Election envy?

Ozawa Ichiro has effectively been elected to a third term as leader of the DPJ; not surprisingly, no one else filed to run in the party leadership election.

At the same time, the LDP field has widened to five candidates, each with markedly different viewpoints.

Not surprisingly, Mr. Ozawa's uncontested reelection has been unfavorably contrasted with the LDP's heavily contested election in the political press, leading me to wonder whether the LDP field expanded largely to show up the DPJ. (I don't seriously believe this, but I'm sure that LDP elders aren't complaining.) Mainichi describes the DPJ as "jealous" of the LDP's election. And a poll of LDP prefectural chapter chiefs found that they believe that the party's image will be enhanced by an "open" election.

Should the DPJ really be jealous of the LDP? If the LDP's election is fiercely contested, it is only because the party has been drifting aimlessly in the two years since Koizumi Junichiro left office, leaving the party fundamentally divided on the most important policy questions facing the government. With Mr. Abe's emphasis on Japanese "culture war" issues and Mr. Fukuda's political balancing act, the LDP has punted on pressing issues like the budget deficit, the persistent pensions problem, education reform, the road construction budget, rural stagnation and on and on. So yes, perhaps the LDP will have a spirited debate in the weeks leading up to the party presidential election. But why should the LDP be praised for this debate when for the past two years it has avoided forging a consensus and addressing the aforementioned issues?

For all the self-congratulation about the debate the LDP will have over the next two weeks, the party is still prepared to back Aso Taro and his "populist" agenda, of which rival candidate Ishihara Nobuteru has said, "If we unify under Secretary-General Aso, we will be the same as Ozawa's DPJ."

Mr. Aso has released his policy platform to allow voters to judge for themselves. Resting on the principles of (1) a society that can feel at ease, (2) an aged society with vitality, (3) robust regions, and (4) a country open to the world, Mr. Aso has promised tax cuts in the short-term, regulatory reform, and support for high technology R & D, as well as assistance to the "working poor." Mr. Aso is not so much copying Mr. Ozawa as answering the critique of the Ozawa DPJ that led to the LDP's defeat in 2007. As argued by Morita Minoru in his Jiminto no shuen (The End of the LDP), the LDP under Mr. Koizumi and Mr. Abe turned a blind eye towards stagnation in rural Japan, neglect that Mr. Ozawa has successfully exploited in his campaigning in the countryside.

I've argued before and I will keep arguing it: Mr. Aso deserves credit for his response to his defeat in last year's party election and the LDP's defeat in July 2007. He is trying to find a way to recreate the LDP as a national party, promising assistance to stagnant regions and help to the forgotten (young) men and women in urban areas. Whether that will be a successful general election coalition remains to be seen, but Mr. Aso is at least putting his popularity to work in an attempt to address the most pressing problems facing Japan (all but the budget problem, which under a Prime Minister Aso will go unaddressed for the indefinite future).

Foreign observers must not let their distaste for Mr. Aso's cultural and historical views blind them when assessing Mr. Aso's strengths and vision. He has learned from the Abe disaster — and from Mr. Ozawa's politicking. He may be the only candidate in the LDP field who combines a popular touch with an agenda that is easily explained and appeals to urban, suburban, and rural voters. If any candidate can deprive the DPJ of the votes to win a majority or a plurality large enough to support a DPJ-led coalition, Mr. Aso is it. If he wins the LDP election, he will still face an uphill battle against a DPJ that has benefited from years of LDP missteps and is led by a leader capable of exploiting them, but with Mr. Aso the election will be closer than otherwise. The national appeal of Koizumism is limited in the absence of the master prestidigitator, undermining the Koike and Ishihara candidacies; Mr. Yosano is a non-starter for his emphasis on fiscal shock therapy; and Mr. Ishiba's views on issues other than defense policy are largely unknown, making his candidacy little more than an effort to raise his profile as a future leader.

Given the strength of Mr. Aso's grassroots support, it's possible that he could clinch the presidency in the first round of voting. Will the parliamentary LDP dare to reject Mr. Aso should he ride into Tokyo with the overwhelming support of the prefectural rank-and-file? And should the election go to a runoff, Mr. Aso will likely be helped by a decision to permit prefectural chapter representatives responsible for the 141 prefectural votes to cast ballots in the second round.

