“I’m gonna be in the government! It’s gonna be grrreat!“

The high-pitched, quintessentially nerdy, but boyishly excited exclamation resounded in my head with as much attached to it as any quote by better-known men every time I saw Mr. Enoki’s outsized face staring up at the camera with all the excitement any ten men could muster for the local politics of Shinjuku beckoning, “Vote for me. Vote for me,” from the campaign posters plastered up on the walls of old houses, dry cleaners, the train station, and just about everywhere else near my Naka-Ochiai apartment. I have since moved away, but I remember every detail of that poster - his big, goofy grin, the comically large glasses that remain his trademark, the odd touch of including pictures of the assembly hall at the Shinjuku ward office.

Most of all I remember the exclamation. I remember it as though he actually said it, which, of course, he didn’t. And if he did say something like that, his voice probably doesn’t match his memorable look.

Mr. Enoki is now a legend in my household and among those willing to listen to me extoll the virtues of my favorite politician - how he cares for the old folks, how he makes sure the schools have new basketball backboards in the gym, but, most of all, how he seems so excited about serving the voters of Shinjuku and, by extension, at a time now past, maybe even little ol’ me. The lucky ones, those who can endure an overexcited monlogue on the most superficial aspects of the career of a local pol, get to hear the most famous quote he never said.

Once upon a time, as the then-Mrs. DeOrio-to-be (since made honest) and I were waiting to cross the tracks at Nakai station, an interminable exercise made more frustrating by the fact that it would have been only too easy for a man less law-abiding to just hop up onto the platform from the crossing, I happened to glance over my left shoulder to have my evening take on a whole new meaning when I uttered what Mrs. DeOrio still regards as my greatest quote.

“I’mgonnabeinthegovernment! It’sgonnabe grrreat!”

It was jo so obviously what Mr. Enoki would have been saying had his poster been able to speak.

Politicians from Boise to Bangkok, from Montgomery to Montevideo, from Topeka to Tokyo all share a few traits - they all try to manage their images, they all try to strike the right balance between gravitas and levity, the formal and the casual, tradition and modernity. And they all come off as insincere. Politicians in democracies the world over can lean Left or Right or stake a claim in the principled Center, but it’s obvious that whether they advocate taxing and spending or cutting taxes, xenophobia or multiculturalism, the most important thing they are going to do for their nations or their towns is get power. No principle is as important to the politician as his holding office.

Are you a lifelong proponent of free trade? Are the benefits of free trade as obvious to you as the need for water? Do the voters want protectionist policies?

Right, start hitting that protectionist message. The most important thing is to win.

This is why Enoki Hidetaka’s brightly grinning, thickly bespectacled visage is such a relief. Why what he proposes is secondary. Why you want to believe him. Why he is a master of branding.

“目印めじるしくろぶちメガネ。” The brand of the big black specs. It’s right there under his ridiculous posed photo. It’s so obvious as to be guileless.

Mr. Enoki isn’t passionate about the children’s future. He isn’t excited about the business ooportunities in Shinjuku. He isn’t all about the environment. Oh, he may care about those things, but you can see what really turns him on in every photo. Mr. Enoki loves the Shinjuku assembly. He loves being in the government. He’s not so different from any other politician in this regard. It’s just the visibility of it, that he doesn’t try to hide it, that gives him his appeal.

Scandal, dishonesty, self-interest, greed, lust, and more dishonesty to pretend that these things aren’t going on. Then a good helping of disrespect in expecting people to buy the BS. It’s cynical, I know; perhaps even a little unfair. But that’s what I see when pick up the paper and turn on the computer pretty much every day for another look at Japan’s interesting, but discouraging governmental behemoth.

It’s at those moments that I think of Mr. Enoki and think, “It’s gonna be great.”

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