"he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha"

(So Great is Tokyo! The Imperial Capital of the East!
[photos taken by the EEE Reporter])




Like A Summer Festival in Japan


Not all the Japanese are humble and great.

Even in the worst company I ever worked in, however there were always some who showed enough virtue for me to appreciate.

But fools are fools in any country.

If Koreans do not show their respect for Japan, it is due to existence of such Japanese fools.

One of the worst types of such Japanese fools is of those who work in an Anglo-Saxon company in Tokyo or who live in North America or Europe while criticizing Japanese politicians as if they were residents in Japan.

Maybe honest and diligent foreigners in Japan might be better for Japan than those arrogant, foolish Japanese.



SECTION I: Broken Korean Kingdom and Invading Russians

As the kingdom of Korea was broken socially, economically, and politically, the Korean Peninsula was about to be subject to the Russian Empire in the second half of the 19th century.

The kingdom of Korea had been long under strong influence and control of the Ching dynasty of China, unlike Japan. But as the Chinese Empire got also disarrayed economically and politically after the Opium War, Manchuria and the Korean Peninsula was about to be subject to the Russian Empire in the 19th century.

However, Chinese and Koreans were not a kind of American Indians, if Russian troops had acted like U.S. Army cavalry with advanced fire arms. So, political games and military demonstrations continued long between them. Yet, in the latter half of the 19th century, it was widely understood in the world that Chinese and Koreans had no power any more to stop invasion by Russians of the Far East.

Just like the colonization of India by the British Empire, everybody in the world thought that it was a matter of time that the Russian Empire occupied Mongolia, Manchuria, Northern China, and the Korean Peninsula as far as the Pacific Ocean regions in the south.

But, there stood up Japanese or samurais. And everybody in the world came to know that the Russian Empire could not take the Far East through its territorial expansion activities based on armed forces to the south so long as Japanese were firmly standing against them.

In 1860's, fully observing the half-collapsed Korean Kingdom and the desperately obsolete and undisciplined Chinese imperial government, most of samurai rulers in Japan decided to reshape the nation with the emperor at the center of its power structure, thus avoiding a fatal war among samurai clans and factions and concentrating efforts of all into building a new nation as strong as Russia and any other European nation.

Especially young samurais who took leading positions after the Meiji Restoration of 1868 through a series of domestic armed conflicts started exhaustively modernization of Japan, introducing various products of the Western Civilization through trade based on Japan's wealth accumulated till then. This sort of revolutionary movement was not however observed in the bigotry and class-oriented Korean kingdom still adhering to national seclusion while Western naval ships and troops were on the rampage around the peninsula.

For example, most of Japanese people could read and write, including farmers, in the late 19th century (men 89% and women 39% in 1878), but literacy rates in China (a few percent?) and Korea (less than 10%) were far smaller compared with Japan.

This is the situation of the Far East in history before the emergence of the Empire of Japan on the international stage in the second half of the 19th century.

Koreans and Chinese in the late 19th century had no government that could be called a government at all in confrontation with modern troops and fleets of the Russian Empire. But, Japan alone succeeded in establishing its own modern empire to stop the Russian invasion, mainly owing to its 1000-year-long samurai ruling traditions.

Today, still many people in the world think Japan was colonized by some Western power in the 19th century, so that Japan could develop its culture and carry out modernization. It is a complete mistake. When it opened the door to the world in 1850's, Japan had already long history, excellent culture, samurai traditions, accumulated wealth and gold, and farmers a half of whom could read and write. Nobody (of China and Europe) could ever colonize Japan in its 2000-year-long history.





SECTION II: Japan Paid So Much to Koreans after WWII

First of all, the annexation of the Korean Peninsula to the Empire of Japan in 1910 was realized through decades-long communications, negotiations, and mutual understanding of situations, though some military violence's were observed sometimes.

It was not a result of any decisive war between the Empire of Japan and the kingdom of Korea. It was a result of long unification movement over decades.

The Empire of Japan did not colonize the Korean Peninsula like the British Empire did with India or other European nations did with Africans and Asians. It should be referred to as annexation rather than colonization. It is so, since Korean framers had been already colonized by the Korean noble class of the Yi Dynasty that had never treated Korean framers in a civilized manner unlike Japanese samurais who had allowed primary education for farmers even before the 18th century.

The Empire of Japan tried to change uneducated Koreans to diligent Japanese, introducing modern education systems.

The Empire of Japan tried to change poor Korea to part of industrialized Japan, investing so much into Korea, building factories, constructing social infrastructures, and even applying advanced rice-farming skills to poor Korean villages.

So, when Korea got independent after WWII, it was full of factories and facilities built by the Empire of Japan. The old kingdom of Korea had nothing to do with modernization of South Korea as well as North Korea before and after WWII. From a historical point of view, it was a great gift from the Empire of Japan.

When the Empire of Japan abandoned the Korean Peninsula after WWII, it left all the industrial assets it had in the peninsula without requesting transfer costs to Koreans or requesting any prices. The amount of these assets abandoned by Japan is said to be $5.3 billion.

What's more, in 1965 when the diplomatic relationship between Japan and South Korea was established, Japan paid $800 million, though South Korea had at the time an only $350 million national budget.

It could be translated into compensation of $12,000 per Korean victim of forced labor by the Empire of Japan if their number had been so large as Koreans today so claim.

