TOO CIVIL FOR POLITICS?

When politicians depart public life by announcing they want to spend more time with family, the platitude often rings false — a facile pretence hiding a less-honourable truth behind a hasty retreat from politics.

Not so much with Brian Jean.

When he resigned Monday as MLA for Fort McMurray-Conklin, citing a desire to spend time with his loved ones and rebuild his home, he left the sense that is exactly where he will be found in the months to come.

Perhaps it’s the personal adversity Jean endured in recent years: His youngest son, Michael, died of lymphoma in 2015 while Jean was campaigning for leadership of the Wildrose Party; a year later, when leading the official Opposition, his home burned down in the Fort McMurray wildfire; and now one of his sisters has Stage 4 cancer while two other family members are also fighting the disease.

Under such circumstances, few could doubt a genuine desire to return to private life — especially after he soldiered on so stoically in the public eye after each calamity.

Jean acknowledges some will accuse him of quitting politics because he’s a sore loser following his loss to Jason Kenney for leadership of the United Conservative Party. There may well be hard feelings, considering the UCP’s rancorous unification and subsequent leadership race, but others will take him at his word because Jean’s persona is one that seems at times too civil and soft-spoken for today’s political bloodsport.

This nice guy seemed destined to finish first. The former Conservative MP resurrected the disgraced Wildrose Party after former leader Danielle Smith and a majority of other MLAs joined the Progressive Conservatives in 2014. In just a few months, he not only saved the party from oblivion, but against the odds, formed the official Opposition after the 2015 election. For many, Jean was a premier-in-waiting. Albertans found him genuine and likable and he consistently topped the opinion polls. As a Fort McMurrayite, he provided rare regional insight in a province dominated politically by its two big cities.

But while he was a popular politician, he was far from a perfect one. He struggled to cap “bozo eruptions” in his party, and had his own missteps such as using a slur for the disabled and joking about beating Premier Rachel Notley. Despite his popularity, he first failed to fend off unification with the PCs and then lost the leadership of the unified party to the strategically savvy Kenney.

In the end, Jean fought the good fight but may go down as the most popular premier Alberta never had.