And then the general election, which could be held as early as November. Looking at the map of places where Mr. Aso ran strongly in 2007 and where the DPJ won in 2007, there is not inconsiderable overlap.

Will the DPJ's uncontested election have consequences?

Noda Yoshihiko's decision not to challenge Ozawa Ichiro for the DPJ presidency has prompted the expected comments from LDP politicians about the DPJ's failings.

Aso Taro, never one to hold his tongue, said Saturday in Kagoshima, "A party leadership election is an especially good opportunity to fight over policy. If one cannot speak without hesitation, is it an open people's party?"

Writing at his blog, Nakagawa Hidenao approvingly cited a Sankei editorial that questioned whether the DPJ can truly be called democratic. He criticized DPJ backbenchers for their weakness in the face of Mr. Ozawa, for their fears that opposing Mr. Ozawa would harm their electoral prospects. (That might sound similar to my own argument — more in a moment — but I don't begrudge their anti-Ozawa group their cowardice. They were being perfectly rational in weighing the consequences for their careers in challenging Mr. Ozawa.)

Finally, Yamauchi Koichi, the Koizumi child whose blog seems to shadow Mr. Nakagawa's, declared that Mr. Noda's decision marked "the beginning of the end of the DPJ."

(Naturally they will also be criticizing coalition partner Komeito for the uncontested election it will be holding two days after the DPJ's.)

As I've noted before, the crowing of LDP reformists like Messrs. Nakagawa and Yamauchi speaks more about their position within the LDP than the failings of the DPJ. Marginalized by the very infighting that Mr. Nakagawa praises as healthy for a political party, they are reduced to weak attempts to cut the DPJ down to size, to deprive it of reformist credentials in the hope that the public will look to the LDP for reform, as it did under Koizumi Junichiro.

The idea that the DPJ will suffer a blow to its reputation — at least a blow severe enough to hurt it at the polls come election time — is laughable; I doubt that the voting public will be distracted by such sophistry, especially with the economy going down the tubes. The next general election, despite the best efforts of LDP spinmeisters, will be about the LDP's rule since 2005 (and before). It will not be a referendum on the DPJ's fitness to govern.

MTC argues, in fact, that the DPJ dodged a bullet by not having a contested election in which the party's platform from the 2007 upper house campaign would be picked apart piece by piece. MTC explains at length why Mr. Ozawa's apparent reversion to baramaki seiji — a favorite slander of the aforementioned LDP politicians — should not be taken at face value.

"It is Ozawa's intent to go back to the rural voters, the ones who voted for the Democrats in 2007 praying that the Democrats would bring the revival of special subsidies, tax cuts or government handouts, and say to them, 'Sorry, as you know, I have argued long and hard for you to get the help you deserve but the b_____ds in the House of Representatives have turned down every one of my proposals. We need your votes to kick these b_____ds out of office.'

"Ozawa is guessing -- and it is a reasonable guess -- that he can go to the well twice with the same set of promises."

I am in absolute agreement with MTC on his account of Mr. Ozawa's designs. I think this is precisely what the DPJ leader has in mind, and what's more, I think it will work: the battle for the twenty-nine single-member districts last summer was just a warmup for the campaign for lower house seats in the same prefectures, prefectures in which the DPJ has performed poorly in the past two general elections. Given just how little progress the LDP has made since its defeat last summer, there is good reason to believe that it will work again.

And so I accept MTC's argument that a party election would have done more harm than good. But only slight harm, I think, especially since no candidate emerged until late in the summer. An abbreviated campaign, long after Mr. Ozawa consolidated the necessary support to win, would have been windowdressing, and little more. Mr. Noda might have scored a point or two, but he would not have been able to undermine the manifesto wholesale, as Mr. Maehara and others have hoped to do earlier in the summer.

Meanwhile, I still maintain that the cowardice of the DPJ's young turks is part of the story of why Mr. Ozawa will be reelected uncontested next month. Perhaps cowardice is the wrong word. Extreme risk averseness? Mr. Maehara and others have good reason for not following through on their destructive path that would have turned the leadership election into outright civil war. There was little to gain from such a course. If somehow they were able to defeat Mr. Ozawa, the party that they would claim as spoils would likely be so broken that their victory would mean the inevitable end of the DPJ (pace Mr. Yamauchi, who thinks that not having an election is the beginning of the end for the DPJ). If Mr. Ozawa fended off their challenge, they would be finished within the party. Either way, a brutal campaign following upon Mr. Maehara's bold rhetoric would lead to a dead end for the young turks. In the face of these circumstances, naturally they were collectively reluctant to take the final step.

