Finance Minister Paula Cox consolidated her position as overwhelming favourite in the race to succeed Premier Dr. Ewart Brown before she said a word yesterday.

The army of former Premiers, current Cabinet Ministers, MPs and Senators who lined up behind her were all that was necessary.

But lining up the party establishment and declaring your desire to be leader does not make it so; it's necessary to back words with ideas and actions, and to present a record that stands up to scrutiny, or so the backers of Terry Lister's "insurgency" will hope.

And certainly, Ms Cox's opening speech was a good deal shorter on specifics and plans for the future than Mr. Lister's was a week earlier.

Certainly, Ms Cox touched on many important psychological touchstones. She said she wanted to bring back the spirit of 1998 when the Progressive Labour Party was first elected. And she promised to bring together a team of people who believed in public service for its own sake and who would bring about "greater opportunity, harmony and social progress" and would be "responsive" to the people's needs, a welcome change from the divisions of the recent past.

Ms Cox said people are "aching for another wave of change following the high of 1998", adding: "This is normal. Familiarity can sometimes get dull, even in the most dynamic of relationships."

Maybe so, but Ms Cox may be misjudging the mood of the Country or the willingness of the public to rekindle the euphoria of that time 12 years later. Aside from familiarity, there's a degree of disillusionment, jaundice and cynicism in Bermuda politics that will be hard to dissolve, especially by someone who has been intimately involved with every Cabinet decision since the PLP took power.

And that's Ms Cox's problem. How does she present herself as a fresh new face with new ideas and plans to take Bermuda in a new direction at the same time that she must acknowledge and trumpet her role in the Government. To a degree, of course, she can rely on momentum and the sheer sense of inevitability that accompanies her campaign, and to a degree her speech yesterday, which was long on ideals and short on specifics, did that. To be sure, she has plenty of time between now and the end of October to outline a more detailed platform, but she should roll out some policies soon.

Ms Cox also has personal assets. Her moderate personality suggests a moderate political philosophy. Her ability to listen and to build a consensus will be welcome now as she works to bring people together. Her own reputation for honesty and integrity will be important as well. And loyalty and being part of a team do matter. A team pulling in 12 different directions will not move very far. However, there's a limit and Ms Cox must overcome the perception that has been magnified since her "cog in the wheel" comment that she failed to stand on principle when it mattered.

To be sure, Terry Lister and Dale Butler will make it plain that they stood up for their beliefs when they resigned from the Cabinet and she remained there, and this is her Achilles heel. For many members of the public, if not the PLP delegates, she needs to make a clean break from the Ewart Brown administration and show that she is her own woman who can stand up for herself and lead.

Her other weakness lies in her record as Finance Minister in the middle of the worst recession in half a century. Stating that "we have to devise ways to be even more innovative in providing jobs and expanded opportunities for those who have lost employment" is not enough. She needs to explain what she has done and is doing to turn the economy around, and soon.