Word: ldp
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...framing Japan's Sept. 11 parliamentary election as a referendum on his postal-privatization plan and outmaneuvering his rivals with dextrous political campaigning, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has scored his greatest victory, helping the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to its biggest majority since 1986. The encore, however, could prove trickier. Koizumi's postal-reform bill, aimed at breaking Japan's $3 trillion postal service into four separate companies by 2017, will be re-submitted at a special Diet session this week and is all but guaranteed to pass. His plans beyond that are hazy. Koizumi has promised...
...Some wonder if the desire to drive through more of his oft-deferred reforms could spur Koizumi to extend his tenure. But he already appears to be handing tough choices off to his unnamed successor. He has avoided discussing any substantial reforms beyond postal privatization, and while LDP party secretary Tsutomu Takebe has admitted that mounting social-services costs have made a consumption tax hike imminent, Koizumi has committed not to raise them. With tough battles yet to come, University of Kyoto politics professor Terumasa Nakanishi and others believe stepping down as promised may be Koizumi's smartest move?leaving...
...this brisk and sunny spring morning, Diet member Yasukazu Hamada was undeterred. A young and conservative member of Koizumi's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), Hamada saw his pilgrimage to Yasukuni as a proper personal tribute to those who made the ultimate sacrifice for his country. No offense to China was intended, he says, but no special concessions were made to soothe China's sensibilities, either. Three such parliamentary prayer services had been held every year for decades, Hamada notes, and this one had been scheduled long before the anti-Japanese riots in China. He looks surprised when asked whether...
...Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ). A passel of hotly contested proposals to broaden Japan's ability to dispatch its Self-Defense Forces, say many lawmakers, passed into legislation only because Ishiba and Maehara worked together to break down interparty rivalries. Then there's Ichita Yamamoto, a 47-year-old LDP member and a graduate of Georgetown University, who says that 70-80% of the newly elected parliamentarians are in support of amending the constitution. A frequent guest on TV political talk shows and a strident critic of North Korea, Yamamoto was a vocal proponent of a law passed last year...
...given to China over the years, some of these observers fear that Chinese leaders will continue to play the history card whenever they consider it expedient. "In the post-cold-war era, the [Chinese] Communist Party is using nationalism as an ideology to maintain legitimacy," says Keizo Takemi, an LDP member who heads the Young Diet Members' group. "Anti-Japanism is an important part of Chinese nationalism, and has become an outlet for pent-up discontent among the young...