＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49）さん / X
In April 2019, the governments of the United States and Japan began negotiations to conclude a trade agreement. In addition to starting negotiations on eliminating or reducing tariffs on goods, mainly agricultural products and automobiles, the two sides also agreed that the “digital trade” sector, in which information and services are traded over the Internet, will be subject to negotiations, but the U.S. is expected to strongly press Japan to correct its trade imbalance in order to “eliminate its huge trade deficit with Japan”!
１．Japan-US Textile Negotiations
There will be intense exchanges like the former Japan-U.S. Textile Negotiations, and I would like to ask the Japanese government to make a firm effort to protect our national interests. The Japan-U.S. textile negotiations were held over a long period from 1955 to 1972. The negotiations in Washington in 1970 were particularly famous and were called the Japan-U.S. Textile Friction. This was the first Japan-U.S. trade friction after the war.
At the 1969 Japan-U.S. summit, Prime Minister Sato secured a commitment to return Okinawa to Japan and told President Nixon that export restrictions would be imposed. After the signing of the Okinawa Reversion Agreement in 1971, Japan compensated the textile industry in exchange for the restrictions, which were settled in 1972.
２．The future of this trade negotiation
Under the catchphrase “America First,” U.S. President Trump has launched a series of policies that are not typical of conventional U.S. presidents, such as “withdrawal from the TPP and protectionist trade orientation,” “stricter immigration policy by building a wall with Mexico,” “excessive support for Israel,” “front-loaded negotiations with North Korea,” “problematizing the trade deficit with Japan,” and “problematizing Japan’s low share of U.S. military spending in Japan. He has also launched a series of policies that are not typical of a conventional U.S. president.
Prime Minister Abe has emphasized the strong relationship of trust with President Trump, but he is by no means a lenient partner to Japan in trade negotiations; on the contrary, he is a very tough negotiator.
However, I hope that the Japanese government will take a firm stance and conduct negotiations steadily and persistently on the basis of “free trade principles,” regardless of whether President Tran is forced into an impeachment trial or reelected.
Along with increased imports from the U.S., I would like to see more efforts to promote exports of Japanese agricultural products. I would like to see not a “shrinking equilibrium” but an “expanding development.
I also hope that Japanese companies will actively promote “product price increases. I hope that this will help to moderately restrain the volume of exports, and at the same time, help to improve the “labor distribution ratio” of workers employed by Japanese companies.
Also, although the issue is different from trade negotiations, we need to make efforts to clear up President Trump’s misunderstanding about “the share of the cost of U.S. forces in Japan” through a reliable Secretary of Defense and Secretary of State. This is not an easy task, since there were several ministers who resigned after saying, “The president is not very smart…”