It’s mostly a ceremonial position, but the GG still retains the power to dissolve Parliament and approve a new government. This was last done in 1975, when then-Governor General Sir John Robert Kerr dissolved the Geoff Whitlam government and appointed Malcolm Fraser prime minister in his place.

Bryce was born in outback Queensland – a tiny town of 200 people – and is a prominent feminist and women’s rights campaigner [RAWR!]. According to this summation in the Sydney Morning Herald:

Now 65, Bryce graduated in arts and law from the University of Queensland at 21 while pregnant with the first of her five children. In 1965, she became the first woman admitted to the Queensland bar. Later she became the first woman appointed to Queensland University's law faculty, where she lectured for 13 years.

In the 1970s she was attacked by campus feminists in the university magazine Semper Floreat: "How can Quentin Bryce be a feminist and wear lipstick?"

Her overt involvement with the women's movement began when she joined the National Women's Advisory Council in the 1970s. In 1984 she established the Women's Information Service in Brisbane under the umbrella of the federal Office of the Status of Women. Three years later she was appointed Queensland director of the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission. In 1989 she became the sex discrimination commissioner on the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission.

In reading Ms. Bryce’s biography, the parallels to Nancy Pelosi are striking (if not perfect matches). Both mothers to multiple children and now grandmothers, both balancing work/life, and both assuming powerful roles later in their careers. Not to mention the fact that both are very attractive women!

Ms. Bryce’s appointment has been nearly universally hailed and is totally in character with Rudd’s style of governance. It is a progressive move in that she is the first woman G-G, and because she has been such a promenant activist, but it is also deeply traditional; she was, at the time of this appointment, serving as Queensland’s governor, the state-level equivalent of the G-G’s position. She speaks of her respect for the British monarchy, just as Kevin Rudd finishes an around the world diplomatic trip in which he said that he would be moving to place a referendum vote to make Australia a republic in the next 12 months, just hours before a formal audience with Queen Elizabeth.

It is also characteristic of a man who has demonstrated repeatedly since becoming leader of the Labor Party that he is perfectly comfortable in governing in the company of women. His Deputy Prime  Minister is Julia Gilliard (whom I’ve raved about before! I love the woman!), his government features four women in prominent ministry positions out of 19 – Ms. Gillard, who also has the education and workplace reform portfolios; Nicola Roxon, health and ageing; Penny Wong, climate change and water; and Jenny Macklin, family, housing, community services and indigenous affairs.  He is also forthright and proud of the fact that his wife, Therese Rein, a multi-millionaire entrepreneur who built her own company from the ground up. He jokes openly about being the "kept man" and says that the only way he could have made it in politics is if his wife had taken on the role of being the breadwinner.

So while my republican instincts [small R, people, small R!] can’t wait to see the end of the role of governor-general, I salute Ms. Bryce and couldn’t think of a more fitting, more empowering choice for the final governor-general in Australia’s history.