Vice Ministers. You can’t expect to know (in the case of the Lower House) all the third- and second-termers well enough to make the right appointments. Over the long-run, administrations may stop treating these jobs as virtual internships and use them to better immediate effect, relegating, not incidentally, the rest of the rank-and-file Diet members to pure backbenchers. Until that happens though － I think it will be a long time in coming, if ever － the Prime Minister and his closest associates must have some viable means of allocating those posts.
Rookies have very good reasons of their own to join factions. A faction is a ready-made network to plug into, a good place to learn the ropes, find mentors, receive introductions***. There’s far less money available compared to the old days, but unless you are independently very wealthy, every million yen in political funds counts. And when a rookie’s first crack at reelection comes around, it’s good to have some nationally recognized figures come around to put in a good word with your constituents. And the bigger the faction, the greater the firepower; and vice versa. So I do not think that it is a coincidence that the Machimura faction has grown over its long hold on the Prime Minister’s seat to become the largest faction in the LDP. Tsutomu Takebe, who ran the party organization under Prime Minister Koizumi, has tried to keep the flame of independence alive by providing venues for training newbies. At least in the short-run, he is fighting a rearguard action.
As for better-established members, they will have accumulated a substantial amount of political capital within their factions. It doesn’t make political sense to throw that away and start anew as independents. Thus, once a faction member, (usually) always a member. Mr. Hatoyama is not really an exception to this rule. He has been in and out of the LDP, coming back again to stay in 2000. He joined the Tsushima faction, where he started out his political career when it was the almighty Tanaka faction****.
For those harboring ambitions for the top office, faction membership is highly helpful, perhaps essential. To file to run for the LDP Presidency, you need the signatures of at least 20 Diet members. A convenient place to start would be the member of your faction, where the smallest micro-faction has more than a baker’s dozen as a starter’s pack. A large faction would be even more convenient for aspirants. Mr. Tanigaki and Makoto Koga, the head of much larger Koga faction, have a natural affinity as foreign policy and history issue doves. But the Koga faction’s lack of a proximate candidate for the Prime Minister’s job must have figured just as importantly in the equation.
Kaoru Yasano, the affable policy wonk and behind-the-scenes operator, has seen much success as a troubleshooter and behind-the-scenes mediator. Most recently, he has been whispered as a potential successor to Prime Minister Koizumi, or replacement for Prime Minister Abe, but nothing really came of a that. Mr. Ishihara must have had this precedent in addition to his own experience in mind***** when he decided to fall in with his ideological and operational opposite, Mr. Yamazaki. It is telling that the Yamazaki faction had no viable for Prime Minister.
Policies and ideologies cut across faction lines; Mr. Ishihara alone is proof of that. However, Diet members do not fall into neat groups holding common positions on all or most of the important issues of the day******. This neccessitates the proliferation of an endless string of semi-permanent caucuses, many of them cutting across party lines. At the other end, no single issue is sufficiently powerful and divisive enough to force a realignment that severs permanently the communal relationships and the practical conveniences of the factions.
Thus, for the foreseeable future, factions should continue to thrive in the LDP. An important corollary of this conjecture is that a political realignment of the two major parties is not in the cards either.
Okay… not quite good enough, but I think I got it out of my system. And life is so short…
* Koizumi Junichirō, Shinzō Abe and Yasuo Fukuda all hailed from the Seiwakai. Mr. Koizumi was nominally the faction head while Yoshirō Mori, the faction head took him turn before him as Prime Minister.
** Yōhei Kōno, the current President of the Lower House, is the only LDP President in its 53-year history never to serve as Prime Minister.
*** This must have been particularly important for the Koizumi kids, since so many of them had little or no political experience or ties to their local political communities.
**** Mr. Hatoyama surely still harbors ambitions to be Prime Minister. Still only 59-years old, he is a 10-term Diet member with a pedigree better than Mr. Fukuda’s and at least as good as Mr. Abe’s. He displayed his ambitions when he tried but failed to stand for the election of the LDP President in 2006. I suspect that this experience was a strong motivation to go to the Tsushima faction, which conveniently does not have ready Prime Minister candidate. Tsushima faction member Fukushirō Nukaga has been seen my many as a potential candidate, but when he tried to stand in 2007, he had to give up because he could not even secure the support of his own faction.
***** I suspect that similar considerations entered into Mr. Hatoyama’s decision, but I couldn’t be sure about it, so I put it in footnote****.
****** To give an example, too many Western commentators regularly refer to Mr. Koizumi as a right-wing politician, a nationalist, because he antagonized the Chinese by insisting on going to Yasukuni Shrine, and also supported President Bush on the war in Iraq. To realize that those people slide beyond shaggy conventional wisdom into the realm of urban legend, you only have to look at his position on the Class A War Criminals and other hot-button history issues, as well as his support for MOF in holding the line against defense spending. And I haven’t even talked about the imperial succession. And North Korea. I’ll try to expand this point into a full post one of these days.
You have been forewarned.
The 1993-94 electoral reforms that put first-past-the-post, single seat districts at the heart of the Lower House electoral system have steadily eroded the power of habastsu, the political factions in the LDP. The state subsidies to political parties, also part of the 1993-94 reforms, loosened the faction leaders’ financial grip over the rank-and-file. So are we going to see, as some people expect, a shift from the faction politics based on personal loyalty toward more policy- and ideology-consistent alliances, eventually leading to a realignment of the major parties? Not so fast.
Once upon a time, factions as a rule served as the vehicle for the political ambitions of their chiefs. No longer. The three most recent Prime Ministers have not been faction chiefs*, and the future does not look too promising for faction chiefs either. Of the current nine chiefs, only Sadakazu Tanigaki and Tarō Asō have run for the presidency of the LDP and by extension the Prime Ministership**, and Mr. Tanigaki will merge his micro-faction into the larger Koga faction later this year and give up his top faction role at least partly to enhance his chances for the top LDP job (but more on that later). And Nobutaka Machimura is the only other faction leader that has a credible shot at the LDP Presidency. In fact, faction leaders are increasingly looking like the political version of the stereotypical salaryman-manager presidents of Japanese companies.
The deterioration of the factions has been evident in the behavior of the individual Diet members. More LDP Diet members elect to stay out of factions and work as free agents. And the ones that remain are increasingly able to marching to their own music, as some of them openly defy the wishes of their respective faction leadership to vote for the party presidential candidate of their own choosing. The power of the faction leaders to punish the deviants is limited. I’ve already mentioned the money angle; and the party leadership has wrested much of the control over the selection of party candidates for Diet seats, and Junichirō Koizumi showed that a Prime Minister could get away with disregarding the wishes of faction chiefs and the imperatives of seniority in picking Cabinet members.
But the trend appears to have peaked with the election of 83 new Diet members, the so-called Koizumi Kids, in the 2005 election, the vast majority coming in as independents. Since then their ranks have been steadily depleted by defection, as it were, to one faction or other, until today, only 23 Lower House rookies remain as independent operators.
It’s not just rookies either. Nobuteru Ishihara, the hawkish son of Shintarō Ishihara and friend of Shinzō Abe, with two Cabinet appointments and a Big Three party post under his belt at the callow age of 50, fell in line under Taku Yamazaki, the Mother of All Doves, only last December. Kunio Hatoyama, of the Hatoyama clan, a 10-term Lower House member currently on his third (or fourth, depending on how you count) Cabinet appointment, joined the Tsushima faction, also last year. So what gives?
In fact, there are still some very good reasons for factions to prevail.
One good reason: Because it’s there. That’s the way they’ve conducted business. Old habits are hard to break. Institutional change, the informal ones at least, comes slowly. In the meantime, they’re a saving on transaction costs. Example: Imagine you’re a Prime Minister and you or your trusted deputies have to figure out how to choose all those political appointees － the Senior Vice-Ministers and Vice Ministers. You can’t expect to know (in the case of the Lower House) all the third- and second-termers well enough to make the right appointments. Over the long-run, administrations may stop treating these jobs as virtual internships and use them to better immediate effect, relegating, not incidentally, the rest of the rank-and-file Diet members to pure backbenchers. Until that happens though － I think it will be a long time in coming, if ever － the Prime Minister and his closest associates must have some viable means of allocating those posts.
Rookies have very good reasons of their own to join factions. A faction is a ready-made network to plug into, a good place to learn the ropes, find mentors, receive introductions***. There’s far less money available compared to the old days, but unless you are independently very wealthy, every million yen in political funds counts. And when a rookie’s first crack at reelection comes around, it’s good to have some nationally recognized figures come around to put in a good word with your constituents. And the bigger the faction, the greater the firepower; and vice versa. So I do not think that it is a coincidence that the Machimura faction has grown over its long hold on the Prime Minister’s seat to become the largest faction in the LDP. Tsutomu Takebe, who ran the party organization under Prime Minister Koizumi, has tried to keep the flame of independence alive by providing venues for training newbies. At least in the short-run, he is fighting a rearguard action.
As for better-established members, they will have accumulated a substantial amount of political capital within their factions. It doesn’t make political sense to throw that away and start anew as independents. Thus, once a faction member, (usually) always a member. Mr. Hatoyama is not really an exception to this rule. He has been in and out of the LDP, coming back again to stay in 2000. He joined the Tsushima faction, where he started out his political career when it was the almighty Tanaka faction****.
For those harboring ambitions for the top office, faction membership is highly helpful, perhaps essential. To file to run for the LDP Presidency, you need the signatures of at least 20 Diet members. A convenient place to start would be the member of your faction, where the smallest micro-faction has more than a baker’s dozen as a starter’s pack. A large faction would be even more convenient for aspirants. Mr. Tanigaki and Makoto Koga, the head of much larger Koga faction, have a natural affinity as foreign policy and history issue doves. But the Koga faction’s lack of a proximate candidate for the Prime Minister’s job must have figured just as importantly in the equation.
Kaoru Yasano, the affable policy wonk and behind-the-scenes operator, has seen much success as a troubleshooter and behind-the-scenes mediator. Most recently, he has been whispered as a potential successor to Prime Minister Koizumi, or replacement for Prime Minister Abe, but nothing really came of a that. Mr. Ishihara must have had this precedent in addition to his own experience in mind***** when he decided to fall in with his ideological and operational opposite, Mr. Yamazaki. It is telling that the Yamazaki faction had no viable for Prime Minister.
Policies and ideologies cut across faction lines; Mr. Ishihara alone is proof of that. However, Diet members do not fall into neat groups holding common positions on all or most of the important issues of the day******. This neccessitates the proliferation of an endless string of semi-permanent caucuses, many of them cutting across party lines. At the other end, no single issue is sufficiently powerful and divisive enough to force a realignment that severs permanently the communal relationships and the practical conveniences of the factions.
Thus, for the foreseeable future, factions should continue to thrive in the LDP. An important corollary of this conjecture is that a political realignment of the two major parties is not in the cards either.
Okay… not quite good enough, but I think I got it out of my system. And life is so short…
* Koizumi Junichirō, Shinzō Abe and Yasuo Fukuda all hailed from the Seiwakai. Mr. Koizumi was nominally the faction head while Yoshirō Mori, the faction head took him turn before him as Prime Minister.
** Yōhei Kōno, the current President of the Lower House, is the only LDP President in its 53-year history never to serve as Prime Minister.
*** This must have been particularly important for the Koizumi kids, since so many of them had little or no political experience or ties to their local political communities.
