While we’re all stuck in the primary wars, there’s this little thing that’s creeping forward:

www.afr.com/…

The economic minister in one of the key countries has just resigned. The World Bank has highlighted the highly variable results for members. And after a split in Labour ranks, even the Maoris are now at odds across the Tasman.

Eight years after the United States seized on an obscure New Zealand-based trade agreement as the basis for a renewed Asian foreign policy, the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade group will embark on yet another byzantine path to conclusion on Thursday [in NZ, where it is already Thursday as of posting time-HY] when the member countries actually sign up at a ceremony in Auckland.

Yes, despite a hard-fought formal agreement among trade ministers in Atlanta last October, the signing ceremony will kick off a new round of domestic political battles. Most members must now go through a formal ratification process in their national legislatures of the international treaty needed to legally enforce the provisions in what is often promoted as a 21st century trade deal because of the way it has gone beyond conventional tariff cutting.