Hulton Archive via Getty Images
7th December 1941: The USS Arizona sinking in a cloud of smoke after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor during World War II, Hawaii. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
トランプ大統領の能力/適性/功績と反トランプのエリート・メディア
President Trump vs. the anti-Trump elite media - ABC, NBC, CBS, New York Times, Los Angeles Times so forth.
*****
Newt Gingrich: Underestimate Trump at your peril
By Newt Gingrich | Fox News 12/29/2017
Would you believe that during his first year as commander in chief, President Trump hosted 43 world leaders at the White House. In total, he engaged or met with 149 world leaders in 2017. In 183 calls, the president spoke with leaders from 51 countries. Not exactly the lack of connectivity his critics expected a year ago.
When Trump won the election, his critics expressed great concern about his apparent lack of preparation and experience in foreign policy and national security.
Even Republicans in the foreign policy and national security establishment were deeply opposed to the Trump presidency because they believed he lacked sufficient knowledge to lead.
As I pointed out in my #1 New York Times best seller “Understanding Trump,” it is easy to underestimate the speed at which Trump learns. He listens constantly (I tell folks he always listens, but he doesn't always obey). He is endlessly curious about virtually everything. He built a worldwide corporate system, which includes hotels, office buildings, golf courses, books, wine, and a successful reality show. That took constant curiosity as he stretched again and again beyond the real estate skills his father taught him back in Queens.
It is easy to underestimate the speed at which Trump learns. He listens constantly (I tell folks he always listens, but he doesn't always obey).
One of the keys to the Trump learning system is his intuition about personnel. He has hired a lot of people in his life, and he has a pretty good instinct for defining what he needs. For his national security team, he brought in Marine four-star General James Mattis to be Secretary of Defense, Army three-star Lieutenant General H. R. McMaster to be National Security Adviser, and Marine four-star General John Kelly to be Secretary of Homeland Security. Kelly proved so effective, the president brought him in to be White House Chief of Staff. It would be hard to suggest that Trump has lacked competent professional military advice.
That may also explain why after years of the Obama team's failure to defeat ISIS, the new Trump team calmly and professionally destroyed its territorial base in less than a year. In fact, the Trump team was so efficient and competent, the victory has been virtually unnoticed in the anti-Trump elite media.
According to the Daily Caller, “ISIS retains historically low numbers of fighters, controls little territory and has lost much of its command and control facilities in Iraq and Syria. The vast majority of the military progress against the group occurred in 2017.”
1-2
Part of his success has been due to Trump’s ability and willingness to listen to leaders who host him when he travels. During the Arab Islamic American Summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, not only did the king of Saudi Arabia meet Trump at the airport, but he was at his side any time Trump was in public during his stay. The amount of time in which they had to compare notes and discuss Iran, terrorism, and Israel was significant and historic.
At the State Department, Trump wanted a major leader as Secretary of State, and as the CEO of ExxonMobil, Rex Tillerson seemed the central casting vision of a global leader. He had routinely made billion-dollar deals, and he was comfortable and experienced in dealing with world leaders. In the first six months of the new administration, Tillerson played an important role in calming fears until people around the world got to know Trump.
When the president made his controversial decision to move the Israeli embassy to Jerusalem, he had been talking with every major American ally in the region for weeks. No one was surprised, and their approving reactions have been muted by the elite media.
Trump's growth as a foreign policy and national security leader is something which deserves major acknowledgment in every year-end review of 2017. Donald Trump is not the president his critics feared. He is adroitly learning the trade of presidential leadership at a rapid pace.
P.S. On Wednesday, I wrote about how dishonest the media has been about Trump’s achievements. On Thursday, I found more confirmation. The elite media has written endlessly about the president’s supposedly low approval ratings, yet a recent Rasmussen poll shows that Trump’s approval rating was nearly identical to Obama’s on December 28, 2009.
----
Newt Gingrich is a Fox News contributor. A Republican, he was speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999. Follow him on Twitter @NewtGingrich. His latest book is "Understanding Trump."
2-2
日本国憲法と違ってアメリカの憲法は日常生活に生きている。それを証明するかように最高法規が保障する言論や発言の自由がオスカーの授賞式でもみられる。それは映画産業に限ったことではない。さまざまな公式の場でも公然と、政権の批判を含んだ政治的な発言が飛び交う。その発言内容により人間の価値が決まるかのように。
*****
Oscars host Jimmy Kimmel makes anti-GOP jabs after first professing positivity
By Tyler McCarthy | Fox News
The Academy Awards get political: A look at the jabs
From President Trump to Dreamers, the Academy Awards didn't shy away from going political. Here is a roundup of host Jimmy Kimmel's and other presenters' controversial comments.
