Ichigen Koji (14)

一言居士
- A person who has something to say about everything.

“When people with no confidence in themselves meet someone and are told something they didn’t know, they believe it immediately. They then behave as if it were knowledge they had all along, and go around broadcasting it. If problems arise as a result, they blame the person who originally expressed the opinion.

“That is Prime Minister Kan’s pattern of behavior….That sort of person does not have the qualifications for leadership, and he should resign immediately. The problem, however, is that Prime Minister Kan lacks the proper awareness of his real character. Therefore, he doesn’t have the slightest intention of resigning.

“It’s typical that he has become deluded into thinking that the world approves of him despite all the criticism at home. Both Japan and the world are aghast, but the only one playing happy-go-lucky is Kan Naoto.”

- Masuzoe Yoichi, former Health Minister and now head of the New Renaissance Party. The expression he used for happy-go-lucky was gokuraku tonbo, a combination of gokuraku, the Buddhist paradise after death, and tonbo, a dragonfly.

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They can see for miles

They are a bus without a destination sign.
- Tanaka Shusei, former director-general of the Economic Planning Agency, speaking at a forum in Nagoya last fall about the Kan Cabinet.

THE USUAL clique of overseas observers who understand Japanese issues better than the Japanese themselves has morphed into a gaggle of schoolmarms exasperated by the political turmoil of the past week, after the dastardly plot by caped mustachioed men to tie the maidenly Kan Naoto to the tracks for slicing and dicing by the Shinkansen was foiled in the nick of time. How much better it would be, they insist, to stop the childishness and allow Mr. Kan and his Cabinet to continue directing the Tohoku recovery, which they have heretofore conducted with such selfless efficiency and dispatch.

Typical was the comment of Michael Auslin writing at the National Review website. He is the director of Japan Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, a Wall Street Journal columnist, and occasional television commentator. He made the obligatory reference to the short lifespan of Japanese prime ministers, with the obligatory glossing over of the Koizumi years. He also wrote:

“Japan’s politicians, busy stabbing each other in the back in the narrow alleyways of Japan’s neon-lit entertainment areas, are oblivious to the fact that they are driving their country off the cliff.”

Yes, it would be so much better if the Japanese modeled themselves after American politicians and stabbed each other in the back in spacious, klieg-lit television studios on programs in which the sharpness of the knives are in inverse proportion to the channel’s ratings.

It would be so much better if the political class of Nagata-cho were as self-aware as the American pols barreling down the royal road to peace and prosperity, generously forcing banks to provide home loans to people unable to afford the payments and penalizing the institutions that didn’t cooperate, thereby fueling the economic crisis of the century. It would be so much better if the Diet were to function like the American Congress, whose superior processes were used to pass — or to deem to have passed — the Obamacare legislation. It would be so much better if Japanese government debt were held by foreign interests, as the United States so magnanimously permits, instead of domestic interests.

How much more efficient the Americans are at encouraging national diversity with a strategy of leaky and lawless southern borders, resulting in Balkanization Español in California, Arizona, and Texas and providing the opportunity to criticize the Japanese for being chary of large-scale immigration. How much better that local government is on such a sound financial footing and is always working to improve the lives of its citizens.

And that dysfunctional Japanese political system with rotating papier-mâché prime ministers! How much better it was for the Americans to have benefited from the wise and steady leadership of Lyndon Johnson after the Tet offensive, Richard Nixon during his last year in office, Jimmy Carter during his last three years and six months in office, Bill Clinton after his historical 1994 repudiation or post-Lewinsky (take your pick), George W. Bush post-Katrina, and Barack Obama post-21 January 2009.

How much better instead would it be for Japan to have a system that would have allowed Hatoyama Yukio and Aso Taro to serve out their full terms of office.

These latter-day Mrs. Jellybys and the other fly-by telescopic political philanthropists don’t seem to have closely tracked events in Japan during the past year. Here’s a quick summary to remind them.

*****
In June 2009, Mr. Kan was elected president of the Democratic Party, whose Diet majority meant he became prime minister. He took office with 60% approval ratings, not because the public thought he was the man for the job — please — but because he was not Hatoyama Yukio, with approval ratings at 18% and falling, and because he shut out from a leadership role Ozawa Ichiro, whose negative ratings were north of 80% then and at 89% today.

Mr. Hatoyama stepped down to avoid a DPJ bloodbath in the July upper house election. It was a critical election for the party: Had they picked up a few more seats, they could have ruled without pesky and incompatible coalition partners. It seemed as if the leadership switch had worked, until Mr. Kan broke the party’s no new taxes pledge in their 2009 lower house election manifesto and waxed ineloquently about the need for a consumption tax hike. That managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by creating a quick about-face in voter sentiment in fewer than six weeks. The party lost seats instead.

