AS THE OBLIGATORY NAZI REFERENCE GOES WORLDWIDE:

System's flaws help keep Koizumi on top (GREGORY CLARK, 9/21/05, Japan Times)

From the start of the recent Lower House election campaign it was predictable that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's theatrics -- his constant references to magic "kaikaku" (reform) and the alleged benefits from postal-service privatization -- would have its inevitable mesmerizing effect on Japan's emotional electorate. But why did the opposition parties fail to stage a de-mesmerizing counterattack? [...]

True, part of Koizumi's electoral support was logical and deserved. He has done much to create a new and better image for his Liberal Democratic Party. Women have been promoted. Decision-making has been centralized somewhat. Factions have been undermined, and with them the former reliance on dubious funds and old boy connections.

The downside though is that we now have a Thatcherite top-down regime where anyone who disagrees is instantly purged or demoted. Indeed, some are even beginning of use the word "Hitleresque" to describe the Koizumi approach. [...]

Especially worrying is the collapse of Japan's main opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan. It was offering programs more reformist than much of what Koizumi was proposing. But somehow the Teflon-coated Koizumi couldn't be painted into a corner as antireformist.

Talk about not getting your own analysis--the opposition lost precisely because it ran as more reformist than Mr. Koizumi instead of anti-reform. Ms Merkel taught the same lesson.

Posted by Orrin Judd at September 20, 2005 10:55 PM