Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Weird

On The Mannsuits

81 Comments

Want to split a gut? Read this insane comment over at Judy Curry’s place:

Mann’s strategic rational for the parallel lawsuit is evident, and is based upon the observation CEI and NR published startlingly similar, startlingly abusive, startling ill-judged editorials.

——————-

Mann’s Objective Publicly expose the command-and-control structure of climate-change denialism.

Mann’s Strategy Call witnesses to testify, under oath, regarding the parallel origins of their libelous assertions.

Mann’s Tactics Offer each of CEI and NR a plea-bargain, providing each “peaches” upon the other, regarding denialist marching-orders and astro-turfing operations.

Mann’s Guidance The Code of Omertà is robust at the institutional level of climate-change denialism, yet notoriously flimsy at the individual level. To exploit this weak point, Mann’s legal team will therefore focus legal pressure upon the individuals under whose name the libels were published. In particular, what services has CEI’s staff of 40 provided to denialist bloggers, and to sister institutions such as Heartland?

——————-

Predictions (1) CEI and NR will do all they can to ensure that individuals named in Mann’s suit do not testify under oath … or if they do, that their testimonies are well-rehearsed and carefully coordinated. (2) Conversely, Mann’s team will do all they can to exert pressure upon individual witnesses, in particular by calling multiple witnesses to the stand, and by deposing CEI and NR employees in separate discovery processes.

Question What portion of climate-change denialist prose, nominally originating from private citizens, in fact originates from CEI professional operatives?

I can’t really comment, other than to wonder if Mann himself believes lunacy like this?

81 thoughts on “On The Mannsuits”

  1. I can’t really comment, other than to wonder if Mann himself believes lunacy like this?

    Well to me that gets to the crux of it, it’s usually those who have convinced themselves that their opponents (very experienced in their own fields) are lunatics, who come unstuck.

    Too often people fall into the trap of believing all the propaganda that they want to believe.

    1. Do you think that this guy is “experienced in his own field”?

      Do you not recognized the unhinged lunacy of this conspiracy theory?

      Of course, when it comes to conspiracy on the part of the warm mongers, we actually have the emails to prove it.

    2. Let me ask the question a different way.

      Do you really believe that there is a “command and control structure of denialism”? Or that such a thing is even possible?

      1. Apparently you believe there’s a command and control structure of “warm mongering”. If that’s possible, why not a parallel one for “denialism”?

        1. Apparently you believe there’s a command and control structure of “warm mongering”.

          Only because we saw it in the leaked emails.

          If that’s possible, why not a parallel one for “denialism”?

          Well, not being a “denialist,” I can’t say it’s impossible, but I find pretty amusing the notion that Mark Steyn happened to publicly link to a piece I wrote as some part of a secret conspiracy pretty amusing.

          1. Only because we saw it in the leaked emails.

            I think you may not understand what a “command and control structure”, people yakking in Emails doesn’t really qualify, if it did just about any group of friends could be called a command and control structure. Do you Email other bloggers who share your views on AGW? Talk about ways to reply to various AGW claims? how about organisations like Heartland, you think their people discuss “skeptic” strategies with others of like view? Do you think the likes of Roy Spencer, Pat Michaels, and Bob Carter have such Email discussions? I do. Gosh, there’s a command and control structure! It’s a conspiracy! EEEK!

          2. Do you Email other bloggers who share your views on AGW?

            No.

            Talk about ways to reply to various AGW claims?

            No. All of my discussion about AGW claims is in public, here and other places.

            How about organisations like Heartland, you think their people discuss “skeptic” strategies with others of like view? Do you think the likes of Roy Spencer, Pat Michaels, and Bob Carter have such Email discussions?

            I doubt it. They have no need to.

            I do.

            I’m guessing that’s projection.

        2. Apparently you believe there’s a command and control structure of “warm mongering”.

          Well, here’s the scenario. If your research supports the accepted view of the AGW advocates who control public funding for climatology, then you have a better chance of getting funding. Seems a pretty straight-forward command and control structure – say what we like and get money.

          I can’t say for sure that structure exists, but there’s a number of politically oriented scientists (James Hansen and Phil Jones in particular) who have done pretty well for themselves.

    3. <Too often people fall into the trap of believing all the propaganda that they want to believe.

      Can you really not see that this might apply to the people who are shouting about catastrophic anthropogenic global warming? Many of the CAGW warmists view themselves as saviors, on a sacred mission to save the world from disaster. It’s unthinkable that the disaster might not come to pass, so anyone who questions them is evil!.

