By Christopher Foulds – Kamloops This Week

Published: March 23, 2010 12:00 PM
Updated: March 23, 2010 12:21 PM

The news concerning a Facebook message that appeared on Bill McQuarrie’s home page is another example of the need to verify or contact those involved before publishing or distributing information as fact.

It has also led to many questions that need to be answered by McQuarrie.

McQuarrie is the executive director of Interior Science Innovation Council and has been working with Kim Sigurdson, the president of the Aboriginal Cogeneration Corporation, which had been planning to operate a gasification project in Kamloops in which creosote-soaked rail ties would be used.

McQuarrie told KTW he has no idea how the posting appeared on his Facebook page on Thursday morning.

The fact is, the message was posted under his name; therefore, someone who had access to McQuarrie’s user name and password posted the message, which infers strongly he and others (including the provincial government) had been working behind the scenes for some time to find another community to locate the Aboriginal Cogeneration Corporation’s gasification project.

In the posting, which reads like a letter or an e-mail, reference is made to a “Terry” (presumably Kamloops-North Thompson Liberal MLA Terry Lake) and claims “Terry” has been told what to say and has received his marching orders from more powerful Liberals in the party.

A reporter at KTW is “friends” with McQuarrie on Facebook (that “friendship” was abruptly severed by McQuarrie this week) and came across the odd posting on Thursday morning, a day before the Facebook message made its way to Ruth Madsen, chairwoman of Thompson Institute of Environmental Studies and a vocal opponent of the ACC.

While we saw the Facebook page and saved a copy, we could not very well report on it without first speaking to McQuarrie, Lake and Sigurdson.

Our print deadline was 11 a.m. on Thursday and we could not talk to McQuarrie before then.

We finally contacted McQuarrie on Friday morning and, immediately after reporter Jeremy Deutsch conducted a long, taped interview with him, Madsen’s mass e-mail regarding the Facebook posting landed in my e-mail box.

McQuarrie denied he wrote the message, despite the fact it appears to be a private Facebook message that may have been accidentally posted for many to see.

He denied it even when we pointed out it was posted by his account.

Nor could McQuarrie explain how a message he had nothing to do with could refer to a press release (ACC’s decision to withdraw from Kamloops) that hadn’t yet been issued.

McQuarrie noted he had seen a CTV News story the night before that dealt with those who hack Facebook and other social-network sites.

While McQuarrie continues to deny he posted the message, there are many — yours truly included — who view such a claim with extreme skepticism.

When I was alerted to the message at about noon last Thursday, my first thought was: Who would be stupid enough to post that publicly? My second thought was: I bet that was intended to be a private message and someone pressed the wrong button.

However, McQuarrie repeatedly denied writing it and we must, at this point, accept his testimony.

But the manner in which Madsen distributed the message is troubling.

I contacted her in Palm Desert, Calif., where she is visiting, and asked if she had contacted McQuarrie to determine if he had, in fact, posted the message.

She said she did not.

Did she contact Sigurdson or Lake?

She said she did not.

She did volunteer that she passed the information by a lawyer before e-mailing it to various people, media outlets included.

That’s not good enough.

It could very well be that McQuarrie had his Facebook site hacked by a clever and vengeful opponent of the ACC proposal with knowledge of a press release that hadn’t yet been released.

Highly unlikely, but possible.

Perhaps McQuarrie left his laptop unattended while having coffee at Starbucks and a clever and vengeful opponent of the ACC proposal with knowledge of a press release that hadn’t yet been released waited for that specific, opportune time to hijack the keyboard and post the message.

Again, highly unlikely, but possible.

The point is, we don’t know.

But we — including Madsen — needed to ask before rushing out with a condemnation that offers as fact that McQuarrie is the author.

Whether the reader believes McQuarrie or anybody else is left to their discretion — once they hear what McQuarrie and others have to say.