For two years after the LDP’s defeat in the 2007 upper house election, the DPJ’s quotidian demand was a dissolution of the lower house and a general election because, they said, that vote was the most recent expression of popular will. The DPJ mislaid the pages of that script after the 2010 election.

In September, Mr. Kan was challenged for the DPJ presidency by Ozawa Ichiro, upset that the prime minister had reneged on the party no-new-tax pledge, leading to the electoral debacle, and that his many allies were deprived of a voice in government. Mr. Ozawa’s electoral skills and money management, after all, were instrumental in the party’s rise to power in 2009. The challenge failed, but the residual bad blood has placed the DPJ on the verge of disintegration, able to act with unity only when their existence and power are at stake.

Later that month came the epic failure of Mr. Kan’s government when it was incapable of upholding national sovereignty with their handling of the Chinese fishing boat captain who rammed Japanese Coast Guard vessels near the Senkaku islets. Credentialed overseas observers like to think the territory is at dispute, but forget that both China and Taiwan recognized it as Japanese territory until 1971, when the possibility of enormous seabed oil deposits was discovered.

Rather than accept responsibility for the disposition of the sea captain, the government insisted it was all the doing of the public prosecutors in Naha Okinawa, a claim disbelieved by three-quarters of the nation. The Chinese responded with in-your-face threats, starting with wildly fictional accounts of the incident and continuing with economic pressure by cutting off rare earth exports and thug state pressure by arresting on espionage charges Japanese nationals helping the Chinese deal with their dismal ecological problems.

The cowed Kan government locked up a video of the incident verifying that the Chinese were at fault so as not to anger the Chinese government or to stir up the backwards nationalist sentiments of the non-progressive Japanese public. It didn’t work; anger was the diplomatic policy of the Chinese government regardless of the Japanese response, while the Japanese public accused him of betraying the nation. The video was released anyway on YouTube by an upset Coast Guard officer.

Demonstrating his diplomatic skills, Prime Minister Kan went all the way to Brussels to tug on the sleeve of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao in a hallway and get him to sit on a chair and chat for 25 minutes, pretending they met by accident. He also held consultations with President Hu Jintao at the APEC meeting in Yokohama that fall by reading from memos prepared by the Foreign Ministry.

Encouraged by the Kan Doctrine in foreign policy, Russian President Medvedev visited the occupied Northern Territories in November, which the Soviets seized in 1945 after Japan’s surrender. Mr. Kan was livid. Mr. Medvedev told him to bugger off.

The key person of the first Kan Cabinet was Chief Cabinet Secretary Sengoku Yoshito, widely assumed to have been the man actually running the government because the task is beyond Kan Naoto’s skill set. (Those hangovers can be a bitch until the fog clears around noon.) But Mr. Sengoku had so alienated everyone in government with bullying behavior, lies, evasions, insults, and gangsterish threats that he was censured by the upper house and forced to resign in six months. (An opposition MP also revealed that Mr. Sengoku told him the Japanese had been in vassalage to the Chinese for some time.)

The ruling Democratic Party’s thrashing in local elections nationwide started in February this year with the balloting for the Ibaraki prefectural assembly and continued through two more rounds in April. An estimated half of all local DPJ candidates left their party affiliation off their campaign posters lest it encourage the voters to choose Anyone But Them.

During Question Time in the Diet with the other party heads that month, Mr. Kan’s blink rate was measured at more than 100 times a minute, leading one psychologist to wonder if he was suffering from panic syndrome. His rate of support fell to Hatoyama levels, New Komeito party chief Yamaguchi Natsuo warned that the Cabinet was in “a perpetual state of collapse”, and talk of a no-confidence motion began.

The government’s response to the earthquake/tsunami of 11 March has most closely resembled that of headless zombie chickens with a taste for duplicity. They’ve been lying and concealing information about the Fukushima nuclear accident. (They really don’t trust the people they’re supposed to represent, do they?) To be fair, one reason they can’t get their stories straight is that they themselves don’t know which story is straight to begin with.

The Kan Cabinet formed 20 separate government bodies to deal with the recovery, creating a situation in which the centipede’s left legs don’t know what its right legs are doing. Nevertheless, neither the Cabinet nor the 20 appendages have formulated a basic law of reconstruction for the Diet, much less submitted one, even though the opposition pledged national unity and were resigned to putting up with the prime minister for another two years.

The Kan Cabinet had passed no legislation for the recovery within the first 40 days of the event, whereas the Murayama government had passed 16 recovery-related bills in that same time after the Hyogo earthquake. The Cabinet pulled back one recovery funding measure from the Diet just before introducing it last month because DPJ party leaders had yet to give their approval.

