The latte set can clink its heritage Nation Review Leunig mugs in clear and suddenly ebullient conscience today: in the same soon-to-be-sanctified 24 hours the Rudd Government has wound back the watermark Howard-era measure of mandatory detention, while US-based purveyor of anti-coffee, Starbucks, is set to announce a series of store closures Australia-wide. 

Things could hardly get much better and while the opposition’s Are You Being Served spokesman, Christopher Pyne, might bleat about Labor going soft on the faceless hordes massed with murderous intent on our borders, others will see today’s announcement from immigration minister Chris Evans as further proof that in November last year something might, after all, have changed for the better.