2012/12/31
On page 5 of the December 29, 2012 edition of the Nikkei Shimbun, there was an article about the Bank of Japan centered on an interview with Governor Shirakawa.
Omitted (most of the introduction omitted).
The additions to the text are mine.
The BOJ has been criticized for ending quantitative easing in 2006, which amounted to “premature tightening” and caused chronic deflation.
It has also been pointed out that the BOJ’s failure to participate in coordinated interest-rate cuts by central banks around the world immediately after the Lehman crisis in the autumn of 2008 contributed to the subsequent sharp appreciation of the yen.
The BOJ bears primary responsibility for a decade of deflation.
Nevertheless, the only solution is for the government and the BOJ to work closely together and mobilize every available policy.
(Takeshi Kawanami, Economics Department)
People who subscribe to and read newspapers and watch television news programs will undoubtedly agree with my observation that the editorials of Japan’s mass media induced the BOJ to adopt this stance.
As I wrote yesterday, there is an issue concerning Korean residents in Japan.
The issue is that, if they suffered discrimination as children or as adults, they rebelled against society through force, formed antisocial groups, and continued to perpetrate “evil” as a segment of Japanese society.
Those associated with “Dowa” likewise unite in the same way and follow a similar course.
In reality, however, Japanese society offers far greater equality of opportunity than other regions of the world, and these people occupy central positions in every sector and stratum of society.
That people who have experienced poverty and misfortune have often achieved success is a fact demonstrated by history, both ancient and modern.
I proudly say that I am the only person in Japan who has pointed out that the “pseudo” moralism of the Japanese media’s editorial leadership kept the BOJ on the wrong course.
Yet because I keep saying this, the day when Japan’s mass media will address the issue grows increasingly distant.
Nevertheless, the truth will surely reach the ends of the earth.
Until that day, I will continue to perform good deeds as a twenty-first-century Kukai.
I also believe that those who encouraged the aforementioned “acquiescence” in line with moralism must have been the people mentioned at the beginning of this article, who occupy central positions in various sectors and strata of society.
Leading them was a business magnate who, on various occasions, mobilized numerous politicians and secured the government subsidies he wanted for his company’s new development projects.
Academics and others were also involved.
As a result, I am convinced that certain people played a decisive role in weakening Japan and severely undermining its industrial competitiveness.
Even so, the reporter who wrote this article was right.
But for the mass media, it was far too late.
You have almost nothing to say in your defense.
Your “sycophantic” moralism brought Japan profound economic stagnation.
It was the first prolonged deflation in the history of industrialized nations, and it further deepened the economic deterioration.
Countless Japanese citizens confronted the “evil” brought about by your “cajoling” moralism and suffered enormously.
The storm of layoffs and restructuring is another form of “evil.”
While the Japanese people suffered greatly, certain robber barons accumulated “evil” assets so vast that they could never spend them all in their lifetimes.
There can be no robber barons in Japan’s major corporations that have continued to employ hundreds of thousands of people.
I call that “goodness.”
The world finally realizes that this is what “goodness” means.