Less than two weeks ago, Kan Naoto gave a speech at the G8 summit and pledged to commit the country to a breathtakingly expensive program of promoting solar energy use. He inserted the proposal in his speech at the last minute without telling anyone in his Cabinet. Some wonder if he cooked up the scheme over a two hour-plus lunch with Son Masayoshi, the third-wealthiest businessman in Japan. A former supporter of nuclear energy, Mr. Son has donated an enormous amount of money for disaster relief, but is also positioning himself with local governments throughout the country to promote the construction of solar power plants. (The DPJ understands crony capitalism as well as the LDP and the Americans.) They intend to build the plants on unused farmland, which might not be unused had Mr. Kan’s Democratic Party not ditched the previous LDP government’s initiatives for promoting agribusiness to institute a legal vote-buying scheme of cash subsidies to individual farm families.

Even without the earthquake, the Kan Cabinet would have submitted a record-high budget with record-high debt for the upcoming fiscal year. It would have broken the records of the previous year’s budget passed under the Hatoyama administration when Kan Naoto was Finance Minister.

Kan Naoto is widely viewed in Japan as a hysterical hothead whose primary talents are self-aggrandizement and the evasion of responsibility. He is seen as more interested in perpetuating the life of his administration and putting his name in capital letters than working for the nation’s best interests.

*****
George Orwell put pacifism in its place during the Second World War when he wrote that it was objectively pro-Fascist and derived from intellectual cowardice.

By their criticism of the no confidence motion, the Jellybys have demonstrated they are objectively pro-Kan, support his behavior in office over the past year, and think he’s just the man to handle the coming challenges. Rather than intellectual cowardice, however, I suspect their position is derived from intellectual laziness.

All politicians seek personal and party advantage, but it should be apparent to the casual observer who examines the record that the politicos behind the no-confidence motion believed they were part of the solution rather than part of the problem, and were acting to prevent the nation from being driven off the cliff that so frightens the overseas critics.

It should also be apparent to the casual observer that Die Drei Weisen of media, academia, and thinktankia prefer spitballing to real research and comparisons with their own environment. Anyone who says that Japanese politicians are oblivious to the problems facing their country are oblivious to the world of Japanese politics.

*****
This one’s for all the telescopic political philanthropists. Be careful not to choke on it too.

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Ichigen Koji (13)

一言居士
- A person who has something to say about everything.

“The three disasters
Storms turn into a soft wind:
A new, humane wind.”

- A haiku written by Herman Van Rompuy, President of the European Council, and delivered at the final joint press conference of the G8 summit in France, as reported by Kan Naoto

Ichigen Koji: A Hatokan bonus

一言居士
- A person who has something to say about everything.

“We’re politicians, so he’ll keep his verbal promise. That’s only natural. If he can’t (keep his promise), he’s a swindler. I don’t think the prime minister will behave like a phony fraud. I believe that now.”

- Former Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio explaining yesterday evening why he thinks Kan Naoto will keep his word and resign

“Just before the no-confidence motion was submitted, he said he would resign, and when it was rejected, he says he won’t resign. A prime minister must not be such a phony fraud.”

- Former Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio this morning after it was revealed Mr. Kan told associates he has no intention of resigning.

*****
Afterwords:

Speaking of phony frauds, the vote on the no-confidence motion yesterday came one year to the date after Hatoyama Yukio resigned as prime minister. Soon after that, he said he would retire from politics when his current Diet term ended.

Why would anyone expect a politician of the left such as Kan Naoto to willingly give up power? (cf. Clinton, William Jefferson; and Gore, Albert) That is not how they are wired, and never has been.

Goodbye hello

大山鳴動して鼠一匹
- The great mountain rumbles and brings forth a mouse (Japanese proverb)

Kan Naoto's impersonation of Foster Brooks

ON THURSDAY 2 June, the opposition no-confidence motion was voted down in the lower house of the Diet at about 3:30 p.m., even though just before lunch it seemed as if it would be carried. Here’s what people had to say about the day’s events.

Before the vote

Prime Minister Kan Naoto spoke with a group of DPJ and LDP Diet members in the Kantei on the night of 1 June:

“I and others of the baby boomer generation will withdraw. We want you to create a new Diet.”

Former Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio, when asked about the possibility he would leave the DPJ:

“Rather, I think we must renew the Democratic Party. It was not my intention to create this sort of Democratic Party.”

Nishioka Takeo, president of the upper house and DPJ veteran who backed the no-confidence motion:

“I think this opportunity today will be a turning point for overcoming the national crisis.”

Former chief cabinet secretary and current deputy chief cabinet secretary Sengoku Yoshito on Ozawa Ichiro, one of the two primary leaders of the rebellion:

“We will not be able to maintain the parliamentary cabinet system with people of that sort, who are out of control.”

Former DPJ president and defense minister Maehara Seiji on the no-confidence motion:

“This is not for the greater good.”

