The "Professional" moniker signals improved workload capabilities more than it does mobility/battery life. Essentially, Apple needs to change "MacBook Pro" to "MacBook On-The-Go" and just admit they don't have a Professional device.
When you think of a person with the title "computing professional", is your first thought, "Gee, I bet this guy spends very little time around power outlets"? No. While that may be true in some cases, that is not what the word "professional" means in the English language.
Professional means that I use it in the context of my profession. For me, the new touch bar pro is fundamentally better than the old for what I do because I need more battery life but I also don't want to pay a weight or size penalty for it. I get paid to get work done with my computer, so in that context I am a professional.
Historically the "Pro" in the MacBook line has referred to a device that is optimized for professional computer work. A journalist can certainly _be_ a "professional" and use their computer to get work done without requiring anything beyond a glorified tablet.
The kind of device required for a video rendering, database engineering, software development, or some other _computer_ based profession is inherently different and has stricter requirements on the capability of the device beyond mere portability and being able to pause Spotify with dynamic function keys.
When you think of a person with the title "computing professional", is your first thought, "Gee, I bet this guy spends very little time around power outlets"? No. While that may be true in some cases, that is not what the word "professional" means in the English language.