Much like the speeding driver who whines that police should be spending their time chasing bigger fish, William Pesek in Bloomberg posts a quite awful defense of Toyota’s newest (and soon to be ex-?) board member.
Japanese authorities could have chosen to confiscate the 57 pills sent to Hamp and schooled her on local regulations.
I’m sure if that had happened, we’d instead have complaints about “one law for the rich and well-connected”.
Instead, they decided to make an example of her in ways that could damage corporate Japan’s efforts to attract foreign talent and diversify its boardrooms.
Perhaps “efforts to attract foreign scofflaws” would be more appropriate here.
The coordinated raids smacked of retribution by the police for Toyoda’s standing by a foreigner over local authorities.
But it’s safe to say the police wouldn’t even have told the media if a male Japanese Toyota executive were allegedly involved in similar lawbreaking.
Japanese law enforcement has never even attempted to arrest officials at Tokyo Electric Power Company for negligent oversight of nuclear reactors at Fukushima, or managers at Takata for selling the company’s faulty airbags.
There are ongoing investigations with Takata (I believe) and various cases against TEPCO have not gone anywhere. Does Mr Pesek believe in due process? Or only for people he does like?
filled with insinuating questions: What medical condition does Hamp have that requires pain medication?
That seems like a perfectly fair question to me; is he reading “Is she a closet junkie?” into it?
Granted, whoever sent the oxycodone did Hamp no favors by appearing to hide it in a jewelry box.
At the time of publishing it had already been revealed that it was her father, and before that the news was saying she had posted it to herself.
Why would other prominent female executives come to Japan if they think a poor personal choice would make them a national scapegoat?
“Scapegoat” seems rather strong, but wouldn’t many countries cover a similar story prominently?
Having said all that, she has achieved sufficient notoriety to be the lead story on this week’s Shukanbunshun.
A chivalrous defense, but I’m sure he’s not going to get a blowjob out of it.
Unless she’s high on something.
Who needs Arudou when you’ve got Pesek?
I think he’s trying to be controversial and provocative, but he just ends up like Ann Coulter after a debilitating stroke. With her it’s all “Did she really just say that?”, but with him, it’s like you’re waiting while he gets the words out, trying to help him along, almost like one waits to applaud a constipated child for finally expelling their poo.
“Granted, whoever sent the oxycodone did Hamp no favors by appearing to hide it in a jewelry box.”
I guess that’s one way of putting it. Another might be something like, “Granted, whoever sent the oxycodone made it very obvious that this was a knowing and calculated attempt to circumvent drug trafficking laws by appearing to hide it in a jewelry box.”
Pesek is another complete racist douche who should not be given a platform. I suspect he would not be similarly forgiving of a Dutch CEO of a major US firm posting himself hash cakes, or (a few years ago, before they cleaned up the relevant laws) a Japanese executive posting himself kiddie porn after being stationed in the US just because those things are kinda okay in other countries.
Why are there so many morons?
NHL player Mike Richards was caught with oxycodone crossing from the US into Canada. The RCMP has started an investigation and Richards’ NHL team has terminated his contract for breach of conditions.
That’s what happens in the real world, William.
Aaaaaaaand she just resigned. Balance in the world has been restored.
When people other than Fackler* write about Japan in the NYT, the news gets written well, with little bias. Consider the final five paragraphs of NYT’s version of the ending of this story:
* I’ve noticed that when NYT considers a Japan story to be really important (that is, it has an important American connection — i.e. Japan’s interactions with the U.S. president), they tend to use journalists other than Fackler/Tabuchi.