AS a general rule memory idealises the past. When personal history is called to mind it is almost always brightly glossed with romanticism. The mental pageant of long-ago scenes is invariably haloed in the rosiest of hues. But when individuals have been the victims of betrayal, when a friend or a leader or a creed has not only failed but actively deceived them, precisely the opposite holds true.

When the mental rewind buttons are pushed, when the original encounters with a feckless friend or ideology or faith are replayed in the theatre of memory, they cannot help but be seen in the dismal light of later deceptions.

The original introduction into a faithless partnership is then viewed with embarrassment, revulsion and a sense of perverse irony. The foolishly misplaced trust, the abused and unreciprocated faith and the resulting sense of outrage all intrude upon the memory.

The ruling passions of the time, passions that set in train events leading to ultimate disenchantment and disappointment, are not recalled with fondness. Rather the shadows of future treachery darken memories of what had seemed to be moments of gratification. For the innocent and ebullient enthusiasms of the past, when viewed in hindsight, are revealed as having cloaked the assassins' soon-to-be brandished daggers.

In politics such profound, soul-shattering disillusionment is an occupational hazard faced by all true believers at one time or another. The unswerving conviction in the correctness of a cause or individual is almost always rewarded with betrayal and derision by those the adherents place their faith in.

Hence the deep, instinctive reluctance of some political devotees to admit they have been gullible, to concede their ideological gods have both failed and abandoned them. The most loyal disciples cling to the great illusions that have deceived them in precisely the same way drug addicts refuse to forego the needle, even when they are only too well aware it only causes confusion and dependence. The pain of withdrawal is seen as too onerous compared to the fleeting comforts that addiction still provides.

In Bermuda the Premier has an ever-diminishing praetorian guard comprising such wilfully blind loyalists, zealots who stubbornly refuse to concede what is now obvious to almost everyone else. The faithful still uncritically parrot his hollow platitudes. They march in lockstep in the twin-track procession he leads feting Independence and a yet-to-be-written Social Agenda as the catalysts of the "New" Bermuda that remains a stale catchphrase rather than an embryonic reality.

But their numbers grow thinner by the day. So do their arguments.

The vast majority of those Bermudians who allowed themselves to be temporarily convinced this Premier would provide more substantial leadership than his hapless predecessor have long since abandoned this illusion. They have dropped their fervour for "The Man" and put their once-dazzled critical faculties through the political equivalent of a 12-Step Programme.

A desultory talent for phrase-making is no longer seen as an acceptable substitute for conviction, direction and passion, those essential political attributes this Premier lacks along with anything remotely resembling a compelling vision for Bermuda's future.

These disillusioned and disappointed former supporters are still working on the anger-management aspects of their recovery from the eruption of Scottmania that followed on from the toppling of Jennifer Smith. And most have yet to fully process all of the bitter emotions produced by what amounts to the Premier's betrayal of their collective confidence.

Bermudians are, rightly, outraged at having been whipsawed, at having their emotional and political investment in a Premier they believed to be a reformist, iron-toothed new broom yield only negative returns. His accidental Premiership, temporarily buoyed by the island-wide closing-of-ranks brought about by Hurricane Fabian, is now sinking quite as fast as a battleship anchor.

And his declining fortunes are not the result of Bermudians "wanting change but being afraid of changes" as the Premier nonsensically but all too characteristically commented last week. His attempt to parry mounting criticism of his drifting, wasteful administration with what amounts to a blame-the-victim putdown is entirely typical of a man who increasingly views accountability, responsibility and whole swathes of objective reality with bemused contempt.

clich?s he invokes when challenged increasingly sound like they are drawn from some kind of English-As-A-Second-Language translation of the . Presumably intended to convey an oracular profundity, the brusque, stereotyped jargon he relies on never actually addresses the increasingly serious matters to hand. In fact, his gnomic pronouncements, clumsily customised with steel-plated defences and shock-absorbing buffers, seem expressly designed to crash through such irritating considerations as answerability and responsibility.

Notwithstanding the Premier's protestations to the contrary, Bermudians are in fact desperate for changes.

They want changes in a failed education system that condemns too many young Bermudians to the shadowy margins of this society. Changes in a criminal justice system that has resulted in lawlessness reaching almost epidemic levels, machete-toting gangsta wannabes pursuing their blood feuds in the streets, at sports fields and in schools. Changes in a political culture that both encourages and rewards corruption.

Bermudians want changes in a political leadership that will discuss the prospect of Independence in London but not with them. Changes in the granting of grace-and-favour public contracts that benefit a small elite of hangers-on but not the larger population, suggesting the new-fangled concept of "economic empowerment" is little more than old-style, jobs-for-the-boys croneyism. Changes in the seemingly next-to-non-existent oversight procedures in civil service accounting that allow bureaucrats to steal public funds in amounts any bank robber or Enron executive would surely envy.

Above all, Bermudians desperately want profound changes in a rigid socio-economic status quo that too many believe is the result of their birthright having been sold by this Government for the equivalent of a handful of beads to unprincipled corporate newcomers.

They want to be able to get ahead in their own island without the benefit of $15,000-per month housing subsidies paid by their employers, without the benefit of expense-account lifestyles, without the benefit of six-figure bonuses and other gilt-edged perquisites. The ongoing stratification of Bermudian society is causing increasing resentment, tension and hardship, impacting on everything from home ownership to education to the island's increasingly shabby physical infrastructure.

Some, but by no means all, of Bermuda's social ills stem directly from the fact an increasing percentage of the population find themselves surplus to the international financial sector's requirements, unemployable in its industries and condemned to lives of relative desperation.

Bermuda might boast the highest per capita incomes in the world but the purchasing power of that $50,000 average has to be put into the scales along with the six-figure salaries routinely earned by those in the international financial services industries.

The results are, of course, more than a little unbalanced, the island's too few resources being disproportionately dominated by those with too much money. And when such financial disparities are projected across the social and cultural spectrums, the result is a two-tiered community of such exaggerated extremes that Bermuda could now serve as the subject for an updated edition of

, perhaps, the international business elite that now controls Bermuda's economy yearns for changes from this Government too. Changes in what they believe are covert plans to introduce income tax by stealth, Government eyeing private capital as a means of making up growing shortfalls in public sector finances caused by profligacy and corruption. Changes in a stop-start Independence initiative that is rightly viewed as destabilising Bermuda's status as a dependable off-shore business jurisdiction. Changes in a policy of encouraging international concerns to relocate to an island that has long since reached its capacity to absorb new enterprises and then, directly they arrive here, scapegoating them as a corporate carpetbaggers responsible for all that ails Bermuda.

Bermudians and the international premium barons who do business here, so mutually mistrustful in so many areas, can probably make common cause with one another when it comes to at least one change they would both like to see. Change at the top ? the removal of a Premier who talks around the issues of the day rather than addresses them, a man incapable of presiding over the building of a senior secondary school who now believes himself qualified to engage in the infinitely more intricate and demanding task of nation building.

Both Bermudians and the resident international business leadership long for a future when they can mentally fast-forward through this increasingly dysfunctional period, a time when "The Man" and his chaos theory of governance have become bad memories rather than ongoing dangers to Bermuda's stability.