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Author Topic: Japan General Discussion  (Read 60842 times)
jaichind
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« Reply #100 on: May 24, 2015, 07:08:17 AM »

More interesting facts about the Osaka Referendum.  Turnout was almost 67% compared to 47% turnout in the December Lower House elections.  The zones that had the highest turnout also were the most opposed to the Osaka restructure plan.  The zones that had a No majority tended to have turnout of around 69% and the zones that had a Yes majority tended to have a turnout of around 65%.  This means that the political apathy of Osaka and most likely of all of Japan is more of function of distrusts of political parties and less about political issues as a whole.  And when there is something to vote against they will turnout. 
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jaichind
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« Reply #101 on: June 19, 2015, 04:21:43 PM »

Japan's parliament enacts law lowering voting age from 20 to 18.  DPJ used to push this thinking that the youth tends to vote center-Left.  Recently LDP is pushing it on the premise that the youth might be becoming more conservative.  Either way, no one seems to want to oppose this, not even the DPJ.  It is also an attempt to counterbalance the growing domination of the elderly during elections.  For example, during the Osaka Referendum, all age groups voted for the proposed change except for the 70+ age bracket.  But that was enough to defeat the proposal. 
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jaichind
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« Reply #102 on: June 23, 2015, 05:56:17 AM »

Latest Asahi poll has the Abe cabinet approval rating at 39/37.  53/29 are against the various security bills that the Abe want the pass.  Various other polls last couple of weeks has Abe approval around low to mid 40s.  The bump Abe got from his trip to USA is gone and dropping. 

It seems the most recent drop is mostly driven by the security bills debate.  It seems that the Abe cabinet is by historical terms fairly popular but any policy that the Abe cabinet seems to push is always falls in popularity.  The Abe cabinet is more popular than any of its policies. This seems to be driven by the lack of alternatives to LDP-KP as well as the fact that the Abe cabinet is seem to be trying to fix the economic problem.  Ergo any policy that the Abe cabinet seems to push that is no economic in nature is less popular and gets less popular as time goes on.
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jaichind
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« Reply #103 on: June 25, 2015, 09:35:18 PM »

Abe has pledged to pass the bills that allow Japan to defend other countries in the current session of parliament, which has been extended through September.  The opposition claims this violates the Constitution.    A Kyodo News survey has support/oppose of these bills at 28/59.  I wonder what the LDP level of support will be in the polls after pass this this law over the opposition of a ever larger majority in the public.
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Nathan
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« Reply #104 on: June 26, 2015, 04:22:09 AM »
« Edited: June 26, 2015, 04:34:57 AM by sex-negative feminist prude »

Wait, he's not even bothering to attempt to change the constitution to allow this, he's just going ahead and passing it with the constitution as it currently reads? In a better world he'd be sure to suffer extreme and more or less immediate political consequences for doing that (and for being so personally obsessed with doing it regardless of what the country thinks or wants), but it's Japan in a year other than 1993 or 2009 and he's the leader of the LDP so he'll unfortunately probably more or less get away with it.

Worth noting that the Japanese Supreme Court has the power of judicial review but almost never exercises it.
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jaichind
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« Reply #105 on: June 26, 2015, 06:10:53 AM »

On Thursday, at a meeting of nearly 40 lawmakers from Abe's LDP, participants called for restrictions on media that oppose the government's bills.  "If you want to punish the media, the best way is to cut their income from advertisement," an LDP lawmaker told the closed meeting, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper said, quoting participants.  The unnamed lawmaker and others also called on the nation's biggest business lobby, Keidanren, to help financially pressure media that were criticizing the bills, the daily added.  When Abe was confronted with this he did indicate that freedom of press must be respected.  I guess the hawkish wing of LDP must feel the pressure of the dovish wing over the public opinion polls and the view of the hawks is that this is mostly a function of media coverage.
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jaichind
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« Reply #106 on: June 26, 2015, 06:18:13 AM »

Abe has to do it this way since he currently cannot change the Constitution.  That will have to wait until after the 2016 Upper House election where hopefully for him LDP-KP gets a massive majority like in 2013.  Then convince KP to come along which is mostly about convincing the married women's wing of the Soka Gakkai, convince the dovish wing of the LDP to come along and then that would put him at around 63% of the Upper House seats.  Then add a handful of PFG MPs and then peal off some hawkish supports of DPJ and JIP for a 2/3 majority.  There are a lot of ifs but he seems determined to try.  This set of bills is more to show that moving in that direction has no real international consequences so the doves of all types (in LDP and KP) will come along after 2016 elections.
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Nathan
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« Reply #107 on: June 26, 2015, 03:13:49 PM »

On Thursday, at a meeting of nearly 40 lawmakers from Abe's LDP, participants called for restrictions on media that oppose the government's bills.  "If you want to punish the media, the best way is to cut their income from advertisement," an LDP lawmaker told the closed meeting, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper said, quoting participants.  The unnamed lawmaker and others also called on the nation's biggest business lobby, Keidanren, to help financially pressure media that were criticizing the bills, the daily added.  When Abe was confronted with this he did indicate that freedom of press must be respected.  I guess the hawkish wing of LDP must feel the pressure of the dovish wing over the public opinion polls and the view of the hawks is that this is mostly a function of media coverage.

