Hatoyama Denies Anti-Americanism; No Response on Whether He Eats the Sun for Breakfast

Just as I’d predicted, the new Japanese Prime Minister’s New York Times op-ed did not win him friends in the United States, although it may indeed have influenced people, and quite possibly drawn some concern from President Obama. Only not as Hatoyama might have hoped, since he’s now forced to backpedal and deny that he’s anti-American.

At moments like this, you learn to appreciate Lee Myung Bak, with all his faults.

Speaking as one whose emotions are easily whipsawed by the disapproval of sexually frustrated Saudi 14 year-olds, Gallic anarcho-syndicalist slum squatters, and the scions of disgruntled alumni of the Axis Powers, Hatoyama’s words wounded me deeply. Wasn’t all of this was supposed to change when we elected Barack Obama? Is there nothing we can do to teach the world to sing? Can’t we be loved by all the little children of the world? No? OK, we’ll take another dozen of those Massive Earth Penetrators, then.

It gets worse. If you found it jarring that Nancy Reagan coordinated her the presidential calendar with the advice of an astrologist, you really don’t want to read this. Also, if he’s eating the sun for breakfast, that would be a rising sun, which is either deeply unpatriotic or a harbinger of Operation Chinpokoman.

Still, it’s no more fantastic than the idea of Hatoyama steering Japan into the leadership of a new Co-Prosperity Sphere Asian Union.