According to Japanese press, Construction and Transport Minister Nariaki Nakayama “intends to resign from his post to take responsibility for a series of verbal gaffes he has made since his appointment last week.” Nakayama came under fire for calling the nation’s biggest teachers union a “cancer” in the education system as well as previously referring to Japan as “ethnically homogeneous,” a comment that angered Japan’s indigenous Ainu population.

Did you get that? What a downhill beginning for the new Aso cabinet — just one week into its tenure and already one minister stepping down. Of course, Aso himself has been know for making gaffes:

• In 2007 people took offense when he said, “Regular-quality [Japanese] rice is sold at about 16,000 yen per [60-kg] bag here. But it can sell for 78,000 yen in China. Which, 16,000 yen or 78,000 yen, is more expensive? Even people with Alzheimer’s disease could understand.”
• Likewise, some international press was also taken aback when he said US diplomats in the Middle East would never solve the region’s problems because they have “blue eyes and blond hair.” The exact quote is something like: “Japan is doing what Americans can’t do [re: Japan-sponsored investment in the Middle East]. Japanese are trusted. It would probably be no good to have blue eyes and blond hair. Luckily, we Japanese have yellow faces.” Somehow, I think Japanese people more reason to be insulted by this than Americans.

Why does Aso put his foot in his mouth more often then Joe Biden? Political commentator Takao Toshikawa told the Japan Times that “Aso often uses blunt language to pass himself off as a common man, not gentry,” but Japan’s new prime minister is anything but a common man. His grandfather, Yoshida, led Japan’s postwar reconstruction; his sister, Nobuko, is married to Prince Tomohito of Mikasa, a cousin of Emperor Akihito. And his own wife, Chikako, is the daughter of the late conservative Prime Minister Zenko Suzuki.

High-class politicians pretending to be “normal” citizens is certainly nothing new in either Japanese or US politics, but as much as any candidate attempts to empathize with the average worker, I doubt that many voters are fooled by the show.