Cooperation breaks out

One meeting between Mr. Fukuda and Mr. Ozawa, another scheduled for today, the MSDF's ships on their way home, and all of the sudden the political mood seems to be completely different.

With the LDP eager to avoid a general election before September 2009 and the DPJ seemingly cognizant that it's not enough just to pass laws in the Upper House, both parties, according to Asahi, "can be seen to be working to compromise, and the confrontational mood is beginning to fade."

One area being considered for a compromise is the drafting of a permanent law on JSDF dispatch, which would necessitate three-way discussions among the LDP, DPJ, and Komeito inside and outside the Diet on the principles that should guide JSDF missions abroad. Undoubtedly this debate would distance the DPJ from other opposition parties, but that may be an unavoidable consequence of the DPJ's having to work more with the LDP, a problem that does not concern the others. That said, this concept remains a possibility, and nothing more.

A more immediate area for cooperation is a revision of the political funds control law. While the LDP, DPJ, and Komeito agreed in a private meeting to revise the law to require reporting of all expenses over one yen, the challenge, Mainichi suggests, is moving the discussion to a meeting of the Diet Strategy committee chairmen that includes the other opposition parties, while hammering out remaining differences between the LDP and DPJ on the specifics of the revised law.

There is still the looming problem of a new law authorizing the MSDF's refueling activities, on the agenda for the Friday meeting, but at least they're talking about practical differences on matters of legislation, and not grandstanding or name-calling. Now that the ships are coming home, I am curious to see whether the LDP will be able to convince the Japanese people to support sending them back in a few weeks. The permanent end of the refueling mission might be a price worth paying for constructive debate on the other, more pressing issues on the policy agenda, particularly if the parties can revisit proposals for Japanese (probably civilian) contributions to the reconstruction of Afghanistan on the ground. Jun Okumura has a solid proposal for how something of this nature could happen.

At least the DPJ has finally learned that with the dissipation of its momentum from the Upper House election win, it needs to have something to offer the public, which means shaking hands with Mr. Fukuda every once in a while. Is Mr. Ozawa prudent enough to manage the task?

This is getting ridiculous

Back in May, in wake of Mr. Matsuoka's suicide and the nomination of Mr. Akagi to be his replacement, back when it wasn't clear whether Mr. Abe would lead his party to its worst ever defeat at the polls, I noted, semi-facetiously, in a post on Mr. Akagi, "No cabinet-eligible LDP politician has clean hands."

Now we learn, thanks to MTC, that yet another member of the Abe Cabinet has been accused of misusing political funds: Suga Yoshihide, minister of internal affairs and communications. Perhaps given that up until this point Suga has been scandal-free, rumors suggested that he would be given an important post in the new cabinet (at one point I recall reading that he was being considered for chief cabinet secretary).

But with Nakagawa Hidenao, outgoing LDP secretary-general, suggesting that members joining the cabinet must have clean records, suddenly it looks like there may be another opening in the new cabinet.

Nakagawa's rule is laughable, in light of what seems to be a universal problem in the LDP (and maybe even in the DPJ, for all we know). Violating the political funds law appears to be a way of life for LDP members — and for what? As Tahara Soichiro wrote in an article mentioned in this post, the funds seem to be going to provide meal and entertainment expenses so that members can entertain constituents and supporters when they visit Tokyo. And for that the majority of the LDP seems to be disqualified from holding ministerial positions.

At some point, when a law is respected largely in the breach, it may be time to reconsider the provisions of the law.

In the meantime, however, this latest scandal should further demolish any expectations that the new Abe Cabinet will be more successful than the last. Perhaps Abe's remaining in office is the best of all situations. A few more months of Mr. Abe could guarantee a DPJ victory in the next general election, forcing the LDP to spend time in the political wilderness thinking about its future.

Looking at the big picture

The LDP-Komeito coalition, after weeks of wrangling with the DPJ, passed its version of a law revising the Political Funds Control Law over DPJ opposition.

The law stipulates that politicians' fund management organizations are to copy and provide receipts for expenditures above ¥50,000. Will it make any difference in stopping political corruption? In a word, no. As the Asahi editorial on the bill's imminent passage noted, the bill provides for transparency "in name only," with the giant loophole being that expenditures can be broken up into pieces smaller than ¥50,000 to escape detection (hence the DPJ draft calling for a ¥10,000 floor).

Meanwhile, the government's management of the legislative agenda has prompted public criticism from former Finance Minister Tanigaki Sadakazu, who criticized Abe for stubbornly insisting on passage of the "amakudari" law (another law that will most likely do little more than serve as window dressing for the cabinet in advance of the Upper House elections). Tanigaki's comments were met with rebuttals from Ministers Aso and Ibuki, as well as Machimura Nobutaka, head of the faction to which Abe belongs.

Far more interesting than the increasingly public political wrangling among senior LDP officials is another story that illustrates the vast divide between the world views of Asahi and Yomiuri.

Asahi gave front page coverage to a ruling by Japan's Supreme Court on a lawsuit that challenged the results of the 2005 Lower House election on the basis that the 2.17:1 disparity in the value of the votes of citizens in the least (Tokushima 1) and most populous (Tokyo 6) districts was unconstitutional. A favorable ruling would have invalidated the election results, and it seems unlikely that the court would have done so — but even so, the suit was dismissed by a 9 to 6 verdict.

But while the short-term impact of this issue is nil, this is yet another battle in the ongoing urban-rural war in Japan, as rural Japan — the LDP's depopulating base — continues to hold a disproportionate number of Diet seats and therefore a disproportionate share of political power, in the interest of ensuring that the views of depopulated regions are considered. The Asahi editorial on this subject is worth reading, as it shows that this issue will only grow in importance, as the disparity continues to widen (see this post on population change). As the population changes, Japan will have to consider how to ensure a better balance between urban and rural constituencies, and as the relevance of rural Japan diminishes, how to ensure that rural constituencies are not entirely forgotten. This also, of course, has implications for the growth of a two-party system; redistribution from depopulating rural prefectures almost necessarily means a loss of seats for the LDP, especially once the LDP's abnormal urban vote total in the 2005 Lower House election returns to earth.

Sooner or later advocates of further redistricting will succeed in having seats shifted from rural to urban Japan — although the LDP will work to push that day back as long as possible. But the urban-rural divide, and the impact a decisive shift to urban Japan will have on policy, will likely be one of the most important developments in political Japan in the medium to long term, certainly more significant than the legislation being rammed through the Diet by the Abe Cabinet in the final weeks of the regular session of the Diet.

And yet Yomiuri felt that its readers had no need to know about this court decision.