June 16, 2006; Volume 02, Number 22
of the
Japan Considered Podcast
[Listen to the audio file by clicking here]
Clink Links Below for Today's Topics
| Introduction |
| Creating the Japan Considered Podcast |
| LDP Presidential Election Fever Intensifies |
| Concluding Comments |
Good Morning from the beautiful campus of the University of South Carolina. Today is Friday, June 16th, 2006. And you are listening to Volume 02, Number 21, of the Japan Considered Podcast.
Greetings to those of you who’ve become regular listeners, and welcome to new listeners who may have dropped by for the first time today. I’m Robert Angel, creator and maintainer of the Japan Considered Project, and creator and host of this Podcast. It’s good to be back! Each week at this time we consider the longer-term implications of recent events in the news for the future of Japan’s domestic politics and international relations. Lots happening in Tokyo these days. So it’s impossible to cover it all in 20 to 25 minutes. I have to select those items that appear to have the greatest potential to provide us with insights into how the Japanese system works, and will work in the future.
This week we’ll have to depart somewhat from the regular pattern. I’m only now beginning to recover from quite a spectacular computer crisis. It would be nice to blame it all on equipment failure, the fickle nature of electrons, or on the computer support people here at the University. But, truth be told, it was entirely my own fault. Over-confidence in my own technical abilities. The computer did exactly what I told it to do. Did it too well, in fact.
Not long after finishing the last podcast, I decided to replace my main, boot, drive with something larger. Simple job. I’ve done it before several times over the years. I bought a much larger drive at a very nice price, brought a screwdriver and pliers in from home, and prepared to operate. Full of confidence.
Well, come to find out, these newer computers require a different procedure. AND a different kind of drive. It was like discovering your car no longer has a carburetor. I backed up all data from the original disks. But managed somehow in the process to instruct the computer to reformat both the original drives AND the backup drive. It did. Promptly. All data gone. Over twenty-five years' worth. Forever. Never to be recovered. Not a good feeling at all.
This went on for several days. The University computer people finally got me reconnected to the network and to the Internet. I began the search for programs that would allow me to recover the deleted information from the fried drives. Fortunately, one of those programs – something called “Stellar Phoenix” – worked. And I was able to recover all of the deleted files, just for the price of the software. Now the Japan Considered Project is back to as close to normal as it ever gets. Nothing lost but time and resources to do last week’s podcast. Apologies for that.
This week we’ll consider events related to the competition to succeed Junichiro Koizumi as president of the LDP, and subsequently, as Japan’s prime minister.
Creating the Japan Considered Podcast
First, however, a few words about how this Podcast is created. Each week I get at least one inquiry about that. So, this is as good a time as any to provide a behind-the-scenes peek at the production and distribution processes.
It’s hard to tell exactly when preparation for any particular week’s show begins. That’s because I’ve been paying close attention to Japan’s domestic and international news each day for a long time. At least since the late-1960s. Introduction of personal computers, electronic storage of text, and above all, the expansion of the internet, have made that process much more efficient. Stacks and stacks of notes have been replaced by electronic text files stored on hard disks. Both in English and in Japanese.
The English text files are indexed with a program called dtSearch, which makes them instantly searchable by word, phrase, or combinations of words. These files, and the interpretation of the significance of the information they contain, then become the raw material from which each week’s Podcast is created. Of course, the more recent news reports get the greatest attention in this process. But program preparation requires frequent reference to the earlier materials each week as well.
A number of listeners have asked about my information sources. Nothing complicated there. All of the written material is freely available on the Internet for the perusing. I don’t subscribe to any of the growing number of news clipping or analysis services. They just cost too much. And this is a self-financed project from beginning to end.
Perhaps the most important sources of weekly information are the electronic English and Japanese editions of Japanese daily newspapers. Each morning I check them for news items of interest for the program. In alphabetical order they are Asahi, Japan Times, Kyodo Wire Service, Mainichi, NHK News, Sankei, Tokyo Shimbun, and Yomiuri. The Japan Times is an English only publication. Sankei and Tokyo Shimbun have only Japanese language sites. Or if they publish English news, I haven’t seen it. The rest have both Japanese and English editions.
