stupidity

1. Announce massive stimulus package and tell everyone that you're handing out money. Don't say how much everybody is getting. Also mention under your breath that you plan to hike the consumption tax in a few years.
2. Eventually decide that ¥12,000 will be given per person with an extra ¥8,000 for each person 65 or older or 18 or younger, except for high-income households.

Some snark on the Web for a Friday. Updated 12/15

• October: The Japan Tourism Agency is established to attract more foreign tourists to Japan

  December:

A few snark-worthy items in the news.

Talk A Lot English textbook: Foreigners at strict Japanese high schools can't speak Japanese properly, ride motorcycles, have long hair, dress like bums, carry knives, and bring beer and scary pets with them.

Something light for the end of Golden Week.

Towards the end of January, the contents of stating that instructors who were absent from work stood to lose their jobs.

If Nova ever digs itself out of the hole it's in, it will be because of idiot consumers like Hikaru Maeda:

This story has been making the rounds in Japan-related forums and blogs:

Thousands of Japanese have been swindled in a scam in which they were sold Australian and British sheep and told they were poodles.

Flocks of sheep were imported to Japan and then sold by a company called Poodles as Pets, marketed as fashionable accessories, available at $1,600 each.