Japan: Verbal gaffs and Japanese politics

Blogger Ken writes about verbal gaffs in Japanese politics [ja]. Ken uses the example of a recent statement by Minister Nariaki Nakayama, which the blogger says became a gaff because Nakayama offended both the teachers union and citizen groups opposing expansion of Narita Airport. Ken argues that verbal gaffs are characterized by being value judgments and not factual statements, as in Nakayama's statement about Japan being “ethnically homogeneous”, which came on the heels of the Ainu being recognized as an indigenous people, and thus was not taken as a fact but as a personal criticism.