Oh, man, these people are just absolutely disgusting, aren't they?

Abe has to do it this way since he currently cannot change the Constitution.  That will have to wait until after the 2016 Upper House election where hopefully for him LDP-KP gets a massive majority like in 2013.

Yes well one can only hope that that won't happen, especially if the electorate realizes that militarist amendments to the constitution would be a probable outcome.
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CrabCake
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« Reply #108 on: June 26, 2015, 03:40:16 PM »

I still don't get how Abe can be doing so well, when literally all of his policy proposals are deeply underwater amongst the public. Well that's a lie, I do know the reason:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2015/06/24/commentary/japan-commentary/pathetic-state-dpj/#.VY23i4ikqK0

But I still find it baffling and depressing.
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #109 on: June 26, 2015, 03:49:09 PM »

Oh God... Is the LDP still far ahead in the polls? Is there any chance Japan finally gets a credible opposition force?
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Simfan34
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« Reply #110 on: June 26, 2015, 03:57:44 PM »

I still don't get how Abe can be doing so well, when literally all of his policy proposals are deeply underwater amongst the public. Well that's a lie, I do know the reason:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2015/06/24/commentary/japan-commentary/pathetic-state-dpj/#.VY23i4ikqK0

But I still find it baffling and depressing.

Be careful. The Japan Times is viciously anti-LDP.
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Nathan
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« Reply #111 on: June 26, 2015, 04:06:27 PM »

Oh God... Is the LDP still far ahead in the polls?

Yes.

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Not really. The various opposition parties could collectively retain enough presence in the Diet to prevent Abe from changing the constitution, but will almost certainly not be able to actually take power in the foreseeable future.

I still don't get how Abe can be doing so well, when literally all of his policy proposals are deeply underwater amongst the public. Well that's a lie, I do know the reason:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2015/06/24/commentary/japan-commentary/pathetic-state-dpj/#.VY23i4ikqK0

But I still find it baffling and depressing.

Be careful. The Japan Times is viciously anti-LDP.

This particular article barely discusses the LDP at all until towards the end. It's as much anti-pro-DPJ as anything.
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Simfan34
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« Reply #112 on: June 26, 2015, 04:08:19 PM »

Well, I'm speaking more generally.
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jaichind
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« Reply #113 on: June 26, 2015, 04:33:52 PM »

I think I pointed this out before.  But the biggest reason the Japanese voter tell posters on why they support LDP/Abe is : "Because there is no one else."
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jaichind
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« Reply #114 on: June 26, 2015, 07:01:41 PM »

The latest NHK levels of support are

LDP    35.8%   
DPJ       9.4%   
JIP        2.6%   
KP        3.6%   
JCP       4.4%

Even though LDP is way ahead one has to un-skew Japanese polls.  Japanese polls always overestimate LDP support and underestimate DPJ KP and JCP.  For NHK polls I found that the vote share of LDP+KP is what NHK shows plus 0% to 2% in the PR vote.  While one usually double the DPJ poll result to be its real vote shaer.  So if an election is called today LDP+KP would get around 40%-42% while DPJ would get around 19% although in an election campaign I am sure these numbers would be higher.  But it is clear that despite everything LDP-KP did lose ground since the December Lower House elections and DPJ gain ground.  If these levels of support continues into 2016 then Abe will find it hard to get the 2/3 majority he is looking for.
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Vega
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« Reply #115 on: June 26, 2015, 09:32:42 PM »

How much longer do we give Abe? He's dipped below 40%, and Japanese PMs don't usually recover once they sink that low.
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jaichind
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« Reply #116 on: June 26, 2015, 09:54:28 PM »

How much longer do we give Abe? He's dipped below 40%, and Japanese PMs don't usually recover once they sink that low.

