The news item is terse: ”Junior B.C. minister quits after firing off a profanity laden email. Bill Bennett has resigned as B.C.’s junior mines minister after firing off an email filled with profanity to a constituent. He says he showed very bad judgement in sending the email to a Fernie veterinarian last week. Bennett says he tendered his resignation to Premier Gordon Campbell this morning, adding Campbell was ‘very disappointed’. For the time being, Bennett says he will continue as the MLA for the East Kootenay.”

The B.C. government website that provides information about the minister is “experiencing technical difficulties…we are working to resolve the issue.” 

I heard the Minister at the Roundup a while ago. He was in fighting form, telling the assembled audience the “white man” is here to stay regarding mining in B.C. A far more balanced perspective was presented by the premier of Nanavut. 

The minister clearly has a perspective. Here are some quotes from his speeches:

• “I believe in protection of the natural world to the extent it needs protection, but the idea that any human interaction with nature is bad is antithetical to my own experience. The Bible makes it plain that we are the stewards of the Earth, and as such, our obligation is not negotiable. However, we are not obliged to preserve the natural world in some kind of frozen inertia at arm’s length from human activity.”
•  ”They are experienced people and know that the future of mountain caribou in this area is bleak, down to 14 animals…Frankly . . . I am prepared to state my position publicly that this herd is doomed and should either be moved or written off. Government should not be throwing good money after bad.”
• “I quickly discovered that even some of my colleagues were not aware of the coal industry and its workers. Coal, in fact, I learned, was a dirty word. Victoria, especially in the 1990s, took the money and tax revenues from the industry but hid the industry like a crazy uncle who was forced to live upstairs, out of the public eye…..At Christmas in 2001, I wrapped up little pieces of coal and gave each member of the BC Liberal caucus a piece of coal for Christmas. At Christmas in 2002, everyone got coal candy.” 
• “I know full well the NDP will politicize healthcare just as they will bring drunks to the polling booths on election day because return to power supercedes all else for the NDP.  (The NDP is one of the political parties in BC.)”
• “Max Baucus (a Montana politician) has said a lot of really terrible things about Canada over the years and the people who met him today are familiar with what he has said.   100 years of coal mining in southeast B.C. has had little impact on rivers in the region. I just don’t understand why they think more mining activity is going to do something that has hasn’t been done over the last 100 years of gold mining. Senator Baucus, I think, is more interested in scoring political points back home than he is in anything else.”

Colorful, but not necessarily polite. Oh well at least he had a trip to China.

I cannot locate his email or establish its contents.  A friend tells me that the text was given last night on local TV and that it told some fellow seeking hunting licenses that he was just an American who had no right to anything (including opinions and licenses) in BC.  If you know more about what is in the infamous e-mail, please let us know.