I am a literary giant in Japan

1998 7 Month 12 Day.

Hundreds of lawmakers from various parties gathered in the National Diet Building of Japan in Chiyoda Ward for the Senate general election, which reelection takes place every three years.

The Diet of Japan is the highest authority and only legislative body in Japan, consisting of the House of Representatives and the House of Councillors.

The House of Representatives is referred to as the Lower House, with a total of 465 seats, and the Senate is referred to as the Upper House, with a total of 242 seats.

The predecessor of the Senate was the pre-war House of Peers, whose members were mostly royal relatives, descendants of the nobility, and members of financial groups. Previously, they were lifelong and never held elections.

In the post-war era, the Senate was modified into its current model: members serve a total of six years, the Senate cannot be dissolved during the term, and half of the members must be re-elected every three years.

Because most members of the Senate are still upper-class people in Japanese society, they are closely connected with various political parties and have a certain say in the election of the prime minister.

Therefore, in this Senate election, Ryutaro Hashimoto arrived early to cheer on the LDP members in order to attract enough votes in the subsequent prime ministerial election.

The elections for Japan's House of Representatives and Senate are nominally decided by voters, so the six major television stations broadcast the election live.

The day before yesterday, Kitagawa Yumeko, Saito Reina, Kawaide Shizuko and others finally flew back to Tokyo from Paris.

Under the pretext of helping Kitagawa Hide receive the Goncourt Prize, they traveled around Paris with the two little girls, Olivia and Victoria, and spent countless dollars on it.

After a crazy shopping spree, the women returned to Japan contentedly, and Kitagawa Hide finally ended his miserable life as a single parent.

“Now is the real good day!”

At this time, Kitagawa Hide was lying on the sofa, eating an apple peeled by Yumeko and watching the live election broadcast happily.

Kitagawa Toru and Kitagawa Midori were teased by Kawaide Shizuko and Saito Rena, so he didn't have to worry about anything.

Every time he sees other people coming to help take care of the two little ones, Kitagawa Hide has a deeper understanding of the saying "The more godparents a child has, the less you have to worry about."

Next time when Kimura Takuya, Kudo Shizuka and others come, let them adopt us as their godson or goddaughter!

Maybe in the future when the two little ones grow up, they will be able to make a name for themselves in the entertainment industry.

Just as he was lost in thought, waves of growls and exclamations came from the TV.

The cameraman was obviously an expert and quickly focused the camera on the face of Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto.

This old man, who was known as the "Swordsman Prime Minister" and had vowed to lead Japan out of the economic depression during his term of office, now had a sad face. He clearly had thousands of words to say, but when the words came to his lips, he couldn't utter a single word.

Kitagawa Hidetoshi could understand the distress in his heart.

After all, the prime minister's election was still an unknown. Even though he had made several irrational moves before, the Japanese economy had deteriorated again.

But he was generally very successful during his tenure.

In particular, the Ministry of Education, which was strongly supported by Ryutaro Hashimoto, has repeatedly promoted Kitagawa Hide, either openly or secretly, thereby winning the favor of many people.

It's a pity that there are not so many ifs.

At this moment, the huge Congress Hall, which was initially bustling with noise, turned into silence that lasted for several minutes.

And after the silence, the growls and roars of MPs and party leaders were heard.

After the cameraman finished filming Ryutaro Hashimoto's bitter expression, he attentively scanned a large number of Hashimoto cabinet members headed by him.

These former top politicians are now stunned and look pale, and it is obvious that they have not yet recovered from the election results.

"Dear~ Are the election results out? How is the situation?"

Yumeko, who usually doesn't care about politics, popped her head out from the kitchen.

Hearing the noise, Saito Rena and Kawaide Shizuko in the room also stretched their heads to look, curious about the election results.

"Big failure!"

Beichuan Xiu was eating melon seeds, looking contented, and replied with a smile,
"The LDP won less than a third of the seats. This is worse than when Prime Minister Hashimoto ran for office."

"Ah, you only won less than one-third?"

The first person to react was Shizuko Kawaide.

The Kawaide family is also one of the most prominent financial groups in Japan and usually has close ties with political parties.

As the head of the family, she was quite knowledgeable about politics, but the Kawade family had always had a mediocre relationship with the Liberal Democratic Party.

It’s not that she doesn’t want to have a good relationship with the Liberal Democratic Party, but that Japan’s largest political party basically cooperates with the top six financial groups.

The six major conglomerates are the six huge mountains pressing down on the Japanese land. Even if you are also a conglomerate, as long as you cannot reach their level, you can only become their subordinate nutrients in the end.