MTC may be right that they were also swayed by the electoral consequences of a contested election. Perhaps Mr. Maehara became aware of the dangerous path he was on when LDP officials began praising him. But I think — and this is just a product of my basic assumptions — that they were first swayed by the personal consequences of a challenge to Mr. Ozawa. Not because of pressure from Mr. Ozawa himself (as argued by Jun Okumura): if the press narrative is to be believed, Mr. Ozawa gave nary a thought to the party election. While some DPJ members came out publicly on behalf of an uncontested election, Hatoyama Yukio praised some of the potential challengers and endorsed the idea of a contested election. He might have been acting differently in private, but the public message was designed to dial down the intensity in the event of a contested election, not stamp out the very idea of dissent.

The point is that Mr. Ozawa and the other party leaders ultimately have little to fear from the dissenters. Policy rifts continue to exist, but young turks in both the DPJ and the LDP appear to lack the willingness to reject their parties and go off on their own. Hence the proliferation of nonpartisan study groups, which it increasingly seems are not proto-parties but substitutes for the parties the young turks might form if they could do so with minimal risks.

Faced with a situation that could very well have resulted in their being forced to break with the DPJ, the party's young turks have backed off, presumably saving their energy for a fight with better odds and in the meantime devoting their energy to study groups.

In the meantime, the party remains in the hands of the formidable Mr. Ozawa.

Noda backs down

I wrote on Wednesday that Noda Yoshihiko was prepared to stand against Ozawa Ichiro in the September DPJ leadership election.

It seems, however, that Mr. Noda's own faction is reluctant to back him.

(As of Friday morning, Mr. Noda has announced that he will not be running against Mr. Ozawa next month. It seems that Mr. Ozawa will get his uncontested election to a third term after all.)

He met with the executives of the Noda group Thursday, who cautioned prudence and appealed for party unity. The Noda group has twenty-four members, a third of which are first-term Diet members, who appear unwilling to rebel against Mr. Ozawa. The result is that Mr. Noda may find it difficult to find the requisite twenty Diet members to endorse his candidacy, although the Maehara group may step in to provide the necessary support.

Whether there is or isn't a contested DPJ leadership election at this point is irrelevant. In their tendency to speak loudly against Mr. Ozawa's leadership only to back down from overtly challenging it, it seems that the DPJ's young turks have revealed their cravenness. For all their bluster, none was willing to risk his career to present their arguments as a candidate for the leadership. Perhaps they shouldn't be blamed: Mr. Ozawa's position is unassailable.

But what this episode should take some air out of the suspicions that Maehara Seiji and his compatriots are in cahoots with certain LDP members and looking for their first opportunity to jump from the party. If they are unwilling to take the risk of going down to defeat in a party leadership election, why would they be willing to take the far riskier step of defecting from the party and striking out on their own?

The DPJ's unity, it seems, is assured.

Noda to step in front of the Ozawa train

After months of deliberation, one of the DPJ's young turks opposed to the leadership of Ozawa Ichiro has indicated that he is prepared to step forward to run against Mr. Ozawa in next month's leadership election.

Noda Yoshihiko, head of a small DPJ faction close with Maehara Seiji's group and the chairman of the DPJ's public relations committee, has indicated that he is finalizing plans to challenge Mr. Ozawa in his bid for a third term as DPJ president.

Even with Mr. Noda's candidacy, the outcome of the election is not in doubt. Mr. Ozawa appears to have the support of more than half the party's Diet members, and also enjoys considerable support among the party's local chapters and the party's nominees for the next general election (who also have a vote in the election).

The DPJ leadership has its patsy: Mr. Noda will spare the party the "embarrassment" of an uncontested leadership election. (The LDP members who have hammered on this point surely deserve some credit for making an issue of the perceived lack of democracy within the DPJ.) Mr. Noda's late announcement is truly the best possible outcome for the DPJ. By waiting this long to step forward, Mr. Noda has spared the party of a summer of DPJ civil war, which would have undoubtedly dominated the political headlines and undermined the party's public image. Given that the party's ruling troika is thinking more about the possibility of an autumn general election than the leadership election, the leadership election will be largely perfunctory.