After WWII, Germany paid $3,000 to $8,000 to each individual who had been forced to work by Nazi Germany during WWII.

(http://blog.livedoor.jp/lancer1/archives/11256231.html)


However, surprisingly, the South Korean government has never informed the Korean people of the above historical fact.

It is no more a matter of pride of some Koreans...



(Note that some ministers in the present Kan Cabinet of Japan seem to lack the above notion.

As the ruling DPJ has so many politicians blind to these historical facts due to their ideology, philosophy, or simply foolishness, the conservative LDP is expected to play its traditional role to defend the Japanese culture and dignity against foreign forces.

Yet, a majority of South Koreans today realize that it is not the kingdom of Korea or the Yi Dynasty but the Empire of Japan that set the foundation for Korean modernization and industrial development of the 20th and 21st centuries, though they seldom admit it openly in their society.)


*** *** *** ***


Finally it is August.

August is a very special month for Japan, since WWII ended on August 15 for Japan.

Japanese children and students can enjoy their summer holidays all through August, in most areas all over Japan.

Yet, how much did Jesus Christ mind a turn from one month to the next, or from one year to the next?

He just said that there is time for harvest. Indeed, without harvest, any year is meaningless.

Without a blessing, living from one year to the next is meaningless.

So, it is the end of WWII for Japan that matters, since three-million brave Japanese people died in three and half years during WWII.



(Politicians should be allowed to take summer holidays.

But, should it be a vacation with pay?

My opinion is more lawmakers, less salary, and more employment in Nagata-chou.

In Japan we need politicians as many as China or North Korea cannot win on their side by bribery.)





Mar 7:31 And again, departing from the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, he came unto the sea of Galilee, through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis.

Mar 7:32 And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him.

Mar 7:33 And he took him aside from the multitude, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue;

Mar 7:34 And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened.

Mar 7:35 And straightway his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.

"And when forty years were expired"

(The Tokyo Imperial Palace Plaza in the summer of 2010; Who is to meet me here? Swans?)






Whose Life, Whose Money?


There are more than 40,000 old citizens 100 years old or older in Japan.

In Tokyo, more than 3,500 citizens are 100 years old or older.

A 111-year old man whose family members claimed he was alive till a few days ago has been found "dead since November 1978" as the old man was actually in a state of a mummy in his house or, specifically, in his own room. He was supposed officially, till the discovery of his remains by the police, to be the oldest man in Tokyo Prefecture.

Indeed it takes 32 years for a man or a woman, if not a public office, to understand certain truth.



SECTION I: Net Debt vs. GDP in JAPAN

Once in the UK, the ratio of the net public debt outstanding over its GDP was 250%.

Today, the ratio is around 60% in Japan.

In the gross national debt outstanding term, it is close to 200% in Japan. But, it is the net debt that matters even in the national finance, according to economist Mr. Yoichi Takahashi. And, as the Japanese Government has huge assets, the net debts obtained by subtracting the assets from the gross debts are not so grave at all.

(http://gendai.ismedia.jp/articles/-/505?page=3)






Mr. Takahashi asserts that if Japanese economy grows at 4%, its tax revenue will increase at a rate more than 4%. Then, the government will be able to forever pay interest to outstanding government bonds and the primary balance will be restored.

Bur, how the 4% economic growth should be realized in Japan getting involved so much in the low-wage Chinese market?


(Note: Recently Chinese workers in many factories and plants run by Japanese businesses in China have started to stage strike claiming a salary rise.

It is nice to see Chinese workers paid decently by Japanese management. But, there are also many Chinese businesses leaving China for South East Asia, since labor costs in the region are smaller than in China.)



SECTION II: Not Tax But Printing Yen Notes

Collecting tax is a concept when money meant coins made of noble metal.

Today, paper money has nothing to do with noble metal such as gold, silver, and copper.

In older days, the government used coins of noble metal to pay salary to soldiers and carry out public work projects.

Today, still the concept that collected tax must be equal to an amount of expenditures by a government persists. But, it is time to abolish it, especially in Japan.

Japan has the mighty industry sector that can compete well in the global market. Its ability and capability to supply goods and services are enormous. Japanese businesses have grown with an eye to the global market in addition to the domestic one. It has surpassed a sphere of possible inflation. Even before China started to supply a huge amount of products to Japan, Japan was entering the era of deflation due to its too large supply power.

However, when printing yen bills and using them for execution of a national budget, the Japanese government must take more conditions into consideration.

This new scheme of separation of tax collection and budget execution must be carefully introduced so as not to invoke a possibility of inflation or any other troubles in the market under capitalism.

But, fundamental justification is that the scale of the global derivative market was $596 trillion as of the end of 2008, which is 10 times larger than total GDPs in the world.

If the world is a nation, it means that the world government is printing paper money ten times more than its GDP, though including a form of credit granting. But, there is no inflation today in the world.

If yen notes the Japanese Government prints, independently from the Bank of Japan, are provided for aid for low-income citizens sick people, older people, handicapped people, and so on, the notes would be simply used by them for purchasing goods and services. And, they will be absorbed by the market while expanding its scale.

Without disturbing the capitalism market system, government notes can be spent through various channels provided that this policy is supported by well studied and proven theory and regulations.

