OK, so they kissed.

Photographers snapped it, headline writers revelled in it (“Sealed With A …”) and rival broadcasters collectively howled at the parliamentary feed as it cut away from Kevin Rudd and Prime Minister Julia Gillard embracing over the successful passage of the carbon tax through the House of Representatives to instead capture footage of Christopher Pyne hyperventilating from glee at the spectacle of said kiss.

Yes, in the context of their relationship, that embrace is quite momentous, considering the two can’t usually manage to look each other in the eye.

But not quite as momentous as, say, passage of the actual Clean Energy legislation.

We are staring down the barrel of a price on carbon in this country.

It’s a done deal in the Senate, all of which means that after years of political dithering too tiresome to repeat here, a minority government has delivered on a carbon price — a plan once floated to the public (albeit in a desperate attempt to reclaim office once again) by one John Winston Howard.

His self-declared love child has promised to repeal the carbon tax in government … made a “pledge in blood” in fact.

This is an unqualified victory for the Greens. After being locked out of negotiations the first time around, and slammed by both sides of politics in the process, after enduring all manner of public insults from the government they’re working hand-in-hand with while privately securing important new initiatives such as the independent Climate Change Authority and after watching a government claim all the glory despite their previous efforts at cocking it up, the Greens are now entitled to crow a little.

So take a moment, people.

And look up. The sky has not yet fallen in.