Japan Oct 22 2017

[jaichind]

HP's first campaign ad.  Mostly about Koike taking on a political establishment dominated by old men.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4c2KZ-f-P8

[jaichind]

Kyodo poll

Abe cabinet approval   40.6(-4.4)/46.2(+4.9)

Who do you support for PM   Abe 45.9  Koike 33.0

Constitutional change for/against 34.0/53.4

PR vote

LDP   24.1（-2.9）
KP     4.9（+0.3）
JRP    2.4（+0.2）
PJK    0.4（+0.4）
HP    14.8（+8.6）
DP      ー （-8.0）
LP      0.3（+0.2）
SDP   0.1（-0.2）
JCP 　4.9（+1.4）

LDP lost some ground to HP while  most of DP support went to HP even as a portion seems to have gone JCP.  Overall makes sense.  Abe approval fall has to be worrying for LDP-KP.

[jaichind]

History of Kyodo PR polls and actual results

using  https://www41.atwiki.jp/giinsenkyo/pages/44.html

2013  Upper House  1) 28.8   2) 31.1   3) 29.8   4) 30.6  -> actual result 34.74%
2014  Lower House  1) 25.3   2) 28.0   3) 28.0               -> actual result 33.11%
2016  Upper House  1) 28.9   2) 27.2                             -> actual result 35.91%
2017  Lower House  1) 27.0   2) 24.1                             -> actual result

Looks like LDP PR vote is headed to the (30-33) range.  2016 LDP over-performance seems to be associated with the relative weakness of DP's brand so a lot of undecided went to LDP.  This time should be enough with KP's 13-13.5 vote share for a solid victory but most likely will miss 2/3 majority.

[jaichind]

Looks like there are several efforts by the DP Left to quit DP and form a new party by mid week.  They might have the funds able get themselves on the PR ballot in some regions like 北海道(Hokkaido) and 東北(Tohoku).  This can only work if they unite their efforts.  If there ends up being several of these DP Left successor parties then this will go nowhere.  We will see.

[FredLindq]

Looks like there are several efforts by the DP Left to quit DP and form a new party by mid week.  They might have the funds able get themselves on the PR ballot in some regions like 北海道(Hokkaido) and 東北(Tohoku).  This can only work if they unite their efforts.  If there ends up being several of these DP Left successor parties then this will go nowhere.  We will see.

Sounds logical. I suprised how the Japanese centre-left merged into a centre-right conservative parti like Koikes.

[jaichind]

In 岡山(Okayama), 岡山市(Okayama City) Central district Council by-election this Sunday.

LDP       47.4%  (Wins)
CP           8.3%  (LDP decentralization regional splinter - somewhat close to JRP)
DP         24.9%
JCP        19.4%

Back in 2015 the Central district results were

            Contested    Won      Vote share
LDP            5             3              40.3%
KP              2             2              17.6%
CP              2             1                6.9%
DPJ             2             2             23.8%
JCP             1             1             10.6%

KP seems to be not to be actively working for LDP this time around.  But overall DP's vote share is holding up while LDP is slipping relative to 2015.  What is obvious is the JCP surge.

[jaichind]

DP MP 枝野 幸男(Edano Yukio) which has become the de facto leader of the DP Left has indicated he will form a new party for those DP MPs that choose not to join HP.  The new Party's name will most likely be 民主党 or Democratic Party.  It seems Edano will be holding talks with DP leader Maehara as well as HP to see what can be done to accommodate as much DP MPs as possible within HP and failing that at least have some sort of tactical alliance between the new party (most likely called DPJ?) and HP.

[jaichind]

武蔵野市(Musashino City) of Tokyo City Council by-election this Sunday had a shock where JCP nearly beats LDP 1-on-1.

LDP      50.4%  (wins)
JCP       49.6%

There was a by-election for mayor for 武蔵野市(Musashino City)  as well and it was

DP-SDP-LP-JCP    65.6% (wins)
LDP                    34.4%

[jaichind]

JX poll in Tokyo on PR vote



HP     29  (+1)
LDP   28  (-11)
JCP    10  (-4)
KP       5  (-1)

Much more undecided now.  There seems to be some shift from LDP toward HP but some core HP supporters disappointed that Koike might jump back to national politics after she got a massive mandate in the Tokyo Prefecture elections in July.

