Japan’s ruling party has secured another overwhelming victory. But beneath the spectacle lies a troubling mix of demographic denial, fiscal illusion and rising geopolitical risk.

Landslide victories in Japan’s lower house elections are no rarity in Japan, which is rather strange since the US-supported and initially-financed, ruling Liberal Democratic party has held power almost without a break since World War 2. It only suffers defeats when its corruption reaches levels that even the conservative Japanese voter cannot tolerate. Then we see landslides.

I was once part of one, for the opposition, in 2019. But it soon collapsed.

This election was surprising in that the LDP, with its pre-election slush funds, leadership crimes and discovery of ugly reliance for votes and money on a rapacious South Korean cult-religion, had reached unsurpassed levels of corruption.Yet with its coalition partner, the oddly and somehow sinisterly named Japan Ishin (or ‘Innovation’) Party (the name Ishin, meaning renewal, is a throwback to Japan’s prewar political naming), it has won a landslide victory.

That tells........

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