News in Japan: Buzzed Finance Minister

The front page of yesterday's local newspaper featured the story of former Finance Minister Shoichi Nakagawa, who showed up to a recent G7 meeting in Rome looking and sounding rather intoxicated. Nakagawa blamed his condition on a large dose of cold medicine, but under increasing pressure he resigned his post on Tuesday.

(Wow, third time's a charm? The youtube videos of this are dropping fast.)

The Mainichi Daily News covered the story here, along with a long list of Nakagawa's past drunken blunders. My favorite quote is "When he painted in the eye of a daruma doll -- a ritual often performed by election winners -- he put too much ink on the brush and ended up giving the doll black tears, flustering those around him." That sounds like something I might do sober.