Japan 2009 is GO!

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Is the LDP still about to get its ass handed to it? Or have their numbers improved?

Ass-handing in the sense that they definitely will not be largest party, let alone have a majority or supermajority (as now). Everything else is as-yet unclear.

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Is the LDP still about to get its ass handed to it? Or have their numbers improved?

Ass-handing in the sense that they definitely will not be largest party, let alone have a majority or supermajority (as now). Everything else is as-yet unclear.

296 seats is 61.67% of the 480 seats total.  Is three-fifths a supermajority in Japan for most/all purposes where more than a simple majority is required?

New Komeito is for all intents and purposes a part of the LDP. That's where the government supermajority comes from, anyway. It's a little bit misleading to say that the LDP has a supermajority... but only a little bit misleading.

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Any idea where LDP's voters are going to go?  Are they going to swing towards LDP's proxy, NK, or will they vote for DPJ or third party?  Or just stay home?

The Tokyo elections suggest a straight swing from LDP to DPJ with the Komeito vote holding up and turnout staying high. But the voters in the countryside may behave very differently from those in Tokyo; the countryside is in much worse economic shape.

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New poll from Yomiuri shows DPJ: 39%, LDP: 22%. No breakdown for others on the English link, but there probably is somewhere if someone can read Japanese. I suspect, and the CW seems to be, that current actual undecideds will break heavily DPJ/other opposition and are mostly not stating which party they support because they've always voted LDP in the past and are maybe unwilling to admit their change in allegiance, particularly in areas of previously almost unanimous LDP support.

http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/33968/japanese_opposition_could_secure_landslide/

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The CW seems to be that New Komeito's support is rock-solid. That is, there are few voters outside New Komeito that would even consider voting for it, but its voters will always vote for it without wavering. The Tokyo council elections seemed to confirm this: while the LDP collapsed, New Komeito's vote was stable. Think of New Komeito like a larger version of the Netherlands' SGP, but one that participates in governments. (The one exception is that the New Komeito vote is disproportionately old and so will probably decline over time.)

Politically, the link between the two parties is very strong, far too strong for New Komeito to consider voting against the LDP or supporting a DPJ government. And New Komeito is very, very conservative--regardless of how little ideology the LDP or DPJ may have, the LDP is undoubtedly the more conservative of the two (in the literal sense of opposing change of any sort) and will remain so. But LDP and New Komeito voters are different. New Komeito voters are intensely loyal to New Komeito only.

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Anyway, new polling has the split at DPJ: 44.6, LDP: 25.4 and DPJ: 40.7, LDP: 23.5. Bear in mind that that split is significantly greater than the split in 2005 that gave the LDP an enormous majority. (2005 was 38.2-31.0; the small opposition parties together outpolled New Komeito somewhat.)

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Is there any data for the smaller parties, aka the LDP dissident outfits, the JCP, SDPJ and so forth?

There probably is if you can read Japanese. I can't. For those of you who can: http://sankei.jp.msn.com/politics/election/090810/elc0908101145001-n1.htm

Anyway, excellent source for analysis: http://www.observingjapan.com/

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Another poll, this one from Asahi.

DPJ: 40
LDP: 21

http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/34063/opposition_dpj_heads_to_victory_in_japan

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Amusingly, the news now is that the DPJ may not have nominated enough candidates for all of the seats it is going to win in at least the Tokai region. Too many of their candidates are running both for the list and for local seats. The DPJ will inevitably win at least twelve list seats in Tokai (they won eight in 2005), but there may not be twelve DPJ candidates left for the list after local seat results.

I'm not sure what happens then--does the DPJ just forfeit the list seats? To whom?

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Amusingly, the news now is that the DPJ may not have nominated enough candidates for all of the seats it is going to win in at least the Tokai region. Too many of their candidates are running both for the list and for local seats. The DPJ will inevitably win at least twelve list seats in Tokai (they won eight in 2005), but there may not be twelve DPJ candidates left for the list after local seat results.

I'm not sure what happens then--does the DPJ just forfeit the list seats? To whom?

Is there an upper limit as to how many candidates can be on a party's regional list in Japan, perhaps varying by region?  There wouldn't be any point in more names being on a party's list than the number of list seats up for election* in that region plus the number of candidates the party has running for both the list and local seats, so an upper limit for a party's regional list of the total number of local + list seats up for election in that region (in case a party fields a candidate for all l local seats in a region and those l candidates, all of whom win their local seats, are also the top l candidates on the party's regional list and the party's list vote entitles it to all list seats as well) would effectively be no limit at all (except perhaps if you factor in vacancies).

I don't know if there is an upper limit, but I can tell you that neither the LDP nor the DPJ is contesting every seat (local or list) in Japan. The LDP has 326 candidates while the DPJ has 330 candidates; there are 480 seats. This is because many candidates are running both for the list and for local seats, which is typical practice for candidates contesting marginal local seats.

(The party with the most candidates is the wacky Happiness Realization Party with 337 candidates; it's the political front for the Happy Science cult.)

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I think you have to live in the region in which you are a list candidate, and you have to live in the prefecture (but not the actual seat) in which you are a local candidate. I'm not sure on that. I think the Japanese would consider having a carpetbagger choose your seat to run in to be an honor, though.

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True, but, then again, when the DPJ was selecting candidates, it still wasn't certain that they would get an absolute majority. Now, it looks like the DPJ might win a supermajority (which is where the trouble comes in; with 330 candidates, a supermajority of 320 seats means almost every candidate wins, but of course the candidates may not be distributed with perfect efficiency).

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The leader of New Komeito lost his seat entirely.

How does that happen?

What sort of Komeito voter leaves Komeito?

As Lewis rather cryptically implies, his local seat was held primarily through LDP tactical votes rather than through Komeito loyalists. (It is, after all, in Tokyo.) Komeito had an incredibly stupid policy of running different candidates on the list and for local seats, so he wasn't on the Tokyo list. When tactical unwind destroyed his majority, and he lost his seat to the DPJ, there was no route back into the legislature.