Mr. Noda — renowned, at least according to his Japanese Wikipedia entry, as the party's best orator (he reportedly spoke for twelve hours straight outside Tsudanuma station in Chiba in his first campaign for the lower house) — will likely suffer little from having been defeated by Mr. Ozawa, and will be in a position to run again in a future party election. And the party's young turks now have their candidate who can vent their grievances about Mr. Ozawa's leadership.

They better hurry: the election is a month away.

LDP reformers on the DPJ election

Ozawa Ichiro's path to reelection as head of the DPJ is increasingly open. Despite bold words from the leading lights of the DPJ's anti-Ozawa wing, one after the other has opted not to challenge Mr. Ozawa in next month's election for the party leadership.

Despite demands form Maehara Seiji and his fellow young turks that the DPJ use the leadership election to debate the party's manifesto, not one of them as been willing to sacrifice himself in order to force said debate.

Should the DPJ worry about Mr. Ozawa's being reelected uncontested? Hatoyama Yukio, the party's secretary-general, isn't concerned about the possibility of an uncontested election.

However, Nakagawa Hidenao and Yamauchi Koichi, standard bearer of the LDP's reformers and first-term Koizumi Kid respectively, both think that an uncontested DPJ election is a sign of a serious deficiency in the DPJ (and presumably an opportunity for the LDP to exploit in a general election campaign). Both comment on an article in the Tokyo Shimbun by Sasaki Takeshi, a professor at Gakushuin, in which he criticizes the idea of an uncontested party election. To Professor Sasaki (and Messrs. Nakagawa and Yamauchi), party elections play an important role in calibrating the party's public presence in advance of an election.

It seems to me that the LDP's reformists are desperate to find a way to halt the DPJ's gains. Naturally both men — especially Mr. Yamauchi, who is especially vulnerable in the next general election — need to recast the DPJ as a party of reaction and the LDP as the party of reform without sanctuaries. Mr. Yamauchi uses this discussion to remind readers of his participation in an study group calling for reforms to the LDP's election process. Party elections, he says, should be manifesto elections.

Why? Why must party leaders be elected on the basis of their platforms, as opposed to other reasons (political acumen, charisma, managerial competence, etc.)? A party election is not a primary, a lead-in to a general election. It is an internal administrative matter that is about more than just the party's platform. The alternative to "manifesto elections" is not dictatorship — both the LDP and the DPJ have organs for debating policy questions.

The enthusiasm with which the last of the Koizumians have seized upon the DPJ's perceived failings is a sign of just how vulnerable their position in the LDP is. Mr. Nakagawa believes that the LDP has changed "from the LDP that protects vested interests" to the "reform LDP that destroys vested interests." Will the voters believe that the LDP has followed through on this claim in the years since Koizumi Junichiro left office? More importantly, are they satisfied with the idea of "destroying vested interests," or do they desire a more constructive approach to Japan's problems?

As I've argued before, I have a hard time believing, in light of the events of the three years since the 2005 general election, that voters will be casting their votes on the basis of the DPJ's fitness to govern.

Maehara will not run

In case there were any doubts about Ozawa Ichiro's reelection chances as head of the DPJ, Maehara Seiji has announced that despite his problems with Ozawa Ichiro's leadership, he will not run against Mr. Ozawa in the September leadership election.

Speaking at Japan's national press club Wednesday, Mr. Maehara reiterated his desire to see a new debate on the party's election manifesto, but said he would not be running against Mr. Ozawa.

Mr. Ozawa, however, rejected suggestions that the party should revisit the manifesto upon which it won the upper house in 2007: "Just one year ago we debated and drafted a manifesto. For a general election in the fall, how would we explain the differences from last year?"

The marginal benefits of reopening a debate on the manifesto in order to clarify some issues are probably outweighed by the costs of airing the party's dirty laundry any further. And if Mr. Maehara and the other discontents are unwilling to stand for the party leadership and use the campaign to advance their ideas, why should the party overextend itself to accommodate their concerns?

I noted yesterday that Mr. Ozawa should be magnanimous to his rivals, but his magnanimity should not be boundless.