Aisawa Ichiro of the LDP:

“We submitted this motion in the belief that it was the best choice for the state and the people. This will be an important day from the perspective of thinking about the future of Japan and its politics.”

Prof. Kobayashi Yoshiaki of Keio University:

“In view of conditions in the Tohoku region and the Supreme Court decision (on the unconstitutionality of the difference in district sizes), I do not understand why politicians can make the judgment that it is appropriate to dissolve the Diet and hold a general election.”

Miyazaki Gov. Murai Yoshihiro on the motion:

“I hope they avoid it, because it would pointlessly create a political vacuum…there’s a shortage of people in the coastal area, and we can’t even issue a verification of damage. Making us create a new registry of voters would be inhumane…

On Prime Minister Kan’s threat to call an election:

“An election is physically impossible. I’m astonished that even though he’s been to the area and seen the damage for himself, he would say that without taking (the situation) into consideration.”

Before addressing the DPJ Diet members’ meeting at noon, Mr. Hatoyama met with Mr. Kan and talked him into resigning at an unspecified date —- something he was unable to do the previous day. Here’s the full text of the memorandum to which they agreed, as released by the news media:

* To not destroy the DPJ
* To not allow the return to an LDP government
* To have a sense of responsibility for rebuilding the earthquake-damaged area and saving the victims.
1. Establish a basic law for recovery
2. Establish the prospects for formulating the second supplementary budget

Most people think they listed their priorities in the order of importance to them. Everyone noticed right away that the document contains nothing about a resignation.

The two men then addressed the DPJ meeting at around noon, and Mr. Hatoyama announced he was changing his vote. That’s when everyone knew it was all over but the shouting — of which there was quite a bit during the later Diet debate.

Matsuda Kota, Your Party upper house member and the founder of Tully’s Coffee Japan, when he heard the news:

“Prime Minister Kan brought up three points at the DPJ Diet members’ meeting: (1) Expend every effort for rebuilding and recovery (2) Not split the DPJ (3) Not hand over the government to the LDP. Those are not objectives, those are one person’s wishes. Other than (1), none of them make any difference to the people.”

Kumagai Yutaka, LDP upper house member:

“There’s already no prospect (for recovery). That’s why we’re demanding he step down.”

The no-confidence motion was defeated by a vote of 293-152. Seventy DPJ MPs showed up for a meeting with Ozawa Ichiro the night before in an apparent expression of intent to vote for it, but only two did. They were former Agriculture Minister Matsuki Kenko, an Ozawa supporter, and 29-year-old Yokokume Katsuhito. The party intends to kick both of them out, though Mr. Yokokume already quit the party in disgust last week.

A total of 33 MPs weren’t present for the vote, 17 of whom were from the DPJ, including Ozawa Ichiro and Tanaka Makiko, Kakuei’s daughter and former Foreign Minister in the first Koizumi Cabinet. There is some sentiment for booting them out too, but a decision on that has been postponed.

After the vote

Prime Minister Kan:

“Well, that was good.”

LDP President Tanigaki Sadakazu:

“He made absolutely no reference to when the prospect for recovery would be established. This is nothing but a farce.”

Toyama Kiyohiko of New Komeito, whose party voted for the motion:

“Rather than declare he would resign, Prime Minister Kan declared he would stay in office. There’s a problem with the news media reporting.”

Kumagai Yutaka:

“The mass media is showing captions on TV calling it a declaration of resignation, but what is the basis for that?”

Your Party President Watanabe Yoshimi:

“The prime minister didn’t specify when he would resign. Unless a deadline is reached, the incentive will be for him to be to prolong it. We can’t have that sort of irresponsible politics.”

On the last-minute change of mind by Mr. Hatoyama and his former Internal Affairs Minister Haraguchi Kazuhiro, who the day before said he was ready to vote for the motion and leave the party:

“They just created a disturbance to bring down Prime Minister Kan. Their motives were impure.”

When he saw which way the vote would go, Mr. Ozawa told his supporters they were free to vote as they wished:

“We’ve gotten something out of him (Kan Naoto) that we’ve never been able to get before, so it’s probably best to leave (the resignation) up to him.”

Mr. Hatoyama was asked several times when Mr. Kan promised to step down, as some people thought they were just blowing smoke.

“He won’t be staying until the secondary budget is passed, it’s when the prospects are there for the early formulation of the budget. That will happen in mid-June.”

And:

“I reached an agreement with the Prime Minister to step down when the prospects are established for formulating the second supplementary budget. I don’t think it’s that far off. Summer is too long.”

And:

“The content of the second supplementary budget will be decided by about the end of June. In other words, the outlook for its passage will have been established.”

That’s not what DPJ Secretary-General Okada Katsuya said, however:

“Former Prime Minister Hatoyama’s statement about the passage of a second supplementary budget and a basic law for recovery are not conditions for the resignation.”

