Kikko-san and the Current Rumor Mill

The cover article for the Feb. 4th Asia-edition of The Economist was titled "Saving Japan from the shadows" - referencing the idea that the old secret, cabalistic Japan had risen up again to swallow the New Capitalist Horie. The editors assure us all that Japan's economy was gangbusters and Horie was indeed a crook, but the tone seems to imply some heightened worry about the actual transparency of Japanese economic and political matters in the Koizumi era.

Here on the streets of Tokyo, there is certainly some serious paranoia a-brewin'. As some of you may know, right after Livedoor was raided in late January, one of the company's high-ranked executives named Noguchi was found dead in Okinawa. The police immediately labeled it a suicide, and the sudden 100% increase in dead executives made Livedoor look guilty as sin. But the coroner could never confirm the death as a suicide, and this has spurred the shukanshi into trying to connect the dots behind what really happened. After a month of new doubts about the original story, I would go as far to say that almost no one in Japan still believes Noguchi killed himself EXCEPT for the Okinawa police, who - despite obvious irregularities in the circumstances - have essentially closed the case.

So who killed Noguchi? The latest theory floating around media types is that Noguchi met his demise at the hands of an Okinawa-based criminal syndicate - the same one behind the success of a certain top-selling rock-rap musical act also from Okinawa! And just today, my reasonably-rational colleagues at school were telling me that the LDP was using their allies at Japan's largest ad firm to suppress the story from getting into the mainstream media. Supposedly, this thing goes all the way to the top politicians...!

I'm not sure where these crazy stories are coming from, but perhaps Kikko is one specific source. Kikko is your normal girl with a blog, a make-up and hair artist who just happened to break a huge story on the construction industry scandals before the shukanshi could even get to it. No one knows who "Kikko" really is, but she currently has the hottest blog in all of Japan. Today she's railing against the new Denan law.

I know my love of conspiratorial drama massively erodes my credibility, but my attitude is that historical precedents give us absolutely no reason to give the benefit of the doubt to organizations like the LDP, the media cabals, and others tied up in the kuromaku. It's best not to jump to conclusions, of course, but what proof do we have, for example, that traditional ties between the yakuza and the LDP suddenly disappeared one day after many. many years of stability? It may seem ridiculous to start pointing fingers to cover-ups and diabolical schemes, but it's just as ridiculous to ignore the numerous cover-ups and diabolical schemes already etched in the last chapters of our history books.

In this age of blogs and greater access to taboo information, the mainstream media's refusal to dig deeper into the most obvious news stories is ironically eroding their credibility now too. Who knows what really happened to Noguchi, but when no one with any kind of authority steps in to set the record straight, even the freelance makeup artist can determine the sway of public beliefs.