Will a New Leader Help?: As the LDP gears up to pick a new chief, one of the contenders is a serious reformer

April 24 is when the race for the presidency of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) will conclude in a vote by party Diet members and local party chapters. The winner will, as head of the LDP, automatically become Prime Minister and inherit the management of the developed world's most dysfunctional economy. The contest has come down to two candidates. In one corner is the blustery Junichiro Koizumi, who wants to get the economic pain over right away. His chief rival is self-assured former Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto. He is pitching a go-slow approach. The LDP's biggest political challenge is to convince skeptical voters that it remains the best party to lead Japan out of the morass. Can the LDP make the wrenching changes needed to head off the opposition?