**** Mr. Hatoyama surely still harbors ambitions to be Prime Minister. Still only 59-years old, he is a 10-term Diet member with a pedigree better than Mr. Fukuda’s and at least as good as Mr. Abe’s. He displayed his ambitions when he tried but failed to stand for the election of the LDP President in 2006. I suspect that this experience was a strong motivation to go to the Tsushima faction, which conveniently does not have ready Prime Minister candidate. Tsushima faction member Fukushirō Nukaga has been seen my many as a potential candidate, but when he tried to stand in 2007, he had to give up because he could not even secure the support of his own faction.
***** I suspect that similar considerations entered into Mr. Hatoyama’s decision, but I couldn’t be sure about it, so I put it in footnote****.
****** To give an example, too many Western commentators regularly refer to Mr. Koizumi as a right-wing politician, a nationalist, because he antagonized the Chinese by insisting on going to Yasukuni Shrine, and also supported President Bush on the war in Iraq. To realize that those people slide beyond shaggy conventional wisdom into the realm of urban legend, you only have to look at his position on the Class A War Criminals and other hot-button history issues, as well as his support for MOF in holding the line against defense spending. And I haven’t even talked about the imperial succession. And North Korea. I’ll try to expand this point into a full post one of these days.
Friday, February 08, 2008
Cellphone Novels
Click through from The Daily Dish, here. I haven't read any cellphone novels and don't plan to any time soon*, but what Bob Dooley writes about the Japanese language and literature jibes with my understanding.
* The translation example leaves me pretty cold, though short excerpts from quite entertaining novels can be pretty tiresome - can you imagine reading a random page from, say, The World According to Garp and really enjoying it?
...
...well, I can't...
* The translation example leaves me pretty cold, though short excerpts from quite entertaining novels can be pretty tiresome - can you imagine reading a random page from, say, The World According to Garp and really enjoying it?
...
...well, I can't...
The Whale Hunt and the Abattoir － Grim Reminders; and Other Random Thoughts on the Latest Salvo from Australia
The Australian government has released photos and footage of whales being killed and dragged onto the Japanese whaling ship. Visuals are always effective, and they got a lot of play on BBC and, I suspect, much of the Western media. I’ll talk about some aspects of the public communications efforts later, but first:
We rarely see animals － more precisely animals for which we can feel empathy* － die violently. In fact, if you are a regular viewer of CNN, Fox News and/or BBC and are not an animal documentary fanatic, you will have witnessed far more untimely deaths and their aftermaths befalling humans than animals. This is particularly true in the case of urban denizens of advanced economies, including yours truly (and most likely you as well), who are shielded from the unpleasant realities of the abattoir. We collectively also happen to be the greatest beneficiaries of the science and engineering as applied to the processing and packaging of animals for consumption.
The protocols of death in the case of cattle has been “humanized” in recent decades, thanks to the enthusiasm of animal activists, but possible only through the efforts of scientists and engineers, such as Temple Grandin. By “humane”, I mean, of course, minimized distress and pain to the animal. It is swift, efficient; a far cry from the exhilaration and agony of the chase, the blow and the denouement, the hunt, which cannot fail to invoke thoughts of a lynching. But swift and efficient? Need I remind you what thoughts would arise if we were to see similar images, photos, and video footage of similar duration, of cattle being systematically filed in, to be slaughtered, one after another, and to be benumbed by the sheer bureaucratic monotony?
* My impression is that for most people, this rules out all so-called cold-blooded animals － snakes, fish, insects, etc. － except perhaps frogs. I stand ready to be corrected. There must be some studies out there on this subject by behavioral scientists. And how do I explain Antz and Jiminy Cricket? But then, you can anthropomorphize a teapot. I need to do more thinking on this.
A couple of thoughts with regard to the Australian government’s most recent actions:
First, there’s a meaningful gap between the harsh words of Australian Environment Minister Peter Garrett, who, according to BBC told reporters, "It is explicitly clear from these images that this is the indiscriminate killing of whales, where you have a whale and its calf killed in this way," and that "[t]o claim that this is in any way scientific is to continue the charade that has surrounded this issue from day one," and the calm and collected approach of Foreign Minister Stephen Smith reported here in talks with Foreign Minister Kōmura and a session at the Japan National Press Club. Words like “indiscriminate killing” and “charade” are not in harmony with Mr. Smith’s desire “that the whaling dispute would not affect the overall partnership between the two countries”.
There are a couple of reasons for this. First, this is what environment ministers do. They tend to be advocators, frontrunners, and jawboning is a most favored, sometimes only, tool available to them. This happens repeatedly in environmental negotiations, when they routinely clash with their industrial, trade, and foreign relations colleagues. Second, Mr. Garrett is playing to the domestic audience. That is compounded by the rowdy, rough-and-tumble nature of political discourse in Australia. My guess is, Mr. Garrett’s statements are milquetoast down under. Here in Japan, though, I suspect that they will be seen as fighting words. If Mr. Garrett’s approach is typical of the “Australian point of view” that “a special envoy” as proposed by Mr. Smith would convey, perhaps it is better for the Labor government to shelve the idea and let the legal process work its course.
My second point is that Mr. Garrett overreaches his evidence when he asserts, according to this AP-CNN report, “that this is the indiscriminate killing of whales, where you have a whale and its calf killed in this way”.
Maybe, maybe not. Who is to judge? After all, one nation’s “random sampling” is another nation’s “indiscriminate killing”. But with regard to “whale and calf”, both AP and BBC fail to mention that the statement issued by Japan's Institute for Cetacean Research (ICR) in response to the Australian claims notes that the larger female whale was not lactating.
We rarely see animals － more precisely animals for which we can feel empathy* － die violently. In fact, if you are a regular viewer of CNN, Fox News and/or BBC and are not an animal documentary fanatic, you will have witnessed far more untimely deaths and their aftermaths befalling humans than animals. This is particularly true in the case of urban denizens of advanced economies, including yours truly (and most likely you as well), who are shielded from the unpleasant realities of the abattoir. We collectively also happen to be the greatest beneficiaries of the science and engineering as applied to the processing and packaging of animals for consumption.
The protocols of death in the case of cattle has been “humanized” in recent decades, thanks to the enthusiasm of animal activists, but possible only through the efforts of scientists and engineers, such as Temple Grandin. By “humane”, I mean, of course, minimized distress and pain to the animal. It is swift, efficient; a far cry from the exhilaration and agony of the chase, the blow and the denouement, the hunt, which cannot fail to invoke thoughts of a lynching. But swift and efficient? Need I remind you what thoughts would arise if we were to see similar images, photos, and video footage of similar duration, of cattle being systematically filed in, to be slaughtered, one after another, and to be benumbed by the sheer bureaucratic monotony?
* My impression is that for most people, this rules out all so-called cold-blooded animals － snakes, fish, insects, etc. － except perhaps frogs. I stand ready to be corrected. There must be some studies out there on this subject by behavioral scientists. And how do I explain Antz and Jiminy Cricket? But then, you can anthropomorphize a teapot. I need to do more thinking on this.
A couple of thoughts with regard to the Australian government’s most recent actions:
First, there’s a meaningful gap between the harsh words of Australian Environment Minister Peter Garrett, who, according to BBC told reporters, "It is explicitly clear from these images that this is the indiscriminate killing of whales, where you have a whale and its calf killed in this way," and that "[t]o claim that this is in any way scientific is to continue the charade that has surrounded this issue from day one," and the calm and collected approach of Foreign Minister Stephen Smith reported here in talks with Foreign Minister Kōmura and a session at the Japan National Press Club. Words like “indiscriminate killing” and “charade” are not in harmony with Mr. Smith’s desire “that the whaling dispute would not affect the overall partnership between the two countries”.
There are a couple of reasons for this. First, this is what environment ministers do. They tend to be advocators, frontrunners, and jawboning is a most favored, sometimes only, tool available to them. This happens repeatedly in environmental negotiations, when they routinely clash with their industrial, trade, and foreign relations colleagues. Second, Mr. Garrett is playing to the domestic audience. That is compounded by the rowdy, rough-and-tumble nature of political discourse in Australia. My guess is, Mr. Garrett’s statements are milquetoast down under. Here in Japan, though, I suspect that they will be seen as fighting words. If Mr. Garrett’s approach is typical of the “Australian point of view” that “a special envoy” as proposed by Mr. Smith would convey, perhaps it is better for the Labor government to shelve the idea and let the legal process work its course.
My second point is that Mr. Garrett overreaches his evidence when he asserts, according to this AP-CNN report, “that this is the indiscriminate killing of whales, where you have a whale and its calf killed in this way”.
Maybe, maybe not. Who is to judge? After all, one nation’s “random sampling” is another nation’s “indiscriminate killing”. But with regard to “whale and calf”, both AP and BBC fail to mention that the statement issued by Japan's Institute for Cetacean Research (ICR) in response to the Australian claims notes that the larger female whale was not lactating.
Wednesday, February 06, 2008
Irony Lost on Japanese Media as Online Chinese Takes a Dig at Authorities
One of the consequences of life under the claustrophobia of authoritarianism is a penchant for conspiracies, real and imagined, as I wrote here (footnote *), as well as an overreliance on the rumor mill. A more positive, defiant approach is the use of rhetorical devices to convey the truth right under the searching eyes of unimaginative officialdom. What you see is not always what you get. Note how the Yomiuri reporter and his editors have completely missed the irony that the comment in the following excerpt employs in a devastating criticism of the Chinese authorities for its failure to maintain food safety at home.
Chinese Dumplings “Conspiracy”, “Terrorism”; Trading Barbs on Japanese, Chinese Websites
While there is a paucity of official reporting in China concerning poisoning by Chinese frozen dumplings, comments are beginning to appear that openly display anti-Japanese sentiments on some websites.
…
On message boards at popular websites, there were some who expounded “conspiracy theories” regarding dumpling poisoning or revealed their antipathy [towards Japan with comments] such as: “Don’t the Japanese have weak resistance? [We] Chinese acquired antibodies a long time ago, and can’t be taken down by ordinary poisons.”
…
－ from Yomiuri, 2008 February 5 (my translation)
Chinese Dumplings “Conspiracy”, “Terrorism”; Trading Barbs on Japanese, Chinese Websites
While there is a paucity of official reporting in China concerning poisoning by Chinese frozen dumplings, comments are beginning to appear that openly display anti-Japanese sentiments on some websites.
…
On message boards at popular websites, there were some who expounded “conspiracy theories” regarding dumpling poisoning or revealed their antipathy [towards Japan with comments] such as: “Don’t the Japanese have weak resistance? [We] Chinese acquired antibodies a long time ago, and can’t be taken down by ordinary poisons.”
…
－ from Yomiuri, 2008 February 5 (my translation)
Media, Online Community, Governments Respond to the Poisoned Chinese Dumplings Incident
The Japanese media are having a field day with the pesticide-laced Chinese dumplings. No wonder; it’s a great story. Food-related malfeasance is always a big draw, and this one has an added fillip: unlike the 2007 string of false labeling cases, this one had casualties, albeit nonfatal. It’s also about imports, thus quickening the pulse of the politics of food security. And of course there’s the China angle, which enlivens the debate on any issue, given our near-obsession with our giant neighbor in ascendance.
Three of the four major dailies are, broadly speaking, pro-China. They are obviously not going to go out of their way to portray China in an unfavorable light. In fact, they show a Chinese government that is working hard to respond positively, a government struggling to maintain control over a rapidly growing but still quite poor nation of 1.3 billion people, a nation where consumer-safety so often takes a backseat to growth and profits issues, a nation so large that domestic developments often have significant regional and global ramifications.
