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Even when you see the train coming at you, it’s a shock when it hits. Such is the case in Ontario right now, where the Liberal government has ensured the coming election campaign — which hasn’t formally been called yet — will be one of the ugliest and demeaning in memory.

Premier Kathleen Wynne cemented this when she launched an extraordinary blitz of invective at opposition leader Doug Ford on Wednesday.

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“Doug Ford sounds like Donald Trump and that’s because he is like Donald Trump,” she intoned. “He believes in an ugly, vicious, a brand of politics that traffics in smears and lies. He will say anything about anyone at any time. Because just like Trump, it is all about him.”

It was as predictable as an onrushing train, yet unsettling nonetheless, that a sitting premier would so quickly turn a political contest into a barrage of insults against an opponent. In particular given Wynne’s justification for her attack: it was, she said, an attempt to alert voters that the race was bound to be nasty. “It’s crystal clear that this is going to be a vicious campaign,” she said. So, to let people know things might get ugly, she got ugly.