Language sometimes masks what one really thinks or feels. It also sometimes exposes what is really on one's mind, consciously or unconsciously. The second case appears to apply to the two statements health minister Hakuo Yanagisawa has made in relation to the nation's falling birth rate. In a Lower House Budget Committee session on Wednesday, he apologized for his Jan. 17 speech in which he likened women to "child-bearing machines and devices." But on Tuesday, he made another controversial statement.