At the same time, on Saturday morning, Kan Naoto suggested that the DPJ is willing to be flexible in working out a compromise bill with the government.
How many times does the DPJ have to stake out an inflexible position, complete with hyper-charged rhetoric, before backing down in the face of the government’s determination to get its way? It would have been far better off staking its opposition largely on the colossal misuse of the funds — yet another example of how the LDP has misgoverned Japan — from the beginning, and challenging the government, whose backers continually claim that the DPJ is standing in the way of resolving important policy challenges, to use these earmarked funds for other, more important policies.
Yet another example, I think, of a certain lack of nimbleness on the part of Mr. Ozawa.
I hope, though, that MTC is right and that the DPJ’s agreement with the government means that at the very least this means the end of channeling the revenue from the temporary tax into road construction.