The unique monster movie "The Shape of Water" took home the award for best picture at the 2018 Academy Awards on Sunday, as host Jimmy Kimmel and some stars brought things to a political place during Hollywood’s biggest award show of the year with jabs at President Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and even Fox News viewers.
Despite calling for a show filled with positivity, both the host and stars like Common, Kumail Nanjiani and Lupita Nyong'o made the movie-centric show political.
Kimmel began with an old-timey announcement in which he listed the stars in attendance, making his first political jab with “Black Panther” actress Lupita Nyong’o.
The Academy Awards tend to go a little long. In order to keep the telecast moving, host Jimmy Kimmel offered a unique prize to the winners, a jetski. Watch the funny moment.
“The stunning Lupita Nyong’o, she was born in Mexico and raised in Kenya,” Kimmel said at the top of the show. “Let the tweetstorm from the president's toilet begin!”
From there, the host launched into a positive monologue that poked fun at the whirlwind year in Hollywood, which saw the #MeToo and Time’s Up movements dominate the headlines and previous award shows. In commenting on the year’s diversity, he highlighted “Get Out” helmer, Jordan Peele.
“Jordan is only the first person in 90 years to be nominated for directing, writing and best picture for his debut film,” he said. “What a debut it was. None other than President Trump called ‘Get Out’ the best first three quarters of a movie this year.”
The final political jab came when discussing the gay romance film “Call Me By Your Name.” The host noted that the film, despite being an Oscar-nominated feature, did not score big at the box office.
“We don’t make films like ‘Call Me By Your Name’ for money,” he quipped. “We make them to upset Mike Pence.”
He lauded the actual Oscar statue, noting its age of 90 and taking a swipe at Fox News viewers in the process: "Oscar is 90 years old tonight, which means he’s probably at home tonight watching Fox News."
(In fact, according to Nielsen Media Research, the median age of Fox News is 65, meanwhile MSNBC is 66 and CNN is 59.)
1-3
Sam Rockwell accepts the award for best performance by an actor in a supporting role for "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" at the Oscars on Sunday, March 4, 2018, at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.
Pic=Sam Rockwell took home the Oscar for best supporting role for his part in “Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri.” (AP)
He also said the Oscar, "Keeps his hands where you can see them, never says a rude word, and most importantly no penis at all. He is literally a statue of limitations."
The host ended his opening monologue by explaining that winners are allowed to say whatever they want in their acceptance speech, encouraging people to comment on the recent shooting in Parkland, Fla. as well as other activism with regards to the #MeToo movement.
From there, the show launched into its first trophy of the evening, with Sam Rockwell taking home the Oscar for best supporting role for his part in “Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri.”
In later quips, the host commented on the recent departure of Hope Hicks from the White House, joking there was now a lack of hope at the White House.
Later, after the best documentary feature award went to “Icarus,” a film that portrays an unflattering look at doping in sports, particularly with regards to the recent scandal in Russia, Kimmel made another jab at the current political climate.
"I did it all by myself," Janney joked before launching into her speech, in which she thanked a bird.
“Now at least we know Putin didn’t rig this competition, Right?”
Kimmel wasn't the only one getting political throughout the night. Stars Kumail Nanjiani and Nyong'o took the stage to share a message of support to Dreamers ahead of announcing "Shape of Water" as the winner of best production design.
“Like everyone in this room and everyone watching at home, we are dreamers. We grew up dreaming of one day being in the movies. Dreams are the foundation of Hollywood and dreams are the foundation of America,” Nyong’o said.
“To all the dreamers out there,” Nanjiani continued. “We stand with you."
The next major award of the evening went to Allison Janney, who took home the Oscar for best actress in a supporting role for her work on "I, Tonya."
"I did it all by myself," she joked before launching into her real speech, which included a thanks to her bird co-star from the hit ice skating biopic.
In the biggest stunt of the evening, Kimmel wanted to thank moviegoers for their contribution to the industry. He enlisted the help of celebrity volunteers from the crowd to surprise a group of unsuspecting people at a nearby theater who thought they were seeing “A Wrinkle in Time.”
