The term “have your cake and eat it too” is one that resonates throughout all Bermudian homes. But, particularly in the home of one Marc Bean, former leader of the Progressive Labour Party, it is hard to disavow the inclination that Christmas has come early.

In an age where Christmas parties are held as early as October, not only is the Bean family tree up, with lights, baubles and tinsel resplendent in their perfectly coiffured glory, but early Christmas presents have been opened as well.

Included among them is the greatest gift of all: a free shot at the big bad wolf, the enemy of the people (which, once distilled, means the “disadvantaged black man”), the perpetrator of mistruths and innuendo, the Antichrist. The Royal Gazette.

It is a difficult pill to swallow when played against a backdrop of numerous conciliatory approaches made to the former Leader of the Opposition that went unrequited.

In a continuation of the theme, the olive branch was again extended, but this time by the features arm of the company, its vehicle being RG Magazine.

On the face of it, Bean’s conditions for the interview in our very own publication were wholly unacceptable, especially given the freshness of his departure from the scene as one of the two or three most influential politicians in the country.

What most observers would want to know so soon after he left the PLP, and politics in general, is what Bean thought of the new direction the party is headed in, if indeed it is charting a new direction; what he thinks of David Burt, his former No 2, as the new leader; what happened in March (which was asked and answered); and will he be back (also answered, if not necessarily asked).

But, after a spell of humming and hawing, not only did Bean handpick the interviewer and the location of the interview, he also pertinently stood his ground in mandating that politics would be off the table — only to introduce politics right from the off by way of having a pop at his unsuspecting Christmas party host, who had been trying to get him on the guest list for the best part of two years.

Planting a Trojan horse, if you will.

To draw a cricketing analogy, for that is the sport that Bean is most aligned to, he has rolled the wicket to his satisfaction, has decreed that there be no toss and that he must bat first, and after he eventually snicks off to slip, as all overly aggressive batsmen are known to do, he takes his bat, ball and stumps with him.

Game over.

Well, not so fast, sir. You left a crumb.

Every form of malware necessitates an antivirus program, and this is ours.

For one, the belief that historically there has been an “unhealthy” relationship between the PLP and the Gazette is incredibly wide of the mark and does a grave disservice to the devoted men and women who commit day in and day out, often during dreadfully unsocial hours to provide balanced commentary for the Bermuda readership.

Any normal citizen up for pulling the double shift of sitting through debate of a private members’ Bill in the House of Assembly at 5am, having begun work at 9am the previous day? Thought not.

Generations of reporters and editors — the last of whom is the first black editor that Bermuda Press (Holdings) Ltd has employed, whose family upbringing is heavily intertwined with the original ethos of the PLP and labour movement, and who was a partially active then active participant in the 1968 and 1977 riots — cannot possibly have been stamped with the same DNA to bring down the PLP, and black people on a wider scale.

What is true is that the job of reporters, no matter their persuasion, is to ask questions — and sometimes they do not get answers. Because our job is to inform, it is impossible to disseminate information without occasionally taking the interviewee into uncomfortable waters — unless we are wed to the notion that the media’s role is merely to recycle press releases, which it most definitely is not.

The advent of social media does traditional media no favours in that regard, but there can be no mistaking which provides more meat on the bone.

There are any number of reasons for Bean’s declining relationship with the media; few, if any at all, have anything to do with us, though, but are rather the result of matters of public record that we have shone a light on.

The unseemly exchanges with Toni Daniels and Nandi Outerbridge led to Bean being branded a misogynist. That was not the Gazette doing the branding but those in the Bermuda community, some of whom are afforded access to opinion-editorials (Op-Eds) or Letters to the Editor, provided they are of high-enough profile to be deemed creditable and that they do not cross the line of acceptable commentary.

What we reported before, during and after the short-lived trial is irrefutable. The phrases “political whore” and “ten cent lick” were said and cannot be denied. Whatever the context, they are inappropriate comments coming from one who aspires to become leader of the Bermuda Government.

Unfortunately, Donald Trump has shown us that to be utterly misogynistic among other things is not to commit political suicide, but it is not the most wise thing to do when courting respect at home or abroad.

Bean, for what it is worth, is a proud man, loyal to his beliefs and is said to be a good and loving family man. But, notwithstanding that the Daniels case should not have gone to trial in the first place, he might have come out of this with far less of the stigma attached if only he had issued an apology.

For those terms are truly offensive; there is absolutely no getting around it. It is one thing to get caught up in locker-room banter, privately; quite another in a public arena.

Many people in Bean’s life know him not to be that guy, but he did little to sway those who are not predisposed to having his back to be of a similar mindset.

An apology to the women of Bermuda for any offence, real or perceived, might have done it.

That it was not, and has not been, forthcoming — not even in RG Magazine, long after the dust had settled — is not the Gazette’s fault.

It is not the Gazette’s fault that the still relatively new Editor was left looking at his unkempt fingernails, and artfully revealed Powerball Lottery tickets, for 45 minutes in mid-January waiting for an exhaustively planned meeting designed to clear the air and to provide the green shoots for forging a greater understanding.

That meeting never happened.

When Bean suffered his stroke in March, we were the first to reach out and to show compassion to him and to his family. Despite what had become a traditional stonewall of suspicion, we stuck to our task to best inform the people of Bermuda about the health of one of its leaders, and then paid greater-than-normal attention to the comments on our website — hastily deleting those that took shots at the man when he was down and in some instances banning the most ill-intentioned commenters altogether.

But the stroke alone did not lead to Bean leaving politics; it was more the seemingly non-stop ructions from within the PLP and the pressures they had on his family life that did.

When Walton Brown challenged Bean for the leadership only to be heavily beaten, Brown could not say the Gazette made him do it.

When Brown, Zane DeSilva, Rolfe Commissiong, Wayne Furbert, Kim Wilson and Derrick Burgess quit the shadow cabinet — with Glenn Blakeney retiring from politics altogether — no one could say the Gazette made them do it.

The Gazette did not put long-time social activist Eva Hodgson up to several unfavourable reviews of Bean — almost from the point he saw off Terry Lister to become successor to Paula Cox in December 2012 to not long before he departed. Those who know Dr Hodgson well would appreciate that 2 Par-la-Ville Road is the last place that was capable of pulling her strings.

Then, when Burt performed what is believed to be the coup de grâce by “quitting” as shadow finance minister, no one can say the Gazette had a hand in that, either.

And, for historical context, the Gazette was not in the background playing the role of Grim Reaper during the split that led to the creation of the National Liberal Party or the fall of Alex Scott or the blood-letting under the leadership of Ewart Brown or the more recent philosophical split between the young and the old of the party.

The only thing that can be proved to be historically correct is that the PLP has a very public history of infighting that is far removed from what transpired at the United Bermuda Party and the One Bermuda Alliance. But even in the cases of the latter, where there is smoke, there is inevitably fire — and The Royal Gazette will dutifully report on it.

Jetgate. Leah Scott. Shawn Crockwell. We were all over that.

Each of the parties has an axe to grind with the media when they cannot get their way, and then the public pile on, depending on which side of the fence they sit.

It is why journalists have to possess tougher skin than any politician — because they get it in the neck from all sides, and sometimes from within. For they are merely the messengers; there to be shot at by whoever is most aggrieved by an inconvenient truth.

Yes, there will be mistakes, and on occasion grave ones. But show us a news organisation anywhere in the world that does not err from time to time and we will have no option but to transport you back to the Stone Age.

Merry Christmas.