Of course, I don’t read every article in every publication each morning. Especially in Japanese! Rather, I scan the headlines and select those articles of significance for that week’s program, or for future programs. It still takes some time each day, though. I was far from the most diligent or talented student ever to have graduated from Ken Butler’s Inter-University Center for the study of Japanese language!
From time to time I find articles available in Japanese political weekly and monthly magazines and journals. But not often. Most of them require a subscription fee to read. And additional time. And I’ve pretty much given up trying to follow Japanese political and international news in the American press. From time to time someone forwards an article to me from one of the US wire services or national newspapers. And a few of those even include interesting information that wasn’t available in the Japanese press. But, unfortunately, not very often.
Many of you listening to the program provide another indispensable source of information and interpretation throughout the week. And others who don’t listen are willing to help. I can’t count the number of times a telephone conversation with a more experienced or better informed individual has saved me from providing unreliable information or interpretation in the weekly programs. Each week I spend around two hours on the telephone, exchanging information and ideas with well informed people in the United States and in Japan. The Skype internet phone service makes that possible now for minimal cost. Responsibility for the final selection and interpretation of information collected is, of course, my own. But conversations every week with these informal advisers raise the quality of the product well beyond what it would be without them.
Some of you have asked about the software and hardware required to create the program. The combination of cost and limited technical expertise keeps my setup here barebones simple. I use a regular desktop IBM-PC linked to the University network for all information collection and production.
In addition to regular English and Japanese language-capable web browsers, two software programs work together to simplify the process of categorizing and sorting the information collected. The first is “Brainstorm.” I’ll put a link to their site in the transcript and in the show notes. Brainstorm is hard to describe. It’s deceptively simple – by design. Sort of an electronic outliner on steroids. It allows me to make lists of promising topics, and then to put notes to sources of information about the topics under the headings created. The program is very efficient. So it’s easy to keep many notes for dozens of topics on the same page, so to speak. And to keep them available for future reference.
The second program is somewhat more complex. Not better or worse. Just more complex. It is MindManager 6 Pro, produced by the Mindjet Corporation of California. MindManager is a graphical “mapper” I use to map out themes for each program. Hyperlinks to accompanying files, and text notes right on the page make it easy to use. This program too is hard to explain without pictures, so I’ll add a link to their website in the show notes and the transcript. Text files downloaded through the week are just noted and added to the electronic archive for indexing and retrieval when needed.
The final recording process is quite simple. I record the audio file directly into Adobe Audition 2.0, using only an Altec Lansing headset for the microphone. No complex audio chain with pre-amplifiers, mixers, vocal strips, or the like. The Adobe Audition program makes it easy to edit out most of the sighs, grunts, and embarrassing pauses before putting the file up on the University server for distribution. Finally, Dreamweaver and Photoshop are the programs I use to create the podcast web pages, and to maintain the whole Japan Considered website.
So, there you have it. Not at all complex or sophisticated. But it gets the job done. Please send any suggestions you have for improvement of the setup – suggestions that don’t require a cash outlay! – to me at RobertCAngel@gmail.com. All greatfully received and considered. Together with your suggestions for topics and interpretations.
LDP Presidential Election Fever Intensifies
The ruling and opposition parties wound up formal parliamentary business today, with the final meetings of this ordinary session of the Diet. Anticipation of the end of parliamentary maneuvering, naturally, has intensified interest in the race to succeed Junichiro Koizumi as LDP president, and presumably, prime minister of Japan. The politicians themselves now have more time to devote to this important contest. And Japan’s political journalists seem determined to have a race that’s worth reporting.