Too significant a revision would only exacerbate intra-party tensions and make the DPJ's beliefs even less clear to the public. But some revision, especially in terms of providing a more detailed account of the party's governing priorities and a map to how it intends to proceed upon taking office would be helpful.

Ozawa unconcerned

The campaign for the DPJ's 21 Sept. leadership election will begin in just over one month.

Not surprisingly, no candidate has stepped forward to challenge Ozawa Ichiro in his bid for a third time. Mr. Ozawa has announced that he will not be thinking about the party election until after next week's Obon holiday.

One by one, potential challengers have stepped forward only to back down in the face of overwhelming odds.

In late July, Okada Katsuya, the great, white hope of the anti-Ozawa groups, dropped hints that he was thinking strongly about a bid to return to the helm of the DPJ. He acted quickly, however, to snuff out any talk of his candidacy, declaring he had no great desire to run. Mr. Okada spells out his reasoning in a post at his blog, noting that while he doesn't want to run, he does want a discussion on the party's manifesto for the next general election, which he thinks must be more specific to strengthen the party's position in the general election campaign.

Edano Yukio, a member of the Maehara group, and Noda Yoshihiko, head of a small conservative DPJ faction close to the Maehara group, have stated their desire to oppose Mr. Ozawa in September, but neither man has made his candidacy offical. Both have said that they'll decide later this month; Asahi says that the Maehara group and its satellite prefer Mr. Okada or Mr. Noda to Mr. Edano or Sengoku Yoshito, who hinted at a run for the leadership earlier this summer.

Given that the campaign is shaping up to be the Maehara-Noda bloc versus the rest of the party, Mr. Ozawa can surely rest easy and act magnanimously towards his rivals.

Maehara backs down?

The DPJ is increasingly focused on its forthcoming leadership election, the date of which has been set for 21 September, with the campaign's official start set for two weeks prior.

The DPJ's anti-Ozawa groups have still not agreed upon a candidate to stand against Ozawa Ichiro, while Hatoyama Yukio and Kan Naoto have both expressed their support for Mr. Ozawa. Mr. Ozawa, reports Asahi, will likely go into the campaign with a majority of the parliamentary party behind him. The groups (factions) of Messrs. Hatoyama and Kan, as well as the left-wing Yokomichi group have pledged their support for Mr. Ozawa. The Isshin-kai, an Ozawa-sponsored group for DPJ members who have been elected fewer than three times, is also expected to support Mr. Ozawa, as are a number of the party's endorsed candidates for the next general election (who get a vote in the leadership election). Mr. Ozawa's support among the party's prefectural chapters is also overwhelming.

In the midst of this gathering Ozawa landslide, Maehara Seiji has softened his critique of the party's policies. Speaking Wednesday at a symposium with Yosano Kaoru, a possibile post-Fukuda LDP president, Mr. Maehara stated, "I don't reject the party's thinking, but the manifesto must be made better." He suggested that the points of contention in the party leadership election should be (1) the form and manner of decentralization, (2) the place of the UN in the party's security policy thinking, and (3) the question of how to fund the party's manifesto proposals.

I'm not surprised by Mr. Maehara's retreat from Liebermanian territory in relations with the DPJ — and I'm not surprised that it looks as if Mr. Maehara will leave it to Sengoku Yoshito to fall on his sword in the September election.

And, I should add, I'm not particularly impressed with Mr. Maehara's attempt to spur a discussion about the DPJ's "failure" to demonstrate precisely how it will govern if and when it takes power.

Yahoo's Minna no seiji has published both Mr. Maehara's article in Voice and the conversation with Tahara Soichiro and Mr. Yosano in Chuo Koron that have prompted criticism of Mr. Maehara from within the DPJ (and given the LDP hope that the DPJ might fragment).

In the first part of his article in Voice, Mr. Maehara chides his party for its role in creating the nejire kokkai by prioritizing opposition to the government over solving national problems. (He also criticizes the LDP and Komeito for dismissing opposition proposals out of hand, unlike, he says, in Germany, where since "various opinions are presented from within the government and the opposition parties, seventy or eighty percent of legislation is revised.") In short, he argues that both the LDP and the DPJ should stop politicking and start working for the good of Japan, logic that sounds awfully similarly to the logic behind last year's push for an LDP-DPJ grand coalition. He then proceeds to criticize DPJ positions on the temporary gasoline tax, the new eldercare system, before explaining his ideas on the aforementioned points of contention in the leadership election.

