Enter the Racist Dragon

The Prime Minister of Japan Yasuo Fukuda announced his resignation yesterday, and this has sparked yet another leadership struggle in Japanese politics. You will recall Junichiro Koizumi, who was PM of Japan until 2006, when he was replaced by Shinzo Abe, Japan's foremost David Schwimmer impersonator. Abe in turn resigned last September, following intense political pressure in the wake of Agricultural Minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka's suicide. He was replaced by Yasuo Fukuda, who has led the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, and the country, until yesterday. His most likely successor will be Taro Aso, who already has the support of 22 of Japan's 47 prefectures.

Taro Aso is a foreign-educated Roman Catholic with a history of controversial (read bigoted) statements concerning race, ethnic stereotypes, and nationalist sentiment. What Boris Johnson is to the Conservative Party, Taro Aso is to a grouping of cunts. One would think that the lesson of turning to strong yet radical leaders in times of political turmoil would have been one well-learned. Perhaps that's too harsh a judgment to make of the Japanese, though. The political system of Japan is much more given to party succession than to radical shifts in power (for examples of that, see Italy's tortured parliamentary system). The Liberal Democratic Party in Japan has been in power since 1996, and it shows no serious signs of leaving. Taro Aso is a careerist within the LDP, having been a party member since 1976, and working his way up the ranks to being the Foreign Minister. Aso's presidency is not going to be the salve that Japan's irritated politics needs at the moment, but neither is it a sign of worrying political polarisation.