As of today, Friday, June 16th, the race is still Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe’s to lose. Abe is well ahead in all of the formal and informal polls reported by the news media. Both among LDP members of the Lower and Upper Houses of the Diet – one important constituency – and among LDP rank-and-file members and the attentive public – another important constituency. His closest rival, Yasuo Fukuda, a former chief cabinet secretary, has yet to formally announce his candidacy. Well, Abe himself hasn’t yet “formally” announced that he will run. Just hinted. But Fukuda has been even more guarded and reticent. Reticent enough to frustrate his potential supporters. They’ll be hard-put to field a competitive candidate to oppose Abe and the Koizumi anti-Factionist legacy, should Fukuda eventually decide not to run.
As I’ve said repeatedly on this program, both Abe and Fukuda are well qualified to become the LDP’s next president, and Japan’s next prime minister. There are differences between them. Age, for one. Experience prior to entering electoral politics, for another. But they share the core mainstream values of the LDP that have guided Japan since the Party’s creation in 1955. And in spite of the best efforts of Japan’s political journalists to accentuate their differences, they’re more similar, really, than different.
So, with Abe and Fukuda as the two main contenders, Koizumi’s successor is certain to be up to the job. Indeed, I believe that the identity of the ultimate victor in the race to succeed Koizumi is less important than the process through which that individual wins the LDP presidency. That is, on September 21st, will the LDP have a new president who was selected through the traditional Factionist process of party boss consultation and horse-trading? Or will Koizumi be succeeded by an individual who has mobilized broader, Populist, Party support to achieve his victory?
This difference will establish the parameters within which the new prime minister will exercise the constitutional powers of that office. Will he be bound by what some observers have euphemistically described as the “politics of consultation”? Or, will he assume office with the confidence that his survival as prime minister depends more on the approval of a considerably broader constituency than the Party’s Faction bosses – a significantly longer leash.
This difference in method of selection will be felt immediately, as the new prime minister selects the members of his cabinet, and appoints his team of senior LDP Party leaders. Will he be bound by the recommendations of the LDP Faction leaders responsible for his selection as Party president? They traditionally have been more interested in rewarding loyal Faction members with cabinet and Party posts than they have been in recruiting individuals best suited to support the new prime minister’s political agenda.
And, while important, the influence of this method of selection won’t end with initial cabinet and Party personnel decisions. Once in office, will the new prime minister be required to consult the interests of the Faction leaders who put him in office – and whose good will he requires to remain – before making important decisions in domestic politics and international relations?
Or will he have the discretion to make decisions with a sense of individual responsibility to a broader Party and attentive public constituency? What I have described as the “Populist” model, recognizing the unsuitability of that term, given the unfortunate baggage it carries, along with its basic meaning.
Japan’s public, as well as observers around the world, have come to expect Japan’s central political executive to assume greater personal responsibility for political leadership than the traditional consultative, or collectivist, model of LDP Factionist politics has allowed. Those expectations, I believe, are unlikely to be realized by a prime minister selected through the traditional LDP Factionist process – no matter how competent and well-meaning that individual might be.
This, then, is the real nature of the battle we’re seeing waged for the LDP presidency. It has more to do with the role of factions and their leaders in the management of the LDP than it does with differences of ideology or policy direction. It has more to do with “popularizing” or “democratizing” the LDP than it does with policy toward Japan’s Asian neighbors or generational differences among LDP members. And that, I think, is where we should focus our attention as we consider this important competition.
Well, that’s all we have time for this week. Thanks again for tuning in. And thanks for your patience with my computer difficulties and technological incompetence. I appreciated the many notes of advice and encouragement that arrived in response to my e-mail earlier in the week. Please continue to send your comments and suggestions for future programs to RobertCAngel@gmail.com. I read them all, and answer as many as possible. The program benefits from your interest.
Let’s go out today with a short clip from the Seldom Scene’s 20th anniversary performance. This one featuring the incredible dobro artistry of Mike Auldridge. You can buy the full two-disk 20th Anniversary Concert set from Sugar Hill Records by clicking here.
Goodbye all. Until next week.