It is already very difficult to satisfy the appetites of these six giants, and the Liberal Democratic Party simply does not have the spare capacity to continue to contact other consortiums.

Therefore, small and medium-sized conglomerates such as the Kawaide Group often cooperate with slightly more disadvantaged parties such as the Socialist Party, the Komeito Party, and the Restoration Party.

The Senate's election rate will indirectly affect the subsequent prime ministerial election.

Less than one-third of the seats means that the Liberal Democratic Party cannot completely control the Senate, which gives other parties an opportunity to take advantage.

The culprit who caused this accident is obviously Ryutaro Hashimoto, who arbitrarily raised the consumption tax and forcibly deprived the people of their wealth in order to save the country.

Oh yes, the “rules” and “systems” that he wildly advocated were also resisted by the people deep in their hearts.

It just so happens that "Hanzawa Naoki" has become extremely popular during this period. Nowadays, almost all young Japanese people say "an eye for an eye, a tooth for an eye". Under this trend, even if the political parties do not agree, they will not stand up and go against public opinion.

It can be said that Ryutaro Hashimoto's downfall was a matter of fate.

Just witnessing this scene with their own eyes still made Shizuko Kawaide and others feel like they had witnessed history.

Ryutaro Hashimoto, who vowed to take over the baton from Tomiichi Murayama two years ago, was once considered the savior of the Japanese economy.

Unexpectedly, two years later, before the grass on the graves of those bastards of Aum Shinrikyo had grown tall, he fell down first and became a rat crossing the street that everyone wanted to kill.

At this moment, it is estimated that many citizens have begun to miss the peaceful old man who strongly supported Kitagawa Hide in clearing out the Aum Shinrikyo cult and fought against the US military who committed the evil in the Okinawa girl incident.

Of course, Tomiichi Murayama is too old, and he does not have the energy and physical strength to continue to support him in the re-election.

Who will be the next Prime Minister?

In any case, it is unlikely that Ryutaro Hashimoto will be re-elected.

“I don’t know who will replace him.”

Shizuko Kawaide had a headache.

Only then did she realize the benefits of Hide Kitagawa's continuous transfer of assets in Japan to overseas.

In fact, the combined assets of the Beichuan Group of companies, plus the Beichuan family's assets, are already very close to their He Chu family.

If we only talk about assets, the Kitagawa family can definitely be regarded as one of the emerging financial groups.

But Beichuan Xiu was very smart and transferred the assets of Beichuan Entertainment, Beichuan Network and other companies in batches to the United States, France, the United Kingdom and other places, and he himself could easily obtain dual citizenship.

Whether in terms of status or wealth in Japan, Kitagawa Hide does not look like an orthodox Japanese conglomerate that can be harvested.

This has led to the fact that political parties dare not easily ask Kitagawa Hide for money. But they dare to ask small and medium-sized conglomerates like the Ha De family for "protection money"!

As soon as the new prime minister takes office, it would be tactful to hand over a donation as soon as possible to ensure that the company will have smooth sailing in the coming years.

This is something that Shizuko Kawaide had to do.

"I think it will be Keizo Obuchi."

Kitagawa Hide took a few bites of the apple, hesitated for a few seconds, and finally told the boss the correct answer directly.

He knew that the big boss had to get closer to the political circles because of his family connections. If he could know the answers early, he could naturally respond early.

Every step ahead in this matter can save a lot of money.

"Hideki-kun, do you think Keizo Kobuchi will be the successor?"

Shizuko Kawaide looked suspicious.

If it were when she first met him two years ago, even with the idol filter, she would never believe such a weird thing.

But over the past two years, Kitagawa Hide has taught her how to be a human being many times. Now every time she hears Kitagawa Hide say something shocking and outrageous, she will subconsciously think whether there is such a possibility.

If she had listened to advice earlier during the financial crisis in 1997, she wouldn't have almost been removed from her position as head of the family and president.

So this time she asked several more times.

"Yes. I think Keizo Obuchi has the highest chance of being selected."

Kitagawa Hide knew why she looked so incredulous.

Because judging from his personal resume, Keizo Obuchi is the least likely to be elected among the candidates.

He comes from a political family, the Obuchi family. His father, Obuchi Mitsuruhira, was a member of the House of Representatives elected from Gunma County. Because his family's influence spread throughout Gunma County, he was re-elected as a member of the House for many terms. When he died of a stroke, he was still a member of the House of Representatives!
With the help of his father's connections and resources, Keizo Obuchi was elected as a member of the National Assembly in 1963 (at the age of 26).

