As I alluded to in my Irish season preview, the wife of the new Japanese prime minister, Miyuki Hatoyama, holds some very bizarre beliefs.  Not only does she believe that she’s been flown to Venus on an alien ship, but she also claims to have known Tom Cruise in a previous life (he was Japanese, of course) and to regularly  “eat the sun”.  Plus, she considers herself a “life composer” and has written a book entitled Very Strange Things I’ve Encountered.

These revelations come on the back of a piece that Prime Minister Hatoyama wrote in advance of his party’s inevitable election victory last week.  In the piece, Mr. Hatoyama basically argued that Japan would be better served by turning its back on globalization and turning even more insular as it looks to generate social harmony.

If we look back on the changes in Japanese society that have occurred since the end of the cold war, I believe it is no exaggeration to say that the global economy has damaged traditional economic activities and destroyed local communities.

Clearly, Mr. Hatoyama either doesn’t quite understand the nuances of international trade or he’s intentionally (and blissfully) ignorant to the obvious benefits of globalization as he tries to play to his political base (note his Democratic Party of Japan is decidedly leftist, this for a country that is already heaps more socialist than China).  Someone should remind Mr. Hatoyama that the only reason Japan currently ranks as the second-wealthiest country in the world is because it mastered an export-led manufacturing model that turned out to be wildly successful.  Such a model would’ve failed miserably in the absence of globalization.  Plain and simple.  Think about the success companies like Toyota, Honda, Canon and Sony have achieved over the years, and now try to imagine such successes in the absence of an ability to export those companies’ products overseas thanks to a globally competitive marketplace.  And now try to imagine the millions of Japanese jobs indirectly and directly supported by those companies (factory workers eat at restaurants which buy food from vendors who buy food from farmers and so on).

So not only does Hatoyama seem to embrace an economic theory devoid of reason, but he’s also married to a woman who appears more than slightly off-kilter (one’s choice in a spouse surely speaks volumes).  After years of ineptitude, it doesn’t look like Japan has any reason to believe its political leadership will turn the corner and start making sense anytime soon.