windandsea comments

Looking back on recent history, Japan has signed a UN resolution to eradicate discrimination (2006). Since then, little or no progress has been made, even after a special envoy from the UN visited Japan to access real conditions and actions taken by the government. When the envoy reported that little to nothing had been done, the Japanese government responded that they had no power to enforce matters at the local level. http://www.geneva-academy.ch/RULAC/pdf_state/Spec-Rap-Racism-2007-G0610396.pdf

Let's look at physical abuse by teachers and coaches: the most recent and sensational case is the suspension of sentence for the basketball teacher who beat his student. The student eventually committing suicide, there is little outcry from the Abe administration. Do we see any other steps to stem the tide of this unacceptable situation?

So then check-book diplomacy again ahead of some international sports games and an Olympics. Meanwhile, revisionist editing of textbooks continue, Fukushima No.1 Plant is falling apart in front of our eyes and a whole region of Japan citizens left out in the cold, neglected. Abenomics is driving the country to such a level of sovereign debt that gov't bonds will soon lose their luster, plunging the country into (further) economic crisis.

Now pledges to improve the plight of women?

They're making this stuff up as they go.

Abe didn't know what was going on either and was just following a choreographed pantomime.

They all of the same ilk. Dip sheets, all.

Although the government purports that this is a containment and remediation process, it is clear that is it a cover-up still yet.

Now more than two and a half years since the man-made (TEPCO) catastrophy occured, the result of non-truth-telling, obfuscation, and inaction, the situation has spiraled out of control beyond anyone's imagination, and perhaps beyond the possibility of containment.

Abe is quoted as saying that he "ordered the scrapping of two Fukushima nuclear reactors",

Meanwhile: "TEPCO President Naomi Hirose promised that the company will make a decision on the decommissioning of the two reactors within the year". That statement is not saying the reactors will be scrapped. It clearly states that it is TEPCO who will make the decision whether to do so, or not.

Abe will be long gone before Fukushima is fixed. He will be remembered by his party for faithfully towing the company line. He will be hailed by Japanese Big Energy and big business who are all invested into TEPCO. But, Abe will not suffer as the ruined and displaced of Tohoku have. He will not endure the same fate as the generations that inherit these problems. He will just be another name in the long list of Japanese Yes-Men prime ministers. He'll retire comfortably, somewhere far from Fukushima.

Isn't anyone paying attention to all this double-talk?

.. ban was not based on scientific ground...

Since when in this crisis has science played a role in policy making?

Hey, didn't Abe just say the gov't was taking over the water issue "with a new sense of urgency?" Why do we have another TEPCO expert ala bonus foreign mouth-piece making these "should do" statements? Abe, keep at least one pledge and get to work on this task.

The irony of all this is that in some sort of an orchestrated theatrical production, TEPCO will slip from the news, it will continue to get bail out money, the government will take the scorn, little meaningful progress will be made, and everyone will have escaped responsibility.

The government having little better idea of what to do, will go through a number of complex pantomimes, buying more time for political machinations such as their Olympic bid, efforts to sell Japanese nuclear power plants abroad, and a bit more time for the large corps to reap profits while the weaker yen lasts. Eventually, higher costs will catch up, Abenomics will run out of steam, the national debt will rise so high that Jpns government bonds will lose their appeal, and the economy will plummet.

When the economy plummets, Japan will somehow find it is having irreconcilable differences with some neighbor, changes will be made to the the constitution, some portion of all that enriched plutonium Inaba has been referring to will be put into some device that has been sitting around waiting, and Japan will thus enter the nuclear club and become a 'big boy.'

Everyone will live happily ever after.

Japanese politicians are bred to keep the status quo, not to change things, not to reform. Such being the case they are hardly equipped to deal with as complex, unforgiving problem as an unbridled, multi-faceted nuclear powerplant failure. More pressure must be exerted on the Japanese government to accept international help with this problem.

If not, even newer frontiers will be trod upon: World Court for widespread contamination of the environment the restitutions collapsing the country; an as yet unspoken possibility that some other entity must step in and forcibly wrest the problem from Japanese control, essentially taking control of the county, the second time for a Japan that has miscalculated on the grandest of scales.

Abe, stop talking and get it in gear before someone else takes the wheel.

Something that is overlooked (with glee by the IAEA) is nuclear waste. All the nuclear weapons and nuke energy nations have huge stockpiles of this waste; however, except for illegal dumping or conversion into 'depleted' munitions there is no adequate repository for this toxic material which will remain with us for hundreds or thousands of years.