MV = PY

M: the total amount of money in circulation
V: the velocity of money in final expenditures
P: the price level
Y: total output from industries

(M + m) x V = P x (Y + y)

m: addition of government notes
y: addition of production demanded by consumers spending "m"

Balance of supply and demand can be maintained.

This scheme would also reduce a number of crimes or quasi-crimes, since nobody needs pension benefits of himeslf or herself or a relative's any more.

*** *** *** ***


In Okayama Prefecture, 150 km west of Kyoto, a farmer discovered an old vase full of old copper coins in his farm lot where his family generation after generation were told that treasury was buried around the lot.

The vase reportedly was one made in the 16th-century. Those coins were mostly made in China, specifically in the era of Ming and Tang. The number of coins having been hidden in the vase for 500 years is 6,000, though this kind of discovery has been reported sometimes, or once or twice per decade or so in Japan.

(http://www.sanyo.oni.co.jp/news_s/news/p/2010072811273756-1/ )

In older days, Japanese people liked to use imported Chinese coins, though they had technology and copper mines necessary for mintage in Japan.

Indeed, it takes 500 years sometimes for a certain legend in a family to turn out to be true.




( http://syoutarou.com/nobarasakumiti.htm

Wild roses under summer sunshine were forgotten and left for so long, while somebody died and another married just like today...)



Act 7:30 And when forty years were expired, there appeared to him in the wilderness of mount Sina an angel of the Lord in a flame of fire in a bush.

Act 7:31 When Moses saw it, he wondered at the sight: and as he drew near to behold it, the voice of the LORD came unto him,

Act 7:32 Saying, I am the God of thy fathers, the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Then Moses trembled, and durst not behold.

Act 7:33 Then said the Lord to him, Put off thy shoes from thy feet: for the place where thou standest is holy ground.

"and he hath sent me"

SECTION I: Shock and Awe for P.M. Naoto Kan

In these eight years, a national election has been conducted six times or in six years as either an Upper-House election (for 121 among 242 seats) or a Lower-House election (for all 480 seats) in Japan.

But, the latest Upper-House election is the most difficult one to predict its outcomes. It was very different from the 2009 Lower-House election where the regime change occurred in Japan as the socialistic DPJ took over from the capitalism-oriented LDP.

One month before the Upper-House election slated to conduct on July 11, 2010, the mainstream weekly magazine Shukan Asahi predicted election results as follows:

Democratic Party of Japan - 54 seats
Liberal Democratic Party - 39 seats

The real outcome:

Democratic Party of Japan - 44 seats
Liberal Democratic Party - 51 seats

Accordingly, the ruling DPJ and Prime Minister Mr. Naoto Kan came to have a sense of crisis, while the conservative opposition LDP has regained confidence somewhat.

Last year, when the Lower House election resulted in the regime change, all the media including The Shukan Asahi predicted correctly the victory of the DPJ even one month before. But, they all failed in foreseeing the victory of the LDP.

But, the real reason for P.M. Mr. Kan's disappointment is that the LDP and spinoffs from the LDP garnered votes more than expected.

The election was competed virtually between the ruling camp with the DPJ and the People's New Party and the ex-LDP camp with the LDP, the Your Party and other two spinoffs.



The ruling DPJ's rival is now not only the LDP alone but the LDP and the Your Party plus other spioffs from the LDP.

In this context, it can be seen in the above figure how gravely P.M. Mr. Naoto Kan was damaged.

It is also clear that as the LDP was very unpopular in the 2003 and 2004 elections, then P.M. Mr. Junichiro Koizumi took a bold initiative in resolving the Lower House for election in 2005 with his own agenda of the postal reform. Eventually, Mr. Koizumi won the wager in a great margin.

This time, P.M. Mr. Naoto Kan also took a bold initiative addressing a new agenda of a 5% increase of a consumption tax rate one month before the voting day only to lose the election. His tactics is still a kind of mystery since it was a commonsense not to raise a tax issue before any election. P.M. Mr. Kan looks like having trusted those forecasts of the election by the media which all suggested his victory in a big margin.

Anyway, the above figure tells the truth of the state of the political community in Japan.

The LDP is not trusted, but the conservative camp with the LDP, the Your Party, and other spinoffs are expected to play a some important role under the ruling by pro-Chinese, pro-North Korean, and pro-labor unions DPJ.

It is so, since the regime change occurred last summer mostly because millions of Japanese people are critically influenced by irresponsible management of the pension fund schemes by the LDP-centric government that had continued for almost half a century till August 2009.


Votes Won by the Pro-Chinese DPJ Camp and Pro-American LDP Camp:
(Proportional-Representation Constituency)

Year....DPJ (+PNP)....LDP (+ ex-LDPs)...Upper/Lower House
------------------------------------------
2003....22,095,636....20,660,185...L
2004....21,137,457....16,797,686...U
2005....22,219,498....25,887,798...L
2007....24,525,456....16,544,671...U
2009....31,064,566....18,810,217...L
2010....19,450,175....24,419,922...U

The DPJ and the PNP could preserve only 60% of votes having been directed to them a year ago.

More specifically,

Year....DPJ+....LDP+....Prime Minister
------------------------------------------
2003....22....21...Koizumi (LDP)
2004....21....17...Koizumi (LDP)
2005....22....26...Koizumi (LDP)
2007....25....17...Abe (LDP)
2009....31....19...Aso (LDP)
2010....19....24...Kan (DPJ)

[votes in millions]

Note that during the reign of P.M. Mr. Junichiro Koizumi, the pension fund management scandal did not surface.

