Japan tells Turnbull he's on his own against Trump

No wonder Japan has abruptly put Turnbull in his place, rejecting his idea to have China take the place of the US in the now-crippled Trans-Pacific Partnership that Trump rejects:

Japan has swiftly rejected a push by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to press on with the doomed Trans-Pacific Partnership, reiterating its view that the deal is "meaningless" without the US.

President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw the world's largest economy from the agreement prompted Mr Turnbull to suggest China could be brought in as a replacement to save the deal.

Trump's win has completely exposed Turnbull, who seems disconcerted, upset and very slow to adjust. Not nimble at all.

And what was he thinking? That Japan would really welcome giving arch-rival China such a leg-up, politically and economically, and at the expense of its most crucial ally?

But consider the full list of Turnbull's mis-steps in dealing with the Trump phenomenon.

Turnbull did not reach out to Trump before the election. Turnbull treated Trump's win as a disaster, holding a press conference in which he urged Australians not to panic. Turnbull is clinging to the Paris agreement to cut our emissions, even though Trump's promise to scrap it makes it a meaningless sacrifice for us. Turnbull even pushed ahead with his deal with Obama to have the US take our boat people (in exchange for something he won't reveal), even though Trump seems certain to scrap it.

And now he's turning to China to fill the US space after Trump tore up the Trans-Pacific Partnership, when Turnbull should instead be eagerly offering the US the kind of bi-lateral deals Trump clearly prefers.

Show some agility, PM. And don't slavishly follow the ABC line on Trump. Make Trump's win work for us. And work for conservatives especially.

UPDATE

Terry McCrann is amazed at Turnbull's denial of the Trump reality:

HAS Malcolm Turnbull slept through the last three months or so?

For he seems to be the last person on the planet who has not woken up to the fact that not only did Donald Trump win the US presidential election all of 11 weeks ago, but that he has actually moved into the White House and taken up where Barack Obama left off signing executive orders...

Read my lips PM (and minister) — the TPP is “dead, buried and cremated”...

The 12 countries that were intended to comprise it made up around 40 per cent of the global economy. But nearly two thirds of that — about 25 of the 40 percentage points — was the US. And Japan is the lion’s share of the rest...

To say that the PM and minister were “grasping at straws” by suggesting yesterday China could be brought in to replace the US would be charitable.

Could someone in the bureaucracy explain to the PM and minister that the TPP was designed to specifically exclude China because of its state-controlled economy? To “invite” China “in” now, would be to invite it into a “not TPP”...

Bad enough and just as pointless are the PM and minister’s desperate efforts to keep flogging the TPP dead horse, much worse are the way it speaks to the broader and utterly depressing Turnbull ineptitude...

The TPP response was effectively the third strike — of non-acceptance of the Trump reality — and the PM should be out.

The first came on the day after the US election when Turnbull went out of his way to ratify the Paris climate agreement that Trump had said he would walk away from just like the TPP.

Turnbull should have been walking away from the Paris agreement, not embracing it — not just to accept the Trump reality, but to walk back from the insane policy which will increasingly hurt every Australian to say nothing of the national economy.

The second was his abysmal performance at the single most important dinner any PM speaks at each year: the Business Council annual dinner just days after Trump won.

Again, Turnbull should have seized on the timing to up the ante on his — quite simply, pathetic — company tax proposal. Trump says he will take the US down to 15 per cent; Turnbull and Morrison say we might go to 25 per cent, in 10 years.

Then came Tuesday’s “considered” response to the TPP icing.

Back last April I wrote that Turnbull was a complete dud. Would anyone now seriously deny I was being too kind?