OT: Japanese Politician Tried to Bribe with Rice

The Fukushima I Nuke Plant accident may be changing the long tradition of vote buying in Japanese politics.

Yomiuri Shinbun (9/1/2011) reports that an assemblyman in Nara City in Nara Prefecture was privately asked by the assembly chairman in June to vote in a certain way in the upcoming election of the new assembly chairman. He refused. Then the chairman said to him, "What if I gave you rice for 5 years?" He declined, but recorded the conversation with his smart phone.

Well, rice was used as a medium of exchange in Japan until the Meiji Restoration knocked out the Tokugawa Shogun government. Rice may have become more valuable, particularly if it is radionuclide-free, than the fiat money they have in Japan. (Personally I think the assemblyman should have taken up the offer...)

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