On February 6, Bill Bennett, British Columbia's mining minister, was forced to resign. Here's a sampling of the coverage.
Anti-U.S. comments lead Canadian mining official to resign
British Columbia's top mining minister stepped down this week amid outrage at his anti-American sentiments, and Montanans who have been negotiating with the province over controversial coal projects were not sorry to see him go.
“Mr. Bennett's resignation may clear the way for a more constructive government-to-government discussion,” said Dan Weinberg, a state senator from Whitefish.
Weinberg's district butts up against Bill Bennett's, with only the international boundary separating the two. A wider gulf, however, might be the ideological divide.
“Let me be very direct with you, as you were with me,” Bennett wrote in a Jan. 29 e-mail to a Canadian constituent. “It is my understanding that you are an American, so I don't give a s--t what your opinion is on Canada or Canadian residents.”
Bennett, 56, is a provincial lawmaker, a member of the Legislative Assembly, and until Tuesday he also held the Cabinet-level post of B.C. minister for mining. That put him in a position of influence regarding the Canadian Flathead, where companies have proposed various coal mining ventures.
Montanans have opposed those projects for decades, saying water quality and wildlife would likely be impacted in and around Glacier National Park.
Bennett has championed the mines, however, and has gone on the offensive with American lawmakers, including Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., whom he once said was not welcome in Canada.
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B.C. official quits after anti-U.S. e-mail exchange
British Columbia’s minister of mines, Bill Bennett, was forced to resign Tuesday because of an e-mail exchange expressing anti-American sentiments.
Bennett is of interest in Montana because of his decision-making capacity about the future of mining in the Canadian Flathead. A wide range of organizations and agencies south of the border are staunchly opposed to mine development near the headwaters that feed Montana’s Flathead River system and Flathead Lake.
The now-infamous e-mail exchange, which was broadly dispersed in Montana, started with correspondence from Maarten Hart, president of the Fernie Rod and Gun Club. Hart, an American who has lived in Fernie for years, accused Bennett of favoring big-money game outfitters over resident hunters in determining big-game permit allocations in the southeastern part of the province.
While attending a mining conference in Vancouver, Bennett typed a flaming response.
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