Sankei, the most conservative of the four, is somewhat harsher on the Chinese. The extensive online coverage －increased substantially since it replaced Mainichi as the MSN mainstream media partner － portrays a reluctant, defensive Chinese government and a media that seeks to put as much of the blame as possible on the Japanese side, as well as a suspicious, even hostile, online public hurling accusations. Of course a visit to the Japanese mega-message board 2 Channeru shows that we can give as good, at least in part*. The pro-China, pro-coalition government Yomiuri gives us a report that covers both sides of this online shouting match. (Not that anyone can understand firsthand what the other side is saying.)
The Japanese government is reacting with considerable restraint. We are cooperating, it tells us at every juncture － our health and criminal bureaucracies from both sides are working with each other; the Chinese are coming to explain, we are going over to conduct a survey… If there is a conspiracy, it must be a conspiracy of the two governments, to calm the waters.
The reasons for this g-to-g collaboration are not hard to figure out. The Chinese leadership does not want to pick a fight with Japan, for Bad Japan, Bad is a domestic trope that is hard to suppress and easy to get out of hand. The last thing that it wants is yet another popular rallying point that could help the erosion of the political stability that President Hu and his party comrades desperately seek to maintain. There are commercial considerations as well. Food exports to Japan are an important part of their economic push. Every scare, whether it’s bird flu, or carcinogenic eels, or poisoned dumplings carries a reputation risk that increasingly goes beyond that particular market segment. That is bad for local economies, bad for political stability.
On the Japanese side, the Fukuda administration also has good reasons to do its best to seal off the contaminated area, to show that things are under control with the minimum fuss. Hu Jintao, the Chinese President, is likely to visit Japan “when the cherry flowers blossom”, which would put the event proximate to the March 31/April 1 turn of the Japanese fiscal year, when the gasoline tax surcharge happens to be expiring this time around**. The liberal, China-friendly Prime Minister would like nothing better than to stage a successful summit, if only to boost his public standing at what promises to be a crucial juncture in the Diet proceedings. Getting the dumplings incident under control is a must, lest it become an unwanted distraction in its quest for the Holy Grail: a defensible deal on the East China Sea gas fields***.
* The Chinese appear to be more prone to outlandish conspiracy theories, even while pure rage and scorn rule on both sides, Chinese and Japanese. Awareness of pervasive manipulation by an authoritarian regime is fertile soil for seeds of conspiracy, real and imagined. Hostility rooted in recent history － real, imagined, and re-imagined － is the fertilizer.
** Not to mention the desirability of passing the budget and budget-related legislative bills before the new fiscal year begins. For what it’s worth, note that the pro-China, DPJ leadership is not going to use this issue other than to castigate the Japanese government for lax enforcement.
*** It is important to remember that Japan has commercial interests at stake as well. Japanese trading companies, retailers, and agribusinesses are increasingly reliant on low-cost input from China. They have made substantial investments of their time and money to bring China into their product chains. This must have entered into the calculations of the Japanese government in forming its response. However, such considerations must have been secondary at best. For the Japanese government, stability means first and foremost getting the situation under control. A closed, authoritarian regime and an open, majority-rule regime have different priorities.
Three of the four major dailies are, broadly speaking, pro-China. They are obviously not going to go out of their way to portray China in an unfavorable light. In fact, they show a Chinese government that is working hard to respond positively, a government struggling to maintain control over a rapidly growing but still quite poor nation of 1.3 billion people, a nation where consumer-safety so often takes a backseat to growth and profits issues, a nation so large that domestic developments often have significant regional and global ramifications.
Sankei, the most conservative of the four, is somewhat harsher on the Chinese. The extensive online coverage －increased substantially since it replaced Mainichi as the MSN mainstream media partner － portrays a reluctant, defensive Chinese government and a media that seeks to put as much of the blame as possible on the Japanese side, as well as a suspicious, even hostile, online public hurling accusations. Of course a visit to the Japanese mega-message board 2 Channeru shows that we can give as good, at least in part*. The pro-China, pro-coalition government Yomiuri gives us a report that covers both sides of this online shouting match. (Not that anyone can understand firsthand what the other side is saying.)
The Japanese government is reacting with considerable restraint. We are cooperating, it tells us at every juncture － our health and criminal bureaucracies from both sides are working with each other; the Chinese are coming to explain, we are going over to conduct a survey… If there is a conspiracy, it must be a conspiracy of the two governments, to calm the waters.
The reasons for this g-to-g collaboration are not hard to figure out. The Chinese leadership does not want to pick a fight with Japan, for Bad Japan, Bad is a domestic trope that is hard to suppress and easy to get out of hand. The last thing that it wants is yet another popular rallying point that could help the erosion of the political stability that President Hu and his party comrades desperately seek to maintain. There are commercial considerations as well. Food exports to Japan are an important part of their economic push. Every scare, whether it’s bird flu, or carcinogenic eels, or poisoned dumplings carries a reputation risk that increasingly goes beyond that particular market segment. That is bad for local economies, bad for political stability.
On the Japanese side, the Fukuda administration also has good reasons to do its best to seal off the contaminated area, to show that things are under control with the minimum fuss. Hu Jintao, the Chinese President, is likely to visit Japan “when the cherry flowers blossom”, which would put the event proximate to the March 31/April 1 turn of the Japanese fiscal year, when the gasoline tax surcharge happens to be expiring this time around**. The liberal, China-friendly Prime Minister would like nothing better than to stage a successful summit, if only to boost his public standing at what promises to be a crucial juncture in the Diet proceedings. Getting the dumplings incident under control is a must, lest it become an unwanted distraction in its quest for the Holy Grail: a defensible deal on the East China Sea gas fields***.
* The Chinese appear to be more prone to outlandish conspiracy theories, even while pure rage and scorn rule on both sides, Chinese and Japanese. Awareness of pervasive manipulation by an authoritarian regime is fertile soil for seeds of conspiracy, real and imagined. Hostility rooted in recent history － real, imagined, and re-imagined － is the fertilizer.
** Not to mention the desirability of passing the budget and budget-related legislative bills before the new fiscal year begins. For what it’s worth, note that the pro-China, DPJ leadership is not going to use this issue other than to castigate the Japanese government for lax enforcement.
*** It is important to remember that Japan has commercial interests at stake as well. Japanese trading companies, retailers, and agribusinesses are increasingly reliant on low-cost input from China. They have made substantial investments of their time and money to bring China into their product chains. This must have entered into the calculations of the Japanese government in forming its response. However, such considerations must have been secondary at best. For the Japanese government, stability means first and foremost getting the situation under control. A closed, authoritarian regime and an open, majority-rule regime have different priorities.
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
What Will Become of the Alliance If the DPJ Comes to Power?
If the DPJ manages to come to power, it will pull the JASDF transport aircraft out of Iraq. It says so in its policy manifest. It will also pull the JMSDF supply boat out of the Indian Ocean and the counterterrorist operations there, since its leader Ichirō Ozawa insists that it’s unconstitutional and once tried to force a snap election on such grounds.
But that’s not what I have in mind. After all, France and Germany stayed out of the war in Iraq and caught a lot of flak from the Bush administration and other Republicans, but that never posed a threat to NATO itself. South Korean (non-combat) troops left the Afghan theater, but that on its own has no effect on its security relationship with the US. The Middle East may be, from a national security point of view the most important part of the world outside one’s neighborhood (be it East Asia, Western Europe, North America, etc.).But for a regional power or other lesser beings, the central security relationship, the alliance itself, is firmly rooted in its territory and the near beyond. No worry, the alliance will survive a DPJ administration. No worry, the alliance will survive DPJ pullouts. But for a regional power or other lesser beings, the central security relationship, the alliance itself, is firmly rooted in its territory and the near beyond. Which brings this post to the DPJ support for anti-realignment candidates.
Katsusuke Imura won the 2003 Iwakuni mayoral election as the incumbent on a platform opposing the transfer of US carrier aircraft to the Iwakuni Base from the Atsugi Base. The LDP-dominated prefectural assembly strongly opposed Imura on this and, helped along by fiscal pressure from Tokyo*, made life difficult for the mayor. In fact, life got so difficult for Mr. Imura that he decided to seek a new mandate from his constituency. He resigned on December 28, traditionally the last working day of the year for the government and ordinary businesses in Japan, and is running against the LDP-backed candidate**. Mr. Imura himself has the support of the DPJ.
Now this is not the first time that the DPJ has backed the anti-troop-realignment candidate. Most famously, it backed Keiko Itokazu, whose personal views go somewhat beyond the run-of-the-mill NYMBYists, in the 2006 Okinawa gubernatorial election. This is likely a pattern that is replicating itself in other prefectures and municipalities that harbor US military facilities.
Now I said “of necessity”, not “of its free will”, since it is well-known that there are a considerable number of DPJ Diet members whose views on national security fit in quite comfortably with those of the LDP mainstream. But the electoral necessity to differentiate its product from the LDP’s compels the DPJ under Ichirō Ozawa’s leadership to support these non-realignment candidates.
Such being the case, I see no way that the DPJ can walk away from all this if it comes to power under Mr. Ozawa. The upshot is that all realignment of US troops with regard to Japan will come to a sudden halt. Okay － you might say － there’s been so little movement for the last dozen years that a few more years of delay won’t hurt much anyway. But having an administration that at least expends words and a princely sum of money to that end is one thing; having one that won’t even bother to make the effort, another.
Without support from the Japanese government, the US government will be obliged to relegate to the backburner any thoughts of troop realignment that would increase the footprints of any one of its military facilities in Japan. It is near unthinkable that this will cause any future US administration to fundamentally rethink the alliance. Still, it is prudent, or at least intellectually stimulating, to think through the lesser ramifications of such a policy change, as well as the long-term uncertainties stemming from prospects of future regime changes.
* Among other things, the government reportedly withheld a 3.5 billion yen subsidy for building a new prefectural government complex.
** There are others, but they don’t matter.
But that’s not what I have in mind. After all, France and Germany stayed out of the war in Iraq and caught a lot of flak from the Bush administration and other Republicans, but that never posed a threat to NATO itself. South Korean (non-combat) troops left the Afghan theater, but that on its own has no effect on its security relationship with the US. The Middle East may be, from a national security point of view the most important part of the world outside one’s neighborhood (be it East Asia, Western Europe, North America, etc.).
Katsusuke Imura won the 2003 Iwakuni mayoral election as the incumbent on a platform opposing the transfer of US carrier aircraft to the Iwakuni Base from the Atsugi Base. The LDP-dominated prefectural assembly strongly opposed Imura on this and, helped along by fiscal pressure from Tokyo*, made life difficult for the mayor. In fact, life got so difficult for Mr. Imura that he decided to seek a new mandate from his constituency. He resigned on December 28, traditionally the last working day of the year for the government and ordinary businesses in Japan, and is running against the LDP-backed candidate**. Mr. Imura himself has the support of the DPJ.
Now this is not the first time that the DPJ has backed the anti-troop-realignment candidate. Most famously, it backed Keiko Itokazu, whose personal views go somewhat beyond the run-of-the-mill NYMBYists, in the 2006 Okinawa gubernatorial election. This is likely a pattern that is replicating itself in other prefectures and municipalities that harbor US military facilities.
