Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has managed to lose four cabinet ministers in a fortnight, setting what may be a new world record for political hemorrhaging in a developed democracy. Analysts are calling it a 'once in a generation' political crisis, which is Japanese diplomatic speak for 'holy hell, this is bad.' The corruption scandal has hit Japan's ruling party with the precision of a bullet train, leaving Kishida desperately trying to salvage his government's image while ministers flee like salarymen catching the last train home.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno and his colleagues have been walking past Kishida with the kind of awkward energy reserved for avoiding eye contact with your boss after a company scandal. The long-ruling party is discovering that decades of comfortable governance doesn't necessarily prepare you for the harsh realities of actual accountability.