VIDEO: Obama and Turnbull talking about John Key

New Zealand’s flag waving at the Apec summit in Manila is having the desired effect, even if the man waving it hopes at the next Apec in Lima he’ll be waving the black and blue Kyle Lockwood design that many detractors have likened to a Weetbix box.

But what’s wrong with that, most of us grew up wolfing down the rectangular, dry biscuit at breakfast?

The current flag flutters from the sleek, highly polished black limousine that Teflon John Key’s been allocated as his siren wailing motorcade makes its way around the deserted highways of Manila as the Aging Politicians Expecting Cocktails go from one glass clink to another.

We know that Key’s made an impression on the numero uno at this summit - Barack Obama. He had a 20 minutes chat to him, but it wasn’t a meeting, or what they quaintly refer to as a pull aside. That conjures up an image of one leader tugging at the other’s suit sleeve, but in reality they’re more formal than that.

So Teflon John had a walk aside with the American President as they made their way between functions in the cavernous hotel corridors. Again that conjures up an image of Barack Obama’s giraffe like legs striding along the carpet with Key struggling to keep up.

They chatted about terrorism with Obama telling him ISIS had to be dealt to but not in a way that’d end up making if difficult to extract themselves from, like in Afghanistan or Iraq. Neither of those countries have benefitted much from American jack boots on the ground, other than seeing Saddam Hussein swing even though they encouraged him to take the Iraqi President’s job in the first place.

But Key’s bounding along the corridor with Barack clearly the word golf was mentioned. They won’t get a chance to play during the downtimes at the East Asia Economic Summit in Malaysia, where they’re heading to today, but Key reckons they could do a round in Hawaii over Christmas.

And even if our flag is the dead spit of the Aussies Barack can certainly tell the difference between the PMs.

Malcolm Turnbull scored a bilateral with the big cheese and as they were sitting there in front of the world’s media, posing for the cameras Obama leaned in and a low voice told the Australian he was going to invite him to the White House next year. Turnbull clearly couldn’t hear above the deafening clacking of the cameras and asked the President to repeat himself.

Turnbull nodded and Obama immediately announced to the media the Australian leader had agreed to come to his home in DC next year which just goes to show how much planning goes into these things.

Obama and Turnbull were sitting next to each other at the TPP talks and they were overheard singing Key’s praises. Key adopted an awe shucks, uncomfortable reaction when told about it.

Was he humbled? He was asked. He thought about it for a moment and said Barack was a good bloke.

Perhaps these aging politicians have been over indulging on the cocktails!