The starpower for the stunt included Ansel Elgort, Mark Hamill, Guillermo del Torro, Gal Gadot, Lupita Nyong’o, Emily Blunt, Armie Hammer, Lin Manuel Miranda and Margot Robbie
Kimmel and Gadot entered first before inviting the others in, armed with candy, a hot dog cannon and sandwiches.
“This is so much better than the Oscars,” Gadot said, before Kimmel noted that the theater had a stench of marijuana.
“It’s true,” she said. “Not that I would know.”
From there, Kimmel asked a random audience member to introduce Tiffany Haddish and Maya Rudolph to introduce the next category.
Dave Chappelle took the stage soon after to introduce a musical performance from Common and Andra Day to perform “Stand Up for Something” as an ode to American activism with politically charged lyrics about topics like the NRA, the Parkland shooting, immigration, feminism and Puerto Rico.
Pic=Common and Andra Day performed a song accompanied by activists at the 2018 Oscars. (Reuters)
2-3
As they sang, famed activists Alice Brown Otter (Standing Rock Youth Council), Bana Alabed (author and Syrian refugee), Bryan Stevenson (Equal Justice Initiative), Cecile Richards (Planned Parenthood Action Fund), Dolores Huerta (Dolores Huerta Foundation, United Farm Workers of America), Janet Mock (#GirlsLikeUs), José Andrés (ThinkFoodGroup), Nicole Hockley (Sandy Hook Promise), Patrisse Cullors (Black Lives Matter) and Tarana Burke (Me Too) took the stage behind them, with one holding up a Puerto Rican flag at the end of the performance.
After that, a pre-taped segment in which actors, directors and many more spoke about the diversity of the year and the rise of diversity and the “#MeToo” and Time’s Up movements. The segment was a complete about-face from last year, in which the awards were criticized for a total lack of diversity.
“Some of my favorite movies are movies by straight white dudes about straight white dudes,“ Nanjiani said in the video. ”Now straight white dudes can watch movies starring me and you relate to them. It’s not that hard, I’ve done it my whole life.”
"I remember going to see 'Wonder Woman,' sitting in the theater and hearing women cry at this big action extravaganza. And something clicked," Berry Jenkins said. "And I’ll say it, this is what white men feel all the time, and all these women are having this experience for the first time. I imagine it will be the same thing when people go see 'Black Panther.'”
From there, "Call Me By Your Name" was awarded best adapted screenplay right before Jordan Peele took home a historic trophy for best screenplay with "Get Out."
Soon after, though, the first female nominated for best cinematography, Rachel Morrison, lost out to Roger A. Deakins for "Blade Runner 2049."
From there, “Shape of Water” took home the award for best musical score and the animated film “Coco” won best song for “Remember Me” before the special musical tribute to the artists we've lost this year.
Eddie Vedder took the stage to sing Tom Petty's "Room at the Top" as images of departed actors, directors and others in showbusiness flashed on screen. John Heard, Martin Landau, Glenne Headly, Roger Moore, Sam Shepard and Jerry Lewis were given special mention.
From there, it was time for the biggest awards of the night, starting with best director.
“These four men, and Greta Gerwig,” Emma Stone joked while announcing the nominees, noting the only female-nominee in the category.
Guillermo del Torro ultimately took home the trophy, though.
He thanked everyone for giving him and everyone in showbusiness an opportunity to "erase the lines in the sand."
"We should continue doing that when the world tells us to make them deeper."
Pic=Guillermo del Torro took home the award for best director and best picture for "The Shape of Water." (Reuters)
The coveted award for best actor in a leading role came next, with Jane Fonda and Helen Mirren taking the stage to discuss the “#MeToo” movement. They announced Gary Oldman for his portrayal of Winston Churchill in “The Darkest Hour.”
“Put the kettle on, I’m bringing Oscar home,” he said to his 99 year old mother watching at home.
From there, Jennifer Lawrence and Jodie Foster took the stage to announce Frances McDormand as the winner of best actress for “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.”
While accepting her award, the star asked every female that was nominated in any category in 2018 to stand before making a plea to Hollywood to finance their stories and their projects. Her parting words for the academy were "inclusion rider."
When it was all said and done, Guillermo del Torro took the stage to thank the youth for showing how films should be done while he accepted the award for best picture for his film "The Shape of Water."
"This is a door, kick it open and come in," he said.
