"Solid, Solid as a Rock" and "Three Straight!" So said, so done. They were the prophetic 2007 General Election theme songs that had been reverberating from one end of Bermuda to the other, and most especially in and around Alaska Hall, the Court Street headquarters of the ruling Progressive Labour Party for the past six weeks.

We were inside party headquarters election night, tuned in to the Government channel CITV, ZBM and VSB monitors absorbing the atmosphere as Premier Ewart Brown and the PLP swept back to power for another five years while the Opposition United Bermuda Party had to accept defeat again as leader Michael Dunkley's gamble on challenging Patrice Minors, the former Health Minister in Smith's North, backfired.

The 2007 General Election will enter the history books as another battle of wits that the old guard, conservative historically white establishment sector of this multiracial community 'just did not get right'.

It was like the 1945 election when Dr. E.F. Gordon, known as Mazumbo and the father of the organized labour movement, outwitted and outsmarted the establishment, literally walking into his first House seat, and again in1953 when the the election theme song was When the Roll is Called Up Yonder I'll be There!

Mr. Dunkley, whose defeat caused tears to well up unabashedly on TV in the eyes of his aides, is questionably a good man at heart, a bright Bermudian. But he was a good man who was badly misled. He lost his seat and the country with a campaign that backfired.

Dr. Brown, who had been subjected to a sustained media blitz of what he called dirt and lies shovelled from every quarter of the establishment, was cool as a cucumber as he and his wife Wanda entered Alaska Hall to thunderous applause.

"Where's Patrice Minors?" were his first words. He bear-hugged her for taking out Mr. Dunkley. He had moved from his own safe seat in Devonshire misguidedly believing he was invincible. Mr. Dunkley styled himself as "the milkman who delivers". Someone at headquarters showed up with an empty milk carton from Dunkley's Diary, waving it aloft upside down to the chants of "Dunkley Dumped" and "Sour Milk" as the monitors revealed he had been beaten.

Zane DeSilva, who had taken out veteran hotelier David Dodwell, the former UBP Shadow Minister of Tourism, was cheered at every turn with claims "Zane zapped Dodwell".

There was plenty of wit, humour and jubilation inside the PLP headquarters, and much throbbing music outside where the crowd was swelling by the hundreds as candidates and supporters arrived from the 36 constituencies.

There was breathing room only on the Till's Hill sector of Court Street, and likewise on the southern end facing the floodlit stage in the middle of the street. The band played and the crowd lustily sang and danced to the hits of the night, Solid, Solid as a Rock, Three Straight, There's No Stopping Now, Thriller and Let's Get Together.

Our pictures show scenes inside Alaska Hall with Premier Brown smothering Patrice Minors under the gaze from the wall of labour heroes, Mazumbo and Wilfred (Mose) Allen; Premier with wife Wanda; and with his influential brothers, who respectfully head the island's biggest bank and Bermuda's fire services; election campaign chairwomanman Dawn Simmons looked on smilingly as PLP chairman David Burt embraced Belinda Cyrus; Labour and Immigration Minister Derrick Burgess and losing candidate LaVerne Furber; young Mah Torrie Wilkinson and Jordan Steede got the attention of the Premier; also in high profile were Hott 1075 Radio personality and his boss Scott Pearman. The mob outside headquarters excitedly awaited the arrival of the PLP candidates, including Zane DeSilva waving his flag, and Environment Minister Neletha Butterfield with her specially made, glittering green Gombey headpiece.