Through rain or shine or even after Sunday's humiliating drubbing, the government must go on, so Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and his ministers Tuesday morning held their first Cabinet meeting since the election, a gloomy gathering participants likened to a wake.
After an unprecedented eight Cabinet members lost their Diet seats, the grim-faced ministers took up their usual places in the meeting room.
Education minister Makiko Tanaka, the outspoken daughter of the late Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka who lost her seat on the anniversary of her father's death, later blasted Noda for dissolving the Lower House at a time when his Democratic Party of Japan faced strong public disfavor.