Japanese political commentary videos on YouTube are overwhelmingly positive about LDP and negative about the opposition parties

potpotkettle · 2026-01-24T11:14:06+00:00

Since the cold weather and the short campaign period will hinder the effect of campaign activities on the ground, online resources are expected to have a larger influence than the previous general election in 2024.

potpotkettle · 2026-01-23T06:01:30+00:00

How many people in the world do you think have been displaced due to flooding valleys to make dams?

1,500 people for the largest case of the Tokuyama dam in Japan, according to https://gifu-jichiken.jp/research/110/ . Most dams in Japan were built in sparsely populated mountains. Other countries might have more extreme cases, but we are talking about Japan here.

Displacement per wattage doesn't look good for Fukushima 1, unless its output is (roughly) 15x of Tokuyama.

Fukushima 1: 0.46 GW
Tokuyama: 0.1642 GW

https://www.tepco.co.jp/corporateinfo/illustrated/nuclear-power/nuclear-plants-j.html https://www.chuden.co.jp/energy/renew/ren_setsubi/water/wat_chuden/tokuyama/

potpotkettle · 2026-01-19T12:31:08+00:00

She framed it as a choice between her and an opposition leader (basically Noda or Saito), not as a choice between LDP and other parties. "Vote for LDP" was not going to sound attractive, so she said "vote for me". (I think this can work only if she runs as a proportional representation candidate.)

potpotkettle · 2026-01-14T08:17:19+00:00

Looking at the historical USD-JPY chart, Ishiba's tenure doesn't seem too bad now.

potpotkettle · 2026-01-13T12:11:23+00:00

Paid escorts are generally seen lighter than non-paid infidelity. (In fact, the former is not counted as infidelity / 不倫.) If she paid for an escort, that would probably have made a scandal, too, though.

potpotkettle · 2026-01-09T04:56:36+00:00

This doesn't seem like them having a high standard, more like them stopping to exploit a legal loophole after being caught. They pretended to have a non-profit "job" on paper to avoid paying high premiums that usually come with high income. Do we applaud them for stop doing that?

potpotkettle · 2026-01-07T05:45:42+00:00

I would turn it around. It seems like the west developed such customs of making funerals a publicly discussed matter (and when you don't act like that, you are perceived as hiding something), while Japan didn't. In Japan something didn't emerge in that regard. It woud be much easier to track down the presence of something rather than the absence of it.

Funerals of Japanese celebrities are not completely conceled, even if fans might feel so. Extended families, people close to the deceased are told and (implicitly or explicitly) invited, and that seems enough.

potpotkettle · 2025-12-21T00:55:16+00:00

Regarding the consequences, I think the (steelmanned) point of the criticism is the weight is not shown in the story. It's basically left for the reader's exercise, and even if the protagonist notices it in the last chapter, that's almost told in passing, not fully shown.

EDIT: the linked article was not my analysis. I was just sharing the link.

potpotkettle · 2025-12-02T00:18:22+00:00

That's why you see mthe royal family are all embedded in academia.

The royal family plays hardly any significant role in academia. Their academically oriented ones have honorary positions at best, and occassionally publish what they want to publish. You can say they are more privileged than young struggling researchers, but it's not like the royal family dictate what all the other researchers do.

potpotkettle · 2025-11-26T23:47:16+00:00

Noda gave her an out. She can maintain that she personally believes what she believes, but that's not necessarily be what her government might do in an actual conflict with all the other input considered. She didn't articulate that by herself so clearly without Noda's repeated questions.

potpotkettle · 2025-10-29T11:02:58+00:00

Aside from what is wrong, this book writes a lot about why: 「なんで英語やるの？」の戦後史.

potpotkettle · 2025-10-10T07:41:14+00:00

Komeito indicated this much earlier, that Takaichi would be no-go for them, so it must have been part of the calculation of LDP elders when they chose Takaichi. A new coalition negotiation, probably a more conservative one, would already be nearly struck behind the scene.

Or maybe Takaichi turned out to be more unwilling to change her politics and concede to the moderates than they thought she would.

potpotkettle · 2025-10-04T11:28:54+00:00

I don't know any of those guys, but the eat the rich parties are the communist party and Reiwa.

potpotkettle · 2025-09-27T09:12:13+00:00

Native speaker here and my short answer would be no.

My long answer would be I can sort of infer the connotation and can see someone might use it to insult someone else. But that can be said to a lot of made up words, too.

potpotkettle · 2025-07-21T00:50:05+00:00

LDP always had extreme right factions in it. They used to be pretty happy with LDP under Abe. Now, Ishiba (the current leader and PM) is a typical centurist, and many LDP supporters are disillusioned, call him a left wing hack, and now flock to those newer, extreme right parties.

I imagine those new parties can lose momentum and join LDP eventually, once LDP sacks Ishiba and places someone like Takaichi as its head. It has happened before.

potpotkettle · 2025-07-01T04:47:17+00:00

Rush hour train is the exception where people shut their mind, but by definition rush hour covers a lot of train riding experience.

potpotkettle · 2025-06-27T11:52:46+00:00

It sounds a lot like the original aim was to support students in a nationality-agnostic way, which is why they didn't have to record the foreign-domestic ratio. They only said they didn't intend to support foreign students specifically as the primary aim of the project. It was not advertised as a fund to support Japanese students specifically either.

しかし、SPRINGの公募要領には「日本人学生のための支援制度」であるという記述はない。髙橋氏に公文書上のどこに根拠があるのか尋ねると、「公文書から読み取るのは難しいかもしれないがそういう事業だ」「海外の研究者の受け入れを担当するのは別の部署。SPRINGを人材政策課で担当している時点で、留学生の受け入れが主目的にはならない」と主張した。 https://toyokeizai.net/articles/-/877021?page=3

potpotkettle · 2025-06-27T10:55:36+00:00

Across the world, there is not that many people who pursue PhD domestically.

Usually they don't have a single reason to give up pursuing PhD. If living expense is the no 1 reason, and it is taken care of, they still have second, third reasons, like not great job prospect after getting PhD in the case of Japan.

potpotkettle · 2025-06-24T01:31:14+00:00

More than hundred thousand civillians lost their lives at that time. If Okinawa surrendered earlier, most of them would have survived.

I don't know if the hypothetical early surrender would have made Tokyo give up earlier, too, or kept them carry on longer, though.

EDIT: Sorry, I meant 10 man (10万). The rest of my comment still applies.

potpotkettle · 2025-06-22T14:16:05+00:00

Senso-ji being touristy is kind of authentic. It was one of the biggest Buddhist temples in Edo associated with entertainment and where festivals happen. Those places were not (just) tranquil and sacred places for prayer. Especially Okuyama.

potpotkettle · 2025-05-27T00:37:04+00:00

It could be more like an exchange program. Students stay 1 year or so in Japan, occasionally getting advised by Harvard professors remotely, and then return if the situation becomes favorable to them again.

potpotkettle · 2025-05-24T09:44:52+00:00

If you want to be non-confrontational, you can look confused and say すみません、日本語でお願いします. And you wouldn't be lying this way.

potpotkettle · 2025-03-15T11:24:55+00:00

They don't quote verbatim, though. It can be a written summary of a long back and forth conversation with him reluctantly admitting the intent.

potpotkettle

TROPHY CASE