Entry for October 18, 2006

"Itsunomani?"
When did this happen?

I expect most of the hits to this blog are from people I know in one way or another, so drop me a line if you're checking up on me. For those of you who don't know who I am or where I live, it will suffice to say I live in Japan. If this were the US, I would be living in an eternal red state if the Republican party were to be equated with the Liberal Democratic party, which is probably a rather apt comparison as the Japanese Liberal Democratic party is neither very liberal and is becoming less and less democratic. To offer proof for this observation, I need to look no further than our new Prime Minister. His grandfather was a prime minister (and I think he was tried as a war criminal, I need to check up on my Japanese history) and his father was also considered a PM candidate until he died of cancer about a decade or so ago.

Now, I'm all about patriotism and being proud of being Japanese and supporting the troops (they are the Self Defense Forces, I know, but they're here or out there or wherever they need to be because their country asked them to be and so the country is obliged to give them support), but when PM Abe (that's Ah-beh for those of you not familiar with Japanese names) talks about "the Beautiful Country Japan", I start thinking about the pre-WWII era and quiet, restrained women serving their fathers-in-law and husbands and sons, and I want to tear out my hair.

Those of you ranting about red states and blue states, those of you who would like to see a Democrat in the White House again, consider yourselves lucky. At least you guys have a fighting chance to get what you want. Japan has been led by a PM from the LDP for essentially its entire post-WWII era. I hope to see a non-LDP PM at least once more before I die (it happened once, sort of, I think it was when I was in university or maybe high school), but I ain't holding my breath.