Obama's In Asia With Pacific Trade Partners, But The Pact Depends On His Sales Job Back Home

[Purveyor]

MANILA — The victory lap President Obama wants to take in Asia this week over a sweeping Pacific trade deal stands to be dampened by frustration among some of his chief allies back home: organized labor.

Leaders from the 12 participating nations that signed off on final terms of the Trans-Pacific Partnership last month appeared together here for the first time Wednesday to mark the deal. The Obama administration counts the pact as a centerpiece of its strategy of rebalancing U.S. military and diplomatic resources toward Asia, where China has become increasingly assertive.

After waving to cameras and posing for a photo, the group sat down to plot its next steps toward enacting the deal, with Obama aware that his domestic sales job, perhaps the most difficult among the group, is the linchpin to its success.

“Execution is critical,” the president said of what he again called the “the highest-standard and most progressive trade deal ever concluded.”

“This is not easy to do,” he noted. “The politics of any trade agreement are difficult.”

more...

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-obama-trade-labor-20151118-story.html

[Hydra]

1. My vote: Kill it with fire! n/t