His contemporaries include Ryutaro Hashimoto, Ichiro Nakagawa, Toshi Oide, Rokusuke Tanaka, Masayoshi Ito and Michio Watanabe.

These people are now well-known figures in Japanese politics, and some are his competitors.

Within the Liberal Democratic Party, he is known for his conservatism and was once a disciple of Takeshita Noboru.

Because he was the one who appeared on TV holding up the era name sign when the Heisei era was decided, young people teased him as "Uncle Heisei".

Keizo Obuchi is not ashamed of this title, and often jokingly calls himself "Uncle Heisei" when making public appearances.

Because of his character and behavior, he was also called the "mortal prime minister" during his term as prime minister.

Even throughout his entire term, he seemed mediocre and seemed to have no sense of existence.

Just like Shizuko Kawaide at this moment.

Many people simply didn't believe he would be elected.

It's because his resume is not worth mentioning compared with other candidates.

In the Japanese political arena, which is full of stars and has connections that are so deep that they make people's scalps tingle, he is truly a pure "ordinary person" protagonist.

However, it was this mortal protagonist who eventually became the prime minister with the highest evaluation and the highest achievements, and led Japan out of the depression.

"Why? Is it also based on men's intuition?"

Shizuko Kawaide sat next to him and looked at the TV in disbelief. Even the nosy cameraman was unwilling to give Keizo Obuchi too many shots.

It is hard to believe that he would be selected later.

"It's a man's sixth sense." Beichuan Xiu smiled. This was his usual excuse, but this time the matter was more serious, so he explained it briefly.

“If I have to explain why, even though they lost the race for seats in the House of Councillors, the LDP still has the most resources, and they can’t afford to lose the position of prime minister.

Therefore, after Hashimoto leaves, another insider will inevitably take over.

In this way, a few candidates can be eliminated for the most part.

Of the remaining few, he seems the least likely, but upon closer analysis, he has the best relationship with the bigwigs in the faction, has the most stable persona over the years, and has the best reputation. "

"The most important point is that he is pragmatic enough."

Kitagawa Hide added another sentence.

Given Shizuko Kawaide's intelligence and talent, this is enough.

Too many prime ministers before have given the public too many unrealistic expectations.

If the story of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" is told too many times, people will lose confidence in political parties.

Therefore, instead of letting someone who is good at making big promises come to power, it is better to let a doer give it a try.

Even if they fail, at least the practical people will not talk nonsense and make the people despair.

"I understand." Shizuko Kawaide nodded and said nothing more. Instead, she continued watching TV with him quietly.

On July 7, facing huge criticism from voters, Ryutaro Hashimoto held a press conference.

Under the countless flashes of the six major television stations, he announced his resignation as prime minister and leader of the Liberal Democratic Party.

His merits and demerits can only be judged by future generations.

On the same day, the first-day sales data of the July issues of "Beichuan" and "Xinwenxiang" released yesterday were released.

What is shocking is that after the completion of "Foolish Love", the traffic of "New Literary Image" has dropped sharply, and the sales volume has been cut by more than half both online and offline.

The situation of "Beichuan" is not much better.

After being taken care of by its biological father, Kitagawa Hide, when it was first published, it was left to roam free.

Mayumi Aso and others who were previously stationed at "Kitagawa" have also moved to "Dazhong", which is more suitable for them.

Without this group of top writers, the traffic of "Beichuan" has become much worse. Fortunately, there are still a large number of new writers attracted before, which barely support the sales volume and slightly suppress "Xinwenxiang".

However, the combined sales of the two titles on the first day of release were not as good as those of Mr. Kitagawa’s newly born son, “Da Zhong”.

However, recently everyone is paying attention to who the new prime minister will be, and not many people are paying attention to the situation of these two pure literature magazines.

The editors of the Beichuan editorial department gritted their teeth and called Beichuan Xiu for help.

Many of them were old editors from the "Gunzo" era, and were quite familiar with Rena Saito, so they also asked "Bungei" for help.

Just like banks that band together for warmth, publishing houses can only work together to get through the current economic downturn.

"Kitagawa" has another important value - the Kitagawa Literature Prize, which is highly related to it, is comparable to the Tanizaki Prize and the Akutagawa Prize.

After receiving the message for help, Kitagawa Hide said he understood and immediately arranged to publish a new book to bring some popularity to it.

On the other hand, the race for the new prime minister has not yet been decided. On July 7, the July issue of "Literature" was released first. The final chapter of "Tokyo People" attracted a large number of readers to buy and read! (End of this chapter)