3-3
1年前の記事。安倍政権が早く実現を目指している憲法改正の「本当」の意図、本音が分かって面白い。天皇主権、戦前教育の強化、民主主義を廃止、日本国を戦前に復帰すること。現行の民主憲法をいま反古にすれば、権力が我がもの顔の天皇主権の過去に戻る舞台ができる。そこで一番助かるのは安倍自身。彼の権力を利用した違法行為の数々がいとも簡単に、愛国心の大義名分によってに葬ることができる、戦前のように。
School For Scandal
Japan’s Shinzo Abe Could Be Brought Down by Kindergarten Corruption
A scandal involving the prime minister, his wife, the Shinto cult Nippon Kaigi, and an elementary school in Japan may teach Shinzo Abe, at last, the need for humility.
03.31.17 1:00 AM ET Jake Adelstein/Mari Yamamoto/The Daily Beast
TOKYO, Japan―A right-wing elementary school, espousing the nationalist philosophy of the Shinto cult and lobby Nippon Kaigi and supported by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his wife, Akie, was supposed to have a glorious opening a few days from now.
But in an unexpected turn of events, the school, which was to be named after Shinzo Abe, may result in his political funeral.
What started as a small scandal only reported locally has in a very short tim, turned into a colossal headache for everyone involved.
Here’s how it happened.
A private school operator, Moritomo Gakuen, has run Tsukamoto Kindergarten in Osaka since 1950; the school currently teaches its children “an alternative history” of World War II, promotes Emperor worship, extreme patriotism and pre-war education.
Abe and his wife expressed support for the school.
For years, the head of the school, Yasunori Kagoike, had wanted to open a large elementary school in the area but couldn’t find a good deal on land―even as he raised funds in the interim.
The school ostensibly was to be named “Abe Shinzo Memorial Elementary” and, starting in March 2014, Moritomo Gakuen briefly collected donations under that school name. Akie, Abe’s wife, even agreed to be the honorary principal, but at some point in time asked for the school to be opened with a different name.
On February 9, the Asahi Shimbun, Japan’s second largest newspaper, with a relationship to Prime Minister Abe rather like the not-so-friendly relations President Donald Trump and the New York Times, revealed that the school had obtained the land from the Japanese government under dubious circumstances.
It then became clear that the school had bought the land, valued at over $8 million, for almost a tenth of its real value.
By any account, that’s quite a steep discount―even if the property had been devalued because of trash on the premises (as Mr. Kagoike claims).
It’s not clear how the Ministry of Finance, which was in charge of the land, determined the depth of the discount, because critical records have gone missing or been deliberately discarded.
What we do know is that the 8,770 square meters of land located in Noda-cho Toyonaka City Osaka was valued at 965 million yen ($8.7 million) by a real estate appraiser. However, according to Asahi Shimbun’s article on February 9, Moritomo Gakuen bought the land in June of 2016 for 134 million yen ($1.2 million), a fraction of the appropriate price.
As the school owner’s ties to the Abe administration have come to light, they have generated a lot of speculation that the prime minister or members of the Abe cabinet intervened on behalf of the school in order to seal the deal. It has also focused attention on the imperialist educational curriculum of the school, which Abe supports, and the racist comments of its administrators.
Those are rather more problematic. Even if the school scandal does fade away, the question will remain―should a prime minister who supports a school promoting racism really be the front man bidding for the 2020 Olympics to be held in Japan?
That is no small thing. A country might fail in its bid for such a distinction for many reasons. But to fail on account of racism? That’s not acceptable.
1-3
One thing that connects Prime Minister Abe and Kagoike is that they are, or were, members of the aforementioned religious cult Nippon Kaigi.
According to Mainichi Shimbun Kagoike was the Osaka branch leader of Nippon Kaigi until his departure from the group in January 2011, based on a statement on the group in March 2017.
It is unclear if Kagoike really has cut ties with the group since he was still wearing his Nippon Kaigi badge at a press conference on March 10 this year.
Shinzo Abe is also a member, as are more than a dozen ministers in his cabinet.
The group wants to rebuild the military, claims that Japan’s goal in World War II was to “liberate” Asia from western colonialism, and that Japan must free itself from the democratic constitution created after World War II and notions of “human rights.”
The elementary school was going to be Japan’s first and only Shinto elementary school, which would “respect Japanese propriety and nurture patriotism and national pride.”
According to the weekly magazine Bunshun, Akie Abe had visited the Tsukamoto Kindergarten, run by Moritomo Gakuen, three times in the past and had been in her own words “deeply inspired” by the educational principles of the institution which included the recitation of the “Imperial Rescript on Education” issued in 1890.
Akie Abie also admired the students’ participation in Self-Defense Force related events and their practice of worshipping at Ise Shrine.