It was before the 2007 Upper House election during premiership of P.M. Mr. Shinzo Abe that the scandal was publicly known. Hundreds of millions of pension cases had been wrongly recorded and managed manually or in computers for decades. So, the media suddenly started to widely report the fact as lawmaker Mr. Akira Nagatsuma of the DPJ, now a state minister, discovered and made it open in the parliament.

Apart from this issue, the most significant controversy was about pro-American or pro-Chinese diplomatic sentiments among political parties, since it is also related to an underlying philosophy of economy.




SECTION II: 2011 General Election?

(to be continued...)



*** *** *** ***






Joh 7:27 Howbeit we know this man whence he is: but when Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence he is.

Joh 7:28 Then cried Jesus in the temple as he taught, saying, Ye both know me, and ye know whence I am: and I am not come of myself, but he that sent me is true, whom ye know not.

Joh 7:29 But I know him: for I am from him, and he hath sent me.

Joh 7:30 Then they sought to take him: but no man laid hands on him, because his hour was not yet come.

"as one having authority"

Space in front of the Imperial Palace
Looking Back to the Tokyo Station under Repair Work
Open Park Area


Cool History


One interesting theory about deployment of mankind along history is that native people in Australia had reached the continent earlier than native Europeans reached the western end of the Eurasia continent.

Original Europeans of modern mankind first appeared in Western Europe 42,000 years ago. But, the first native people appeared 50,000 years ago in the Australian continent.

Ancestors of native Australians and West Europeans must have departed from Africa about 60,000 to 50,000 years ago.

The first wave must have reached the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula and then moved to the Persian Gulf, South India, Indonesia, and finally to Australia. They moved just under the sun or to the east without moving north.

(In my theory, they travelled looking for environments very akin to the ones where they had lived in Africa. They moved greatly, but environments they encountered, lived in, and left again must have bee always similar, so that their physical and mental features did not much change from what they had had in Africa.)

But, the second or following waves must have opted for moving north or west avoiding the heat, or during 10,000 years, the climate in Europe must have changed to sub-tropical before entering the ice age.

Anyway, as native Australians seem to still preserve features of early mankind going out of Africa, we have to respect them more. It is just like direct descendants of early followers of Jesus Christ must be respected more, if there are such people preserving the spirits of the first Disciples who lived and followed Jesus Christ 2000 years ago.

The summer is also time to think about our ancestors leaving Africa or staying and watching others leaving.


(http://www.nationalgeographic.co.jp/news/news_article.php?file_id=90006&expand)

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indigenous_Australians)



SECTION I: Yen vs. Dollar/Euro

Some American politicians and economists once tried to damage Japan, pointing at a huge budget deficit of Japan.

American rating companies gave very lower scores to Japanese government bonds.

But, unlike Greece and other nations, 90% of the Japanese government bonds (JGB) are purchased and possessed by Japanese financial institutions, businesses, and wealthy people who have $15 trillion in total, though recently China has started to buy JGB.

So, the financial deficit of the Japanese Government linked with accumulation of outstanding JGB cannot be easily assessed and judged.

But, how much yen is evaluated in the exchange market reflects more clearly political and financial situations before and after the Lehman Shock as well as significance of the subsequent financial crisis.



Before 2000, American and European financial sectors realized that an interest rate in Japan was extraordinarily low. But, interest rates in the U.S. and the E.U. were not so low.

So, they came to borrow money in Japan in the form of yen with a low interest rate and exchange yen with the dollar and euro. The gap of the interest rates promised profits. The more they borrowed money in Japan to exchange it with the dollar and euro, the more they got margins in the American and European markets.

This transaction means huge selling of yen and huge purchasing of the dollar and euro. Accordingly, from 2000 to 2008, the exchange market evaluated yen lower and lower.

In America, there emerged a special condition: the 9/11 Terror and the subsequent War on Terror. Before it, the yen carry trade lowered the value of yen to 135 yen per dollar in early 2002.

From 2002 when the War was launched and to late 2004 when George W. Bush was re-elected, financial institutions were more concerned with special huge expenditures by the U.S. Government for the War. The yen carry trade was relatively less influential in this period. But, as the Bush Administration was authorized again by American voters and the war did not go out of control, the yen carry trade got momentum again. Yen became weaker again.

In 2006, the scale of the yen carry trade reached about $450 billion while 115 yen was exchanged with one dollar.

Then, the subprime-loan mortgage debacle started in 2007 and the Lehman Shock hit the financial sectors of the U.S. and the E.U. so badly. They needed to make the ends meet in their balance sheet. So, they decided to return borrowed yen to Japan. For this, they had to first get yen in the exchange market. They started to buy yen with funds obtained through selling of any financial instruments in any currency.

Today, one dollar is exchanged with 87 or 88 yen, as the yen carry trade has been cancelled in a large scale.

But, an interest rate in Japan is still low. At any time, the yen carry trade is started again.

Yet, it is deflation in Japan that makes the Bank of Japan take a low-interest policy.

Deflation is so potentially dangerous:

Deflation --> Low Interest Rate --> Yen Carry Trade
--> Need to Borrow and Exchange Yen with Dollar --> Weak Yen
--> Lehman Shock --> Cancellation of Yen Carry Trade
--> Need to Get and Return Yen --> Stronger Yen

There is a theory that this yen carry trade also spurred the subprime loan sales. As Wall Street had such a huge source of a low interest rate in Japan, it expanded its credit granting to American consumers, leading to expansion of a scope of possible damage.