The interesting section is when he discusses the Koizumi-Takenaka reforms, because this section reveals much about Mr. Maehara. He says, "The direction and sense of the Koizumi/Takenaka reforms is completely correct." But — there had to be a but — the reforms as implemented were sham reforms because the bureaucracy interfered with them. And perhaps, he suggests, Mr. Koizumi could have been a little more attentive to growing inequality and the need for more spending on health care.

In the second part, he provides fodder to those who see Mr. Maehara as being at the center of any political realignment by discussing the existence of "reformists" and "conservatives" in both the LDP and the DPJ. He then talks at length about his cross-partisan activities, especially on national security and foreign policy, and notes how there are many politicians in the LDP who understand Japan's problems.

Finally, he closes with advice to the DPJ. First, he has the gall to note that "only the LDP will profit" from cracks in the party that will be the result of internal squabbling. Second, he calls on the DPJ to resist the temptation to populism, to telling the people what they want to hear instead of what they need to hear.

The conversation with Mr. Yosano hinges more on specific policy questions, but Mr. Maehara's criticisms of the party and Mr. Ozawa are the same. (Part one; part two.)

I don't necessarily have a problem with Mr. Maehara's policy ideas; like most politicians, he has some good ideas and some not-so-good ideas (in the latter category I would put his statement, "If I were at the helm, I would make 'world leader in per-capita GDP' a national goal"). My problem is with his naivety. He genuinely believes that if reformists in both the LDP and DPJ just work together to craft good policy, Japan will be saved.

But to paraphrase Horace, you may drive politics out with a pitchfork, she will nevertheless come back. There is no escaping the "political situation," reputedly an obsession of Mr. Ozawa above all others. Working with the LDP simply means giving the LDP the means to cling to power. There may be reasonable, intelligent LDP members, but the LDP remains the LDP, collectively frightened of any change beyond that necessary to stay in power, allied with the bureaucracy, and bereft of any vision beyond survival.

This is the unspoken meaning of what Mr. Yosano says in his discussion with Mr. Maehara: "The LDP is a rather flexible political party. If we receive various requests, we change that which can be changed."

For all of Mr. Maehara's ideas, he lacks wisdom (or political sense). He fails to see that any compromise behind tactical, issue-by-issue compromise abets the LDP. He fails to see that in many ways the continuance of the LDP in power — no matter how well-intentioned and sensible some members of the party are — is the single biggest obstacle to remaking Japan into the kind of society that Mr. Maehara purports to want. His fixation on balancing the budget in the DPJ's electoral manifesto simply misses the bigger picture that regime change will provide a new government, free of the pathologies of fifty years of one-party rule, with the opportunity to chart a new direction for Japan, a goal that Mr. Ozawa shares. Unlike Mr. Maehara, however, it seems that Mr. Ozawa has actually given some thought to how to topple the LDP in an election first. And his way of thinking would not only give the LDP policy victories, but it would also make it increasingly difficult to tell the two parties apart, a development that would make it easier for the LDP to fend off a DPJ challenge to its rule.

For all his unhappiness with how the DPJ is run — and all of his efforts to cultivate partnerships with LDP members — I expect that Mr. Maehara will ultimately fall into line. The election end in a landslide reelection for Mr. Ozawa, Mr. Maehara and a buoyant Mr. Ozawa will reconcile on Mr. Ozawa's terms, and the party will unite in pursuit of regime change.

Sengoku steps forward?

Is this the next leader of the DPJ?


That is Sengoku Yoshito, a five-term member of the House of Representatives from Tokushima's first district.

When we last heard from him (on this blog), he was leading the fight against the nomination of Muto Toshiro to be the governor of the Bank of Japan from his position as chairman of the DPJ's subcommittee on joint appointments. Thanks in part to his opposition, Ozawa Ichiro opted for a harder line on the BOJ succession than he had perhaps initially intended, outmaneuvering Mr. Sengoku and other DPJ rivals while embarrassing the government (and, some would say, the DPJ) at the same time.

