The pond now spends far too much of its time furtively watching cable news from the United States, with hysteria and apocalyptic fear all the go, and endless celebrations of Steve Bannon - as fine a specimen of Ayran manliness as the world has seen since the likes of Himmler donned a double breasted leather jacket.
We're well down the path of the cult of personality when the dress habits of the leadership are top of the page ...
Here for more good dress sense ...
The result whenever the pond returns home to the lizards of Oz?
An unnerving sense of sanity ... where once the pond would have thought almost anything that the bromancer scribbled was a sign of being in the presence of the barking mad, now the flip-flopping, equivocations and contradictions seem almost charmingly normal, almost realist ...and so it was today ...
Of course it's understandable why the bromancer has turned to Japan for signs of hope ...
When your own company conspired to help get the Donald elected, and now shamelessly panders to him on a daily basis over breakfast courtesy of foxy friends, of course you have to look elsewhere for signs of hope ...
Indeed, indeed, there's nothing like being a nationalist to fix things up ...
But you can't keep a good hair-splitter down, and so the bromancer's fine distinction between militarism and 'normalising' is a marvel to behold ...
Indeed, indeed, the pond isn't worried by militarism anywhere.
The one thing you can say about political parties is that they are completely incapable of turning on a dime, reversing policies, changing direction, or forgetting in a nanosecond what they once stood for a nanosecond before ...
Never mind, the pond is vastly reassured by the bromancer, even as he reveals that Abe hasn't solved any of Japan's fundamental problems ...
All that means is that a skilled bromancer must apply his exceptional skills, as best he can, to put the very best spin on things ...
God bless the Japanese voter?
Who is this god of whom the bromancer scribbles and speaks?
Never mind, at least we can move incrementally in the right direction, and who knows what marvels and wonders it might produce ...
Hi Dorothy,
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to foreign affairs you can always rely on Sheridan’s analysis to be utterly and totally wrong. An unerring weather vane always pointing in the wrong direction.
As for Japan’s being “a 24-carat democracy” it seems supremely undemocratic that some voters, usually in rural districts, have 2.34 times as much voting weight as others. It also seems surprisingly undemocratic that the LDP has virtually been in continual power since 1955 (a situation much like Sheridan’s beloved Singapore).
As for Sheridan praising Abe’s slashing election win to control a two thirds majority of seats. He managed to achieve this with less than 40% of the combined vote of his own LDP party and its coalition partner New Komeito. Hardly the will of the people.
http://www.fairvote.org/japan-s-electoral-unfairness-goes-deeper-than-malapportionment
As for Abe’s political and economic management, this piece from The Japan Times paints the more or less opposite picture to Sheridan’s effusive praise.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2017/03/07/commentary/japan-commentary/abes-nationalism-hurts-japan/#.WfFSSEx7HgE
Still it’s all grist to Sheridan’s Neo-Conservative mill and the push to ramp up military conflict with China.
DiddyWrote
"...you can always rely on Sheridan’s analysis to be utterly and totally wrong"
DeleteHeh. Absolutely spot on there, DW. But I thought I'd add on my own small contribution:
Bromancer: "Therefore the Japanese economy jogs along OK but can't find a new engine of growth."
But, butt, Bro, if your country is contracting - and Japan surely is - your economy doesn't need to grow. It can contract too but still maintain a steady GDP per capita ! Can't you see that ?
And just by the way, Australia (13th largest world economy by exchange rate valuation and only just behind South Korea) has a population that is approximately 1/5th of Japan's but a GDP that is around 1/3rd of Japan's. That's what you call a truly successful economy, isn't it.