国家の品格

The ex-Yakuza fellow turned Buddhist-with-a-U.S.-liver, and main subject of the book, Tokyo Vice, has written his own book. Tokyo Subculture has just posted an interview of the kindly old man. As is not unusual for the possibly right-leaning (certainly not left) fellows of his type, he is also somewhat concerned with the lack of patriotism and national pride among Japan's young.

I was pleased to see that he admired Shigeru Yoshida and Nobusuke Kishi for hanging tough when thousands opposed the 1960 U.S.-Japan Security Treaty. I believe that there were some folks of his profession who assisted with crowd control during those troubled times. Unfortunately, despite everyone's best efforts, "I like Ike" was not an especially popular slogan among the trouble-making demonstrators, and then-President Eisenhower's trip to Japan was canceled. The treaty is still around though.

I was even happier to see that not only has Mr. Goto found religion and written a book, but that he also shown a taste for fine literature by mentioning the classic by Masahiko Fujiwara, The Dignity of the Nation.

August 25: Thanks to Durf for pointing me toward The Dignity of the British Nation. I somehow missed it back when Fujiwara's tome came out, but it seems that Britain is in many ways similar to Fujiwara's Japan. Masahiko even hinted at that in his book.