In other word, as Mr. Greenspan and Mr. Summers could not understand this scenario in late 1990's, the yen carry trade was practiced so vastly influencing foreign exchange markets in the world.

This cycle can be explained in this way, but deflation in Japan is still going on.

Japan needs a 4% increase in GDP per year but not a 5% increase in tax.


(As for economics students in Harvard, I recommend them to try to explain all the major incidents in the world after 2000 with a key word of "an exchange rate between yen and the dollar/euro." The world can be so simply understood if it is explained with this single keyword "an exchange rate between yen and dollar/euro." However, it looks so complicated to those who get blind due to their desire.)




SECTION II: New Japanese Ambassador to China

For the first time, a non-bureaucrat Japanese ambassador was appointed to China.

But, he said, "Military expansion of China can be understood, taking into consideration that China is a big country."

It is said that he has 20-year long close association with China, since he was an elite businessman of a big Japanese firm.

Yet, his comment does not honestly reflect the stance of the Japanese Government and the Japanese people.

Japan wants China to adopt the same peace article as Japan has in its constitution.

Japan does not accept military expansion of China which might threaten independence of Taiwan and the Japanese security and economic interest.

But, if Chins is so bellicose now, it was so before WWII, very naturally.

So, China attacked Shanghai protected by the Marines of the Empire of Japan and other very moderate forces of the U.S. and European nations in 1930's.

History tells that China's attack led eventually to the preventive attack on Pearl Harbor by the Imperial Navy in 1941.

China should stop increasing its military budget which has been multiplied by more than 20 times in the past 20 years.

*** *** *** ***


Some liberal or progressive people in Japan claim that America is evil, American military bases in Japan are evil, Japanese politicians going on friendly terms with America are evil, and thus the ruling DPJ and Prime Minister Mr. Naoto Kan are now evil, but ex-head of the DPJ Mr. Ichiro Ozawa is all the more great.

But, Mr. Ichiro Ozawa, last year after the regime change, took with him 140 DPJ lawmakers of the Japanese Diet to Beijing to greet Chinese President Mr. Hu Jintao while subsequently demanding the Imperial Household Agency to change a schedule of the Emperor so as to realize a metting between the Emperor and vice president of China who is however ranked No. 4 or 5 in the Chinese Communist Party.

I do not understand why those liberal or progressive Japanese critics do not call Mr. Ichiro Ozawa evil.

If they think they are wise, they are fools. If they think they are pretending to be fools for their true aim, they are still fools.

If they criticize China and Mr. Ichiro Ozawa as much as they do against America, they can be wise.

Anyway, they should not have criticized the Imperial Household Agency only because the Agency criticized Mr. Ozawa.

And, then P.M. Mr. Yukio Hatoyama should have protected the honor of the Agency at the time.

In this way, Mr. Yukio Hatoyama became unsuitable for presiding over the August 15 ceremony to commemorate the end of WWII for Japan.





(http://www.geocities.jp/kiyomius/chanson.html

Hot, hot summer! So, hot, hot midis.)



Mat 7:27 And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.

Mat 7:28 And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these sayings, the people were astonished at his doctrine:

Mat 7:29 For he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.

"the devil is gone out of thy daughter"

Public Road before the Imperial Palace
No Business including Selling and Picture-Taking Allowed; No Bicycle and Night Walking Permitted (unless the state minister in charge so authorizes)
Rare Scene with an Army Vehicle Running near the Imperial Palace



Know This Era and Predict Weather


A grudge, a blaze of temper, and an uncontrolled jealousy are said to be the three major motivations for murder.

A young Japanese who killed with a truck and a knife seven persons on the street of Akihabara, a globally notable commercial town in town, in 2008 stands now his trial.

If you have never worked in a subsidiary factory of Toyota or Nissan, you cannot understand a background of those young non-permanent workers living in a highly managed society of Japan while being surrounded ubiquitous riches of industrialized and commercialized Japan.

As this incident was very symbolic for the dead end of the era of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, even Wikipedia (not Wikileak) introduces it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akihabara_massacre

In the 11-07-2010 Upper-House election, a female candidate of the Democratic Party of Japan got almost two million votes in the Tokyo election district.

The present ruling party DPJ seems to be supported by youths in Tokyo more than the LDP is.

But, it might be only because DPJ members have a less grudge, blaze of temper, and uncontrolled jealousy.



SECTION I: Basic and Applied Analysis - General

I-1. Yourself

Your happiness consists of the following elements:
1. Spiritual Stability
2. Physical Conditions
3. Emotional Relationships
4. Sense of Security
5. Position among People
6. Material Fulfilment

There is order among the above elements partly in terms of casual association. In principle, the order, 1 -> 2 -> 3 -> 4 -> 5 -> 6, is the norm in the basic conditions.


Basic contribution to your happiness:
1. Spiritual Stability...50%
2. Physical Conditions...20%
3. Emotional Relationships...20%
4. Sense of Security...5%
5. Position among People..3%
6. Material Fulfilment...2%

If there is the above order, all the elements coexist at any moment with some feedback mechanism. However, weighing is possible as above presented in the normal conditions.


