A WILLING suspension of disbelief is becoming as much a prerequisite for accepting what happens in Bermuda these days as it is for negotiating the most credibility-straining plot devices in fiction.

Critical faculties have to be anaesthetised to the point of insensibility before the serial incompetence of Bermudian officialdom, the Ozymandean folies de grandeur and the bemused contempt for common sense, can be regarded as a normal state of affairs.

Nevertheless, there's no shortage of self-deluding apologists for Bermuda's increasingly off-kilter status quo. An unholy alliance of convenience has arisen between tub-thumping political true believers, international corporate chieftens and local community and civic leaders who still fancy that accommodating the leaden despotism of this Government's leadership is better for the island's long-term well-being than challenging it.

It's a shame Bermudians don't come into the world equipped with Hemingway's built-in, shock-proof bullshit detectors. Such a sixth sense is becoming indispensible for anyone wanting to avoid prolonged exposure to the torturous wishful thinking Government's champions engage in, crediting the uncreditable either out of unwavering faith-based conviction or because they have self-medicated their reasoning powers with a mental cocktail of chloroform and Valium.

Recently this unlikely bodyguard closed ranks to defend Government mediocrity, to fete a patently wrong-headed decision, when the "mega"-cruise ship Triumphant inaugurated its weekend service to Bermuda. It was an example of lickspittle toadying as epically proportioned as that steel and plastic Leviathan itself. Even those who did half-heartedly shake their fists at the Tourism Ministry did so from prostrate positions, couching criticisms of this cross between a sea monster and a seagoing trailer camp in language that reeked of servility.

The reality is that, the Tourism Ministry's decision to contract with Carnival Cruise Lines for weekend visits by Triumphant is a shameless attempt to artificially boost tourism arrival figures.

It's a move that will not appreciably benefit the Bermudian economy and which could, in fact, have serious repercussions for both the already moribund hospitality industry and the island's continuing viability as a resort destination. Frankly, this vessel is the floating answer to the largest lead balloon imaginable.

Currently, the relatively upscale cruise ships that visit Bermuda only produce about $40 million annually in tourism-derived revenue for the island, a pittance compared to the hundreds of millions of dollars generated both directly and indirectly by even the greatly diminished air arrivals.Yet it's money the island can ill afford to lose at this juncture.

However, it seems all but certain the other cruise lines serving Bermuda are giving serious consideration to renewing their contracts with the island now that Carnival's mega-ships have arrived here in all their clownish glory. And the bald fact of the matter that even an armada of these Goliath liners could not make up the revenue shortfall should the smaller cruise ships - which remain the preferred choice of more affluent travellers - withdraw.

Carnival has an unfortunate but not entirely undeserved reputation within the cruise line industry for turning even the most well-established destinations into perishable commodities, of souring the cream overnight as it were. As Jim Woolridge is fond of saying, the classes do not follow the masses in tourism - and in the case of Carnival Cruise Lines this has been demonstrated time and again.

Two years ago the Transport Minister warned of the environmental and economic chaos that would result if Bermuda ever found itself entirely dependent on the mega-ships.

Currently, these massive vessels can only be berthed at Dockyard. A feasibility study conducted by technical officers in the Transport Ministry concluded that accommodating these behemoths in Hamilton would entail the construction of a 600-foot wharf stabbing south into the harbour like a concrete stiletto, a massive project that would necessitate the destruction of most of White's Island, multi-million-dollar dredging extending from the waters off Albuoy's Point to North Rock and the dynamiting of one of the twin islets that makes up Two Rock Passage.

The marine environment within the reef-line, an indispensable component of Bermuda's appeal as a resort, would be obliterated; the face of Hamilton, one of the most beautiful natural harbours in the world, would be as crudely vandalised as Michelangelo's Pieta was after a lunatic took a hammer to that exquisite statue.

And such an exorbitantly expensive project, one that would cause irreparable damage to Bermuda's ecology, would yield only the most pitiful returns. Wall-to-wall mega-ships disgorging their human cargoes onto the streets of both Dockyard and Hamilton throughout the summer season would simply overwhelm Bermuda's capacity to deal with them, adding little to the island's bottom line and further cheapening its appeal to potential air visitors in search of a gilt-edged vacation destination.

For the Tourism Ministry to enter into a contract with Carnival amounts to running down the traditional if somewhat tattered standard of quality Bermuda has always flown and hoisting the white flag of surrender to quantity-driven mass tourism.

