By any honest account — emphasis on honest, not the government-approved press release variety — Mark Carney has now sat in the Prime Minister’s chair for over forty days. Forty days — not in the biblical sense of trial and transformation — but in the Kafka-esque sense of scripted announcements, symbolic gestures, and legislative landmines. Carney, Canada's investment banker turned political shepherd, has worked diligently to emulate his idol — Donald Trump, of all people — though lacking the charisma, disruption, or delivery. The results? Let us count the disappointments..Take, for instance, so-called Middle-Class Tax Relief. Here, Carney produced a 1% tax cut in the lowest income bracket, heralded by Ottawa as a miracle for the working Canadian. A miracle, it is not. At best, it delivers $70 a month in disposable income — just enough for a half tank of gas and a despairing shrug. If this is the Liberals' idea of prosperity, then we are not so much climbing out of economic malaise as being handed a longer spoon to stir it..Then there is the great Affordable Housing Initiative. The promise? To double the rate of residential construction and build half a million homes a year. Lofty, indeed.But also, shall we say, a bit on the aspirational side? Yes, they eliminated the GST on homes under $1 million — bravo — but neglected to explain how first-time buyers will conjure up the down payment. The latest estimates put that particular task at ten years of savings for the average young family. That is, if they avoid eating or living indoors in the meantime.As for actual houses built, the numbers are not just disappointing — they are scandalous. Ten years, $78 billion committed, and a generous interpretation puts the total output at around 42,000 homes. That’s one house per $1.8 million spent. One would hope these houses come with gold plumbing and concierge service. And let us not forget: this 500,000-home annual target still falls far short of what CMHC says is needed just to stabilize affordability. The math, much like the delivery, doesn’t add up..On trade diversification and infrastructure, Carney spoke of nation-building, of freeing Canada from over-reliance on the United States, and of removing interprovincial trade barriers. It all sounded Churchillian until you looked at the results. The premiers' conference was a policy soufflé — puffed up and hollow. Provinces are now striking deals without federal leadership. The conference yielded no policy changes on pipelines, no reform on trade barriers, and no progress on enabling projects that could unify the nation. What we did get was a post-conference drumbeat for even more veto points — be they provincial or indigenous — on development. It’s curious how in provinces where polling shows support for pipelines, the government insists there’s “no mandate.” Curious, too, how indigenous voices in Alberta that support resource development are so rarely included in the national narrative..And what has emerged from Carney’s legislative oven? Bills C-2 and C-3 were enthusiastically offered as steps toward stronger borders and fairer citizenship. Noble aspirations, both. But under the crust of principle lies the usual Liberal filling of control and sleight of hand.Bill C-2, for example, quietly grants law enforcement the ability to open your mail without a warrant. A casual erasure of centuries-old privacy protections — because, they say, we must fight fentanyl and organized crime. Apparently, liberty is now conditional on the latest crisis. Another provision outlaws cash transactions over $10,000. Ostensibly to target money laundering, but the stench of ulterior motive clings. You may recall when, under Trudeau and with Carney’s blessing, banks froze the accounts of protestors and their supporters. The backlash nearly sparked a run on the banks. This bill, one suspects, is not about crime — it’s about sealing the exits for lawful citizens in the next political emergency..And then there’s Bill C-3. On its surface, it's a compassionate correction for “Lost Canadians.” In reality, it's a Trojan horse for chain migration. By permitting Canadians born abroad to pass citizenship to their children after just three years of presence in Canada, it opens the door to a sprawling expansion of eligibility — entirely sidestepping normal immigration processes. So much for population control, or, heaven forbid, housing policy coherence. But not to worry — apparently, you’ll own nothing and be happy..Just as revealing as what he’s done is what Mr. Carney has not done. In the face of Alberta’s growing constitutional alarm — summarized in Premier Smith’s Nine Terrible Policies — Carney has offered neither dialogue nor repeal. In this, he mirrors his predecessor, Mr. Trudeau. But where Trudeau could be dismissed as an unserious man with serious responsibilities playing dress-up, Carney is a different breed. He is not the village idiot. He is the village actuary — cold, clinical, exacting. The danger is not in his foolishness but in his competence.And while he speaks softly of national unity, carbon markets and “shared prosperity,” his policies — indeed, his instincts — betray a command-and-control worldview that treats western enterprise and individual liberty as bugs to be debugged from the system.He may be selling a decarbonized Canada, but what he’s really peddling is a denationalized one. “One Canadian economy” is not a vision — it’s a warning. And it reads like the fine print in a Brookfield merger.Albertans see through the veneer. We’ve heard enough rhetoric, seen enough legislative drift, and smelled enough of the eastern perfume of technocratic rule. If there is hope, it lies in Alberta's resolve to “de-provincialize”— to take back the rights, the revenue, and the reality of a place that refuses to be managed like a risk portfolio.
