{"id":435,"date":"2007-12-06T08:37:50","date_gmt":"2007-12-05T22:37:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/2007\/12\/06\/some-welcome-optimism\/"},"modified":"2007-12-06T08:37:50","modified_gmt":"2007-12-05T22:37:50","slug":"some-welcome-optimism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/2007\/12\/06\/some-welcome-optimism\/","title":{"rendered":"Some welcome optimism"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A friend who is a public servant was telling me how, in her department, it feels as if a great weight has been lifted since the change of government.\u00a0 I certaintly feel a great relief to have done with the awful Howard era.\u00a0 So far the signs are promising:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-admin\/Prime%20Minister%20Kevin%20Rudd%20yesterday%20signed%20the%20instrument%20of%20ratification%20of%20the%20Protocol%20in%20the%20first%20official%20act%20of%20his%20new%20Government.\">Rudd ratifies Kyoto Protocol in the first official act of his new Government<\/a>: We now have a high profile portfolio for Climate and Water, as well as one for Environment, and the promise of the issue addressed as all-important.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/7.30\/content\/2007\/s2109452.htm\">Jeffrey Sachs<\/a>, speaking on the 7.30 report: &#8216;Australia has given me a huge boost of optimism with this wonderful election result and the leadership that the new government is showing. How could anybody be a pessimist when we see what Australia&#8217;s doing now on taking on the challenge of climate change&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/news\/books\/pm-puts-culture-in-spotlight\/2007\/12\/05\/1196812824450.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1\">Prime Minister&#8217;s Literary Award<\/a>  : a thumping big new award for writers. The Arts portfolio is now being handled by a senior cabinet minister, while Sports moves to the outer ministry and a junior minister.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.theage.com.au\/news\/opinion\/exciting-defining-times-for-women\/2007\/11\/30\/1196394620994.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1\">Exciting, defining times for women<\/a> :<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>But if I had to nominate a flashpoint when I felt my body jolt upright with exultant anticipation and gushing love of country, it actually came courtesy of the first lady-elect, Therese Rein.<\/p>\n<p>When Kevin Rudd walked on stage to claim his place as Australia&#8217;s 26th prime minister, the woman he calls his life partner stood with her hand in his beside him, and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=VFBvyjAAfeI\">shimmied<\/a>. She leant forward and, with a cheeky glint in her eye, shook her shoulders from side to side and shimmied. And it was glorious.<\/p>\n<p>If ever there was an image to differentiate the old from the new on election night, it was Therese Rein&#8217;s shimmy. As surprising as the revelation that I&#8217;ve placed a shimmy above Australia electing its first female deputy prime minister and Maxine McKew&#8217;s &#8220;in heaven no one&#8217;s blind&#8221; moment might be, the shimmy said it all.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Yeah! It was at that point that I sat up and said &#8221;Oh! I think I am going to like her!&#8221;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A friend who is a public servant was telling me how, in her department, it feels as if a great weight has been lifted since the change of government.\u00a0 I certaintly feel a great relief to have done with the awful Howard era.\u00a0 So far the signs are promising: Rudd ratifies Kyoto Protocol in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[24,313,312,1358,63,314],"class_list":["post-435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-australia","tag-government","tag-kyoto","tag-politics","tag-rudd","tag-women"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paZhI-71","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritsdancing.com\/sdblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}