Tokyo gubernatorial stupidity: Naoki Inose

Ah Japanese politicians. The outside world must seem so confusing to them. Yes, I'm thinking of Tokyo Governor Naoki Inose's remarks on Istanbul's Olympic bid (go ahead and click that link, the picture is great: looks like they're trying to use the mics to push him over backwards*).

Its almost embarrassing to read what he said, and it shows an outspoken ignorance of the outside world that would get you fired from most jobs in the public eye over here. I find it a bit funny that not so long ago he was warning against complacency over winning the Olympic bid.

Well, its obvious that Tokyo has now screwed its Olympic bid to Pluto and back, but I doubt that will do much to mar Inose's reputation at home, considering his predecessor was completely outrageous, and still was able to resign on his own terms.

But for my part, I'm not going to lose all faith in Inose-sensei. Even if he is a complete pratt, reading his wiki page (Japanese) gives the sense of a reformer, and if nothing else, he played a part in the rescue of several people in the 2011 Tohoku earthquake.

That said, the guy needs to get a bookshelf for that ¥4.5 million toilet of his. Perhaps he can then learn something about how Istanbul was a major seat of civilisation for hundreds of years (maybe thousands of years including the other civilisations that existed there. Hell, I need that book too)...

EDIT: Somehow, Tokyo managed to win the 2020 Olympic bid, though I suspect it has more to do with this person, than Inose.

* I hope you'll forgive my being light-hearted. As much as anything this post is just an excuse to use the word "gubernatorial"** which I can't imagine a single way of pronouncing that doesn't sound ridiculous.

** a word so strange to me that I initially thought it was a cute Japanese corruption of some other word that doesn't sound stupid. If only English were so sensible...