[jaichind]

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/10/01/national/politics-diplomacy/leading-kibo-no-member-says-koike-led-party-unlikely-take-power-lower-house-election/#.WdFmH1tSyUl

HP is pretty much admitting that it will not defeat LDP this election and only in 2021 will HP hope to overthrow LDP.  HP is pretty much trapped.  To have the number of viable candidates to make a HP majority even possible HP pretty much have to take in all DP candidates including those on the DP Left.  But to do that HP makes itself vulnerable to the charge that it is an opportunistic party only interested in power.   HP is mostly targeting around 250 candidates overall out 465 seats available.



So HP has taken the road of relative ideological purity and mostly accept there will be some sort of DP Left party outside of HP.  I think some sort of HP tactical alliances with this new DP Left party would be wise where HP can back the DP Left in districts it has no hope of winning, mostly in 北海道(Hokkaido) and 東北(Tohoku).

Of course this key fact is the reason that it seems Koike will not quit her Tokyo governor position to run for the Lower House.  The main risk on the other side is that by 2021 the novelty value of Koike could have run past.  The ideal time for Koike to strike would be in the 2018  Lower House elections when she has managed to recruit a bloc of quality candidates across Japan.  So while it seems Abe's risky move might cost him a bunch of seats the alternative of a 2018 election might be worse for Abe.

[jaichind]

In 山梨(Yamanashi) we also have a by-election for 山梨市(Yamanashi City) mayor that became a swing against LDP.  It ended up being

DP-SDP    55.1%  (wins)
LDP          44.9%

Back in 2014 it was

LDP          51%   (wins)
DP-SDP     49%

[Vega]

DP MP 枝野 幸男(Edano Yukio) which has become the de facto leader of the DP Left has indicated he will form a new party for those DP MPs that choose not to join HP.  The new Party's name will most likely be 民主党 or Democratic Party.  It seems Edano will be holding talks with DP leader Maehara as well as HP to see what can be done to accommodate as much DP MPs as possible within HP and failing that at least have some sort of tactical alliance between the new party (most likely called DPJ?) and HP.

Why?

[jaichind]

Looks like HP will announce around 210 candidates tomorrow.  80 are novices and 130 are from DP.  A bunch of heavyweight DP MPs including former PM 菅直人(Kan Naoto) and 野田佳彦(Noda Yoshihiko) as well as DP Left leader 枝野 幸男(Edano Yukio) and former DPJ leader 海江田 万里(Kaieda Banri), 岡田 克也 (Okada Katsuya) will not be on the list of approved candidates.  

List of DP heavyweights not on the HP list


In addition to being top leaders in DP/DPJ which HP does not want to inherit most of them are from Tokyo/Tokyo suburbs or Osaka where HP feels that it has enough strength not to have to rely on DP (Tokyo and suburbs) or had ceded to JRP (like Osaka).

[jaichind]

DP MP 枝野 幸男(Edano Yukio) which has become the de facto leader of the DP Left has indicated he will form a new party for those DP MPs that choose not to join HP.  The new Party's name will most likely be 民主党 or Democratic Party.  It seems Edano will be holding talks with DP leader Maehara as well as HP to see what can be done to accommodate as much DP MPs as possible within HP and failing that at least have some sort of tactical alliance between the new party (most likely called DPJ?) and HP.

Why?

It is a quirk of the PR ballot.  People can either check off a box for the PR ballot or write the name of the party.  What the party is known as in the general public would work.  So if someone wrote 自民 for LDP instead of the official name of the party 自由民主党 that would be fine.  So if the new party is called 民主党 people who are used to writing down 民主 (or Democratic) would be counted toward this new party.  

Of course the opposite logic could work as well since DPJ/DP has a negative image from the 2009-2012 DPJ administration. But if they go with 民主党 then the DP Left feels that there are residue support the 民主 brand has they can cash in on.

[jaichind]

The party that DP Left leader 枝野 幸男(Edano Yukio) will form will be called 立憲民主党 or Constitutional Democratic Party (CDP I guess).  It will almost certainly be allied with SDP and JCP.

Also it seems that the far left co-leader of LP, 山本 太郎(Yamamoto Tarō), who Ozawa let into LP back in early 2015 to make sure PLP has 5 MPs will refuse to enter into HP along with Ozawa.  So some form of LP will continue under Yamamoto's leadership.  This rump LP party will be part of this Leftist alliance.

