LOOK diligently and you can still find a handful of the old yellow signs discreetly announcing Bermuda's official 20 mile per hour speed limit. Not all of them fell victim to metrification. They're amusing relics from another age, just like the occasional asthmatic Mobylette you see wheezing along the roads and the horse-drawn carriages which are probably the only vehicles on our roads never to have run afoul of a traffic cop's speed trap.

Fact is nobody has obeyed the speed limit in Bermuda for decades. Except when it comes to their thought processes.

And at the Cabinet Office it seems this slower-than-an-arthritic-turtle pace at which the speed of thought moves is strictly enforced. Perhaps it's time for Works & Engineering to rummage around its supply huts and post one of those antique signs on the lawn outside the Premier's office.

Just as anyone who has glanced at actuarial tables on the life expectancies for 72-year-olds should be more than a wee bit concerned about the prospect of Alaska's Governor ending up a heartbeat away from the US Presidency in November, anyone with the native wit to balance a cheque book should be nonplussed by Government's seeming indifference to the crisis now disrupting the world's financial markets.

All modern global economies are reliant on these financial markets to allocate capital. And history demonstrates that national economies slow down - or, on occasion, come to dead stops - in the weeks and months following any major downturns in those markets.

There's a delayed reaction of sorts, a period between the contraction of available credit and the time when an economy begins to tighten.

During this period leaders traditionally lead: they use whatever powers of persuasion they have to educate their people about the Economic Facts of Life, to warn them that the social environment and way of life they take for granted could be seriously disrupted. Or even disintegrate entirely.

They call on their people to make economies, to prepare for the approaching storm. They lead by example, immediately curtailing expenditure, eliminating deficit spending as best they can and generally going well beyond pathetic cosmetic changes like taking a few GP cars off the road. Which, so far, is Bermuda officialdom's only response to the looming catastrophe aside from a self-evident observation that more than a few American International Group employees might want to start scanning the "Help Wanted" ads.

Other than those tacit acknowledgements of the near-perfect financial storm that's forming, it's been business as unusal in Bermuda Government circles. Certainly the Premier hasn't deemed it necessary to cancel any of his publicity engagements to attend to the people's business. But that's not altogether surprising given the man seems to believe holding political office amounts to playing host of a neverending infomercial for himself.

Blame the usual culprits, corporate opportunism and greed, for the fact credit is becoming as difficult to find on the financial markets as a BLT in a kosher deli. Rampant and reckless speculation in the housing market by financial institutions which believed wishful thinking could repeal the Law of Diminishing Returns has led the world to the brink of an economic abyss unglimpsed since 1929. And the stars are aligning over Wall Street in such a way that suggests the situation will worsen dramatically no matter what stimulus packages are agreed to in Washington. The ominous signs of mounting credit difficulties are everywhere. The issuance of corporate debt in the US was already plummetting like a Mexican cliff diver before last week's events. Lending will undoubtedly shrink even further given the increasing difficulties banks are going to face in raising capital.

Bottom line is this: the loss of credit means that governments and businesses and individuals will find it increasingly difficult to borrow money to carry out their normal, day-to-day activities. Mark Twain, one of Bermuda's favourite adopted sons, was entirely correct when he referred to: "Beautiful credit! The foundation of modern society". The disappearance of such credit on the world's financial markets would have much the same devastating effects on global economies as the abrupt elimination of most of the oxygen from the atmosphere. The impact would be catastrophic on a scale that's almost impossible to imagine. But there's no need to panic, folks. After all, the Premier threw out a ball at Shea Stadium on Tuesday. And there are still tickets available for the Beyonce and Alicia Keys shows.

A 20 mph speed limit for rational thought at the Cabinet Office? No. Clearly the area should be designated a breakdown lane. - Tim Hodgson