Now I said “of necessity”, not “of its free will”, since it is well-known that there are a considerable number of DPJ Diet members whose views on national security fit in quite comfortably with those of the LDP mainstream. But the electoral necessity to differentiate its product from the LDP’s compels the DPJ under Ichirō Ozawa’s leadership to support these non-realignment candidates.
Such being the case, I see no way that the DPJ can walk away from all this if it comes to power under Mr. Ozawa. The upshot is that all realignment of US troops with regard to Japan will come to a sudden halt. Okay － you might say － there’s been so little movement for the last dozen years that a few more years of delay won’t hurt much anyway. But having an administration that at least expends words and a princely sum of money to that end is one thing; having one that won’t even bother to make the effort, another.
Without support from the Japanese government, the US government will be obliged to relegate to the backburner any thoughts of troop realignment that would increase the footprints of any one of its military facilities in Japan. It is near unthinkable that this will cause any future US administration to fundamentally rethink the alliance. Still, it is prudent, or at least intellectually stimulating, to think through the lesser ramifications of such a policy change, as well as the long-term uncertainties stemming from prospects of future regime changes.
* Among other things, the government reportedly withheld a 3.5 billion yen subsidy for building a new prefectural government complex.
** There are others, but they don’t matter.
Monday, February 04, 2008
Nikkyōso Convention Canceled; Civil Society, Administrative Branch at Fault
The Japan Teachers Union (Nikkyōso) is regarded as one of the more leftist-pacifist labor unions in Japan. This, and the fact that its members are responsible in large measure for developing the hearts and the minds of children, have put it at loggerheads with the LDP and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. It has also been the target of attacks, verbal and worse, from right-wing organizations.
Nikkyōso’s annual national get-together, the National Conference on Educational Research, is no exception. In fact, the national exposure it receives makes it the Super Bowl of sorts for right-wing activists, who gather at the site of the conference plenary in the thousands, camouflage gear, darkly painted vehicles and all, to stage lengthy, noisome protests. Thus, it is not always easy to find a hotel or other suitable convention center willing to host the main event, and Nikkyōso has on occasion had to resort to law suits to force venues that wanted to back out of commitments. This year’s event, scheduled to be held on February 2 came down to the wire, as the Tokyo High Court upheld a temporary injunction declaring the contract with Grand Prince Hotel Takanawa valid.
But this year’s event had a new twist. For Grand Prince Hotel Takanawa chose to ignore the injunction altogether and go ahead with another event contracted after they had decided to break the contract. Nikkyōso had no choice but to cancel the main event, and is considering suing the Hotel for damages. The Japanese mainstream media are understandably upset at this turn of events, and Asahi, Mainichi, and Yomiuri (but not － yet － Sankei*) have come out with editorials condemning this turn of events.
The said editorials rightly see this as a threat to freedom of assembly and freedom of speech. But they focus their criticism on the hotel for ignoring the injunction, and see it as a show of disrespect for the judiciary. Which I think is completely wrong.
Typical of the thinking behind the criticism is the following excerpt from Asahi:
Although the hotel is owned by a private company, by the very nature of its business, it essentially operates as a public facility.
This is very dangerous thinking. The hotel is owned and operated by a private-sector, for-profit corporation. As such, the corporate entity enjoys none of the privileges of a public-interest or non-profit entity, the quid pro for the restrictions under which the latter operates. Conversely, it is free to operate within, of course, the constraints imposed by the laws and customs of the land.
Remember, the hotel is not doing anything illegal. The court decision in question is a declaratory injunction. To be enforced requires another court decision. Did the hotel act cravenly? Perhaps. But it merely decided not to honor its contract, which is not that uncommon as business decisions go. A contract has been breached, but no contract law or civil procedures law is being called into question here.
What has happened is something more far-reaching than the media believes to be the case: a failure on the part of civil society. A fellow member is unable to exercise its rights and fulfill its obligations in order to conduct its business according to the land and customs of the land. Civil society has failed to protect its individual members. This is a communal failure and, as such, calls for a communal response. The media has spoken on behalf of civil society as a whole, but for only Nikkyōso, and somewhat misguidedly at that. In fact, the rights of the hotel, a private-sector business, to conduct its normal line of business is also being violated. It is the responsibility of hotelier associations and business federations (say, the chambers of industry and commerce) to act jointly to counter future infringements of their members’ rights.
Some members of civil society are more equal than others and carry an added responsibility. For example, Nippon Budokan, the preferred site for major professional sports events and pop concerts (think, Madison Square Garden meets Carnegie Hall), has in the past been sued, successfully, by Nikkyōso. It is important to realize that Nippon Budokan is a public-interest entity, which enjoy income-tax privileges and as such should be particularly careful about denying future requests to act as venue, lest it be accused of playing political favors in its revenue-earning activities.
In the government, the administrative branch, including in this case the Tokyo prefectural government, is also presumptively at fault for not providing civil society with an environment in which events undesirable to pressure groups can be held. Whatever their feelings for Nikkyōso may be, Fukuda administration and Governor Ishihara should be among the first to speak out on this matter.
This is of particular importance when the victims are those that you perceive as your opponents. For if you do not speak out in support of your enemies, then you surely cannot expect them to defend your rights**. And what greater denial of the communality that is the essence of civil society can there be than that?
Incidentally, a firm statement, carefully crafted, would go quite a long way in restoring confidence in a lackluster Fukuda administration without alienating anyone but the hardcore right-wing, which isn’t in Mr. Fukuda’s corner anyway. Doesn’t anyone around the Prime Minister have some imagination***?
* Don’t come down too hard on Sankei. The entire English-language media, including the wire services, have also passed on it so far.
** Yomiuri feels compelled to point out in its editorial that at other events, speeches have been canceled in the past due to pressure from the left as well.
*** In the LDP’s defense, I must mention that I can’t find anything about the matter on the DPJ website either. Or the Socialists'. Or the Communists'. Doesn’t anyone want to hug the teachers?
Nikkyōso’s annual national get-together, the National Conference on Educational Research, is no exception. In fact, the national exposure it receives makes it the Super Bowl of sorts for right-wing activists, who gather at the site of the conference plenary in the thousands, camouflage gear, darkly painted vehicles and all, to stage lengthy, noisome protests. Thus, it is not always easy to find a hotel or other suitable convention center willing to host the main event, and Nikkyōso has on occasion had to resort to law suits to force venues that wanted to back out of commitments. This year’s event, scheduled to be held on February 2 came down to the wire, as the Tokyo High Court upheld a temporary injunction declaring the contract with Grand Prince Hotel Takanawa valid.
But this year’s event had a new twist. For Grand Prince Hotel Takanawa chose to ignore the injunction altogether and go ahead with another event contracted after they had decided to break the contract. Nikkyōso had no choice but to cancel the main event, and is considering suing the Hotel for damages. The Japanese mainstream media are understandably upset at this turn of events, and Asahi, Mainichi, and Yomiuri (but not － yet － Sankei*) have come out with editorials condemning this turn of events.
The said editorials rightly see this as a threat to freedom of assembly and freedom of speech. But they focus their criticism on the hotel for ignoring the injunction, and see it as a show of disrespect for the judiciary. Which I think is completely wrong.
Typical of the thinking behind the criticism is the following excerpt from Asahi:
Although the hotel is owned by a private company, by the very nature of its business, it essentially operates as a public facility.
This is very dangerous thinking. The hotel is owned and operated by a private-sector, for-profit corporation. As such, the corporate entity enjoys none of the privileges of a public-interest or non-profit entity, the quid pro for the restrictions under which the latter operates. Conversely, it is free to operate within, of course, the constraints imposed by the laws and customs of the land.
Remember, the hotel is not doing anything illegal. The court decision in question is a declaratory injunction. To be enforced requires another court decision. Did the hotel act cravenly? Perhaps. But it merely decided not to honor its contract, which is not that uncommon as business decisions go. A contract has been breached, but no contract law or civil procedures law is being called into question here.
What has happened is something more far-reaching than the media believes to be the case: a failure on the part of civil society. A fellow member is unable to exercise its rights and fulfill its obligations in order to conduct its business according to the land and customs of the land. Civil society has failed to protect its individual members. This is a communal failure and, as such, calls for a communal response. The media has spoken on behalf of civil society as a whole, but for only Nikkyōso, and somewhat misguidedly at that. In fact, the rights of the hotel, a private-sector business, to conduct its normal line of business is also being violated. It is the responsibility of hotelier associations and business federations (say, the chambers of industry and commerce) to act jointly to counter future infringements of their members’ rights.
Some members of civil society are more equal than others and carry an added responsibility. For example, Nippon Budokan, the preferred site for major professional sports events and pop concerts (think, Madison Square Garden meets Carnegie Hall), has in the past been sued, successfully, by Nikkyōso. It is important to realize that Nippon Budokan is a public-interest entity, which enjoy income-tax privileges and as such should be particularly careful about denying future requests to act as venue, lest it be accused of playing political favors in its revenue-earning activities.
In the government, the administrative branch, including in this case the Tokyo prefectural government, is also presumptively at fault for not providing civil society with an environment in which events undesirable to pressure groups can be held. Whatever their feelings for Nikkyōso may be, Fukuda administration and Governor Ishihara should be among the first to speak out on this matter.
This is of particular importance when the victims are those that you perceive as your opponents. For if you do not speak out in support of your enemies, then you surely cannot expect them to defend your rights**. And what greater denial of the communality that is the essence of civil society can there be than that?
Incidentally, a firm statement, carefully crafted, would go quite a long way in restoring confidence in a lackluster Fukuda administration without alienating anyone but the hardcore right-wing, which isn’t in Mr. Fukuda’s corner anyway. Doesn’t anyone around the Prime Minister have some imagination***?
* Don’t come down too hard on Sankei. The entire English-language media, including the wire services, have also passed on it so far.
** Yomiuri feels compelled to point out in its editorial that at other events, speeches have been canceled in the past due to pressure from the left as well.
*** In the LDP’s defense, I must mention that I can’t find anything about the matter on the DPJ website either. Or the Socialists'. Or the Communists'. Doesn’t anyone want to hug the teachers?
Sunday, February 03, 2008
The Lack of Space between the LDP and DPJ and What That Means
I’ve already spent too much time on this, which keeps morphing on me. Even the title doesn’t really work anymore, but I’m posting it here in all its untidiness in the hopes that I can give more clarity to my thoughts at a later date.
I mentioned here that the space between the political agendas of the LDP and DPJ is mostly of tactical rather than strategic origin. Let me expand on that.
First of all, the refueling operations in the Indian Ocean and the extension of the gasoline tax surcharge, the two issues with which the DPJ tried/is trying to force Prime Minister Fukuda to call a snap election, were not even mentioned in the DPJ policy manifest under which it fought the July election. Before that, it is easy to forget that the DPJ was broadly in agreement with Prime Minister Abe’s hallmark initiatives, i.e. bringing patriotism into education and setting constitutional amendment in motion. In fact, if you watch the debate on these and other issues (say, Yauskuni), the real fault lines among the Diet members － in contrast to the tidy but politically imposed borders － cut across party lines on most if not all of the momentous issues* and are far more complex than media reports and some Japan hands will have you believe. As sensible and/or intriguing as so much of the DPJ policy manifest is, the DPJ has deliberately shifted focus away from it and on to a political agenda to further its electoral prospects.