That’s not what Financial Services Minister Yosano Kaoru said either:

“(Prime Minister Kan) did not use the word “resign”. It’s not as if he reached an agreement with the opposition parties to resign.”

The Asahi Shimbun was confused:

“The prime minister has already said several times that he expects to formulate the second supplementary budget sometime around August, and then submit it to the Diet. He’s also said that he thinks the problems at Fukushima will be resolved by next January at the latest.

Seko Hiroshige, LDP upper house member:

“He’ll resign when there’s an outlook for a response to the earthquake and the nuclear disaster? I think he’ll stay put with the excuse that there’s no outlook in sight.”

Kakizawa Mito, Your Party MP:

“Here’s the reason I can’t trust the Kan Cabinet. No matter how often he says something, he doesn’t do it. Even though he understands, and he’s been warned that a situation will grow serious without a change of approach, he can’t do anything to prevent it. Then, when it happens, he gets angry. That pattern keeps repeating itself. It’s really futile. The damaged region will continue to suffer if a change is not made.”

Maehara Seiji:

“I have extremely mixed feelings about this. Just because the motion was defeated doesn’t mean we’ve settled anything. There’s no change in the problem of the legislation for the special government bonds and other issues. We’re really going to have to rack our brains.”

People outside the political world also had some choice words:

Kurogane Hiroshi, manga artist:

“They talk about the great mountain rumbling and producing a mouse, but this didn’t even produce a mouse. What was this slapstick of the past few days all about? The people have a sense of powerlessness and exhaustion over the DPJ’s lack of ability to conduct the affairs of government. Though they’ve been spiritually beaten, the people who suffered in the disaster have suffered even further by being shown this farce.

“Prime Minister Kan said he would resign, without specifying when he would resign. The people won’t have any expectations for a lame duck prime minister to begin with, and it’s not possible for him to manage Diet affairs. It would have been better to make a change at the top. Mr. Hatoyama, who lent his power to Prime Minister Kan…Mr. Ozawa, who misread the situation…and the LDP, who couldn’t corner that DPJ. If politics of this sort continue, the people will suffer a real misfortune.”

Rengo Chairman Koga Nobuaki, the largest support group for the DPJ:

“The DPJ has not developed into a ruling party of government….Just because the no-confidence motion wasn’t adopted doesn’t mean anyone should raise their hands and shout hallelujah, or say they’re relieved. Unity is not that simple a matter.”

On the motion:

“The act of submitting a no-confidence motion itself at this time means they’re completely divorced from the sense of the people. I am angry at the lack of (good) politics in this situation, and deeply regret it.”

Back to Matsuda Kota:

“I’ve never been as disappointed in Japan’s politicians as I am today. All those Diet members who said they’d support the motion until just a few hours beforehand — how impressive of them to calmly mount the podium and cast their nay votes! More for the party than for the country, more for their faction than for their party, and more for themselves than for their faction.

“Were they afraid of losing their seats in a general election? Were they afraid of being disciplined by the party? Just who was it who shouted that Japan would never recover unless Prime Minister Kan stepped down. If it’s so easy for you to stick your finger up and wait to see which way the wind is blowing, don’t put on airs and tell other people what you think. Don’t make any comments for the TV or mass media. Don’t say anything that would confuse the people.

“This was really pathetic.”

At a post-vote news conference, reporters asked Mr. Haraguchi why he changed his mind in less than 24 hours:

“Going along with an opposition no-confidence motion is the path of evil.”

They also asked him whether he would be a candidate to replace Kan Naoto when the latter stepped down:

“I don’t know whether I have the qualifications, but if I’m asked, I won’t run away.”

Freelance journalist Nitta Tamaki:

“Just what sort of a man is Hatoyama Yukio? He couldn’t do anything when he was prime minister, he talks smooth, and he’s the DPJ’s posturing millionaire.”

On what almost happened instead:

“His brother Kunio can’t figure out Yukio. A few days ago, he asked Masuzoe Yoichi to join them in a new party.”

Mr. Kan at a news conference at 9:00 p.m., on when he would resign. Emphasis mine:

“We must be headed toward recovery and reconstruction, and have the second supplementary budget for 2011 for reconstruction. I said (I would resign) when there are prospects for moving in the direction of building a new society.”

Finally, one of the two DPJ rebels, Yokokume Katsuhito, who left the party last week. He’s wise beyond his years:

“I am extremely appreciative and thankful for the help I received from everyone in the DPJ. But beyond that, I daresay the DPJ has already completed its historical role, and the meaning for its existence has been lost.”

Afterwords:

Even Richard Nixon resigned when it was time to go. Kan Naoto is incapable of even that.

Politicians who think they can contribute to “building a new society” have demonstrated by that statement their unfitness for public office.

