Michael Bosack, in his opinion piece "For Japan, Upper House results signal stability" in the July 23 edition, doesn't even scratch the surface of Japanese politics. In reality, Shinzo Abe capitalized on the pervasive sense of instability he helped create in this nation.
Abenomics has failed to achieve an economy that grows with healthy inflation. Instead, it created huge windfall incomes for the wealthy who invested in stocks at the expense of the nation's financial health, which must be remedied by future generations through austerity and heavy taxes, thus stoking the sense of instability.
Abe's disastrous top-down diplomatic activities have created instability in Japan's position in Asia, which is being drastically realigned by Chinese economic, political and military power.
Abe has long been antagonizing South Korea, destabilizing the U.S.-Japan-South Korea coalition, in the face of the threatening development of a China-Russia coalition. The instability Abe created is of the gravest nature this country has experienced in the post-World War II period.
By adopting the idiot's strategy of trying to avoid a crisis by avoiding seeing the crisis, Japan's electorate avoided taking the opportunity this election for serious consideration of the mounting problems we face.
Abe, for that matter, took advantage of the nation's growing sense of instability by painting himself in a false picture of a strong leader who could be depended on in an age of instability, while discouraging the media from taking up the real issues worth debating in the run-up to the election. This collective self-deception by the nation will further exacerbate Japan's already gloomy prospects.
The opinions expressed in this letter to the editor are the writer's own and do not necessarily reflect the policies of The Japan Times.
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