Hatoyama's subliminal message to DC

Japanese language is said to be difficult to master and even

more when you have to interview a Japanese politician who is

going to play with words being in the Chinese pronunciation

(Prime Minister Aso) or giving a rather vague and fuzzy

explanation not to answer to a reporter question. My

Japanese colleagues are well trained to the exercise but it

seems that it is creating a wave of dissatisfaction overseas.

Take this issue of an essay of Yukio Hatoyama, new Prime

Minister to come around mid September after his historic

victory in the general election August 30th, essay originally

published in the September edition of the Japanese monthly

journal Voice and titled "My Political Philosophy."

It appeared Aug. 27 on The New York Times' Web site under

the headline "A New Path for Japan."

Hatoyama's views about Japan as "equal partner relation with

US," are already drawing criticisms from the West and the

media reported: "Distorted' in translation? Hatoyama denies

Op-Ed piece expresses 'anti-American' view" (Japan Times)

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20090902a5.html

Quotes:

"Naoki Nakazawa, managing editor of Voice, said that so far

he has not received any reprint requests by any of the U.S.

papers that published the essay and was unsure if this

infringed the essay's copyright, which belongs to Hatoyama.

"Then you would realize that it's not about anti-Americanism,

but about 'yuai' (fraternity)." Hatoyama's secretary, Daisuke

Haga, said they were also unaware that the essay was

circulating in U.S. publications. He urged people to read

the entire essay, which is posted on Hatoyama's Web site in

Japanese, English and Korean. End of quotes.

Fraternity... Just a precision: I asked a teacher to confirm

to avoid being lost in translation in Japanese and the answer

is you can use: Nakama, Hakuai, Yuai. Now it looks like we

are not any more talking about translation but about

political intentions.

Something uncomfortable here?

This time it is not a Japanese politicians legion which is

going to DC but the opposite. U.S. Defense Secretary Robert

Gates will be Tokyo in October to discuss the U.S.-Japan

military alliance with the new Prime Minister Hatoyama to

talk about the 50,000 troops deployed across Japan and the

security treaty.

Hatoyama's Democrats have said they want to re-examine

Tokyo's relations with Washington and bring to Japan a more

independent stance, while keeping U.S. relations as a

cornerstone of their global policy...

Something chili's going on. Small steps here, small steps...