When you spend your career going for the top, striving for power, it’s not so easy to leave it all behind. Especially not when you help put a second party in a position to strike at power, setting the stage for two-party democracy for the first time. . . well, ever, really, in Japan.

Ozawa offered his resignation on Sunday. No one in the DPJ was willing to try to fill his shoes. They were all really sorry they made him feel as though he’d lost their confidence. They were unprepared to call his bluff.

Ichiro Ozawa will remain president of the DPJ.

The Kyodo story:

Democratic Party of Japan President Ichiro Ozawa expressed his intention Tuesday to retract his offer to step down and instead remain in his post as head of the largest opposition party, DPJ Secretary General Yukio Hatoyama said.
Hatoyama told reporters after meeting with Ozawa for a second day to try to convince him to stay in his post that the DPJ leader told him, ‘’I feel like I have made an embarrassment of myself, but I would like to give it one more go.'’
The development comes just after Ozawa’s aides said no conclusion was reached following the talks between him and Hatoyama as well as some other party executives.
The DPJ is scheduled to hold a joint plenary meeting of its lawmakers from the House of Representatives and the House of Councillors on Wednesday afternoon concerning the situation, DPJ sources said.
Hatoyama said earlier in the day that he believes Ozawa will agree to continue as party chief if all DPJ lawmakers were to show their intention to realize a change of government, adding that the idea of forming a coalition with the ruling Liberal Democratic Party has ‘’completely vanished.'’
Ozawa said Sunday he will resign to take responsibility for the confusion caused by discussions last week with Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda over a grand coalition with the LDP, which Fukuda heads.
On Monday, the DPJ’s executive board unanimously agreed to ask Ozawa to retract his decision to quit, and the vice presidents of the party met separately following the emergency board meeting and similarly agreed to try to persuade Ozawa to remain.
In addition, the DPJ Standing Officers Council decided Tuesday to ask Ozawa to resume his work as party president so that the party can fight to win the next general election and try to take over power from the LDP, according to Hatoyama.
DPJ executives also spent Tuesday afternoon briefing groups of party lawmakers from both houses of parliament about recent developments to secure their support in asking Ozawa to stay as DPJ head.
Some lawmakers said in the briefing sessions that they want Ozawa himself to explain the situation as they do not understand the meaning of the concept of a grand coalition or policy consultations with the LDP toward such a framework, according to participants.
Others said it would be disadvantageous to the party if Ozawa were to step down as he has worked hard with the aim of achieving a change in government, while still others were against asking him to remain in his post.
Meanwhile, Ozawa met with former Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata, who serves as the DPJ’s top adviser, in the early afternoon and told him he will make a final decision after hearing what the DPJ lawmakers had to say in the day’s group briefings.
Hata was joined by former top adviser Kozo Watanabe and Vice President Hajime Ishii, all of whom have been on close terms with Ozawa since the time they were lawmakers in the LDP.
Ishii told reporters after the meeting that Ozawa seemed worried that there may be some DPJ lawmakers who are against having him continue as party chief.
Ozawa’s sudden resignation announcement Sunday came after he and Fukuda held talks as respective party heads twice last week, mostly on a one-on-one basis, including discussing the idea of a grand coalition on Friday.
Ozawa took the idea back to the DPJ executives Friday night, thinking it was worth beginning interparty policy consultations over, but they rejected it. He said in announcing his resignation that he took the rejection by the executives, whom he had appointed, as tantamount to a vote of no confidence in him.
==Kyodo

(I don’t like doing that, but they take stories down after mere minutes sometimes, so linking to them is pointless.)

As you were.

(Editorial comment to come. Unless commenters beat me to it.)