[jaichind]

ANN poll

Abe approval/disapproval 36.9(-4.4)/46.3(+6.7)



Note this is party support and not PR so DP is in there (change on Mid Sept) which is really just LDP and DP losing support to HP

LDP  39.7  (-6.5)
KP     4.6   (+1.1)
JRP    2.8   (+1.0)
HP     9.6   (+9.6)
DP     7.1   (-4.2)
SDP   1.9   (+1.1)
JCP    5.8  (+0.1)

[jaichind]

Hokkaido Times poll for 北海道(Hokkaido)

Abe approval/disapproval  37(-4)/61(+4)

Party support
LDP   24.4（-0.3）
KP   　3.4（-0.3）
NPD    0.9（-0.9）
JRP     0.2（-0.8）
HP      2.7（new）
DP     14.3（-1.0）
SDP    0.6（+0.1）
JCP     4.1（-1.5）

PR vote

LDP    25
KP    　6
NPD     5
JRP      1
HP     29
SDP     1
JCP      8

I am surprised how much of the DP base here has gone over to HP when I expected more to flow to JCP.  Anyway, if the new LD Left splinter DCP gets on the PR ballot I think 9%-10% of the HP vote will flow back to DCP.  NPD seems to be cannibalizing the LDP vote.

[jaichind]

福島(Fukushima) poll also has HP ahead in PR



Abe approval/disapproval   27.8 (-2.8 )/54.4(+2.7)

PR vote

LDP    23.9
KP    　3.8
JRP     1.4
PJK     0.6
HP     30.6
LP       1.0
SDP     2.8
JCP      8.2

[Kamala]

Is it too early to say "Koikementum"?

[jaichind]

Is it too early to say "Koikementum"?

Yes.  Note that 北海道(Hokkaido) and 福島(Fukushima) have very anti-LDP leans.  What these polls show us is that the Center-Left base of the DP seems to be willing to back HP just to beat LDP.  If CDP gets in there I am not sure they will stick with HP since there will be a Center-Left non-JCP alternative.  On the other hand these polls does seem to show that the DP Left voting bloc can and will vote HP tactically to defeat LDP.    If so HP is making the right call in rejecting DP Left candidates in areas of HP strength and go with novice candidates that can pull in LDP votes while watching the DP Left vote roll in as long there is no CDP candidate in the race.

[jaichind]

Latest NHK poll

Abe approval/disapproval  37(-7)/44(+8)

Party support



LDP   30.8 (-6.9)
KP      3.8 (+0.7)
JRP     1.0 (-0.1)
HP      5.4 (new)
DP      3.9 (-2.8 )
LP       0.3 (---)
SDP    0.6 (+0.1)
JCP     3.3 (+0.7)

[jaichind]

Write-up on Aoki index

In some isolated corners of the LDP there seems to be noises being raised against Abe and calling for his ouster.  For sure he will face serious competition in next year's LDP President race.  So far there are no formal organized opposition to Abe yet.  So what sort of situation would lead to more organized resistance to Abe.  

For this we look to something called the 青木の法則 (Aoki's law).  青木 幹雄 (Aoki Mikio) was Secretary-General of the LDP in the Upper House and interim PM back in 2000.  He was a powerful figure in the LDP in the 1990s and retired in 2010. He came up with something called the Aoki Index which is [Approval Rating of the Cabinet + Support for the ruling Party].  His theory is that if this index is above 85 then it makes sense to call a mid-term election since the ruling party is sure to win by a large margin.  Also if this index falls below 50 then the ruling party will face an electoral rout and it is best to replace the PM.  The logic of this index is similar to that old USA electoral rule (which might not be true) that undecided break for the opposition so the performance of the ruling party is a function of visible levels of support (approval rating and party support) and that in an election campaign the opposition ratings will rise.

Back in 2014 when Abe was deciding to see if he should call a mid-term election, a political science article pointed out that most likely he will since the Aoki index was in his favor.  The article pointed out the seats won by the LDP was very correlated to the Aoki index



The Blue bar is the number of seats LDP won and Orange line the Aoki index which he computed using NHK poll.  For 2012 he used an "Inverse Aoki index" where he added Cabinet Disapproval rating + LDP support since the ruling party in 2012 was DPJ.

Then he pointed out that a historical view of the Aoki index



Shows that Abe's Aoki index in Nov seems to be above 80 which seems close enough to 85 to call an election.

An updated version of the Aoki index using NHK polling data up to earlier in 2017 shows Abe in pretty good shape (above 80) up to the Spring of 2017


Of course the most recent fall in Abe/LDP ratings means that his Aoki index have fallen a lot


The latest NHK numbers has Abe's Aoki index is a 65.7.  I think if the Aoki index falls below 55 most likely there will be organized movements within LDP to remove Abe.

