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There has to be a reason for this early onslaught of promises, and there are two theories. The first is that Wynne is desperately trying to get the poll numbers up so that she doesn’t get booted out by her own party.

If so, the strategy might be working.

A poll earlier this month by Campaign Research shows the Liberals ahead with 37 per cent support, followed by the PCs at 33 and the NDP at 22. The margin of error for the online poll is plus or minus four per cent. Polling from the same company shows the pharmacare and basic income plans are pushing up Liberal numbers.

The second possibility is that the Liberals intend to call the election for late August or early September of this year. Strategically, this would be a smart move and if there is one thing the Ontario Liberal party is good at, it’s election strategy.

Rationally, one could argue that the promised spending orgy from a party that has taken a decade to balance the budget is like celebrating one’s first week of sobriety with a pub crawl, but rationality doesn’t have much to do with Ontario politics.

The bottom line is that Liberal candidates have plenty of attractive-sounding free stuff to talk about at the door. The bill will come some other time and history suggests Ontarians don’t much care.

A late August election would also get the vote over before two separate trials involving senior Liberal staffers. Those begin in early September and are unlikely to produce any good news for the Liberals.