Some in the DPJ were pleased at their victory and the large vote margin. That is akin to expressing marvel at one’s particularly large and well-formed bowel movement.

Some still think it’s possible the Hatoyama Brothers will create a new party using their money, Ozawa Ichiro’s retail political skills, and Masuzoe Yoichi, former LDP Health Minister, as prime minister.

*****
“I can stay until it’s time to go.”

Ichigen Koji (12)

一言居士
- A person who has something to say about everything.

“What position did Terasaki Nobuaki, the head of the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, hold before his current job? According to Kaieda Banri, the Minister of Economy, Trade, and Industry, he was the deputy director-general for commerce and distribution policy. That’s correct, Mr. Terasaki is not an expert on nuclear policy. In his previous position, he was responsible for department stores. That’s how the top position at NISA is monopolized by administrative bureaucrats with a bachelor’s degree in law. That agency has provided oversight and regulation for the electric power industry.

“Hasn’t the monopolization of this position by the bureaucrats hindered the effectiveness of NISA as a regulatory agency? Mr. Kaieda said, “(Terasaki) doesn’t work on-site. As long as he is knowledgeable about the administration of nuclear power safety from an overall perspective, he can sufficiently perform his job.” I am surprised at that string of justifications.”

- Kakizawa Mito / Your Party lower house MP

(During Question Time in the Diet in May 2010, Mr. Terasaki was asked about the possibility that a nuclear accident could occur as a result of a natural disaster. He answered, “It is virtually impossible (an accident) could happen.”)

Would there be an election?

PRIME MINISTER Kan is threatening to call an election in which his party would surely be decimated if the no-confidence motion passes. The Constitution requires an election if the Cabinet does not resign.

However, the Sankei Shimbun reports that many influential people in the Democratic Party are opposed to the election option, including the Maehara Seiji group (which includes Sengoku Yoshito and Edano Yukio, the former and current chief cabinet secretaries) and the group led by Finance Minister Noda Yoshihiko. They would prefer to cede power for the moment to someone else (and perhaps hope the shoe would wind up on the other foot).

Another factor is the physical difficulties involved in holding an election in the Tohoku region — voter registration rolls in some places were washed away in the tsunami, for example. Still another factor is that the Supreme Court ruled in March that the last lower house election was technically unconstitutional because the differences in the populations of individual Diet districts exceeded acceptable limits. That problem, which would require redistricting, has not been resolved.

Meanwhile, Kamei Shizuka, the head of coalition partner People’s New Party, visited the Kantei this morning and told Mr. Kan he should resign for the good of the nation. The prime minister said he would think about it.

The rhetoric elsewhere is becoming white-hot. An aide to LDP MP Nakagawa Hidenao compared those who would support the current Cabinet because a successful no-confidence motion would create a political vacuum to the Kenpeitai. They were the military police during the first half of the 20th century and the war years who were, in essence, thought police.

Mr. Kan did not help his case by repeating his intention to delay the tabling of the second supplementary budget. Who’s creating that political vacuum again?

UPDATE: Now there’s word that Mr. Kan might tell the conference of DPJ Diet members meeting right now that he will voluntarily put a time limit on his term; i.e., he’ll announce that he’ll resign as of such-and-such a date. The idea is to forestall the passage of the no-confidence motion. (On the other hand, Chief Cabinet Secretary Edano Yukio denied the story: “(The prime minister) has no thoughts of relinquishing on his own his heavy responsibilities, including the response to the Tohoku earthquake.”

A promise to resign might still not be enough. If the opposition passes a non-binding censure motion in the upper house, Nishioka Takeo, the president of that body and a Kan opponent, could refuse to call the house into session, bringing the governnment to a halt until the prime minister leaves.

UPDATE 2

Prime Minister Kan did tell the DPJ Diet members that he would resign, but without setting a specific date — when the Tohoku recovery and Fukushima cleanup has reached a firm footing. Whenever that will be.

That is the promise of a man desperate to retain power, who has added up the numbers of this afternoon’s vote and doesn’t care for the sum. The Western media refuses to see (or more likely, is unaware) that an important element of the opposition to Mr. Kan in Japan is his lack of character.

UPDATE 3

That vague promise seems to have been enough to change Hatoyama Yukio’s mind, and it now looks as if he’ll vote against the no-confidence motion. So much for the idea of redemption.

Jiji analysis

“The people who say it is wrong to defy the current master because they don’t know whether or not a better master will come are presenting, in essence, the argument of slaves…Perhaps those who think the current master is preferable are receiving special treatment from the master in secret.”
- Journalist Hasegawa Yukihiro, who argues that a vote for a no-confidence motion will not create a political void because the Kan Cabinet has already created one

THE JIJI news agency offered a quick and pertinent analysis of this afternoon’s vote in the lower house on the opposition’s no-confidence motion. As of now, it seems the vote will be close, and no one is making any predictions. Both the Communist Party and the Social Democrats have decided the best way they can fulfill their duty to the nation is to abstain from a vote, and the motion will need 82 votes to pass. Jiji, however, reminds readers that 66 votes in favor would be a critical number.

