Politic?

This is a blog dedicated to a personal interpretation of political news of the day. I attempt to be as knowledgeable as possible before commenting and committing my thoughts to a day's communication.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Suited Up For the Job

Royals and Popes sit on toilet seats just like anyone else. Not the usual symbol of common humanity but close enough. The equivalent of that shared human function is the knowledge a woman has of her husband. Inscrutable to others, but familiar to her.

Women who shrewdly assess the all-too-human and often quite particular lack of positive assets of their unprepossessing spouses. Whom they, nonetheless hold dear. Most wives are more discreet about their familial wisdom. They keep it to themselves, held tightly close where there is no danger of it accidentally spilling into the light of day, perhaps to harm a husband's aspirations.

Then there are those women whose tongues will not be stopped. They wag constantly directly in front of their husbands, spelling out fully their perceptions, informing the man of his failings and he is left to shrug and get on with his life. It takes quite the relationship and quite the special man to weigh what his wife says against their life together and the manner in which they otherwise treat one another, and his feelings about her.

Seems Japan's new prime minister, Naoto Kan, must be one of those special men. If so, it would appear his kindly disposition is directed toward his wife only. One reads he is referred to as "irritable Kan", reflective of his quick temper.

On the other hand, it is entirely possible that Mr. and Mrs. Kan have some extremely electric conversations, disquieting discussions with one another. Probing, piercing, darting and deflecting. And perhaps their emotional bond is sufficiently strong to accept as normal for them that situation, one which would most surely be destructive of most intimate relationships.

Nobuko Kan has published a book. Obviously a tell-all book, since she discusses her husband's abilities and spectacular lack of them for a public figure quite frankly. Only her opinion, of course, but who knows a husband better than a wife? Certainly not the husband, since most people see themselves as they prefer to.

"I wonder, 'Is it OK that the man is prime minister?' - because I know him so well," appears to be one of the little zingers to appear in her book, What on Earth Will Change in Japan after You Become Prime Minister? Either these two enjoy a solidly strident love-hate relationship, or they're quite simply immune to each other's barbs.

Quite unlike, on the face of it, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and his beautiful wife who is divorcing her husband because of his irrepressible public sexual imbroglios. One would naturally assume that Mr. Berlusconi hardly represents Prime Ministerial material, yet he has been voted into office more than once, his publicly unseemly peccadilloes notwithstanding.

"Many people in the current political world are light-weights. Things may turn out like this if you choose from among them. Kan likes to be in the field. I believe he is best suited to giving directions on the spot in support of somebody else." But wait, there's much worse, alas, for the poor man appears to have "no interest in fashion at all", and is incapable of cooking the simplest of meals "because of the bad education by me and his mother."

"Even as a family member, I could not give him even a passing grade for his delivery of a policy speech, or for the question-and-answer sessions after he became prime minister." Give the guy a break, he's only held the office for a month...? Sounds as though an otherwise-loving wife is completing a vendetta-curse.

Well, holy soya-sauce! Men in Japan, particularly men of Mr. Kan's vintage were never expected to do housewifely things. This kind of expectation is not normal in Japan, where the genders have their strictly separate roles, and male children are doted on by their grandmothers, their mothers, and usually their wives as well.

Mrs. Kan is quite obviously not a traditional Japanese wife; not for her humble paces behind her husband. "I will do what I can as his wife, but I'd also like to keep my own freedom", she says. No kidding. No problem.

As for Mr. Kan, he accords her the title of "officious opposition". (Just kidding, her hubbie-conferred title is actually "opposition in the home".) Long may they fondly bicker.

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