This week, a current events episode on the leadup and immediate aftermath of the assassination of Prime Minister Abe Shinzo. Note: this episode is intended to be a continuation of Episode 364 (our last episode on Abe).
Sources
Chryssides, George. The Advent of Sun Myung Moon: The Origins, Beliefs and Practices of the Unification Church
A pair of excellent Tokyo Review articles on the faction system (1,2) in the LDP by Michael Bosack. If you’re curious what a faction’s website looks like, here’s the one for the former Abe Faction, the Seiwa Seisaku Kenkyukai (Seiwaken for short).
A Japan Times breakdown of the factional alignments in the LDP after the general election last year.
Kyodo News on the relationship between Kishi Nobusuke and the Unification church.
Washington Post coverage on Abe and the Unification Church.
New Zealand’s 1News on the Unification Church in Japanese politics.
The Financial Times coverage of the cult allegations against the Unification Church.
Kurokawa Atsuhiko’s TV spot on NHK (Japanese only). Fair warning: I did warn you about the song and dance number.
Images
1. What are the security details like for Japanese Prime Ministers/Ex-Prime Ministers and is the Japanese government making plans to tighten them in response to this incident?
2. It sounds like you are suggesting that Kishida is planning to leverage Abe’s life and legacy to get the constitutional revisions done. This is similar to how London Johnson leveraged Kennedy’s legacy to get the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts through congress. But is Kishida as good of a politician as Johnson? What are the levers that he needs to work in order to actually get that done?
I really don’t like these ads at the beginning. It’s really intrusive. I much preferred when you’d do the ad read. It’s much more relaxing to listen to.