Hatoyama Yukio's essay in VOICE has officially become a problem for his government-in-waiting.The latest sign of discord is a New York Times article documenting fears in Washington about the incoming Hatoyama government and the DPJ more generally. Indeed, the article reads like a catalog of the myths and exaggerations surrounding the DPJ in the US …
Category: Observing Japan Blog
Who will lead the LDP?
Masuzoe Yoichi, the upper house member who I recently listed as the obvious front runner in the race to replace Aso Taro as LDP president, said Wednesday that he would not seek the position.Masuzoe cited his responsibility as a member of the ruling cabinet for the party's defeat as his reason for not seeking the …
Sankei’s revealing gaffe
In case anyone doubted that the conservative media will have it out for the incoming DPJ government, the Sankei Shimbun has done everyone a favor and admitted that, like the LDP, it has gone into opposition.Sankei's city desk recently established a Twitter feed, at which the following was posted on 30 August even before voting …
Moving on up?
With the DPJ's ranks swelling to 417 Diet members between both houses, some in the party are asking whether the party needs to move its headquarters into a larger space.The DPJ currently rents eight floors in a twelve-story building across the way from the National Diet Library in Nagata-cho, with floor space totaling approximately 3000 …
Everything you ever needed to know about the Japanese media
Via Joël J. Legendre comes a link to a truly encyclopedic report from the US government on the state of the Japanese media, up to and including a wide variety of digital media.You can find the report here.The whole report is worth reading, although perhaps not in one sitting, and keeping as a reference.I found …
Continue reading Everything you ever needed to know about the Japanese media
Two weeks
After negotiations between the DPJ and the LDP, the parties have agreed that a special session will be convened on 16 September to elect Hatoyama Yukio as Japan's prime minister. The DPJ had wanted the session to meet on the 15th, which was apparently inconvenient for the Emperor. With the prime minister and his cabinet …
The DPJ begins work on regime change
In a remarkable coincidence, the day after the DPJ's victory in the general election — and the day the DPJ began its transition in earnest — was the same day that ministries and agencies submitted their spending requests to the ministry of finance for the Fiscal 2010 general account budget.The requests totaled roughly 92.13 trillion …
Hatoyama shifts the blame
The DPJ is transitioning into power, and Hatoyama Yukio is doing burasagari press conferences again after not doing them during the campaign.(For those wondering what burasagari means, it simply refers to impromptu press conferences given by politicians to reporters as the politicians walk to or from, say, a car. The term, which means "hanging" or …
The LDP has an election date
Aso Taro has resigned his post as party president and the LDP has scheduled its party leadership for four weeks from today, 28 September. The campaign for the party presidency will officially begin ten days earlier, on 18 September, giving the candidates just over two weeks to make their intentions known and then begin traveling …
Discussing the DPJ’s administrative plans on CNBC
Bright and early this morning, I somehow managed to speak coherently (I think?) about the DPJ's plans for the government.http://plus.cnbc.com/rssvideosearch/action/player/id/1232917692/code/cnbcplayershare
Tobias S. Harris 