So the prime minister is routinely described, as if it were uncontroversial fact, as having blundered, erred, misstepped. The interview was a "bombshell," said the Globe and Mail, a "major blow" to the Quebec Liberal Party's election strategy, and inevitably, a "gaffe." Mr. Chretien had shown how out of touch he was with his native province. He had "sideswiped" Jean Charest. "Thoughtful federalists," reported the Toronto Star's Rosemary Speirs, "are sighing in despair." As the week wore on, speculation mounted over whether Mr. Chretien's "political instincts" had deserted him, polite phrasing for "the old man's gone completely ga-ga." Nor was this restricted to the usual suspects in the national unity industry. Preston Manning, eager to cement Reform's new respectability in Ottawa, was quick to join the media pile-on. "Why on earth," he wondered aloud, "would the prime minister make such remarks on the eve of a Quebec election?" Well, now: what were those remarks? What could the prime minister have said to bring even "thoughtful federalists," those doughty irregulars, so near to tears? Three things. He said the country's fate does not turn on whether Quebec's distinctiveness is entrenched in the constitution. He said that, with restrictions on the federal spending power, an effective veto on constitutional change and other measures his government had introduced, "the list [of Quebec's traditional demands] has been filled." And he said that, although further accommodations could be made, there are limits. The constitution, indeed, is not a general store.

Of all the nerve. What was he thinking? Whatever else the prime minister of Canada is permitted to say, the one thing that is strictly taboo is to defend the legitimacy of the existing constitutional order. The one thing he cannot suggest is that Quebec could ever be satisfied.

I suppose it is no defence to point out that, in fact, each of the prime minister's statements is true, with the small proviso that no one really knows whether Quebec's "traditional demands" have been filled, as no one can say with any certainty what Quebec's "traditional demands" are: since the dawn of Jean Lesage, Quebec's demands have changed every few years, as each new round of constitutional talks began and each new federal concession digested.

The issue, it seems, is not whether the things Mr. Chretien said were right, but whether he was right to say them. There is a time and a place for everything, after all, and if the effect of such plain speaking is to tip soft-nationalists into Mr. Bouchard's camp, why not seize the opportunity to shut up? This line of argument will be especially persuasive to those -- including, it seems, virtually every member of the parliamentary press gallery -- who believe the very survival of the country hinges on the election of Mr. Charest's Liberals.

It does not. What matters is not whether Mr. Charest wins, but how. It would be one thing for the Liberals to win on a promise, as Mr. Charest seemed to pledge when he took over as party leader last spring, to change the subject: to put the constitution firmly aside and concentrate on the economy and social services. But lately, as his poll numbers have sagged, Mr. Charest has begun to sound more like a traditional Quebec Liberal, bragging of the powers he will wrest from Ottawa -- this time with the help of the other provinces.

He can't, of course, nor should he. But Mr. Charest is in, as he says, the "fight of his life," and may be tempted to rashness.

The worst possible election result for the country would be for Mr. Charest to try to out- bid the Parti Quebecois for the nationalist vote, promising constitutional changes he can never deliver. It may be that Mr. Chretien, as some allege, would prefer to confront a separatist government in that event. But if his timely shot across the bow does nothing else but foreclose the constitutional option, he may yet save Mr. Charest from himself.