True, the mega-ships do carry some 4,000 passengers and crew. But these numbers are inversely proportionate to the dollars spent at a cruise destination. Carnival offers all-inclusive package holidays from as little as $420 per person. With on-board duty free shopping, restaurants and nightclubs, Bermuda cannot realistically expect to earn much more from them than the $65 per person head tax and berthing fees. The passengers contribute nothing to the local economy other than the cost of a few T-shirts and some dubious Bermuda knick-knacks.

A Government backbencher, one who is seemingly not just blinkered but blind to great swathes of reality, last week argued the mega-ships are the way of the future for Bermuda, claiming they benefit tourism infrastructures from the bottom up and Caribbean islands are clamouring to attract them.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

"When will the Caribbean ever learn that cruise ships are not our friends; their contributions to the local economies is negligible," John Bell, director and chief executive officer of the Caribbean Hotel Association, said recently. "By contrast, Caribbean hotels and their guests pay significant taxes to their governments and provide hundreds and thousands of well-paid jobs for Caribbean nationals, with millions more created indirectly through a frequently underestimated network of business that either support or supply land-based tourism activity."

Precisely the same holds true of Bermuda. It's a matter of simple arithematic and can be demonstrated by way of even the most cursory cost/benefit analysis .

A well-heeled couple willing to pay, say, $600 per night just for accommodation during a three-week holiday at an upscale Bermuda resort contribute more to the island's economic well-being than an entire mega-boatload of cruise passengers. The couple eat in Bermudian restaurants, shop in Bermudian stores, pay green fees at Bermudian golf courses, hire Bermudian caddies, travel by Bermudian taxis, buses or rental cycles, visit the reefs in Bermudian glass-bottom boats, pay the entrance fees at Bermudian sightseeing attractions, tip Bermudian staff.

Then factor in the multiplier effect. It should be self-evident to even those who have trouble balancing a cheque book why Bermuda needs to pursue the upper echelons of the travel market, those willing to pay a little bit more to enjoy a vacation that's a little bit better than what's available elsewhere.

During the halcyon days of Bermuda tourism the island essentially invented what in today's jargon is known as "niche marketing". The island, in trial-and-error fashion, came up with a resort that put a premium on exclusivity and as a result attracted an exclusive clientele. Given its small size and limited resources, Bermuda purposely eschewed quantity (and all of the associated disadvantages so apparent in the mega-ship scenario) for quality.

The niche Bermuda created for itself was the very highest end of the market, one drawn from the 100 million or so potential visitors who live along the US East Coast corridor extending from South Carolina to Maine - people who speak the same language, who use the same money and who live only 90 minutes to two hours away.

The East Coast remains the island's natural catchment area for visitors. Yet for four years the current Tourism Minister, who has stretched the distance between ambition and achievement to near infinity, has shilled for potential clients in Argentina even while that country's economy was slipping into the abyss and led conga lines of Gombeys through the Swiss Alps and Spain. All to no avail.

His have been bizarre, expensive and self-defeating efforts to create markets for the island where there is next to no airlift while the airlift Bermuda does have continues to fly here half- or three-quarters empty from the largest market in the world.

Today the Tourism Ministry rarely even promotes the island in the newspapers and magazines serving the East Coast. TheNew York Times is far more likely to be pillorying Bermuda as a larcenous tax haven in its editorial columns than carrying advertisements for it in the Travel Section. Bermuda no longer has a fixed, untarnishable international image. And the island is doing nothing to correct the new one being created for it by a handful of vote-catching Congressmen and lobbyists representing on-shore businesses who stare green-eyed at the success of the island's financial services.

The dwindling number of East Coast vacationers - as opposed to business travellers - the island still manages to attract are greeted on arrival by a situation that does nothing to dispel the uppity Third World image being crafted for Bermuda by others. The decision to combine Immigration and Customs duties at the Airport has led to a daily logjam, with visitors having to spend the first hours of their Bermuda vacations in snaking, slow-moving lines before they are processed. This has created appallingly bad first impressions, frayed tempers and an escalating public relations fiasco.

Yet the Finance Minister, apparently straight-aced, denies this is the case. He simply does not believe it is so.

Some willing suspension of disbelief on the Finance Minister's part would actuallly be welcome in this instance so the worsening situation at the Airport can actually be addressed rather than just wished away.

Tim Hodgson