Japan P.M. Visits Obama

Washington will be visited today by a leader more unpopular than former president Bush: Highly unpopular Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso will be the first foreign leader to meet President Obama at the White House. According the recent polls, seven out of ten Japanese disapprove of his government, and in recent weeks Aso has shouldered blame for the rapid decline of the country’s export-heavy economy and the public derision of his economic recovery plan—$130 cash handouts to everyone in the country. When his (now former) finance minister Shoichi Nakagawa appeared drunk and bumbled his way through a news conference recently, the public blamed Aso, who has also been criticized for his lavish evenings out.