Is it a reasonable attempt to bridge the differences that exist in this great nation? Unquestionably." The second principle of political rhetoric is to declare that you are not saying what you are in fact saying, even as you are saying it.

So, for example, an obvious falsehood is traditionally prefaced as follows: "Frankly..." A shabby personal attack begins, "without getting into personalities..." And if ever you are called upon to boast about yourself, you of course protest "I don't wish to brag, but..." That last bit was a little joke. Nobody ever calls upon politicians to boast. They just do it. All the time. It is so frequent and so shameless that we hardly notice, though the same behaviour in private life would not be tolerated.

That, to me, is what is so noteworthy about Jean Chretien's latest musings, shared with reporters aboard the prime ministerial plane: that they are so unnoteworthy. Announcing that it was "not in his nature to brag about his accomplishments," as the National Post reported it, the Prime Minister went on at considerable length to brag about his accomplishments: how his government had run a string of surpluses, how he had convinced the world to ban land mines, how he had put African aid on the international agenda and brought human rights to China and saved the Canada Pension Plan.

His record on the economy, in particular, was so magnificent that the G8 leaders had asked him to share his secret with them at next week's summit. "Why? It is because we seem to have a good recipe," he told reporters. Apparently, it involves frequent phone calls to the president of the Business Development Bank. And of course, all of this was in sharp contrast to, you know, that other North American leader.

But did the press ever write about any of this? Had he been given even one iota of credit for this remarkable list of achievements?

Mind you, "I am not complaining." Even by the usual standards of political vanity, this was too much: so much so that Brian Mulroney, of all people, was moved to protest. For Mr. Mulroney, who was strangely available to be interviewed, the Prime Minister's real offence was that "to puff himself up, he felt that he had to denigrate the President of the United States." And for about a day or two we all had fun trumping this up into another crisis in Canada-U.S. relations.

But it wasn't the alleged slight to the President that made Mr.

Chretien's remarks worthy of comment -- they expect it by now, and in any case there was nothing terribly disparaging in any of it.

Rather, it was the unvarnished self-flattery that ought to have attracted our disdain.

But then, as I say, it seems to be an occupational hazard. Mr.

Mulroney was as guilty of the sin of pride. So was Joe Clark, who for all his professed humility has an ego as big as all outdoors. Mr.

Chretien, for his part, has been on something of a vanity trip of late, bragging about having been right on Iraq (we'll see) and taking credit for the demise of separatism in Quebec. Again, the issue isn't whether he's right or wrong to think so highly of himself, in substance (on Quebec, I'd say he had a point). It's that he should be the one to say it. It's that he feels he has to.

It would be one thing if the self-promotion in which our leaders habitually indulge was merely a means of getting elected: a tiresome ritual, like knocking on doors, required less for any practical reason than as an act of democratic tribute, a way of debasing themselves before the public. In this way, an exaggerated show of boasting might in fact display a kind of humility. I'm humble enough, it says, to make a fool of myself in public, if that's what it takes to get your vote. Which in turn says, I'm secure enough to be willing to humble myself.

But flatter yourself often enough, and you begin to believe it. Or, worse, you come to fear that others will not. A certain amount of monomania is probably inevitable in those who seek high office: Who else would subject their families to the sort of media hazing that today goes with it? But too many of our leaders betray a deep streak of insecurity, a gaping maw in their psyches that must be fed with constant bits of positive reinforcement. When they brag, it is not a false show or ritual act: it is wholly serious, intended to convince us and to reassure themselves.

Mr. Chretien makes a better show of jaunty unconcern for how others think of him than Mr. Mulroney or Mr. Clark, whose neediness was palpable. In his first two terms as Prime Minister, one might almost have believed it: that he was as comfortable in his own skin as, say, George W. Bush. But as the performance has deteriorated, the self-idolatry has increased -- like the later Roman emperors, building ever more impressive statues to themselves as the barbarian hordes closed in.