On 23 November, 2007, Crikey ran this little tidbit in our tips & rumours section:

Democratic party hostesses in Washington are already writing Kim Beazley’s details into their address books, so they can get in the first invitations to the Labor party’s new Ambassador to Washington…

Speculation about the former Labor leader taking up the position as US Ambassador began almost the moment he ceded to Kevin Rudd as head of the ALP.

But it wasn’t to be — Prime Minister Kevin Rudd “shut the door on giving out overseas ambassadors’ postings to former ALP notables”, wrote Alex Mitchell in Crikey in January 2008.

By July 2008, Beazley was appointed as the new Chancellor at the Australian National University.

The announcement that current US Ambassador Dennis Richardson would come home in November 2009 to head up DFAT started fresh speculation, with Phillip Coorey saying the decision was centring on Beazley, with Bob Carr as a second option.

Today, it’s been revealed that Beazley will indeed head to Washington as the next US Ambassador. Maybe he’ll even get to meet the real Karl Rove.

And in a smart nod to bipartisanship, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has also announced Brendan Nelson as Australia’s new ambassador to the European Union and NATO.