The less he says, the better it gets

The CROP/La Presse poll indicated 38 per cent of Quebecers support the Liberals, with Pauline Marois' PQ running second (29 per cent) and the ADQ at 17 per cent – and dropping like a rock. The Dumont Express has effectively derailed, through Dumont's inability to recruit candidates that actually know what they're doing. It's one thing to picture Dumont as the premier-in-waiting; it's quite another to imagine of his recruits from say, the Beauce region, lording over the environment or justice portfolios.

On the other hand, all Charest has had to do is sit back and watch as the PQ and the ADQ fight over the hard-nationalist vote in the regions, while his own approval rating skyrockets.

How is this happening? Pretty simple, actually.

Charest has never had great instincts for governing. By all accounts, he is a charismatic campaigner with boundless energy, but when he's in office, and legislating, he's at his weakest.

The evidence is there. Not one major move by the Charest Liberals since they took over office in 2003 has been what can be called a success. The de-merger imbroglio (which is still tied up in court as Île Bizard prepares yet another appeal), the initial smoking ban in restaurants, (which was moved back six months because the original date was – imagine – poorly thought out), and even the Bouchard-Taylor commission, (which provided bigots across the province with a stage for their ill-informed and unfortunate thoughts on multiculturalism and immigrants who –gasp! – are different from small-town Quebecers) have all been failures to a certain extent.

No, what Charest has done well in recent months is stay out of the limelight and stay out of the news. Out of sight, out of mind has done wonders for Charest's approval ratings and if he continues at this rate, he might well be able to stretch his party's minority rule through 2011, as he said he might in a CBC News story that hit the web Monday afternoon.

The two opposition parties are onto his game, accusing the Liberals of coasting through their mandate since 2003, and making public announcements with little real value or impact.

That, though doesn't seem to matter to Quebecers, who seem to feel about the premier the way many parents felt about their children once upon a time: that it's better to be seen and not heard, and mostly not even heard.