Speaking at a fundraising party in Tokushima, Mr. Sengoku alluded to a possible run against Mr. Ozawa in the party's forthcoming leadership election.

There is a certain logic to a Sengoku candidacy. At 62, Mr. Sengoku is the oldest member of the Maehara group and enjoys a reputation as the guardian of the rabble of (mostly) thirty- and forty-somethings. His anti-Ozawa credentials are sound — he was a prominent critic of Mr. Ozawa's attempt to form a grand coalition last November — and as a former member of the Socialist Party he is somewhat out of place in the hawkish conservative Maehara group. All of which make him an ideal patsy for the Maehara group, ensuring both that Mr. Ozawa is not reelected unchallenged and that allowing the young, ambitious members of the group to keep their powder dry for a future leadership election.

It grows increasingly unlikely that Mr. Sengoku or anyone else will unseat Mr. Ozawa. The DPJ's Hokkaido chapter has already declared its support for Mr. Ozawa on the basis of the party's success in elections under his leadership, a not entirely surprising announcement given that Hokkaido is something of a DPJ kingdom (home to both Hatoyama Yukio and Yokomichi Takahiro, head of the DPJ's former Socialist wing). Hokkaido is unlikely to be alone for long.

Mr. Ozawa, meanwhile, claims to be focused only on his next swing through the country's regions, scheduled for August. Asked about Mr. Sengoku's remarks, Mr. Ozawa said, "Since Setagaya-kun or anyone else who wants to step forward is free to do so, they may step forward."

The DPJ may get the best of all outcomes: an election, which deprives LDP members like Nakagawa Hidenao of the argument that the DPJ is less than democratic and not to be trusted, but one that is not especially rancorous and returns Mr. Ozawa to power with a solid mandate with which to proceed in his campaign to unseat the LDP.

The DPJ debates its election

The DPJ is scheduled to hold a leadership election in September.

There is some debate about the election. Should the party even bother with an election (see this article in Liberal Time), or should it just reaffirm Ozawa Ichiro as party president to minimize the risk of election-related instability? Should it wait until September, when the extraordinary session of the Diet is likely to have already begun, or should it hold an election in August, just before or at the very beginning of the session?

On the former, there should be no debate. While the LDP hopes that the DPJ will hold an election and that it will be fierce, pitting Mr. Maehara and his followers against Mr. Ozawa, that is no reason not to hold one. On the other hand, if the DPJ doesn't hold a vote, the LDP will complain about the DPJ's being antidemocratic. So the DPJ should ignore the LDP, ignore the media, and hold an election. If Mr. Ozawa's position in the party is so strong that he can be reaffirmed without a vote, then he should have no problem winning a vote. Yes, having a proper leadship campaign will give Mr. Maehara or a surrogate an opportunity to air their grievances against Mr. Ozawa's leadership (something that Mr. Maehara is obviously already doing). The party is better off letting him challenge Mr. Ozawa in a formal setting than continue to undermine the party in the media and to add "dictatorial control" to his list of grievances about Mr. Ozawa's leadership of the party. A formal election could be cathartic, and as a result strengthen Mr. Ozawa's legitimacy and power at the head of the party.

As for the latter question, there is little reason to wait until September to hold the election. Tahara Soichiro argues in Liberal Time that "until the DPJ leadership election, nothing will improve in Nagata-cho." I think Tahara overstates internal opposition to Mr. Ozawa — large sections of the party may be uncomfortable with Mr. Ozawa, but I don't think a majority of the party "always opposes" him — but his general point is right. As long as Mr. Ozawa is distracted by sniping from his internal opponents, he will be less able to pressure the government. An election won't end internal opposition to his leadership by any means, but it will delegitimize it somewhat, as he will have a new mandate to lead.

There is no consensus on the timing of the election, however. Hatoyama Yukio, the secretary-general, has nixed proposals to move it forward; Koshiishi Azuma, the head of the DPJ caucus in the upper house and an advocate of reelecting Mr. Ozawa without a vote, would prefer to hold an election before the new Diet session, as soon as the party finishes its survey of party members and supporters eligible to vote in a leadership election (now scheduled for completion in early August). No word on where Mr. Ozawa himself stands on the issue.

He should push for an early election, giving his critics their moment in the spotlight , disposing of them, and getting back to the business of unseating the LDP before the Diet reopens in late August.