But to what extent will this tacking determine the DPJ’s electoral outcomes? It is instructive to observe the ups and (mostly) downs of LDP fortunes under the bumbling, fumbling Abe administration, or the short-lived, though very real, honeymoon period of the Fukuda administration. The failures of the Abe administration have been detailed and dissected elsewhere; let’s briefly look at the Fukuda administration. Although it is too early to gauge how much the fight over the gasoline tax extension will hurt the Fukuda administration, it is Mr. Fukuda’s mishandling of the public pension issue (and possibly, to a lesser extent, failure to resolve in a timely manner the blood transfusion type C cirrhosis lawsuits) that has had the most impact in bringing down his public support by 10-15 percentage points. The failed (for now) outreach to Ichirō Ozawa to form a Grand Coalition also seems to have undermined his authority and imposed a sense of vulnerability around him. But if the extension of the refueling operations has made any lasting impression on the general public, the effect is almost negligible in proportion to all the political noise that it produced.
In fact, the initial public reception to each of our most recent Prime Ministers as well as the subsequent shifts in their political fortunes tells us the following: The Japanese public remains a patient public, still willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the latest version of the post-1955 establishment regime. But it does not like demonstrated incompetence, indifference, or venality. Conversely, it values competence, compassion, and honor.
With regard to competence and compassion, the LDP, often in association with the bureaucracy, has gifted the DPJ with major mishaps along the way. The DPJ has been somewhat less fortunate with virtue, since Mr. Ozawa, fairly or unfairly, has been unable to keep his name out of the two major money issues that have rocked the Diet, political financing and the Yamada Yōkō/Moriya bribery scandal, both now out of sight, possibly out of mind**. Even so, the DPJ appears to be comfortably ahead of the LDP in the virtue column as well.
Now it was on the basis of these virtues that the DPJ won and, more significantly, the LDP lost the July Upper House election. But can the DPJ win the Lower House general election by default? Can it be sure that Mr. Fukuda will keep repeating the kind of mishaps that hurt him in the virtue column, or that other LDP leaders will resume tripping over themselves en masse? That could turn into a long wait, unless the DPJ acts on its own to effect change.
In fact, the DPJ has been making efforts under Mr. Ozawa, which is where the aforementioned political tacking comes in. However, there is a disturbing tendency to favor no-pain, all-gain promises. This began most famously with the no-new-taxes pledge for its otherwise appealing proposal for public pension consolidation － even Prime Minister Fukuda has shown some interest in it; the consolidation, not the pledge. But a few trillion here, a few trillion there, and, inevitably, it begins looking like real money. This raises competence issues about the DPJ itself.
A regime change under such circumstances will have an effect that far transcends the political game. Whatever the motive for the positions that the DPJ has adopted or will adopt, every promise will have real-world consequences when the DPJ assumes the mantle of power. When you have the votes, you will be compelled to use them.
So where will they go from here?
Actually, the gasoline tax surcharge provides a good opportunity to retool their political agenda. Compromise is inevitable. As April 1 approaches, the two House Presidents will put enormous pressure on the two sides to come to a conclusion. They will put forward a compromise if it comes to that. At that point, I don’t see a scenario, barring some unforeseeable mishandling by the LDP, where the DPJ can refuse to move an inch and, without suffering devastating political damage, keep the Upper House from taking a vote. Similarly, there is no way that the LDP can remain intransigent and expect the surcharge extension to emerge unscathed. The DPJ should consider it a success if it can achieve an agreement that forces the Diet to take a new, publicly accountable look at the more fundamental issues underlying the gasoline taxes. After all, that was the point of the policy manifest in its call to abolish special budgets. There will be no prospects for a pre-Summit snap election if they go this route, but the odds of eventually prevailing will be substantially improved for the DPJ by this show of competence. It will have the not-trivial, added benefit of ensuring that party dissidents on this issue stay in the fold.
* This, by the way, is the main reason why a major realignment of the main political parties is highly unlikely, regardless of the results of the next Lower and Upper House elections. Individual poaching, maybe. But no wholesale defections. During that period, Daisaku Ikeda’s death is the event more likely to be the trigger of a chain reaction, but I believe that even this will take at least one general election to be activated. Besides, Mr. Ikeda, bless his soul, is not showing any signs of ill-health. At least nothing that the public is privy to.
** Unless, of course, new indictments come to the fore There’s been silence on this front, but you never know.
I mentioned here that the space between the political agendas of the LDP and DPJ is mostly of tactical rather than strategic origin. Let me expand on that.
First of all, the refueling operations in the Indian Ocean and the extension of the gasoline tax surcharge, the two issues with which the DPJ tried/is trying to force Prime Minister Fukuda to call a snap election, were not even mentioned in the DPJ policy manifest under which it fought the July election. Before that, it is easy to forget that the DPJ was broadly in agreement with Prime Minister Abe’s hallmark initiatives, i.e. bringing patriotism into education and setting constitutional amendment in motion. In fact, if you watch the debate on these and other issues (say, Yauskuni), the real fault lines among the Diet members － in contrast to the tidy but politically imposed borders － cut across party lines on most if not all of the momentous issues* and are far more complex than media reports and some Japan hands will have you believe. As sensible and/or intriguing as so much of the DPJ policy manifest is, the DPJ has deliberately shifted focus away from it and on to a political agenda to further its electoral prospects.
But to what extent will this tacking determine the DPJ’s electoral outcomes? It is instructive to observe the ups and (mostly) downs of LDP fortunes under the bumbling, fumbling Abe administration, or the short-lived, though very real, honeymoon period of the Fukuda administration. The failures of the Abe administration have been detailed and dissected elsewhere; let’s briefly look at the Fukuda administration. Although it is too early to gauge how much the fight over the gasoline tax extension will hurt the Fukuda administration, it is Mr. Fukuda’s mishandling of the public pension issue (and possibly, to a lesser extent, failure to resolve in a timely manner the blood transfusion type C cirrhosis lawsuits) that has had the most impact in bringing down his public support by 10-15 percentage points. The failed (for now) outreach to Ichirō Ozawa to form a Grand Coalition also seems to have undermined his authority and imposed a sense of vulnerability around him. But if the extension of the refueling operations has made any lasting impression on the general public, the effect is almost negligible in proportion to all the political noise that it produced.
In fact, the initial public reception to each of our most recent Prime Ministers as well as the subsequent shifts in their political fortunes tells us the following: The Japanese public remains a patient public, still willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the latest version of the post-1955 establishment regime. But it does not like demonstrated incompetence, indifference, or venality. Conversely, it values competence, compassion, and honor.
With regard to competence and compassion, the LDP, often in association with the bureaucracy, has gifted the DPJ with major mishaps along the way. The DPJ has been somewhat less fortunate with virtue, since Mr. Ozawa, fairly or unfairly, has been unable to keep his name out of the two major money issues that have rocked the Diet, political financing and the Yamada Yōkō/Moriya bribery scandal, both now out of sight, possibly out of mind**. Even so, the DPJ appears to be comfortably ahead of the LDP in the virtue column as well.
Now it was on the basis of these virtues that the DPJ won and, more significantly, the LDP lost the July Upper House election. But can the DPJ win the Lower House general election by default? Can it be sure that Mr. Fukuda will keep repeating the kind of mishaps that hurt him in the virtue column, or that other LDP leaders will resume tripping over themselves en masse? That could turn into a long wait, unless the DPJ acts on its own to effect change.
In fact, the DPJ has been making efforts under Mr. Ozawa, which is where the aforementioned political tacking comes in. However, there is a disturbing tendency to favor no-pain, all-gain promises. This began most famously with the no-new-taxes pledge for its otherwise appealing proposal for public pension consolidation － even Prime Minister Fukuda has shown some interest in it; the consolidation, not the pledge. But a few trillion here, a few trillion there, and, inevitably, it begins looking like real money. This raises competence issues about the DPJ itself.
A regime change under such circumstances will have an effect that far transcends the political game. Whatever the motive for the positions that the DPJ has adopted or will adopt, every promise will have real-world consequences when the DPJ assumes the mantle of power. When you have the votes, you will be compelled to use them.
So where will they go from here?
Actually, the gasoline tax surcharge provides a good opportunity to retool their political agenda. Compromise is inevitable. As April 1 approaches, the two House Presidents will put enormous pressure on the two sides to come to a conclusion. They will put forward a compromise if it comes to that. At that point, I don’t see a scenario, barring some unforeseeable mishandling by the LDP, where the DPJ can refuse to move an inch and, without suffering devastating political damage, keep the Upper House from taking a vote. Similarly, there is no way that the LDP can remain intransigent and expect the surcharge extension to emerge unscathed. The DPJ should consider it a success if it can achieve an agreement that forces the Diet to take a new, publicly accountable look at the more fundamental issues underlying the gasoline taxes. After all, that was the point of the policy manifest in its call to abolish special budgets. There will be no prospects for a pre-Summit snap election if they go this route, but the odds of eventually prevailing will be substantially improved for the DPJ by this show of competence. It will have the not-trivial, added benefit of ensuring that party dissidents on this issue stay in the fold.
* This, by the way, is the main reason why a major realignment of the main political parties is highly unlikely, regardless of the results of the next Lower and Upper House elections. Individual poaching, maybe. But no wholesale defections. During that period, Daisaku Ikeda’s death is the event more likely to be the trigger of a chain reaction, but I believe that even this will take at least one general election to be activated. Besides, Mr. Ikeda, bless his soul, is not showing any signs of ill-health. At least nothing that the public is privy to.
** Unless, of course, new indictments come to the fore There’s been silence on this front, but you never know.
Saturday, February 02, 2008
How Empires Deal with History： Australia Finds It Difficult to Turn Back Time on the “Lost Children”
The Australian Senate passed its own, somewhat belated motion (motion 920; scroll down to page 24459) on the comfort women issue on 2007 September 20. It must have been a disappointment to supporters of the ongoing campaign to force the Japanese government go beyond the Kōno Statement, though. For, I quote:
[T]he Senate
(a) notes that:
(i)...
...
(iv) the 1993 statement by then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono on the comfort women issue (the Kono statement) fully and officially acknowledged the complicity of the Japanese Government and military in the 1930s and 1940s in a coercive system of sexual slavery in occupied territories, and
(v) the Kono statement has been reaffirmed by subsequent Japanese governments and prime ministers, including by Prime Minister Abe;
(b) commends the Japanese people and Government for the steps they have taken so far to acknowledge and atone for Japan’s actions in the 1930s and 1940s; and
(c) encourages the Japanese people and Government to take further steps to recognise the full history of their nation, to foster awareness in Japan of its actions in the 1930s and 1940s, including in relation to comfort women, and to continue dialogue with those affected by Japan’s past actions in a spirit of reconciliation.
The Labor Party and other members of the opposition introduced an amendment that would make the motion read:
(iii) the 1993 statement by then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono officially acknowledged the Japanese Government’s findings, including its involvement in the comfort women system;
(b) encourages the new Prime Minister of Japan to acknowledge and officially apologise to comfort women by introducing such a resolution in the Diet; and
(c) encourages the Japanese Government to take further steps to recognise the full history of its nation, by taking historical responsibility and accurately teaching the history of comfort women in its schools.
However, the amendment was rejected by a vote of 34 to 32, and the motion passed as introduced. But Senators newly elected in the will take their seats on July 1, which will give the Labor Party, with an absolute majority of its own (39 seats out of 76 in all), to take another crack.