That total will not be enough to pass the motion, but it will mean that the number of defectors from the party would eliminate the DPJ’s lower house majority. One party member told the Jiji reporter it would prevent executives from carrying out Eda Satsuki’s threat of burying the rebels. If the number of rebels reaches 70, it would also eliminate the lower house majority for the coalition with the People’s New Party, which has four members. That would result in a seriously weakened government.

Former party president Ozawa Ichiro convened a meeting last night for party members to discuss the motion, and 71 people attended. About 40 DPJ members have yet to make their intention known as of this morning. Mr. Ozawa insisted once again at the meeting that the people in the audience were the real DPJ, but he’s also said if the motion failed, he would form a new party.

One of the possibilities that could result is a time-limited reconstruction grand coalition with the LDP, New Komeito, and a new Ozawa/Hatoyama party, but the LDP has insisted it won’t work with Mr. Ozawa. We’ll see if that lasts. During his debate yesterday with Prime Minister Kan, LDP President Tanigaki Sadakazu told him to his face that if he resigned, there were several possibilities for multi-party groupings.

Meanwhile, the anti-tax increase elements are concerned that a coalition with Mr. Tanigaki in a prominent role would result in the same tax increases that Mr. Kan favors. That means the passage of a no-confidence motion could portend another serious political fight in the not-distant future.

Ichigen Koji Bonus edition

一言居士
- A person who has something to say about everything

“In the past, politicians offered the advice of working hard and breaking a sweat yourself, but giving the credit to others. Prime Minister Kan — you have it backwards. You take all the credit for yourself and make others do all the work.”

- LDP President Tanigaki Sadakazu quoting Takeshita Noboru to Prime Minister Kan Naoto’s face

Ichigen Koji (11)

一言居士
- A person who has something to say about everything.

“At the G8 Summit, Prime Minister Kan proposed that natural energy sources account for more than 20% of all energy consumption by the early 2020s. He set as a target the installation of solar panels in 10 million homes. When Minister of Economy, Trade, and Industry Kaieda Banri was asked what he thought of the policy, he answered, ‘I haven’t heard anything about it.’ That’s only natural. Achieving these targets would require an enormous outlay by the citizens.

“New energy sources, including solar, wind, and other forms of natural energy, now account for less than 1% of all Japanese power generation. Solar panels are installed on 540,000 homes. It’s not possible for ordinary market mechanisms to increase this number 20-fold in the next decade; it can only be accomplished with greater governmental subsidies.

“Installing solar panels in one dwelling unit costs about JPY 2.4 million. The current government subsidy is JPY 48,000 per 1 kW, or an average of about JPY 200,000 per dwelling unit. To install panels on another 9.5 million homes would cost JPY 1.9 trillion. In addition, power companies purchase the power generated by solar cells at a fixed cost of JPY 42 per kWh. This is about five times the utilities’ own power generation costs. Based on the calculation of JPY 160,000 per year per household as the difference between these two amounts, the conversion of that difference into the electric bills for 10 million households presents an additional burden of JPY 1.6 trillion….

“…None of this likely makes any difference to Mr. Kan. His recent activities have been devoted to the goal of maximizing his poll numbers, so as long as they rise, it’s OK with him…The members of the general public who think that eliminating nuclear power is the right thing to do will applaud him — without realizing that a 3% tax increase awaits.”

- Ikeda Nobuo

(That no one in his Cabinet, much less the rest of the political class, seemed to know the prime minister was going to make this declaration at the G8 is typical of the Kan MO. He inserted the proposal in his speech himself just before he delivered it in France, without telling anyone.)

Mr. Hatoyama calls the bluff

INTERESTING TIMES have officially arrived in Japanese politics — an announcer just broke in with a bulletin on NHK radio that former Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio revealed he’ll support the opposition’s no-confidence motion against the Kan Cabinet because of the prime minister’s handling of the earthquake/tsunami recovery. Mr. Hatoyama met Mr. Kan in the Kantei and asked him to avoid an intra-party split by stepping aside, but the ever-doofless prime minister refused, saying it was his “mission” to rebuild the country.

