Ivan Martinez comments

The worst of the story is that there's still no opposition parties getting ready to take advantage of the situation and present themselves as a reliable alternative to this gang-ruled party. Sure there'll be some movement within the LDP, but no one doubts that they will win the election if it was held today or anytime soon.

Feels so annoying and hopeless in my opinion...

We're deep inside the 21st century. I think it's time to stop caring about whom the neighbor sleeps with.

Maybe also keeping religions for the private environment and not funding any with public money?

Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike knows how important networking and mentorship are to building a career, so she's making sure her administration offers women these opportunities.

Unless those women are Chinese. Or Korean. Or from any other countries.

At 83 one should be retired and enjoying life, but looks like Aso enjoys parasiting Japanese institutions.

I fail to understand what's the point of keep earning and earning when your life (and those of, at least, 3 generations after yourself) is already solved.

I now remember what that song from Faithless said: greed is a weapon of mass destruction.

We should also start from the point that the moonies are actually a political organization disguised as a religion. Apart of that, all religions should be taxed, and all the financial activities of the lawmakers (not only in Japan, but worldwide) should be monitored.

Kishida doesn't have to worry because he can still be a member of the parliament. Also, the LDP members at the Nippon Kaigi will still working under wraps to not allow any big changes on their statu quo. The issues with the moonies has brought too much attention and looks like Kishida will be a perfect scapegoat for the situation. It's just a matter of timing.

@Legrande

I did. It just hits too hard that the statu quo seem to be so well established and impossible to change that is so discouraging...

The problem is that right now there is no party in Japan that can be a real alternative to LDP. I see a lot of corruption cases, the people claim to not like them... so why nobody seem to be able to organize a trustworthy alternative? If nobody seem to really like LDP why the keep winning the election by a broad margin? Are all the other options really that bad? I'm really asking, it's not rhetorical...

I suffer from anxiety and depression myself, so anything that helps beating it or coping with it or anything similar will always have my support.

I also know the case of Spanish NBA player Ricky Rubio who's currently on a career hiatus due to mental health. He lost his mother a few years ago due to cancer and it seems that he's been struggling ever since.

"I'm old enough to remember. DPJ got screwed by having to take the blame for 3/11 and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster which was due to decades of LDP corruption and incompetence. Talk about unfortunate timing. Apart from that they were trying to do some good things, one does not forget the sight of Renho grilling government bureaucrats about their wasteful spending or proposals to increase child support, decrease highway toll robbery fees etc. DPJ was not perfect but was a breath of fresh air after the stale LDP. The earthquake sank them."

I do agree with you. It wasn't just bad timing (maybe the worst of them all, I mean the strongest earthquake in Japan since humans can measure them and the devastating tsunami that came after!) it's also that (in my opinion) they committed the same mistake as LDP having different factions fighting between them instead of everyone working for a common objective within the party. They also failed on making their good deeds prevail over the mishandling of the 3/11 aftermath (lack of experience?).

It's definitely not a simple topic. I just hope that a real strong opposition party come and change things around. And I really hope that it happens sooner than later.

"This country needs a stronger alternative to the old boy's club."

Absolutely. As someone said before, the young people are not interested in politics because they see no real alternative to LDP. Some of them are old enough to remember what happened when DPJ when they took office. That would discourage even the most optimistic ones! Who can tell about a real alternative that looks powerful enough to apply some changes that the Japanese society would thank?

...and that's why things doesn't seem to change in the very near future. I really hope that someone can prove wrong my pessimistic take on this.

At 75 anyone should be retired and enjoying life.

If any politician accepts bribes and it's proved at court, should be banned to exercise political activities for life.

Why is this even allowed to happen? The travel to Russia sounds way less important compared to his age and past activities...

I think that the main problem is not LDP being this lousy, the problem is that there's no opposition party that can get them out of the government because they're even worse or look even lousier.

I hope I'm wrong, but I don't see Japan getting rid of this gerontocratic system anytime soon.

I've heard that there's a warrant against him and that the police have been keeping record of all the times that this scumbag has been acting like a fool just for the sake of views and visits.

Hopefully he'll spend some time in jail before being kicked out of Japan forever.

If you move out of your country, behave. Otherwise you'll get deported. I really hope this is the case.

Instead of building skyscrapers like there's no tomorrow, Tokyo and other big cities (in Japan and the rest of the world) should plant a lot of trees that create natural shadows, tighten the ground together and help cooling down the temperatures, along with making gardens on the rooftops of as much buildings as possible... or there'll be no tomorrow...

If they really want to go after the Yakuza and get people not to join them, then they should hit the film industry. Crack down on yakuza films that always display them as having honor. Which is far from reality as they are just parasites that takes from the weak.

The film industry and the real estate market, there are too many building licenses being managed fraudulently by Yakuza gangs.

In my homecountry (Spain) happened the same.

It's very sad knowing that less than 10% of the victims of rape and/or similar cases of sexual abuse and/or assault dare to sue. I hope this changes soon...

In my experience, after the opening of the borders the japanese people that I interact most with are the ones who are starting to wear masks less frequently, specially in open spaces, which makes sense.

The last news I knew about said that we're already above the 90% of herd immunity, so I believe that we will gradually take off the masks more and more until we reach the pre-pandemic normality.

I also believe that the only difference that will remain is that we will use masks more often when we feel a little sick, just in case, which is also fine in my opinion.