No one can say that the business of nuclear energy or arms is safe, well managed, or acceptable until such a basic feature of the industry is solved. This does not even start to address the problems of day-to-day handling of nuclear energy or arms, such as Fukushima.

It serves well to remember that Fukushima is just ONE incident. Heaven forbid that Japan suffer another incident. A second accident would collapse the country both economically and environmentally. A worse picture is one in which a previously untainted area of the tiny island of Japan was affected. Is it possible to evacuate the population of an entire country?

Fukushima No1 plant is far from stabilized and it is obvious that neither TEPCO nor the Japanese government have the resolve, expertise, or facilities to rein in the problems they face there. Liquification of the ground due to another earthquake in the area could rupture hundreds of tanks. Worse yet, should reactor building 4 collapse both hot fuel rods and spent rods would go tumbling to the ground. Unapproachable and uncontained the probability of an unchecked criticality accident is almost certain. There is no plan to deal with such an eventuality, except run. But then again, you can only run so far and it will catch up to you in one way or another.

If one were to dismiss the issue because it does not affect 'me', it is worthwhile to remember that those rings of proximity to an incident are only a generalized guideline. Airborne nuclear contamination issuing from an accident site is more like a lighthouse, sending saturated nuclear contaminants in a stream, dependent on wind direction and strength, across borders and oceans. With eventual mixing of air in the strata, nuclear pollution of the air envelope becomes well dispersed and nearly uniform over the ages.

If we are to judge world standards on nuclear reactor safety based solely on those plants in which an accident has not yet occurred, without examining the one shinning example of what can happen to (any) plant in the matter of hours, it would be the most grevious example of negligence and intoxication with the myth of safety.

Next job? TEPCO of course...

Questionable if TEPCO leadership could find their backside with both both hands... and so goes the company.

The Jpns are not interested in a clean-up, it is more like a cover-up.

http://fairewinds.org/demystifying/cleanup-from-fukushima-daiichi-technological-disaster-or-crisis-in-governance

Business as usual:

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/04/16/national/oi-reactors-can-remain-online-court/#.UdYRT6xhB8E

Laughable. Business as usual in Japan.

Price is a smokescreen for seed money for new developments in the private business sector. Eventually, we'll see the robots price exceed a hundred times the 'expected' amount and those innovations arising from this project will be used for commerce other than social services. Even now, the industry cannot produce for any amount of money a probe-robot device that can enter and measure the conditions in Fukushima #1's most contaminated areas, must less the complex and intimate duties of caring for a human being.

Another aspect completely overlooked here is that robots do not pay taxes, subscribe and contribute to the national health insurance fund, or contribute to the state pension fund. What Japan needs is to reform immigration policy and to repopulate the country.

It is clear that TEPCO has learned nothing. Their admissions of responsibility and apologies are lip-service concealing an unchanging, reckless and misguided attitude to continue their old ways. It is only action by the people, coordinating resistance and activism that can counter such blind 'manifesto' and profit driven motives.

Symbolic gesturing by the JOC is nice; however, anyone who has had experience in Jpns martial arts or sports knows this sort of thing (abuse) is rampant and systematic. It is certain everyone around the women's national judo team knew it was going on but said nothing. It was a heroic thing the ladies did by going public, but it is yet to be seen if their careers will be negatively affected by this. They may well end-up ruined in an activity they have dedicated their whole lives to, and to such a pinnacle of achievement, for speaking out against the hubris and inhumanity of the system. The budoh or martial arts are considered to be stepped in tradition and character-developing. Let's consider the flip-side of those same coins: (1) jaku nike kyou shoku, the weak are the food of the strong, (2) deru kugi wa utareru, the nail that sticks up is pounded down, (3) Jpns vertical society, its unquestioning top-down system in which nothing less than the yes-man survives, (4) absolute power corrupts, absolutely. Apply this same template and we can see how much of the society functions. It would be nice to see things change as a result of the JOC's mandates; however, it is hard to believe that things will change when they are so endemic in the society. In any case, best wishes to the ladies, their lifetime of effort, and sacrifice.

