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Dalton McGuinty haunts the Ontario Liberals. He was premier for nearly a decade and his successes are the Liberal partys successes as they campaign to stay in power. But his failures especially the stinking mess of the billion-dollar gas-plant cancellations before the 2011 election are the partys failures, too.

They ultimately chased him from power and theyre the handiest clubs for the other parties to use against his successor as premier, Kathleen Wynne.

She hasnt quite seemed to know what to do. Shes proud of the Liberal record, shesays at the same time as shes pronounced herself as keen as anyone to find out just who did what, and who knew what when, when the two unpopular generating stations were cancelled and a possible coverup was engineered from within the premiers office.

For a while, to the point where it got downright weird, Wynne and her ministers treated McGuintyas someone whose works they could talk about but whose name would not pass their lips. In question period the opposition turned it into a game, trying to formulate queries that would force Liberal MPPs to say Dalton McGuinty.

Theyreprofessionals. They avoided saying what they didnt want to say.

But now, it seems Wynne has made up her mind.

She made her first eastern swing of the new 2014 campaign Wednesday and landed in Ottawa South, ceremonially opening the campaign office of McGuintys longtime aide and successor as MPP, John Fraser.

You can go to the legislature and not talk about Dalton McGuinty. You cannot do thatin Ottawa South.Hot under the lights, in an overcrowded storefront next to a karate school by the Canadian Tire,Wynne embraced the absent McGuinty rhetorically.

Behind her on the podium stood Ottawa Liberal candidates and volunteers, including Bob Chiarelli and Madeleine Meilleur, ministers McGuinty made senior and Wynne made more so. Chiarelli was one of McGuintys earliest supporters when he was a long-shot candidate for the Liberal leadership in the 1990s. Hes not the type to backstab when his own job is on the line, but hes a reminder that theres still such a thing as McGuinty country and you have to reckon with it when you leave Toronto.

Ottawa South, Wynnesaid, is a riding with a rich history of representatives we can all be proud of, especially Dalton McGuinty. Wynne is proud to have been an MPP in his caucus, a minister in his cabinet, she declared. They invested in hospitals, in rail, in education, together, she said. We did that, she said the Liberals under Dalton McGuinty. Its a record shes happy to run on. Dalton McGuintys.

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Reevely: Wynne embraces McGuinty's ghost