Now I have no quarrel in principle with members of civil society pressing claims, their own or otherwise, against the Japanese government*. But what are we to make of governments, particularly those of former empires, that try to dictate how the Japanese government deals with its history even while falling far short when it comes to dealing with their own. So let’s sit back and watch the Australian government deal with its own apology to the Australian aborigines. For this BBC report says nothing about any resolution, and the new Labor administration has apparently ruled out any compensation. Moreover, the proposed apology refers only to the “Stolen Generations”. It says nothing about the aborigines who were living on land expropriated by settlers over the years**, nor does it mention the aborigines in Tasmania, who were hunted as game and slaughtered as vermin.
Perhaps the Australian Senate should take the easy way out and demand that the British Parliament pass a resolution of apology. After all, there are no personal costs to making demands that only others need fulfill.
Incidentally, I would be very much obliged if someone could enlighten me as to any other action, administrative or legislative, that the Australian government has taken on this issue.
* Anyone who is curious to know what I personally make of the comfort women issue is requested to look here. I have not done any thinking beyond it.
** Yes, I am aware that Japan has been less than exemplary in its treatment of the ainu. Yes, I am aware that the United States… In fact, it is a fact of history, the sadness of which is correlative to the degree of empathy in the beholder, that expanding nations are rarely kind to indigenous populations.
[T]he Senate
(a) notes that:
(i)...
...
(iv) the 1993 statement by then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono on the comfort women issue (the Kono statement) fully and officially acknowledged the complicity of the Japanese Government and military in the 1930s and 1940s in a coercive system of sexual slavery in occupied territories, and
(v) the Kono statement has been reaffirmed by subsequent Japanese governments and prime ministers, including by Prime Minister Abe;
(b) commends the Japanese people and Government for the steps they have taken so far to acknowledge and atone for Japan’s actions in the 1930s and 1940s; and
(c) encourages the Japanese people and Government to take further steps to recognise the full history of their nation, to foster awareness in Japan of its actions in the 1930s and 1940s, including in relation to comfort women, and to continue dialogue with those affected by Japan’s past actions in a spirit of reconciliation.
The Labor Party and other members of the opposition introduced an amendment that would make the motion read:
(iii) the 1993 statement by then Chief Cabinet Secretary Yohei Kono officially acknowledged the Japanese Government’s findings, including its involvement in the comfort women system;
(b) encourages the new Prime Minister of Japan to acknowledge and officially apologise to comfort women by introducing such a resolution in the Diet; and
(c) encourages the Japanese Government to take further steps to recognise the full history of its nation, by taking historical responsibility and accurately teaching the history of comfort women in its schools.
However, the amendment was rejected by a vote of 34 to 32, and the motion passed as introduced. But Senators newly elected in the will take their seats on July 1, which will give the Labor Party, with an absolute majority of its own (39 seats out of 76 in all), to take another crack.
Now I have no quarrel in principle with members of civil society pressing claims, their own or otherwise, against the Japanese government*. But what are we to make of governments, particularly those of former empires, that try to dictate how the Japanese government deals with its history even while falling far short when it comes to dealing with their own. So let’s sit back and watch the Australian government deal with its own apology to the Australian aborigines. For this BBC report says nothing about any resolution, and the new Labor administration has apparently ruled out any compensation. Moreover, the proposed apology refers only to the “Stolen Generations”. It says nothing about the aborigines who were living on land expropriated by settlers over the years**, nor does it mention the aborigines in Tasmania, who were hunted as game and slaughtered as vermin.
Perhaps the Australian Senate should take the easy way out and demand that the British Parliament pass a resolution of apology. After all, there are no personal costs to making demands that only others need fulfill.
Incidentally, I would be very much obliged if someone could enlighten me as to any other action, administrative or legislative, that the Australian government has taken on this issue.
* Anyone who is curious to know what I personally make of the comfort women issue is requested to look here. I have not done any thinking beyond it.
** Yes, I am aware that Japan has been less than exemplary in its treatment of the ainu. Yes, I am aware that the United States… In fact, it is a fact of history, the sadness of which is correlative to the degree of empathy in the beholder, that expanding nations are rarely kind to indigenous populations.
Republicans for Obama － A Problem We Don't Have
What fascinates me as the US presidential primaries unfold is how hard it is to find Obama haters. He has his detractors, true, but he conjures all the love and adoration that a Bill Clinton can command and more but suffers little if any of that visceral hate and ridicule from opponents that rain down on all the other serious primary candidates. He is truly the It politician. Some people are hard to not hard to like. But Mr. Obama is hard to not love.
At least that is the impression that I get from the news and blog reports about Republicans crossing over and declaring (or even volunteering) for Mr. Obama. But even more arresting it is to read about people saying that they will crossover to vote for Obama if Mitt Romney becomes the Republican candidate.
Now, a Republican can be a social conservative, fiscal conservative, government conservative, religious conservative or a neo-conservative without being all of those things at the same time. In fact, in Massachusetts, a Republican need not be any of those things. And even conservatives can change their minds. Still, Mr. Obama, by this account at least, the most liberal Senator in 2007, wrongfoots the Republican agenda in every which way.
Some people explain this crossover phenomenon by calling Mr. Obama a conservative by temperament. Perhaps. In any case, it is the messenger, and not the message, that these recent and prospective converts are buying. The messenger is the message.
Now imagine what an Obama could do in Japan, where the space between the political agendas of the LDP and DPJ is mostly of tactical rather than strategic origin. We caught a glimpse of the possibilities with Prime Minister Koizumi, who on one occasion beat the DPJ by running against the LDP. Instead, the choice we now have is between the pleasant but uncharismatic Yasuo Fukuda and the erratic and secretive Ichirō Ozawa.
Perhaps it is for the better. After all, charisma can just as easily lead the public into making really bad choices.
UPDATE (same day):
“…Everyone in Arizona ought to see what we saw today," said Tim Nelson, a lawyer for the state government, after bringing his 9-year-old daughter to see the candidate in Phoenix.
…
In Phoenix, Cynthia and Stuart Preston said that as they were driving to Obama's rally with their children, they quizzed each other to come up with three of the candidate's major platform planks. To their surprise, they couldn't think of them. Despite that, Cynthia Preston said she is supporting Obama. She was drawn, she said, by the "popular movement" behind him.
…
Voters "need to know the magic…" she said. "It's a problem."
－ from The Washington Post
These are not selected quotes, at least on my part. There's a hypnotic quality here that reminds me of Jesus Christ and the Pied Piper of Hamelin.
UPDATE II:
And an Eisenhower to boot. Note the excerpt from President Eisenhower’s farewell address. It is so finely crafted that it makes you want to go and read the whole thing. His granddaughter seems to have a way with words too.
UPDATE III:
Yes, Ted Kennedy is a Democrat. But the excitement is infectious. Look, the reporter has caught the bug too. Which is a little scary.
At least that is the impression that I get from the news and blog reports about Republicans crossing over and declaring (or even volunteering) for Mr. Obama. But even more arresting it is to read about people saying that they will crossover to vote for Obama if Mitt Romney becomes the Republican candidate.
Now, a Republican can be a social conservative, fiscal conservative, government conservative, religious conservative or a neo-conservative without being all of those things at the same time. In fact, in Massachusetts, a Republican need not be any of those things. And even conservatives can change their minds. Still, Mr. Obama, by this account at least, the most liberal Senator in 2007, wrongfoots the Republican agenda in every which way.
Some people explain this crossover phenomenon by calling Mr. Obama a conservative by temperament. Perhaps. In any case, it is the messenger, and not the message, that these recent and prospective converts are buying. The messenger is the message.
Now imagine what an Obama could do in Japan, where the space between the political agendas of the LDP and DPJ is mostly of tactical rather than strategic origin. We caught a glimpse of the possibilities with Prime Minister Koizumi, who on one occasion beat the DPJ by running against the LDP. Instead, the choice we now have is between the pleasant but uncharismatic Yasuo Fukuda and the erratic and secretive Ichirō Ozawa.
Perhaps it is for the better. After all, charisma can just as easily lead the public into making really bad choices.
UPDATE (same day):
“…Everyone in Arizona ought to see what we saw today," said Tim Nelson, a lawyer for the state government, after bringing his 9-year-old daughter to see the candidate in Phoenix.
…
In Phoenix, Cynthia and Stuart Preston said that as they were driving to Obama's rally with their children, they quizzed each other to come up with three of the candidate's major platform planks. To their surprise, they couldn't think of them. Despite that, Cynthia Preston said she is supporting Obama. She was drawn, she said, by the "popular movement" behind him.
…
Voters "need to know the magic…" she said. "It's a problem."
－ from The Washington Post
These are not selected quotes, at least on my part. There's a hypnotic quality here that reminds me of Jesus Christ and the Pied Piper of Hamelin.
UPDATE II:
And an Eisenhower to boot. Note the excerpt from President Eisenhower’s farewell address. It is so finely crafted that it makes you want to go and read the whole thing. His granddaughter seems to have a way with words too.
UPDATE III:
Yes, Ted Kennedy is a Democrat. But the excitement is infectious. Look, the reporter has caught the bug too. Which is a little scary.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Now that the Other Presidential Candidates Are Going, Going, (Mostly) Gone
The Democrats are down to the two I already did. Now let’s take a look at the two Republicans remaining with a chance to win to see how they see Japan.
Mitt Romney’s Foreign Affairs essay is an easy one. Japan is missing, except as, together with Germany, as a country that the US defeated. In fact, most of the known world has been left off his roadmap. Instead his entire focus is on national security, and the Middle East is the only place and Muslims － the bad ones only, mind you － are the only place and people outside of the US that matters*. Even free trade agreements are invoked to solve the Middle East problem. Near the beginning of his essay he does tell you that “…[t]he economic rise of China and other countries across Asia poses a different type of challenge. It is easy to understand why Americans -- and many others around the world -- feel so much unease and uncertainty.” But this thread is never picked up. He is playing to national security conservative Republicans. Nothing else matters on foreign policy until he wins the nomination.
John McCain’s essay is another thing altogether. Now his Middle East policy is basically Bush on steroids － altius, citius, fortius. He sees Japan and Asia from a similar perspective, and is effusive in his praise of Japan, whether it is for “serving alongside” the United States as a “democratic all[y]” in Afghanistan as part of Mr. McCain’s grand strategy of “Uniting the World’s Democracies”, or exerting “international leadership and emerg[ing] as a global power” as part of Mr. McCain’s grand design for “Shaping the Asia-Pacific Century”. It is no surprise then, that a President McCain will “encourage its admirable ‘values-based diplomacy,’ and support its bid for permanent membership in the UN Security Council,” while speaking favorably of the "'arc of freedom and prosperity' stretching across Asia."
As for North Korea, future talks with it “must take into account [it]s ballistic missile programs, its abduction of Japanese citizens (my italics), and its support for terrorism and proliferation.” China is given even more attention, but not necessarily in ways that the Chinese authorities will appreciate, his conclusion being: “until China moves toward political liberalization, our relationship will be based on periodically shared interests rather than the bedrock of shared values.”
John McCain, a President that the Prime Minister can only love. Prime Minister Abe, that is. And therein lies the… I can’t quite find the right word, but you know what I mean…
Actually, there’s little about Mr. McCain’s thoughts about Japan that goes against official policy here. Yet I cannot escape the feeling that Mr. Fukuda must be hoping that Mr. McCain’s bark is worse than his bite.
* In fact, Mr. Romney’s limitless capacity to live in the moment is one of the secrets to his past successes. It is essential to his ability to slip seemingly effortlessly into any role that he chooses to take on. The downside of all this: The simultaneous, granular attention that a presidential campaign casts brings to all his characters and lines reminds me of that Martian shapeshifter who has a meltdown in a Ray Bradbury story whose name escapes me.
