On March 20, 2011, this essay denounces Asahi Shimbun commentaries by Hoshi and Soga, condemns Naoto Kan’s vulgarity, and contrasts it with the selfless struggle of those at the front lines.

This post from March 20, 2011, sternly critiques Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s handling of the Great East Japan Earthquake, citing a newspaper commentary about his remark that TEPCO might go bankrupt. The author contrasts this with the self-sacrificial efforts of TEPCO employees risking their lives at the plant. He urges Kan to abdicate power to a more capable leader and calls on the journalists who elevated him to withdraw from public discourse, blaming them for creating a “vulgar” political landscape. The piece also reflects on the author’s own political convictions and his unique perspective as an outsider.

You have lost none of the happiness you once seized.
March 20, 2011.

(Honorifics omitted)
Following yesterday’s column by Hoshi Hiroshi in the Asahi Shimbun, today it was Soga Go writing in a separate frame.
In Soga’s piece, I found a fact I had not known.

Excerpt:
“At such a time, the prime minister must not say that Tokyo Electric Power might collapse. He should say that even if reactors are decommissioned, the power supply will be maintained. So argues a former economic cabinet minister.”
End excerpt.

It has long been said that a person’s true character is revealed in times of crisis, in hardship.
That the prime minister not only engaged in the reckless conduct I described earlier, but also uttered such words—it is outrageous.

Now, with nearly all contact with their families severed, men continue to work day after day to repair the damage their company has sustained—damage that affects not only the lives of the Japanese people but also the entire world.
Risking their own lives, Tokyo Electric Power employees continue performing the most urgent and difficult work on earth.
It is only natural that I should speak in their defense.

Naoto Kan, now is the time for you to recognize your faults and the limits of your ability.
You must yield the premiership to one truly capable.
That is the only way to atone for the vulgarity you have sown and restore what is right.

Even if you do so, Japan will lose nothing—and you know that best of all.
You did not create the budget.
Nor did you manage anything else.
Almost everything you have done has been a negative for the nation.
If you are too incompetent to recognize this, then all the more reason.

Japan has countless men who can replace you.

Before talking about a grand coalition at such a time, consider: of the 410 Democrats who won a sweeping majority in the House of Representatives, how many did you actually rely upon to form your cabinet?
Surely, before anything else, you must confront your own failings.
Or are you the sort of man who will never realize this, even in death?

And Soga—here in the 21st century, after what can rightly be called a once-in-a-millennium disaster, you dare to say we should learn from the circumstances of the Great Kantō Earthquake?
Before saying such foolish things, Hoshi yesterday and Soga today, you must first recognize the weight of the sins you have committed over these past twenty years.
It was you who enabled Naoto Kan.
What you must do is disappear from the world of commentary.

Cease writing about politics in the Asahi.
Simply live out your own lives.
That is the only thing left for you to do.
To continue to preach in lofty tones even now is beyond absurd.

Just as in politics, the Asahi has no shortage of replacements for you.
It is always the arrogance of men like you that leads the nation astray.
Recognize this, and spend your remaining years doing work like the volunteers now heading to the disaster zone.
Or else devote yourselves to honestly examining where and why you went wrong, and write books so that future generations will not repeat your mistakes.

Since beginning to write The Turntable of Civilization, I was driven to link my writing with politics only because of the unbearable unfairness of the media’s treatment of Ichiro Ozawa.
Through that process, I came to understand everything.
I realized that what had happened lay within the Lockheed scandal.
And I learned that Komuro Naoki was a man of rare brilliance.

During the Democratic Party leadership election, I declared clearly that I supported Ichiro Ozawa.
If Ozawa had been like Naoto Kan—like the “nue” I have written of many times before—then it would have been absolutely impossible, 150 percent impossible, for me to support him.
If he had been such a man, I would never speak of politics again.

Why, then, do I hold this 150 percent certainty?
Because, Hoshi, Soga, though nominally my classmates, seniors, or juniors, you walked the promised path of the elite, living lives of stability, with family happiness assured.
You will never possess the gaze I have.

The true truth of the world cannot be seen by insiders.
It can only be perceived by Christ, by the Buddha, by Kūkai, by Saichō, by Nobunaga, by Hideyoshi, by Ieyasu.

You have lost none of the happiness you once seized—though I do not know about psychological issues within your families.
But those now struggling at the front lines risk not only everything you have kept, but even their own lives.
They continue their work day and night.

Before spouting such intolerable high-mindedness over two days, what you must consider is this: when, and how, will you remove Naoto Kan, whom you yourselves created?
Only after that should you withdraw from the world of commentary yourselves, never again appearing on the political stage.