Last Wednesday, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe implemented a long-awaited Cabinet reshuffle. Personnel matters are not Abe's forte; worse, he tends to be particularly beholden to friends and factions. I am highly pleased with some appointments but disappointed with others.
In any case, these movements have tended to overshadow an important anniversary in Japan this week. The Yukio Hatoyama administration, the first of three consecutive Democratic Party of Japan-led governments, began 10 years ago on Sept. 16, 2009.
Readers will remember that earlier this year in February, Abe called the three years of the DPJ administration "a nightmare" at a Liberal Democratic Party gathering. But what he neglected to say is that it was the failures and scandals of the repeatedly short administrations of him and his LDP successors that brought about the overwhelming DPJ victory in the August 2009 general election.