(UPDATE) The Martian, from The Martian Chronicles. Thanks, MTC
Mitt Romney’s Foreign Affairs essay is an easy one. Japan is missing, except as, together with Germany, as a country that the US defeated. In fact, most of the known world has been left off his roadmap. Instead his entire focus is on national security, and the Middle East is the only place and Muslims － the bad ones only, mind you － are the only place and people outside of the US that matters*. Even free trade agreements are invoked to solve the Middle East problem. Near the beginning of his essay he does tell you that “…[t]he economic rise of China and other countries across Asia poses a different type of challenge. It is easy to understand why Americans -- and many others around the world -- feel so much unease and uncertainty.” But this thread is never picked up. He is playing to national security conservative Republicans. Nothing else matters on foreign policy until he wins the nomination.
John McCain’s essay is another thing altogether. Now his Middle East policy is basically Bush on steroids － altius, citius, fortius. He sees Japan and Asia from a similar perspective, and is effusive in his praise of Japan, whether it is for “serving alongside” the United States as a “democratic all[y]” in Afghanistan as part of Mr. McCain’s grand strategy of “Uniting the World’s Democracies”, or exerting “international leadership and emerg[ing] as a global power” as part of Mr. McCain’s grand design for “Shaping the Asia-Pacific Century”. It is no surprise then, that a President McCain will “encourage its admirable ‘values-based diplomacy,’ and support its bid for permanent membership in the UN Security Council,” while speaking favorably of the "'arc of freedom and prosperity' stretching across Asia."
As for North Korea, future talks with it “must take into account [it]s ballistic missile programs, its abduction of Japanese citizens (my italics), and its support for terrorism and proliferation.” China is given even more attention, but not necessarily in ways that the Chinese authorities will appreciate, his conclusion being: “until China moves toward political liberalization, our relationship will be based on periodically shared interests rather than the bedrock of shared values.”
John McCain, a President that the Prime Minister can only love. Prime Minister Abe, that is. And therein lies the… I can’t quite find the right word, but you know what I mean…
Actually, there’s little about Mr. McCain’s thoughts about Japan that goes against official policy here. Yet I cannot escape the feeling that Mr. Fukuda must be hoping that Mr. McCain’s bark is worse than his bite.
* In fact, Mr. Romney’s limitless capacity to live in the moment is one of the secrets to his past successes. It is essential to his ability to slip seemingly effortlessly into any role that he chooses to take on. The downside of all this: The simultaneous, granular attention that a presidential campaign casts brings to all his characters and lines reminds me of that Martian shapeshifter who has a meltdown in a Ray Bradbury story whose name escapes me.
(UPDATE) The Martian, from The Martian Chronicles. Thanks, MTC
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Gasoline Tax Surcharge Update: Was I Right After All?
I don’t know how the President of the Lower House Yōhei Kōno (LDP), in consultation with his Upper House counterpart Satsuki Eda (DPJ) managed it － the media will no doubt come out with their backstories later － but he has convinced the ruling coalition to withdraw its 60-day extension bill that was going to be passed from the Lower House to the Upper House within the month, setting the stage for a supermajority override and would have enabled the gasoline tax surcharges to be extended without a hiatus. The gist of the agreement according to the most detailed online source on this point, the Asahi:
(UPDATED to full text printed in January 31 hardcopy Yomiuri)
1) In examining the full budget (FY2008 budget proposal) and revenue legislative bills (such as bills concerning taxation), we shall reach a certain conclusion within this fiscal year after conducting thorough deliberations including public hearings and question and answer sessions of witnesses.
2) The legislative body shall amend any items over which agreement is reached between the political parties with regard to tax law through deliberations in the Diet.
3) The so-called safety net (bridge) legislative bill (interim bill) shall be withdrawn where a clear agreement has been reached with regard to items 1) and 2) between the government parties and opposition parties under the auspices of the two Presidents [of the Houses].
And they’ve agreed.
There’s enough ambiguity in the wording to enable either side to walk out of the deal under extreme circumstances. Still, it looks like a process along the lines of what I had envisioned, hoped for, really, is going to unfold, with a commitment to finish up by the end of fiscal year 2007. The DPJ commitment is somewhat squishy, but it is a commitment. And the deal is vested with the authority of the two House Presidents. All in all, it has been a good day for the political process in Japan.
(UPDATED to full text printed in January 31 hardcopy Yomiuri)
1) In examining the full budget (FY2008 budget proposal) and revenue legislative bills (such as bills concerning taxation), we shall reach a certain conclusion within this fiscal year after conducting thorough deliberations including public hearings and question and answer sessions of witnesses.
2) The legislative body shall amend any items over which agreement is reached between the political parties with regard to tax law through deliberations in the Diet.
3) The so-called safety net (bridge) legislative bill (interim bill) shall be withdrawn where a clear agreement has been reached with regard to items 1) and 2) between the government parties and opposition parties under the auspices of the two Presidents [of the Houses].
And they’ve agreed.
There’s enough ambiguity in the wording to enable either side to walk out of the deal under extreme circumstances. Still, it looks like a process along the lines of what I had envisioned, hoped for, really, is going to unfold, with a commitment to finish up by the end of fiscal year 2007. The DPJ commitment is somewhat squishy, but it is a commitment. And the deal is vested with the authority of the two House Presidents. All in all, it has been a good day for the political process in Japan.
Dangnabbit, You Dastardly (South) Koreans!
Turning to sports, to stop the replay of the Asia handball qualification finals for the Beijing Olympics, Sheikh Ahmed Al Fahad Al Sabah, the Kuwaiti President of the Asia Handball Federation, tried to bribe Japan with support for the Tokyo bid for the 2016 Olympics, but Japan has gone ahead with it anyway. The muslim countries that had played in the original qualification finals that were canceled by the International Handball Federation are boycotting the replay, so it's being played between Japan and South Korea in Tokyo.
Now that’s thirty Middle East votes out the window right off the bat for Governor Ishihara's* Olympics bid. Since both the men and women’s South Korean handball teams are a notch above the Japanese teams, in effect, the Japanese world of sports is taking a huge hit for South Korea's sake. This must have been a factor when the South Koreans decided to intiate the challenge.
So South Korea, you owe us one. And what do you do?
This. Isn’t. Fair. I mean, how could you expect us to root for the home team against this?
You want home court advantage, pay for home court advantage. Sheesh.
* Our Governor Who Can Say No must be thinking, So much for the 9 billion dollars to pay for the Gulf War. Next time, Kuwait, don’t call us, we’ll call you.
Now that’s thirty Middle East votes out the window right off the bat for Governor Ishihara's* Olympics bid. Since both the men and women’s South Korean handball teams are a notch above the Japanese teams, in effect, the Japanese world of sports is taking a huge hit for South Korea's sake. This must have been a factor when the South Koreans decided to intiate the challenge.
So South Korea, you owe us one. And what do you do?
This. Isn’t. Fair. I mean, how could you expect us to root for the home team against this?
You want home court advantage, pay for home court advantage. Sheesh.
* Our Governor Who Can Say No must be thinking, So much for the 9 billion dollars to pay for the Gulf War. Next time, Kuwait, don’t call us, we’ll call you.
Idle Speculation over Ichirō Ozawa's Sherman Act
Do you really think that Ichirō Ozawa will serve if elected? He looks so uncomfortable being the face of the DPJ that I find it hard to believe that he’ll consent to being the face of Japan.
If Mr. Ozawa bows out and lets the other boys do rock-paper-scissors for the honor, it won’t be the first time. In 1991, many LDP leaders begged him to be the successor to the hapless Toshiki Kaifu but he declined, giving his callow age (49!) as the reason. Makes you wonder.
If Mr. Ozawa bows out and lets the other boys do rock-paper-scissors for the honor, it won’t be the first time. In 1991, many LDP leaders begged him to be the successor to the hapless Toshiki Kaifu but he declined, giving his callow age (49!) as the reason. Makes you wonder.
Gasoline Tax Surcharge Update with Ozawa Chaser
In a neat ideological split of newspaper editorials, Asahi and Mainichi oppose the two month-extension bill for tax measures that are scheduled to expire after March 31, while Yomiuri and Sankei support the stop-gap bill. However, look at their positions on the underlying issues with regard to the gasoline taxes*:
Asahi: put gasoline tax revenues into general budget, consider maintaining surcharge as environment tax
Mainichi: put gasoline tax revenues into general budget (negative reference to 10-year road construction plan), consider maintaining surcharge as environment tax
Yomiuri: put gasoline taxes revenues into general budget, maintain surcharge*
Sankei: rethink road construction plan and the dedication of gasoline tax revenues thereto
It looks like there’s a pretty good consensus that the 10-year, 59-trillion-yen road construction plan is excessive and that a good way of getting the reform that Prime Minister Koizumi left unfinished back on track is to put the tax revenue from auto fuels into the general budget and by implication making it harder for the construction lobby and the LDP construction tribe to get their hands on that money. Other than Sankei, the newspaper of record for economic conservatives, they all appear to be resigned to taxing auto fuel over and above the “normal”, i.e. sans surcharge, rate.
The DPJ position under which it won the July election is not inconsistent with this consensus. No, its policy manifest did not explicitly mention gasoline taxes ***, but the manifest did advocate the abolition of all special budgets, and one of the consequences of this is that legally dedicated sources of tax revenue would disappear. There was no indication with regard to the tax rate or its name, so it could have gone any which way on it.
Unfortunately, under Mr. Ozawa, they’ve been busy outdoing the LDP at the bribe-them-with-their-own-money game, and the gasoline tax surcharge has not been spared. But they could, in the context of an environment surtax that goes into the general budget (with some of it no doubt going back to roads), peddle back without completely abandoning their stand on the surcharge. This is but one element that will surely be considered in the search for a compromise － a three-year timeout is my pet idea*** － once the dust settles and the DOJ goes back to work with the backing of the mainstream media, and holds the coalition accountable for its non-transparent road construction plan and more broadly its erosion of this key item of the Koizumi reform.
Right now, the DPJ is using brute force to make a spectacle of the parliamentary process, but that is so Showa Era, a game plan more befitting a “ten-thousand-year opposition party”. It must come to its senses soon, get to work, and bring the debate back to the underlying issues that it only hinted at in its policy manifest. If nothing else, it already has promised too much on too many issues; it does not need yet another thirteen-digit check to make good on in the unlikely event that it takes over after the next Lower House election.And it will have the mainstream media’s support. And the coalition will bend to placate public opinion, if its overtures during the failed talks with regard to the temporary extension bill are any indication. Besides,itthe DPJ needs to keep Yasuhiro Oé and his surtax-friendly DPJ friends onside***, and this is a good way to do it.
* There are other tax measures at stake, though they are irrelevant to this post. If you’re new here and are interested, please read this. The first three sets of items listed there have been submitted as one tax bill per set.