Effective influence on outward behaviors:
1. Spiritual Stability...5%
2. Physical Conditions...20%
3. Emotional Relationships...20%
4. Sense of Security...20%
5. Position among People..20%
6. Material Fulfilment...15%

Yet, in reality, the world is not sound and normal, human society is biased and suppressed, and human relationships are warped in most cases.

If you are sick with a trouble in human relationship while being engaged in unstable business without satisfactory promotion, you might be depressed so badly.

However, basically, if you can return to the basics of a human being, spiritual stability is recovered and your behaviors will not be derailed.


I-2. Your Nation

Prosperity and peace consist of the following elements:
1. Religious State of the Nation
2. Natural Environments
3. Respect for Humanity
4. Law and Order
5. Social Structure
6. State of Economy

If a nation is at a high level of religious state, it can effectively leverage its natural environments.

If the nation has very sound, natural environments, it can effectively leverage them to promote respect for humanity.

If the nation can have respect for humanity assured, it can effectively leverage it to maintain a high level of law and order.

The high level of law and order leads to building social structure where economy can grow in a balanced manner.




SECTION II: Basic and Applied Analysis - Economy

II-1. General Advice

As I repeatedly stressed, American economists, such as Mr. Lawrence Summers, cannot correctly analyze the Japanese economy, since he has never learnt the Japanese language, the Japanese history, the Japanese culture, and the Japanese society.

As he cannot correctly discuss the economy of the Roman Empire without studying its language, history, culture, and society, he cannot correctly discuss the Japanese economy. So, America had to suffer the 9/11 Terror and the 2008 Financial Crisis, while Japan did not have to.

Therefore, American economists should first study the following structure before discussing the Japanese economy.

1. Religious State of Japan
2. Natural Environments of Japan
3. Respect for Humanity in Japan
4. Law and Order in Japan
5. Social Structure of Japan
6. State of Economy of Japan

As for the Chinese economy, it is apparent that Japanese economists can more deeply understand it than American economists who might speak some Spanish.


II-2. Acute Appreciation of Yen

The most significant and anomalous condition recently observed in the Japanese economy is acute appreciation of yen.

It is however expected, since the subprime loan-triggered crisis damaged Japanese banks far less than American and European ones. In addition, China was also about to turn its eye to yen so as to compensate a need for rising yuan in the currency exchange market.

As the U.S., the E.U., and China are all starting to buy more yen (but not Japanese stocks), it leads inevitably to higher appreciation of yen. But, a more detailed check is necessary to measure significance of this trend.


(http://www2.ttcn.ne.jp/honkawa/5070.html )

The following causes can be pointed at:
1. Chinese covert operation to balance yen and yuan in the currency market, for example, starting to buy Japanese Government bonds on a massive scale.

2. Deflation in Japan leading to relatively higher interest for yen assets.

3. Yen's merit confirmed in the wake of US/EU financial crisis (Lehman Bros., Greece, etc.) that have led to huge supply of the dollar bills and euro credits to the market.

4. Huge sales of the Japanese Government bonds taking funds to be directed to the stock market and other investments.

5. Reluctance of the Bank of Japan for direct infusion of funds to businesses.

6. The Japanese Government is helping the U.S. and China by allowing a strong yen.

Viewed from the stock market in Japan, higher appreciation of yen has resulted in lowering stock prices of Japanese exporting businesses. So, Japanese financial institutions buy more government bonds which have virtually no risks, driving the above factor 4.

American/European financial institutions also sell Japanese stocks they have kept, in order to get yen as yen can be exchanged with dollars/euro in a higher ratio.

In this cycle, Tokyo stock prices are under the down pressure and yen is under upward pressure.

So, it is not an error to say that the government bond market pinches the Tokyo stock market, driving a trend toward higher appreciation of yen.

It is not only Greece, the Obama Administration, and China that are aiming for overvaluation of yen. The Japanese Government and the Bank of Japan are also responsible.

(Ref. http://grsj.org/2010/05/post-105.php)

Anyway, remember no economists in the world before 2007 could predict the steep appreciation of yen to occur after 2007. In 2004, there was no economics theory that predicted the steep appreciation of yen to occur after 2007. Today, there must not be.

Learn religion, culture, and business before being duped by any mathematical equation used in an economics textbook.

*** *** *** ***


Jesus Christ never said what type of women He would rather praise except the one who anointed Him.

I have of course some affinity to some types of Japanese women.

Yet, I cannot praise Japanese women who come and work in Tokyo from Osaka but speak only the Osaka dialect. They should speak the standard Japanese.

No Okinawa women, or Tohoku or Kyusyu women who come and work in Tokyo from those local prefectures speak their dialects in Tokyo. They speak the standard Japanese. They are afraid of looking foolish if they speak their native languages. Only Osaka women (or Kansai women including female politicians) speak the Osaka dialect in Tokyo so boldly.

Yet, Jesus Christ never mentioned anything about language or how to speak. Speaking honest may have the best sound effect to ears.

Sheep never mistake a voice of their shepherd. The killer of Akihabara must not have heard a voice of his shepherd, since he killed seven persons and harmed other 10 shoppers and sight-seers by dashing with a truck and brandishing a knife on the most popular street of Tokyo a year before the regime change in 2009 while he worked in a subsidiary factory of Toyota, though he was born in a prefecture of the Tohoku region, hundreds miles north of Tokyo...