While Mr. Hatoyama is known to have been displeased with his successor’s conduct in office, the scene between the two must have had emotional overtones. In 1996, the Hatoyama brothers, their wives, and Mr. and Mrs. Kan spent the weekend at the former’s Karuizawa villa to create what became the Democratic Party of Japan. Those of the Timeweek school of over-dramatized journalism will see the poignancy, while The Economist has already flayed Mr. Hatoyama for even daring to oppose the Kan government. Why the coincidence of timing that put Mr. Kan in charge of the reconstruction effort should trump demonstrated incompetence and a lack of character is something only their editors could explain. As I’ve noted before, some Japanese see this as an act of redemption for Mr. Hatoyama for squandering a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

That raises the question of how the DPJ will discipline the man who founded and bankrolled the party and served as its first prime minister. Will they actually try to boot him out? The rumors we’ve passed along about a new Hatoyama Brothers party seem to be a step closer to becoming reality. A more pressing concern for the Kan government and its supporters, however, is how to stop the bleeding. The DPJ’s Hatoyama group has about 60 members, but that’s still short of the roughly 80 rebels needed to pass a no-confidence motion if all of them follow the leader. But his decision has made it a lot easier for fence-sitters in the Ozawa group to vote aye, and there are about 100 of them. That’s plenty more than enough.

Depending on your outlook, it looks as if it’s time to either buckle your seatbelts for the ride, or to pull up a chair and break out the popcorn. Either way, regardless of what you’ll hear or read over the next few days, there’s no question this is a step in the right direction.

UPDATE:

Is this a Captain Queeg moment? Former Internal Affairs Minister Haraguchi Kazuo of the DPJ hinted that he would vote for the no-confidence motion, and was prepared to leave the party. He got a phone call from Prime Minister Kan, who suggested that they work together to resolve the problem of — the Isahaya Bay landfill project in Kyushu. (The landfill and the floodgates are a matter of contention because fishermen claim it is harming their catch, and farmers claim that if the floodgates are opened, it will ruin their farmland. It’s a long story.)

Considering today’s events, that is the last thing Mr. Haraguchi expected to hear. He limited his comments to: “He’s talking about that at a time like this?”

You’d better think twice

THE POLITICAL MOBS are meeting in Tokyo this week to gird their loins and line up the troops in anticipation of the submission of a no-confidence motion in the Kan Cabinet by the opposition Liberal Democratic Party and New Komeito. Judging from the surface turbulence, a lot of the squeezing and twisting that seems to be going on underwater would surely meet the disapproval of the Marquis of Queensbury. LDP upper house member Yamamoto Ichita commented that he didn’t think the motion had a chance of passage, but was surprised at the effort the ruling Democratic Party is expending to suppress the rebellion. He wonders if the situation within the DPJ might be more desperate than he suspected.

Here’s a taste of what he’s talking about. Justice Minister and ruling party member Eda Satsuki addressed Kan Naoto’s group/faction within the party yesterday, and said he was baffled that some in the party did not understand what a vote in support of that motion meant. I think they actually understand quite well what it means, but Mr. Eda made sure to remind those who didn’t:

“If there were a movement among some in the party in sympathy with the no-confidence motion, we would bury it with overwhelming force. I hope you really think seriously about this.”

The dread judge Mr. Eda and Mr. Kan, by the way, have been political pals for a long time. The first party both of them joined was a small group whose English name was the Socialist Democratic Federation. Come to think of it, Mr. Eda’s threat does have a whiff of the Politburo about it.

Meanwhile, Shimoji Mikio, secretary-general and parliamentary affairs chief of the People’s New Party, still part of the ruling coalition after all these years, met DPJ parliamentary affairs head Azumi Jun to let him know they would vote against the no-confidence measure. But he also delivered some pointed criticism:

“Half-baked threats are meaningless. Now you should be holding dialogues and working to unify the party.”

That’s an understandable position for the PNP. The party exists only because Koizumi Jun’ichiro threw some of them out of the LDP when they refused to back postal privatization.

At a news conference later, Mr. Shimoji said:

“The DPJ has more than 300 MPs in the lower house. The idea that there is a debate over whether or not the no-confidence motion will pass is strange in itself. Negligence on the part of DPJ leadership is the reason this situation has arisen, and it is very unpleasant.”

Another idea strange in itself is that the PNP continues to stay on board with the DPJ at all. For example, Mr. Shimoji also announced yesterday that the PNP opposes the DPJ plan to increase the consumption tax. The only reason this party of social conservatives has associated with a party of the left for this long is to kill the privatization of Japan Post. Such are the dilemmas of a single issue splinter party.

Contrary to Mr. Eda’s faux befuddlement, those members of the ruling coalition parties who have seriously considered voting for the measure know exactly what it means. At a minimum, they would be voting themselves out of the perks of power, and at worst, they would be voting themselves out of a job if a lower house election is called.

Yet some observers overseas blithely dismiss this whole episode as typical Japanese political infighting. If you want to see someone who doesn’t understand what the no-confidence motion means, that’s the direction in which to look.

*****
There’s bound to be a whole lot of thinking goin’ on: