Writing on the Upper House election

Here is a collection of essays and articles on tomorrow's Japanese election (including some shameless self promotion of my own writing):

THE POLITICS

Japan Echo - Rethinking the House of Councillors
http://www.japanechoweb.jp/diplomacy-politics/jew0101

Jeff Kingston - Can anyone govern Japan?
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/07/09/can_anyone_govern_japan

Karel van Wolferen - Japan's stumbling revolution
http://www.japanfocus.org/-Karel_van-Wolferen/3341

Ampontan - Are Japan's DPJ really democrats?
http://ampontan.wordpress.com/2010/07/02/are-japans-dpj-really-democrats/

Observing Japan - The meaning of the Upper House election
http://www.observingjapan.com/2010/06/meaning-of-upper-house-election.html

Japan Echo - Challenges for Prime Minister Kan
http://www.japanechoweb.jp/diplomacy-politics/jew0107

Richard Smart (sorry!) - Change Postponed?
http://metropolis.co.jp/features/the-last-word/change-postponed/

FEATURES

Jake Adelstein - The Last Yakuza
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/wopj.2010.27.2.63

Mari Yamaguchi - Japan split over maiden names and foreign suffrage (nice, short link here,)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100708/ap_on_re_as/as_japan_maiden_names;_ylt=AmT1505kmhLUmcJEN6PpK7unxQ8F;_ylu=X3oDMTJyNmtibWg4BGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwNzA4L2FzX2phcGFuX21haWRlbl9uYW1lcwRwb3MDNARzZWMDeW5fcGFnaW5hdGVfc3VtbWFyeV9saXN0BHNsawNqYXBhbnNwbGl0b3Y-

Yuri Kageyama - Tweets in Japan fall silent in election campaign
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jEvQQwU747lVuVwNYS4_GaGy1yTgD9GL2PIO0

Ourmani Nabiko - Crap. Left the headline till last and ran...
http://ourmaninabiko.blogspot.com/2010/05/crap-left-headline-till-last-and-ran.html

Richard Smart - Sounding out on the election (sorry again)
http://www.cnngo.com/tokyo/life/sounding-out-election-408969