ANOTHER CONSIDERATION ON CABINET FORMATION
GM, a US automobile giant, reported a big deficit, since consumers are suffering loans and high prices of gasoline.
This is a consequence of a bio-fuel fever in the U.S.
Clearly, it is a politician-led slump.
Global conditions on energy and foods need more responsible governments here and there. Yet, a government is a mass of people or personalities and talents.
SECTION I: NEW JAPANESE CABINET
There are some global media reports on the new formation of the Japanese Cabinet:
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YAHOO
Japan's beleaguered PM reshuffles cabinet
August 1, 2008, 11:45 pm
TOKYO (AFP) - Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda on Friday named a new cabinet filled with heavyweights, vowing to jump-start a lacklustre economy in a last-ditch bid to revive waning public support.
Fukuda replaced 13 of his 17 ministers, mostly by tapping seasoned politicians, bluntly acknowledging that most people in Japan were feeling worse off than a year ago because of rising global oil and food prices.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/a/-/latest/4845995/japans-beleaguered-pm-reshuffles-cabinet
BBC
Fukuda's rival rises in reshuffle
A main rival to struggling Japanese PM Yasuo Fukuda has assumed a key role in a major cabinet reshuffle.
Taro Aso, 67, has accepted Mr Fukuda's offer to become secretary general of the Liberal Democratic Party.
Thirteen out of 17 cabinet posts have been replaced, including finance and economics ministers, but some important positions were unchanged.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7536517.stm
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My summary on this reorganization of the cabinet of the Japanese Government is as follows:
(1) Departure from, or erasing the economic policy of the former Koizumi Administration and the national security policy of the preceding Abe Administration.
(2) Inclination to the paradigm of the Japanese upper class.
Prime Minister Mr. Fukuda has appointed two female politicians as the ministers for the consumer protection and the operation to take back Japanese citizens abducted by North Korea, respectively.
One of them is a female politician who was once against the Koizumi Administration which strongly pushed the privatization of the Japanese postal saving system.
Another is a symbolic ex-high-ranking female bureaucrat in this North Korean matter, recruited by the Koizumi Administration and treated preferably in the Abe Administration which succeeded the Koizumi cabinet.
Now, these two female Diet members pledge fealty to Mr. Yasuo Fukuda who is senior than the two former Prime Ministers and must have a hidden sense of rivalry against them in terms of personality and policy.
Therefore, consciously or unconsciously, incumbent Prime Minister Mr. Yasuo Fukuda will try to depart from, or erase the economic policy and the national security policies the two former administrations adopted and promoted.
It means that Prime Minister Mr. Yasuo Fukuda will not look like nationalistic or anti-China; he will not help with zest aggressive operations by foreign financial institutes in the Tokyo Market.
In other word, Prime Minister Mr. Yasuo Fukuda has put an end to the remaining momentum of the former Koizumi and Abe Administrations, so that he can face the coming General Election in his own style, if he intends not to withdraw from the politics before the Election.
Prime Minister Mr. Yasuo Fukuda has succeeded in establishing a tie-up with Mr. Taro Aso, the most possible next prime minister of Japan if the Liberal Democratic Party can continue to hold the reign of government after the coming General Election.
But, as the father of Mr. Yasuo Fukuda was once Japan’s Prime Minister, a grandfather of Mr. Taro Aso was once Japan’s Prime Minister, too.
They both belong to the upper class of Japan; and they really look so more than Mr. Jyunichiro Koizumi and Mr. Shinzo Abe, two former prime ministers born in families specializing in politics as a family trade.
SECTION II: A SUN ECLIPSE
A solar eclipse happened globally yesterday.
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/popup?id=5500106&contentIndex=1&start=false&page=6
In ancient days in Asia, if a great earthquake occurred, people suspected that their king or the government did something wrong to displease Heaven.
In ancient days in Asia, if an extraordinary phenomenon occurred in the sky, people suspected that their king or the government did something wrong to displease Heaven.
The eclipse which happened in the northern part of the Eurasia Continent yesterday must have significance even in this modern era of the 21st century.
Indeed, Heaven must be displeased by the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games or the new Japanese cabinet, or otherwise by the recent diplomatic decision taken by the US President on an disputed island in the Sea of Japan if not a bio-fuel fever causing a global surge of food prices.
SECTION III: ENDOWMENTS FOR A STATESMAN
What quality does a statesman need? It is always a non-nonsense issue in the society based on democracy and a free market system.
Once in the Japanese national politics, a minister was not requested to perform a Question and Answer session held in the Parliament (Diet) all by himself unaided by bureaucrats.
If a cabinet minister could not answer a question posed by an Opposition member, he could order by a simple gesture a high-ranking bureaucrat to answer in lieu of him, even in a televised budget committee.
It is because a politician in Japan can be appointed to any ministerial post regardless of his specialty and past experiences, which is a big difference from the way the US President appoints his cabinet member or a Secretary.
If you are a Japanese politician with a background in the financial sector, you may be assigned to a ministerial post in the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. Accordingly, you will not be able to answer some questions in a Diet session. Therefore, it was regarded as a matter of course for a minister to order his official to answer questions on behalf of him.
But, this custom changed since the Koizumi Administration. Nowadays, any cabinet minister of the Japanese Government is requested to answer for himself in a Diet session except the case of responding to a very detailed question.
(http://ichita.blog.so-net.ne.jp/2008-08-01-5 )
It may be similar to a public hearing held in US Congress; but an amateur minister is requested to answer like an expert with guts like a US Presidential Election candidate.
Yet, morality must come first. A minister must stand against an opposition lawmaker in a Q&A session as a representative of public servants with moral rectitude.
In this context, if a prime minister chooses a politician as a member of his Cabinet based on not visibility on TV or on the Internet but good conducts and behaviors, he would be more appreciated by the people.
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That is all for this week.
And, the God told me in these days to go low-keyed.
He also told me not to work too hard.
(So, I went to bed without watching TV after 11 p.m., so piously.)
Joh 8:1 Jesus went unto the mount of Olives.
Joh 8:2 And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them.
Joh 8:3 And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst,
Joh 8:4 They say unto him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act.
Joh 8:5 Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou?
Joh 8:6 This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not.
Joh 8:7 So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.
Joh 8:8 And again he stooped down, and wrote on the ground.
Joh 8:9 And they which heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst.
Joh 8:10 When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee?
Joh 8:11 She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.