Well, that is one poll.  Most other polls are mostly in the 40s.  On the other hand these polls were from early June before the security bills became part of the public discussion.  I do expect these polls to also fall, perhaps to below 40% so we will have to see what other polls show.  On the other hand once Abe rams these laws through and memories of public opposition fade from the debate Abe's approval rating will recover but perhaps not to the level where LDP-KP can win in a landslide in 2016.  If so LDP-KP in 2016 will gain a few seats versus the 2010 election but not enough to give him the 2/3 majority he needs.  Especially if changing the Constitution might become a topic of the 2016 elections with all things equal will work against LDP-KP.
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MaxQue
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« Reply #117 on: June 27, 2015, 03:44:15 PM »

How much longer do we give Abe? He's dipped below 40%, and Japanese PMs don't usually recover once they sink that low.

Well, that is one poll.  Most other polls are mostly in the 40s.  On the other hand these polls were from early June before the security bills became part of the public discussion.  I do expect these polls to also fall, perhaps to below 40% so we will have to see what other polls show.  On the other hand once Abe rams these laws through and memories of public opposition fade from the debate Abe's approval rating will recover but perhaps not to the level where LDP-KP can win in a landslide in 2016.  If so LDP-KP in 2016 will gain a few seats versus the 2010 election but not enough to give him the 2/3 majority he needs.  Especially if changing the Constitution might become a topic of the 2016 elections with all things equal will work against LDP-KP.

I think the question isn't about LDP losing, but about LDP returning to its tendency to ditch leaders very often.
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jaichind
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« Reply #118 on: June 27, 2015, 04:27:55 PM »

I think the question isn't about LDP losing, but about LDP returning to its tendency to ditch leaders very often.

LDP ditches leaders because 1) their poll numbers are so bad that they will get in the way of LDP winning and 2) LDP is really a confederation of various factions so the various faction leaders want their chance to be at the top.  Abe has neutralized both problems for now.  Even in the low 40s or even high 30s in terms of approval rating Abe can still claim that it is good enough for a majority given how badly split the opposition is.  Also Abe has weakened the faction leaders so much that none of them are much of a threat to him. In fact the only real influential faction leader, Nobutaka Machimura, leader of the Machimura faction, the faction that Abe is from, died just recently removing the last LDP factional check on Abe.
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jaichind
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« Reply #119 on: June 28, 2015, 05:26:21 PM »

Latest Nikkei polls (which tends to be more pro-Abe/LDP) has Abe Cabinet Approval at 47/40 and support for new securities bills are 25/57. 
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jaichind
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« Reply #120 on: June 29, 2015, 07:55:23 AM »

Sankei poll.  Shinzo Abe’s Cabinet  approval is now 46 which is the lowest for Sankei since Abe came to power in Dec 2012.  Security related legislation approval are 59/32.
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jaichind
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« Reply #121 on: June 29, 2015, 08:03:57 AM »

The magazine Shūkan Gendai  (週刊現代) came out with a bombshell.   It claims that a couple of weeks ago, Abe meet with a bunch of senior members of the media at a high end Chinese restaurant (赤阪飯店) (ironically).  After Abe got drunk he admitted that the purpose of these security bills is to prepare the way for a war between Japan and PRC.   He also bashed Obama as weak and ineffective in dealing with PRC and not being able to get moving on TPP.

While I have no doubt this is how Abe feels inside, I think even a drunk Abe is not foolish enough to say something like this openly.  This feels some sort of plant by the media to wreck Abe's plans for the security bills.   This is relevant because up until now the media has been very supportive of Abe.  But recently events seems to have turned the media against Abe.
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BundouYMB
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« Reply #122 on: June 29, 2015, 10:43:28 AM »

PSA: The NHK poll are NOT polls of voting intention. They are polls of party approval ratings, in other words poll of which party they think is handling themselves the best in parliament.
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jaichind
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« Reply #123 on: June 29, 2015, 10:47:14 AM »

PSA: The NHK poll are NOT polls of voting intention. They are polls of party approval ratings, in other words poll of which party they think is handling themselves the best in parliament.

I get my data from

http://www.nhk.or.jp/bunken/yoron/political/index.html

Where it says it gives the numbers by party under "政党支持率."  Of course it could mean something different in the Japanese context but in Chinese 政党支持率 means party support not really party approval.  While NHK is not the best pollster it does have a historical time series which is great.  If you look at the time series one will notice that the number each party gets under 政党支持率 rises arcross the board around election season which implies it is party support and not party approval.   I could be wrong about that.
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jaichind
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« Reply #124 on: July 06, 2015, 05:51:57 AM »

Mainichi poll has approval at 42/43 although Mainichi polls historically has been less friendly to LDP than normal.



Approval of security bills are 29/58.

Abe has extended the current diet by 3 months to avoid passing the security bills while are so unpopular.  He has the votes to pass it but is hoping that extra time will give him a chance to increase popular opinion on the bills before he passes it.
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