The perennial anti-signal Economist "The World Ahead 2024" predicts that in Japan "Kishida will lead the LDP to victory in an early 2024 election"
To be fair I think if an election is held LDP-KP will still hold a majority although it is very likely LDP itself will lose its majority position.
Well does an "early 2024" election look at all plausible on the current poll numbers?
Not at all. The LDP will never go for elections under these circumstances. If his numbers do not improve most likely Kishida will be pushed out and replaced with another LDP PM with an interim LDP Prez election to try to turn around the numbers. An early general election might be called before the 2024 Sept LDP Prez election to boost the position of the LDP PM in the leadership race.
I agree. The time would certainly be bad because it's in the LDP's interest to wait until the electorate doesn't have a reason to care about showing up to vote. The trends over the years tell us that when the Japanese public is largely apathetic, it's good news for the LDP, but if they're motivated to come out and vote, the LDP could end up in a 2009 situation. Of course it's looking not like 2009 right now, but it could become another 1993 where there's a disorganized and fragmented opposition that somehow still wins.
Speaking of the opposition, Kenta Izumi's position as CDP leader is looking increasingly tenuous. He's pissed off Ichiro Ozawa, and if you know about Japanese politics, you'll know that he's not the kind of enemy you want to make because he's very cunning still, even in old age, and a dangerous opponent. Lo and behold, Yukio Edano, once known as the last hope of the Japanese center-left, is re-emerging. He's put forward an updated "Edano Vision" (a play on EdaVision that was created by Saburo Eda, who tried to reform the JSP with it, but the hard left ended up beating him back. Edano was actually a member of the Kan Cabinet with Eda's son) in preparation to challenge Izumi. Edano would probably be a better choice to lead the CDP in an election since Izumi just seems to be flailing about without any kind of direction, but we'll see, I guess.
