Japan Lower House election - Dec 14, 2014

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Yes, the average lifespan of a personality cult who's personality is destroyed by scandal is not long.

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A totally unbiased guide to the various political parties, starting with the four largest from the last election:

Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) - officially a conservative party, it is in reality hideously corrupt clientelist organisation that has dominated political life in Japan since it was founded in 1955. In this respect it can be seen as being quite genuinely a conservative party as above all else it is in favour of keeping political and economic power in the hands of those who currently hold it. It is also firmly nationalist. Certain factions can be described as criminal conspiracies without fear of hyperbole, while there are also elements of the party that can be accurately and fairly described as 'fascist'. Exactly where the LDP stands in policy terms can be highly variable and often depends on its infamously byzantine internal politics. The LDP is currently adopting a populist persona (Abenomics on the one hand, shockingly unrestrained nationalism on the other) and thus far it has worked a lot better for them than the bumbling managerialism of the post-Koizumi years. It is currently led by Shinzō Abe who is serving his second term as Prime Minister. Abe is the grandson of controversial LDP founder (and sometime Prime Minister himself) Nobusuke Kishi. The LDP is joined at the hip with:

Komeito (formerly New Komeito and sometimes translated into English as - ironically - the Clean Government Party). Komeito is the political wing of the Soka Gakkai religious movement, a Buddhist sect that some people consider to be a cult (I'm not familiar enough with it to comment). Officially Komeito and Soka Gakkai are completely independent but this is, frankly, bollocks. New Komeito was founded by a merger of the old Komeito party (which was anti-LDP, amusingly enough) and a couple of fringe parties. It has recently returned to the old name. Komeito possesses a large and motivated vote bank and is thus an extremely useful ally to have. It is currently led by Natsuo Yamaguchi, not that the identity of it leader is terribly important.

And now the two largest opposition forces:

Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) - a rag-tag-and-bobtail coalition of anti-LDP parties and LDP splinter groups that fused into a nominally centre-left political party, the DPJ is in fact a human disaster masquerading as a political party. The DPJ has more factions than it does seats in the House of Representatives and includes market liberals, hick conservatives, multiple different varieties of socialist and many more tendencies besides those. For many years it was dominated by the frankly satanic figure of Ichirō Ozawa who buggered off elsewhere in 2012 amidst various scandals and policy disagreements. The LDP ed up so badly after Koizumi left office that the DPJ walzed to a massive landslide in 2009, sweeping incompetent nitwit Yukio Hatoyama (grandson of former PM and LDP founder Ichirō Hatoyama) into power. Hatoyama did not last long and was replaced by tired ex-leftist gadfly Naoto Kan who you may remember doing a truly spectacular job of handling the Fukushima disaster. He was replaced by Yoshihiko Noda (best known for comparing himself to a bottom-feeding fish) who was hammered by Abe in the general election. The DPJ is currently led by former TV personality Banri Kaieda.

Japan Restoration Party (JRP) - with a name like that, would you be surprised to learn that these people were not especially nice? The JRP was an out and out fascist party headed by creepy Osaka Mayor Tōru Hashimoto and featured a full deck of various other creeps, many of the drawn from the seedy world of Japanese local government (including repulsive former Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara). It polled stunningly well in 2012 - comfortably beating the bedraggled DPJ on the block vote, though winning less seats - but has since fallen victim to the usual factional brutalities. The remains of the JRP were merged with a bunch of defectors from the eternally ridiculous Your Party to form the Japan Innovation Party which is headed by Hashimoto and is about as unpleasant as the JRP was. Ishihara's faction formed their own fascist party and gave it the unbelievably creepy title of the Party for Future Generations which is officially led by former LDP hack Takeo Hiranuma.

Part two soon.

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Any ideas as to why the JCP is doing so comparatively well?

The JCP is basically a cult (albeit a rather benign one) and one that has been doing well in the recruiting stakes recently (including young people, extraordinarily enough). Its supporters always vote.

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Shintaro Ishihara and Yoshimi Watanabe both look to be defeated.

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Silliness aside, one thing to note is that when the opposition (in whatever guise) has taken power in Japan it has made a complete hash of things. Think we can be fairly sure now that LDP dominance can only be truly broken if that changes...

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Okinawa