Ozawa smiles behind the scenes
When your political party is down and out, on the ropes, and little chance of surviving the next election…what do you do?
If you are in Japan, and your name is Ozawa, all you have to do is pull the reigns a little tighter to turn your ship around.
Translation:The previous Prime Minister of Japan recently stepped down…shortly after holding a meeting with his #2, the Chief Cabinet Secretary Ozawa. If you follow Japanese politics, you know that Ozawa is the king of politics with about 150 representatives who are directly beholden to his sway. He got them elected. He is also beyond the reach of the law…his aides have been indicted for illegal handling of funds…but the holder of the funds walked away scott free–no once, but twice. The Prime Minister himself was blasted for his monthly subsidies from his mom (a cool $1.5M per month that he claims he didn’t know he was receiving…recall that his mom is comes from the Bridgestone Family with coffers full of money). Politics and money, the second oldest profession.
It was business as usual except that the Prime Minister and his cabinet were suffering abysmal support ratings that plummeted to around 17~19%. Many say it was for overall bumbling of everything, but mostly for bumbling the US-Japan relationship by insisting on doing things that were not possible…like moving Futenma operations out of Okinawa instead of the promised dissecting and relocation out of populated areas. In the end, the PM relented and said it was inevitable to keep the Futenma mission on Okinawa, but it would be moved as previously agreed.
So far so good. Support rate drops and the PM will either tough it out, call a snap election, or step down, right? What would you do? Well PM Hatoyama chose to step down. But why now? Anything special about the timing? Sure, plenty special. This is on the eve of another election. With support rates in the dumps, the DPJ would be expected to lose lots of votes and seats. But by taking the top, resigning, and taking the tainted Ozawa with him, the party looks fresh and energetic again. But look closely….this is all window dressing. Both Hatoyama and Ozawa keep their diet seats. They just relinquish the roles of standing in front of the cameras. Let someone else handle the heat. And so they passed the torch to Kan in a nearly pre-ordained election. Kan was just figuring out his new post as Finance Minister when he got tapped for the top seat. In a smart move, Kan kept most of the previous Cabinet members in his new Cabinet. Nearly are almost all the same as the previous cabinet members, but now the support rate rockets up to near 70%.
Can you see Ozawa smiling. If he didn’t orchestrate this turn of events, I’m sure he at least thought about orchestrating it. Because now, his party stands a chance again of sweeping the election. The fickle public. Give them what they want when they are looking, take what you want when they are not.
But then again, I could be wrong. Only time will tell. Look ma, I’ve got an election coming up! Let’s see what comes of this.
It’s all about Change. Or at least the appearance of change. I guess now Japan can say “YES WE KAN”. Good Luck Prime Minister Kan. If anyone kan do it, you kan.
-Dylan
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