Can Japan’s democracy survive Abe’s designs?

[bananas]

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2014/07/07/commentary/japan-commentary/can-japans-democracy-survive-abes-designs/

Can Japan’s democracy survive Abe’s designs?
by William Pesek
Bloomberg
Jul 7, 2014

Sunday shoppers in Tokyo could be forgiven for wondering if they had been transported to Tibet or Myanmar as a man climbed atop a pedestrian crosswalk, voiced his reason to the crowd via megaphone and set himself ablaze.

Self-immolation as political protest is almost unheard of in developed nations. The middle-aged man, identified only by the family name Yamashiro, said igniting himself was the only way to show Prime Minister Shinzo Abe his anger at a plan that some see as violating the spirit Japan’s pacifist constitution.

While extreme, Yamashiro’s fury isn’t uncommon. One day later, thousands demonstrated outside Abe’s residence against this “reinterpretation” of a constitution that he lacks the votes to amend. Public opposition didn’t stop Abe’s Cabinet from rubber-stamping his semantic end run around the law, which raises a vital question: Will Japan’s democracy survive Abe?

For the third time since taking office in December 2012 Abe did exactly what all too many of his 126 million people oppose. Earlier, he rushed into law a controversial secrecy bill that could send reporters and whiste-blowers to jail on varied and ambiguous grounds, then he pushed to restart reactors shut on safety grounds after the March 2011 Fukushima disaster.

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Along with the secrecy law, Abe stacked the board of national broadcaster NHK with like-minded conservatives. NHK, it’s worth adding, barely covered the suicide attempt in Shinjuku on Sunday, June 29. Is it because it didn’t fit with the Abe narrative?

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[blkmusclmachine]

1. I would not be at all surprised to learn that Abe is associated with THE FAMILY/THE FELLOWSHIP

[bananas]

2. "this veteran journalist gave me a dumbfounded look and asked what I was talking about"

Last edited Mon Jul 7, 2014, 05:54 PM - Edit history (1)

http://www.japanfocus.org///events/view/222

Self-immolation Protests PM Abe Overturning Japan’s Pacifist Postwar Order
Jeff Kingston
Jul. 07, 2014

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NHK news, the government broadcaster, didn’t even mention the event, apparently playing by Pyongyang rules: ignore any ugly truths that might discredit the powers that be.

Since NHK is the dominant media presence, its non-coverage is significant. In his Independent Web Journal, reporter Iwakami Yasumi says that someone at NHK divulged to him that NHK’s blackout was politically motivated, leading him to comment wryly that NHK is a ‘state broadcaster’ not a ‘public broadcaster’. However, TV Asahi did air some footage of the self-immolation and the next morning the television ‘wide shows’ that feature a discussion format probed the event at length, connecting it with Abe’s reinterpretation of Article 9.

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On July 1, an NHK correspondent interviewed me about Abe’s reinterpretation gambit, and when I mentioned the self-immolation at Shinjuku station this veteran journalist gave me a dumbfounded look and asked what I was talking about. When I explained that it was highlighted in CNN’s coverage and on social media, he said he had never heard about it. When I offered to show him, he expressed no interest. So there are reasons to worry about media censorship in Japan, but ignorance and incuriosity of mainstream journalists may be an even bigger threat.

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July 1, 2014, the sixtieth anniversary of the establishment of the SDF, will go down in history as a watershed in Japan’s postwar history, a 21st century day of infamy when Abe hijacked democracy by renouncing Article 9 and the nation’s pacifist postwar order in an unscrupulous manner, achieving by fiat what he didn’t dare try through established constitutional procedures. Apparently Abe fears the people as much as they fear him.

[hack89]

3. With China making aggressive claims on Japanese territory

Japan needs to defend themselves. What did China think would happen?