Looks to me a lot like hubris, that excessive pride in your accomplishments. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has called a federal election for April 28. I think his Liberal Party is going to lose, and, if it does, Carney will enter the history books as Canada’s shortest serving Prime Minister. Probably not how he wants to be remembered.

Carney is riding high in the polls. He won the party leadership a couple of weeks ago, taking 85 per cent of the votes. People are so happy to be rid of Justin Trudeau that Carney is receiving support from people who only a couple of months ago said they would never vote Liberal

I don’t think it will last though. Carney has a policy problem. He can either stick with the past policies that Canadians have grown to loathe, or he can borrow from the Conservative Party. Neither is likely to work well for him.

His only hope is that the euphoria of Justin Trudeau’s departure will last and that people won’t look closely at him, his ethical challenges or the policies he is proposing.

That’s a lot of balls to juggle for a rookie politician who has never held elected office before. He’s a smart man, but beginners inevitably make mistakes. In a short election campaign that can be politically fatal.

Listening to his campaign kickoff press conference was jarring. Politicians learn to be smooth speakers, to think on their feet. Listening to carney take questions was painful. He knows the policies and how to spin them, but his sentences were more “ums” and “uhs” than nouns, verbs adjectives and adverbs.

Somebody needs to give him elocution training- it was painful to listen to. And that was in English, his first language. The French version was perhaps more painful.

Carney did have a path to electoral victory that I mentioned here previously without giving details. I didn’t want to give him any ideas.

What Carney should have done was cut another deal with the New Democratic Party to say in power a bit longer. They propped up the Liberals for two years, they would have been willing to continue the arrangement if they thought there was benefit.

All Carney needed was a few months to get used to the job and introduce himself to Canadians. he could have promised the moon, knowing the legislation wouldn’t have made it through the House of Commons before the next election.

A few months would have given him time to distance himself from Justin Trudeau, to propose policies that were different from his predecessor. Can’t really do that the same way with a snap election.

Furthermore, if he had hung on in office until June, he would have hosted the G-7 meetings which are being held in Alberta this year. The host country sets the agenda. Carney could have chosen climate change, the Russo-Ukraine War, foreign aid or any one of a number of other topics sure to irritate US President Donald Trump. It would practically have guaranteed that if Trump did show up that he would walk out.

Which would make carney a hero in Canadian eyes, and maybe to the rest of the world too. Stand up to Trump, call an election and waltz to victory.

But no, his pride and the polls convinced him that now is the time. And pride, as it says in The Bible, goes before destruction.

It feels to me a lot like 1993. Canadians were fed up with Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. They fell in love with new Conservative Leader Kim Campbell, who, riding high in the polls, called a snap election.

The Conservatives won two seats. Canadians, once the euphoria of Mulroney’s departure had worn off, decided not to return the Conservatives to office. I’m expecting that the same holds true for Mark Carney and the Liberals in 2025.

We’ll find out when the results come in on April 28.