Here, at last, would be a place where children could learn “alternative history” and build a bright shining future for Imperial Japan.
Of course, the school has had some issues―such as passing out flyers with ethnic slurs towards Koreans and Chinese and ordering children to cheer Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
***
It seems odd that Akie Abe would support such a nationalistic school, when she is remarkably liberal in other areas like LGBT rights and a need for Japan to integrate marijuana into society.
Bunshun writes that her newfound Shinto spiritualism might explain the attraction of the school for her.
Supposedly, Ms. Abe is actively deepening her relations with spiritual advisors and Shinto communities while she visits Shinto shrines across the country speaking out and making some strange proclamations like “(my husband) was destined to be prime minister.” She says, “Fate is God given.” And she also says, yes, “Marijuana is a necessity to experience the traditional Japanese way of Shinto. Bringing Japan back means bringing back its pot culture.”
Okay. If her overall goal is to “bring back the good old Japan,” her activities do align up to a slightly confusing point with her husband’s views.
So the kindergarten must have seemed like another great way to advocate for her ideal Japan, until the word got out about the shady way the land had been purchased.
And since then other problems have emerged.
On March 23, Kagoike said in sworn testimony before the National Diet that he had received a one million yen donation directly in cash from Ms. Abe with the words “from Shinzo Abe” on the envelope in September of 2015.
This happened during Akie’s visit to the kindergarten where she gave a speech. She ordered her aide to leave the room before doing it, he claims.
Prime Minister Abe has vehemently denied allegations about such donations and furthermore any relation suggested between himself or his wife and the discounted real estate the school received. He went as far as to claim that he would “step down as prime minister and as a Diet member if such facts existed”.
The whole scandal seems to have shaken him badly and the ostensible glow from his post, “I met Trump and he liked me,” has faded away completely.
2-3
It’s not just Abe’s judgement that’s at issue. He may have broken the law.
The real estate donation, and the lack of documentation for it, could be a violation of Japan’s political funds laws.
If Prime Minister Abe exerted influence on the Ministry of Finance to lower the estimated price of the land, he could be guilty of violating Japan’s Laws Prohibiting Mediation Remuneration.
In simpler terms, it’s illegal for a public official to use his or her power to benefit a third party for a reward. Bur if there was any reward for Abe in the deal, it’s highly unlikely that it was monetary but rather “spiritual.” Such is his sympathy with the school’s educational philosophy.
***
After testifying at the Japanese Parliament, Kagoike held a press conference at the Foreign Correspondent’s Club of Japan. Kagoike distributed to the press a fax from Akie Abe’s secretary to him dated November 17, 2015, 17:04 hours, which seems to demonstrate that she was lobbying on his behalf to have the Ministry of Finance lower the price of the land and give him a better deal on the site of his future school.
Did she also speak to her husband about it? No one is sure.
When pressed by a reporter as to whether he believed that Prime Minister Abe had directly intervened on his behalf in the land deal, Kagoike minced his words: “I believe that people around him may have taken it upon themselves to do it…possibly [several] bureaucrats in the Ministry of Finance.”
The word he used to explain the shady circumstances, sontaku, is difficult to translate directly, but it’s about reading the unspoken feelings of another and acting upon them.
The mainstream Japanese media is surprisingly uninterested in the details of why the land was discounted and has been focusing on tangential issues―such as Abe’s handpicked Minister of Defense, Tomomi Inada, lying about her connections to Kagoike.
The reluctance of the major Japanese media to focus on the land discount is perhaps indicative of another issue.
Takashi Uesugi, one of Japan’s best known independent investigative journalists, summarizes the problem eloquently.
“Most major Japanese media firms also have their headquarters on land bought from the government―with the help of the Ministry of Finance―at steep discounts. Looking too deeply into the Moritomo Gakuen problem would be opening a Pandora’s box.”
At present Kagoike has withdrawn his application to open the school. The land will return back to the government. But maybe if he’s lucky, when the heat dies down, he’ll get to open it somewhere else.
As for Prime Minister Abe―yet another scandal involving a private school operator with ties to him and dubious government land dealings has emerged―this time in Okayama Prefecture.
Abe really seems to have problems with education.
Who can forget that Abe’s previous handpicked minister of education had strange ties to the yakuza and a chain of sexual massage parlors, some with school girl themes?
Perhaps it’s time for Abe to step down, chill out, get high with his wife and enjoy Japan’s traditional pot culture, commingling with the gods. That would be good for him and probably good for Japan.
3-3