One can use the Aoki index using NHK data to look at various Japanese political events since 2000.

Late June 2000 - General election - Aoki index (Average June and July numbers) at 50.5 - LDP-KP barely won over a divide opposition (JCP LP and DPJ).  Any sort of opposition coordination and LDP-KP should have been beaten

April 2001 - Aoki Index at 28.4 - LDP PM Mori forced out of leadership of LDP and out of office

Late July 2001 - Upper House election - Aoki Index (Average of July and August numbers) at 108.2 - massive Koizumi LDP-KP-NCP landslide.  From a vote share point of view greatest landslide in modern Japanese election history

Nov 2003 - General election - Aoki Index at 88.6 - Solid LDP-KP win which is somewhat blunted by the a united DPJ since LP merged into DPJ before the election

July 2004 - Upper House election - Aoki index at 76.1 - LDP-KP barely won and was seen as a setback for Koizumi

Sep 2005 - General election - Aoki Index at 100.4 - LDP-KP Koizumi landslide despite creation of several LDP splinter parties

July 2007 - Upper House election - Aoki Index at 69.8 - LDP-KP defeat at the hands of DPJ led opposition mostly due to opposition unity against LDP.  

Sept 2007 - Aoki index at 61.4 - Abe forced out of office as LDP President and with that the PM as well.

May 2008 - Aoki index at 46.6 - Fukuda forced out of office as LDP President and with that the PM as well

Late Aug 2009 - General election -  Aoki Index (Average of August and Sept  numbers) at 43.8 - LDP-KP landslide defeat by DPJ led opposition alliance

May 2010 - Aoki index at 41.8 - Hatoyama forced out of office as DPJ President and with that PM as well

July 2010 - Upper House election - Aoki index at 68.8 - DPJ defeated by LDP-KP mostly due to inability of DPJ to lock on allies like SDP or YP or even KP.  

August 2011 - Aoki index at 34.4 - Kan forced out of office as DPJ President and with that PM as well

Dec 2012 - General election - Aoki index at 36.1 - DPJ destroyed by LDP-KP in a landslide defeat.  JRP and YP added to the damage by splitting the anti-LDP vote

July 2013 - Upper House election - Aoki index at 99.5 - LDP-KP landslide victory as JRP and YP loses vote share to LDP-KP

Dec 2014 - General election - Aoki index at 85.1 - LDP-KP landslide victory despite DPJ-JIP tactical alliances

Aug 2015 - Aoki index at 71.7 - Abe's low point so far due to new Security Law.  LDP held firm and Abe bounced back.

July 2016 - Upper House election - Aoki index at 88.3 - significant LDP-KP victory whose scale was somewhat blunted by DP-JCP alliances in 1- member districts

July 2017 - Aoki index at 65.7 - A series of scandals, gaffs and debacle in the Tokyo Prefecture election drives Abe into the worst crisis since his 2012 comeback.  

Looking at this history of Aoki index if the index falls below 60 then there will be pressure for Abe to go ASAP.  If going into the LDP leadership race which will most likely before the 2018 general election and the Aoki index cannot get above 75 if not 80 then Abe's opposition will be very significant with a strong chance he will be defeated.

[jaichind]

The latest NHK poll has Aoki index at 67.8. 

The history of Aoki index seems to be if it is 70-80 for LDP then it is a marginal victory, while 80+ is a LDP landslide and below 70 is a LDP setback if not defeat.    A lot would depend on opposition unity.

There will be another NHK poll a week before the election. I suspect LDP support will rise a couple of % as support rises for all parties right before an election.  So it seems LDP will head into the election with
 an Aoki index in the low 70s which would imply a setback if the opposition is unified or a smallish win of the opposition is splintered.  It seems a lot would depend on how strong the new CDP gets.

[jaichind]

ex-DP MPs that have a centrist or center-right background but rejected by HP due to the fact that they have had leadership roles in DPJ/DP/JIP have opted to run as independents and not join CDP.  They are former DPJ/DP leader 岡田 克也(Okada Katsuya), former PM  野田佳彦(Noda Yoshihiko), former JIP leader 江田 憲司(Eda Kenji) and very likely former JIP leader 松野 頼久(Matsuno Yorihisa.)  It is possible they might even run without HP or CDP-JCP candidates in their districts.   Of course not having these Centrist DP MPs in their ranks does limit CDP's appeal and reach.

[jaichind]

It seems HP is so strapped for cash, even after the infusion of DP cash, that Koike is charging 30K Yen ($270) for anyone that want a picture to be taken with her.