It begs to be asked: If the 'government' fails and there is a nuclear accident, what is the penalty? who pays? who is (will become) responsible? Although Japan's economic hurdles are enormous, another catastrophe notwithstanding, measures to mitigate our troubles and to extend the period of action to overcome them are possible. The question that should be asked in every circle of government, industry, and the constituency is: If Japan experiences another nuclear accident of even a fraction of the scale of Fukushima No 1 plant, could the country survive? Heaven forbid, if it were not another incident in the same region but some other unspoiled area of the country, it would trigger an immediate systemic collapse of agriculture and infrastruture. It is a bit ironic, but the old right-wing who are so adamant about ignoring Japan's past, have managed to drop a third bomb on the country and are not hesitant to drop a fourth in effort to pursue their vested interests. Russian-roulette should end with one dead person on the floor, it is not a game of chance when you continue to reload the gun.

Same company up to their old tricks again.

Chief government spokesman Osamu Fujimura said 'We cannot tolerate this...' Considering the obfuscation, inaction, and lack of accountability relating to the Fukushima NPP catastrophe; leaving a whole population living in shelters now over a year and a half along; allowing the restarting of the Oi NPPs before the newly formed regulatory agency was installed; insane chatter about meddling with the Constitution Article 9, the no war article; drafting new plans for Monju, one of the most spectacular and most covered-up failures of the Jpns atomic village; pork-barrel politics and fiscal management leading to sovereign debt of 230% of GDP; failure to address the shrinking population issue, it does seem like 'they' can tolerate a lot. Japan does not need to worry about external threats: inflexibility and clinging to a status quo that became unviable long ago, Japanese leadership is doing an efficient job at tanking the country on their own. If Japan is to have a credible voice in international affairs, whether is be NK missiles, ASEAN, or multi-lateral currency interventions, it must demonstrate some responsibility at home first.

Winter is coming. He probably wants three squares, dry place to sleep, rehabilitation job training and placement, library, and an exercise yard in a safe place. Such the job market, we will see more of this.

Waiting for the third.

Strip away the phony tinsel of Hollywood and you'll find the real tinsel underneath. - Oscar Levant

Simple: Reduce government, not the care of nor support of taxpayers.

Same Hashimoto who caved-in to government (big energy's) nuclear power-plant restart?

Country is ready to collapse. Good time for more bureaucracy...

The real question about nuclear power in Japan is: could Japan survive another disaster such as Fukushima again? A reoccurance at Fukushima would be horrible enough, but imagine if another untainted region was affected. TEPCO and the government excused themselves from culpability by saying that the failure of the reactors were "beyond their comprehension...". (That is after they chose to ignore expert advice at the time of construction, throughout the years up to weeks before Fukushima failed, including their own in-house studies.) Now, without any significant improvements to plants or infrastructure they are restarting plants? The Fukushima related liability and clean-up costs are expected to exceed all the profits of not just TEPCO, but the entire nuclear-energy program in Japan from its beginnings in the 70's. We now see that the Japanese tax-payer will carry the burden, only to have nuclear power resume according to the whims (and money thrown around) of the vested-interest energy monopoly. Government is failing the people.

While it is true that a married man lives longer than a single bachelor, the married man is must more willing to die.

Well done. Thank you.

Add it to the TEPCO bill.

These cases are not uncommon and the only reason this one makes the news is because of a decision against the teacher. There is plenty of lip-service from the budo community about "ningen-keisei" (development of proper character) through budo training, but in reality it is a further extension of the indoctrination to compliancy and obedience. It make gangsters out of formerly good people. After spending a lifetime trying to advance in grade and prestige, the senior teachers will keep their mouth shut and do anything to keep what they have, even when they see immoral and unethical behavior in their ranks. The most dangerous are the people at top, they can do anything, as they are untouchable. Look around, it is the same in all vertical society in Japan. The only mechanism for change, in all cases of unjust society is the legal system. However, as with all the Japanese society, the component people who comprise the legal system are themselves part of the 'ole boy system, entrenched in this "king's new clothes" charade. Let's applaud this one court finding and hope that there is a shift in society's values, and common peoples' power to call out for a shift to justice and accountability.

When a utility can lie and withhold essential news about safety, with the cooperation of the government and its beholden press, who believes any of this stuff? It is also useful to consider that estimates are being made for the recovery of the Tohoku-region: they haven't even started passing out relief-money or made a significant dent in the clean-up operations. What basis does anyone have to make a qualified estimate of any recovery without seeing the outcome of relief-aid, the return of residents to stricken areas, without any systematic approach to clearing, decontaminating, and rebuilding? Look at Chernobyl, decades past and still a ghost-town. Can any of us believe the affected areas around Fukushima #1 will be any different? The charade has gotten completely out of hand. Either Japanese press must reform and transition to a free and independent press, or we are forced to look to the foreign press entirely for reliable news.