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That crazy result on Friday shows political lunacy may be the prevailing national mood. A man said to be a strong Premier - with each Minister hand-picked by himself - could not even muster the support of his own Cabinet on an issue he backs passionately. Yet the Premier took the measure to the floor and, predictably, lost.

When debating the Gaming Green Paper, a senior BDA politician bludgeons, beats and bashes Bermuda's church community, then expects that same community to cast votes for his party.

Overall, it seems 25 of the 36 members of the House of Assembly did not like the Premier's favourite lollipop flavour.

Surely the Premier, often touted as bright and intelligent, ought to have known that.

Surely he should have known the weight of opinion, especially within his own party, was against his lollipop.

Putting it all together, the timing of the debate was wrong.

The idea that there would be majority support for gambling was idiotic.

The clear demonstration of a divided Cabinet and a decidedly non-supportive Deputy Premier was unnerving.

Shooting

Because it was proven on Friday, I now know that Bermuda is led by an unsupported Premier, managed by a disarrayed Cabinet and that there is a clear disconnect between the ruling PLP party and broad and broader Bermudian reality.

With casinos and gambling issues behind us, where do we go from here and what is facing us?

What immediate threats are there?

Hospital cleaner George Lynch's shooting last Wednesday night is the first time a completely innocent person - a genuinely uninvolved bystander - has been killed in this now almost year-long killing and shooting spree.

The weekend Ice Queen shooting could demonstrate a paucity of witnesses.

This could make the matter of getting court convictions even harder.

So gun violence has ramped up one level higher and one ripple wider.

Over the past seven days, those two terrible facts have combined into one conclusion and consequence.

Gunmen can now believe that they will be able to shoot with the almost certain knowledge that they are unlikely to have anyone give evidence against them.

Gunmen will appreciate that they have won this round - which means we have lost.

Two things must happen - and happen now.

One is that individuals must find the courage to give evidence. Secondly, individuals selected for jury duty must understand that the concept of 'village justice' must apply.

Many Bermudians parrot the cliché that "it takes a village to raise a child".

The flipside of this is that it also takes a "village to maintain law and good order".

If you say the one, you must live the other.

Like the two sides of a coin, they are not inseparable.

If Bermudians want law and good order to prevail then we - all separate 50,000 of us but with each individual acting on the same principles - must see and tell.

If each one of us does that and if each one of us, when called upon, supports law and good order, we will act as a "village" and we will restore law and good order.

If we do not, we let the gunmen win.

If the gunmen win, their win will be temporary and disastrous.

Disastrous because our way of life will disappear and we - each one of us - will react with anger and further destroy a now tenuous peace.

After that, there will be a regime of tough love, where repressive law and heavy-handed policing will eventually restore a better semblance of law and good order.

Ashes

But this restoration will happen in the ashes of our destroyed society.

Then, from the ashes of what we now know, Bermuda's grandchildren - today's pre-schoolers - will have to try to reconstruct the world that their

grandparents once knew.

That world, as history will likely show us, will probably be Bermuda's half-generation 1970 to 2005.

For us Bermudians, the period after will be like the period that Europeans call "le fin de siècle".

Bermudians can wait around for the winds of fate to blow us.

If so, we are going where I have pointed.

Or, Bermudians can stand up and restore law and good order to our own, our very own, "village".

This is an issue for us individual Bermudians, not the politicians.

Bermuda's best politicians live in cloud cuckoo-land.

Bermuda's Premier is isolated in Alice's wonderland.

Last Friday's debate on the Gaming Green Paper at the House of Assembly proved that.[[In-content Ad]]

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