** See January 24 editorial.
*** I went over this point in this post.
Asahi: put gasoline tax revenues into general budget, consider maintaining surcharge as environment tax
Mainichi: put gasoline tax revenues into general budget (negative reference to 10-year road construction plan), consider maintaining surcharge as environment tax
Yomiuri: put gasoline taxes revenues into general budget, maintain surcharge*
Sankei: rethink road construction plan and the dedication of gasoline tax revenues thereto
It looks like there’s a pretty good consensus that the 10-year, 59-trillion-yen road construction plan is excessive and that a good way of getting the reform that Prime Minister Koizumi left unfinished back on track is to put the tax revenue from auto fuels into the general budget and by implication making it harder for the construction lobby and the LDP construction tribe to get their hands on that money. Other than Sankei, the newspaper of record for economic conservatives, they all appear to be resigned to taxing auto fuel over and above the “normal”, i.e. sans surcharge, rate.
The DPJ position under which it won the July election is not inconsistent with this consensus. No, its policy manifest did not explicitly mention gasoline taxes ***, but the manifest did advocate the abolition of all special budgets, and one of the consequences of this is that legally dedicated sources of tax revenue would disappear. There was no indication with regard to the tax rate or its name, so it could have gone any which way on it.
Unfortunately, under Mr. Ozawa, they’ve been busy outdoing the LDP at the bribe-them-with-their-own-money game, and the gasoline tax surcharge has not been spared. But they could, in the context of an environment surtax that goes into the general budget (with some of it no doubt going back to roads), peddle back without completely abandoning their stand on the surcharge. This is but one element that will surely be considered in the search for a compromise － a three-year timeout is my pet idea*** － once the dust settles and the DOJ goes back to work with the backing of the mainstream media, and holds the coalition accountable for its non-transparent road construction plan and more broadly its erosion of this key item of the Koizumi reform.
Right now, the DPJ is using brute force to make a spectacle of the parliamentary process, but that is so Showa Era, a game plan more befitting a “ten-thousand-year opposition party”. It must come to its senses soon, get to work, and bring the debate back to the underlying issues that it only hinted at in its policy manifest. If nothing else, it already has promised too much on too many issues; it does not need yet another thirteen-digit check to make good on in the unlikely event that it takes over after the next Lower House election.And it will have the mainstream media’s support. And the coalition will bend to placate public opinion, if its overtures during the failed talks with regard to the temporary extension bill are any indication. Besides,
* There are other tax measures at stake, though they are irrelevant to this post. If you’re new here and are interested, please read this. The first three sets of items listed there have been submitted as one tax bill per set.
** See January 24 editorial.
*** I went over this point in this post.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Two-Month Extension Means Gasoline Tax Surcharge Will Prevail － Stay Tuned
The LDP-New Kōmeito coalition decided they couldn’t run the risk of allowing the gasoline tax surcharge to lapse after March 31. Today, it told the opposition parties that they would submit a bill to the Lower House tomorrow for a 2-month extension, which would surely give it ample time to use its Lower House supermajority to override an Upper House veto (or inaction after 60 days). They obviously figured that the confusion of a temporary lapse and the public backlash from reinstating the surcharge would be too much of a political risk to run*.
As I’ve said, there’ll be no turning back now. However, both sides will keep a close eye on public opinion (the DPJ in particular – it’s their modus operandi, while the LDP is more responsive to the status quo). You can bet the LDP and the DPJ will be running private polls of their own through major PR agencies to guide them through the turbulent months ahead. All this is bad for statecraft, mind you, but it will provide much fodder and guilty pleasure for us bloggers.
* Objectively speaking, this is a very sensible thing to do, no matter what the ultimate conclusion winds up being. But given the fact that no coalition member stands ready to be swayed by arguments to the contrary, I understand the opposition’s fury.
I had guessed here that the coalition would take a more conciliatory approach. Not for the first time... I’ll keep making these calls, though, because it’s an excellent learning tool. It helps me understand the political process, as well as my strengths and weaknesses. Looking back, I do appear to have a bias towards the softer conclusions. Wimp. In the future, I’ll try to follow more closely my rational, fact-based self.
As I’ve said, there’ll be no turning back now. However, both sides will keep a close eye on public opinion (the DPJ in particular – it’s their modus operandi, while the LDP is more responsive to the status quo). You can bet the LDP and the DPJ will be running private polls of their own through major PR agencies to guide them through the turbulent months ahead. All this is bad for statecraft, mind you, but it will provide much fodder and guilty pleasure for us bloggers.
* Objectively speaking, this is a very sensible thing to do, no matter what the ultimate conclusion winds up being. But given the fact that no coalition member stands ready to be swayed by arguments to the contrary, I understand the opposition’s fury.
I had guessed here that the coalition would take a more conciliatory approach. Not for the first time... I’ll keep making these calls, though, because it’s an excellent learning tool. It helps me understand the political process, as well as my strengths and weaknesses. Looking back, I do appear to have a bias towards the softer conclusions. Wimp. In the future, I’ll try to follow more closely my rational, fact-based self.
Time to See What Mr. Obama Has to Say about Japan
A long time ago, I promised I’d look at Barack Obama’s Foreign Affairs essay and what it had to say on Japan. Since he’s been surging with the south Carolina blowout and endorsements from Democrat heavyweights (Ted (and Caroline) Kennedy, Kathleen Sibelius), this is a good time to make good on it. However, I wound up with so little to say － not entirely my fault － that I expanded a footnote and made this a two-part post.
Members of the Japanese establishment who seek a more aggressive national security and foreign policy stance must be disappointed to find that “Japan” is mentioned only once in Mr. Obama’s Foreign Affairs (2007 July/August) essay. No, not because China is mentioned five times. After all, the European Union appears only once as well, and none of the West European nations are mentioned by name. By contrast, Iraq comes up no less than 15 times. Chances are, if he mentions you, you are part of the problem or, in terms that the amiable presidential candidate prefers, a challenge. To quote:
As China rises and Japan and South Korea assert themselves, I will work to forge a more effective framework in Asia that goes beyond bilateral agreements, occasional summits, and ad hoc arrangements, such as the six-party talks on North Korea. We need an inclusive infrastructure with the countries in East Asia that can promote stability and prosperity and help confront transnational threats, from terrorist cells in the Philippines to avian flu in Indonesia.
Here, it is notable that Mr. Obama sees Japan on the same plane as South Korea and, to some extent, China. This must reflect the views of his foreign policy advisors on the Japanese government’s not-quite-forthcoming approach to North Korea. The European Union does not appear in flattering circumstances either. In fact, it comes up in a most embarrassing manner as he covers climate change. Namely, in a list of “those that pollute the most: the United States, China, India, the European Union, and Russia.”
As for his take on China:
I will also encourage China to play a responsible role as a growing power － to help lead in addressing the common problems of the twenty-first century. We will compete with China in some areas and cooperate in others. Our essential challenge is to build a relationship that broadens cooperation while strengthening our ability to compete.
Relationship, not partnership; a challenge, in his own words.
Onside nations are for the most part anonymous counterparts in “alliances” and “partnerships” and “institutions”. And speaking of institutions, there is one that is mentioned by name, and six times at that － NATO. Mr. Obama wants “NATO allies to contribute more troops to collective security operations and to invest more in reconstruction and stabilization capabilities.” In Afghanistan, he wants “to remove the limitations placed by some NATO allies on their forces.” You wonder, does he realize that Japan is missing from this picture? Does he even mind? Japan may not be part of the problem, but, outside East Asia, it is not part of the solution either. So much for aspirations to be a normal “normal” country.
The essay, of course, addresses the US public first and foremost. Moreover, it was written before the US surge in Iraq had begun to show much effect and subprime lending problem had not yet reached crisis proportions. Thus, economic and financial issues per se are ignored other than as a Third World issue. For instance, there is barely a hint, a fleeting shadow of FTAs, and the Doha Round is not mentioned at all. To quote:
As president, I will double our annual investment in meeting these challenges to $50 billion by 2012 and ensure that those new resources are directed toward worthwhile goals. For the last 20 years, U.S. foreign assistance funding has done little more than keep pace with inflation. It is in our national security interest to do better. But if America is going to help others build more just and secure societies, our trade deals, debt relief, and foreign aid must not come as blank checks. I will couple our support with an insistent call for reform, to combat the corruption that rots societies and governments from within. I will do so not in the spirit of a patron but in the spirit of a partner -- a partner mindful of his own imperfections.
Note that “trade deals” are mentioned in the context of foreign aid and come with strings attached. But where Hillary Clinton would “enforce labor standards” (albeit through the ILO), Mr. Obama does not use these labor-union-friendly code words here and focuses on “corruption”.
Members of the Japanese establishment who seek a more aggressive national security and foreign policy stance must be disappointed to find that “Japan” is mentioned only once in Mr. Obama’s Foreign Affairs (2007 July/August) essay. No, not because China is mentioned five times. After all, the European Union appears only once as well, and none of the West European nations are mentioned by name. By contrast, Iraq comes up no less than 15 times. Chances are, if he mentions you, you are part of the problem or, in terms that the amiable presidential candidate prefers, a challenge. To quote:
As China rises and Japan and South Korea assert themselves, I will work to forge a more effective framework in Asia that goes beyond bilateral agreements, occasional summits, and ad hoc arrangements, such as the six-party talks on North Korea. We need an inclusive infrastructure with the countries in East Asia that can promote stability and prosperity and help confront transnational threats, from terrorist cells in the Philippines to avian flu in Indonesia.
Here, it is notable that Mr. Obama sees Japan on the same plane as South Korea and, to some extent, China. This must reflect the views of his foreign policy advisors on the Japanese government’s not-quite-forthcoming approach to North Korea. The European Union does not appear in flattering circumstances either. In fact, it comes up in a most embarrassing manner as he covers climate change. Namely, in a list of “those that pollute the most: the United States, China, India, the European Union, and Russia.”
As for his take on China:
I will also encourage China to play a responsible role as a growing power － to help lead in addressing the common problems of the twenty-first century. We will compete with China in some areas and cooperate in others. Our essential challenge is to build a relationship that broadens cooperation while strengthening our ability to compete.
Relationship, not partnership; a challenge, in his own words.
Onside nations are for the most part anonymous counterparts in “alliances” and “partnerships” and “institutions”. And speaking of institutions, there is one that is mentioned by name, and six times at that － NATO. Mr. Obama wants “NATO allies to contribute more troops to collective security operations and to invest more in reconstruction and stabilization capabilities.” In Afghanistan, he wants “to remove the limitations placed by some NATO allies on their forces.” You wonder, does he realize that Japan is missing from this picture? Does he even mind? Japan may not be part of the problem, but, outside East Asia, it is not part of the solution either. So much for aspirations to be a normal “normal” country.
The essay, of course, addresses the US public first and foremost. Moreover, it was written before the US surge in Iraq had begun to show much effect and subprime lending problem had not yet reached crisis proportions. Thus, economic and financial issues per se are ignored other than as a Third World issue. For instance, there is barely a hint, a fleeting shadow of FTAs, and the Doha Round is not mentioned at all. To quote:
As president, I will double our annual investment in meeting these challenges to $50 billion by 2012 and ensure that those new resources are directed toward worthwhile goals. For the last 20 years, U.S. foreign assistance funding has done little more than keep pace with inflation. It is in our national security interest to do better. But if America is going to help others build more just and secure societies, our trade deals, debt relief, and foreign aid must not come as blank checks. I will couple our support with an insistent call for reform, to combat the corruption that rots societies and governments from within. I will do so not in the spirit of a patron but in the spirit of a partner -- a partner mindful of his own imperfections.
Note that “trade deals” are mentioned in the context of foreign aid and come with strings attached. But where Hillary Clinton would “enforce labor standards” (albeit through the ILO), Mr. Obama does not use these labor-union-friendly code words here and focuses on “corruption”.
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