(I observed a knife-like stone monument for a past big flood on a bank of a river around Tokyo just before the bloody incident. The first controversy the DPJ government faced after the regime change was construction of a huge and costly dam at the upstream of the river intended to prevent such a flood. That is why I am highly concerned with this crime committed by a 25-year old.

Finally, Akihabara, the regime change, Toyota, the controversial public work, and an Internet addict, and non-permanent workers are all linked and converged into this symbolic incident of 2008.

[Due to this incident some lawmakers showed their compassion to those who lost jobs due to the Lehman Shock at the end of 2008, visiting a tent village set up near the Diet Building and the Imperial Hotel...])




Mar 7:27 But Jesus said unto her, Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it unto the dogs.

Mar 7:28 And she answered and said unto him, Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the children's crumbs.

Mar 7:29 And he said unto her, For this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter.

"A prophet? Yea"

(Not in 1945 or 1947, but July 25, 2010)



Not So Bad, since So Humble


There are two places in Japan good for spending the summer holiday, Okinawa and Ogasawara, both once occupied by the American military and General MacArthur, since they look like real tropical islands in the summer.

In the Okinawa island, some nice beaches are still occupied by the American Marines.

It is time to station real American soldiers in Okinawa who would rather love to go for a bathe in Guam in their holidays, since Okinawa is the possible, holy battle field for them still.

The U.S. Camp Schwab Beach in Okinawa:
http://www.akinoluna.com/Photography/Okinawa/SchwabBeach/



SECTION I: A Helicopter Crashed Killing 5

A glacier express train got derailed killing one Japanese woman and harming scores of Japanese senior tourists in Switzerland very recently.

A woman enjoying forests and mountains fell to a waterfall to be killed in a mountain are north of Tokyo yesterday. A helicopter carrying seven crews crashed after landing two of them near the waterfall and a mountain stream so as to rescue her. The chopper belongs to a subsidiary of Honda Motor which has its headquarters in Saitama Prefecture in the immediate north of Tokyo Pref.

If you stay in Japan or go out to mountains in Europe, you will die at the precise moment the God has fixed a long, long time ago.



SECTION II: The Four-Party System in Japan

There are still many discussions about the results from, and their implication of, the 11-07-2010 Upper-House election in Japan.

Everybody was talking about the coming of the two-party system in the Japanese political community before and still now. But, as I pointed out, it indicates the coming of an era of the four-party system in Japan.

The key players are: the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) led by Prime Minister Mr. Naoto Kan, the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan (LDP) led by its head Mr. Sadakazu Kanigaki, New Komeito based on the Sokagakkai Buddhist body, and the Your Party led by ex-LDP lawmaker Mr. Yoshimi Watanabe.

The DPJ includes some very-pro-North Korean and Chinese politicians. The LDP mostly consists of very-pro-American lawmakers since they had been in power till the last year for half a century or so. New Komeito is virtually a political branch of Sokagakkai led by controversial Mr. Daisaku Ikeda for decades. The Your Party has the only binding agenda of reformation of the Japanese public servant system.

Relative influences of the four in effective terms:
DPJ 4, LDP 3, New Komeito 1, and Your Party 1.

Accordingly, the unification of operation of the DPJ and the Your Party would assure a majority in the National Diet or Parliament, somehow, for the ruling DPJ.

Conversely, if the LDP, New Komeito, and the Your Party collaborate, the DPJ would lose power and P.M. Mr. Kan would be forced to dissolve the Lower House and eventually step down.

This is not bad for non-affiliate voters. Millions of swing voters in the Japanese society have now discretion. On each public-opinion poll, they can express their support for, or anger at, those major parties, thus influencing the course of politics.

Now, the focus is however whether ex-head of the DPJ Mr. Ichiro Ozawa will be indicted by Committees for the Inquest of Prosecution for illegal political fund handling and reporting. It is so, since 40-year-long Lower-House member Mr. Ozawa is said to command 150 Diet members among 400 or so LDP national lawmakers.

Will Mr. Ozawa be able to take over from P.M. Mr. Kan in the party's general convention to be held this September? Mr. Ozawa might try to do so to consolidate his personal power base. But, if he should be officially prosecuted, what would happen? The media, critics, politicians, and the general public have been all wondering.

My concern is how much the Japanese people at large will be offended by any outcome.

A possible grand coalition of the DPJ and the LDP is however out of question.




SECTION III: Third Depression

U.S. economist Mr. Paul Krugman wrote that depressions occurred only twice in the past in 1873 and 1929-31.

We are heading for the third, while we think we are not as situations are improved.

But, Mr. Krugman wrote that the past two depressions had also intermittent processes in which situations were improved to the degree people thought they were no more heading depression.

So, Mr. Krugman wrote that President Mr. Barack Obama wrongly trust economists who claim that their theory is based on orthodoxy. Accordingly, they have recommend President Mr. Obama to slash spending and aim at austerity in national finance.

But, Mr. Krugman criticized: "So I don't think this is about any appreciation of tradeoffs between deficits and jobs. It is, instead, the victory of an orthodoxy that's main tenet is imposing suffering on other people shows leadership in tough times. And who will pay the price for this orthodoxy? The tens of millions of unemployed workers, many of whom will go jobless for years, and some of whom will never work again" - The New York Times.

These are basics for economics and economists. Yes, unemployment and the unemployed.

Without any compassion to jobless people, if an economist is arguing something even without fully discussing measures to increase jobs, he is a cold-blood, stupid guy who wrongly thinks he is smarter than the president.

That is why the DPJ and P.M. Mr. Naoto Kan of Japan lost the national election held on July 11, 2010. It is because they shamelessly proposed an increase of a consumption tax rate to 10% before the election.

What Japan's prime minister should present to voters and citizens is his strategy to increase Japan's GDP by 4% stably for years.

*** *** *** ***


It is hot nowadays around Tokyo.

I once lived around a city 60 km north of the Tokyo Station. The city is hot especially in the summer. It recorded the highest temperature in Japan, 40.9 degrees C in 2007, as with another town in the 40 km north-west of Nagoya City, 300 km west of Tokyo.

I think that there must have been a reason that the city had to suffer the hot summer, since I once lived around the city 60 km north of the Tokyo Station.

What I want to say to any citizens in any city is to live humbly. They should not be stupidly proud of making $1 million or $10 million. It is so, since they cannot protect their honor with $100 million they could get from selling their ancestral acres or venture stocks, if the God decides to punish them.

Anger and the heat can be well associated especially in the summer.

As for another town in the 40 km north-west of Nagoya City, 300 km west of Tokyo, Toyota can be one of factors, since Toyota City must be also near Nogoya City.

By the way, why is the CEO of BP not going to resign, while the summer is so hot?



(http://doratomo.jp/~stephano/chanson/le_ciel_le_soleil_et_la_mer.MID

Source:http://doratomo.jp/~stephano/chanson/chanson.htm)




Luk 7:25 But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? Behold, they which are gorgeously apparelled, and live delicately, are in kings' courts.

Luk 7:26 But what went ye out for to see? A prophet? Yea, I say unto you, and much more than a prophet.

(Passageway from the Tokyo Station to the Imperial Palace Plaza or the old Edo Castle of the Tokugawa Clan)



Toward Tokyo, I got on a train and took a seat. I watched down to find on the floor of the vehicle a torn ticket with a serial number such as 15XX...

While returning from Tokyo, I stepped down from a train and bought a bottle of vitamin drink from a vending machine. Then I moved to another platform for a different line, sitting down on a chair and waiting for other train. I watched down to find on the floor of the platform a torn ticket with a serial number such as 15XX...

I checked my ticket to find it had a serial number of 2677. This year 2010 of the Christian era is 2670 in the imperial calendar of Japan.
It is hard to explain but I may be allowed to live till 2017, at least.

Or, something that happened in the 16th century might happen again by 2017.

What do you think, since it is very rare to see a ticket having been torn and thrown by some passenger on the floor of a train or a platform in Japan?

And, today, around the Imperial Palace Plaza, I also saw a very rare object.

Incidentally, the biggest incident in the 16th-century Japan was the death of samurai-lord hero Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582) at the Honno-ji temple near Kyoto in 1582.

Oda Nobunaga adopted revolutionary matchlock-gun based tactics and protected Vatican missionaries, since a matchlock gun was introduced to Japan in 1543 and Christianity in 1549, both by Europeans.

Leveraging merits of the two products of the European Civilization, materially and philosophically, Oda Nobunaga almost succeeded in putting all the samurai lords, including future samurai rulers of Japan Hideyoshi and Ieyasu, under his command and control.

But, Nobunaga was betrayed for still unknown reason by one of his generals who attacked and killed Nobunaga at the Honno-ji temple. At the night of the betrayal, the samurai general was supposed to be moving and marching his 13,000 troops to a certain Western region for war as Nobunaga had so ordered.

As Nobunaga, a genius at war, trusted the intellectual samurai general Akechi Mitsuhide so much, he had only a small number of samurais as guards in the temple, though Nobunaga then actually led tens of thousands of samurai lords, generals, and troops in his large territory around Kyoto covering one third of the main island of Japan.

It is believed by most of historians: If Oda Nubunaga had not been killed by Mitsuhide, a popular samurai among court nobles in Kyoto, in 1582, he should have conquered all the other samurai lords who had been at war against one another for decades and more, since the Imperial Court had no power and the central samurai government or shugunate had already collapsed.

In that case, Nobunaga must not have ventured into war with China through the Korean Peninsula like Hideyoshi did. Nobunaga must not have forbidden Christianity, which led to the later closure of Japan for 200 years and more, like Ieyasu did.

If Oda Nobunaga had survived and destroyed the insurgence by Mitsuhide who was tragically defeated soon after the Honno-ji temple incident by Hideyoshi, Japan might have joined Spain, Portugal, and the Netherlands to expand to the world, while the Vatican could have their missionaries safely work in Japan.

Yet, with the death of Nobunaga, the most powerful samurai lord or daimyo at the time, Japan could preserve and further develop its unique culture and traditions as well as religions. Nobunaga was so revolutionary and acted like a king of destruction through his 48-year long bloody life. It is even believed that he intentionally neglected authority of the Imperial Court which was then almost simply nominal and spiritual.

So, the biggest incident in the 16th-century Japan was the death of samurai-lord hero Oda Nobunaga (1534-1582) at the Honno-ji temple near Kyoto in 1582.

In Europe, it was of course the insurgence by Martin Luther against the Vatican.

Anyway, you do not have to sweat it: the miracle of 15XX and 2677.

(Take vitamin drink some time...)