      Consider that back in the 1980s and ’90s the Experts told us, quite earnestly, that fifty thousand children per year were being abducted for purposes of satanic ritual abuse. Anyone who questioned that claim, or denied the reality of widespread satanic abuse of children, was obviously on the abusers’ side and covering for them in a Vast Conspiracy.

      1. Can you really not see that this might apply to the people who are shouting about catastrophic anthropogenic global warming? Many of the CAGW warmists view themselves as saviors, on a sacred mission to save the world from disaster. It’s unthinkable that the disaster might not come to pass, so anyone who questions them is evil!.

        Can you not see that no one is immune to this, and the more politically partisan some one is, the more likely they are to fall into the trap of letting their instincts and emotions justify to themselves the demonizing those they see as their adversaries? Everyone else is “dreaming”, or “lunatics” or “evil” or it’s “all a conspiracy” etc.

        1. Why, of course I can, Andrew! I never said I didn’t.

          But ask yourself this: who is trying to shut up whom with a lawsuit? Who is more likely to be the extremist?

          And why do you believe that political partisanship is at work here? I know technical people of all political stripes — including one red diaper baby communist — who have looked at Mann’s work and called it shoddy at best. You don’t do good science by refusing to reveal your methods and data, and you don’t do good science by refusing to admit that your hypotheses aren’t holding up under the evidence.

          1. But ask yourself this: who is trying to shut up whom with a lawsuit? Who is more likely to be the extremist?

            The threatened lawsuit is over an accusation of fraud, nothing to do with free speech.

            I, quite rightly, shouldn’t be able to claim it as fact that you Murgatroyd, stole from your employer, or lied in court, without being able to prove it as fact. You’d, understandably be upset at such false allegations, and not expect me to be able to claim I had the right to make up such claims on the grounds of free speech.

            And why do you believe that political partisanship is at work here?

            The whole public AGW debate is split along political lines (where have you been?) Mann’s work has been targeted by the Right as it is seen as a weak link for the AGW case (unacceptably in my opinion), he’s more recently been targeted on a personal level, some people, unsuccessful in proving his work false to the wider public, have become frustrated and ramped up and personalized the attacks in an attempted to demonize him.

          2. In America, we have a long tradition of being able to say things about public figures including statements that they are frauds, liars, and thieves. This is about freedom of speech.

            Mann has a track record of attacking free speech rights of those critical of his public work and advocacy. Mann threatened to bring a lawsuit against the makers of the “Hide the Decline” parody song along much of the same grounds as he is using now. It is still on YouTube. I imagine this threatened lawsuit will turn out the same way.

            As the AGW alarmists demonstrate on a daily basis, Americans have the right to use offensive speech.

          3. In America, we have a long tradition of being able to say things about public figures including statements that they are frauds, liars, and thieves. This is about freedom of speech.

            General accusations aren’t quite the same as specific accusations, Obama is a crook is one thing, if a newspaper were to falsely claim that in 1998 Obama committed tax fraud, to the tune of $160,985, and has since used his position and acquaintances to block investigation of that fraud would be something different, if a paper made such a claim (against the candidate from either party), with malicious intent just before the next Presidential election, I’d hope to God “free speech” wasn’t considered a fair defense.

          4. > The threatened lawsuit is over an accusation of fraud, nothing to do with free speech.

            That isn’t what Times v. Sullivan established. Michael Mann is a public figure. Even if the people named in the still-unfiled lawsuit called him a fraud, and even if they were wrong, they still should not be found legally guilty because they believe the accusation is true.

            Or do you actually believe that Rand is secretly convinced that CAGW really is valid, and he’s just saying it’s all a crock because he’s malicious and eeeeevillll?

            > I, quite rightly, shouldn’t be able to claim it as fact that you Murgatroyd, stole from your employer, or lied in court, without being able to prove it as fact.

            And that’s what discovery is for. That’s also why I doubt that Mann will sue — it exposes him to the risk that something will turn up that can be taken as evidence of fraud. Why do you think he’s been refusing to release his data and methods for all this time?

            >> And why do you believe that political partisanship is at work here?

            > The whole public AGW debate is split along political lines (where have you been?)

            So? The whole scientific “controversy” over whether Trofim Lysenko was right or wrong about the inheritance of acquired characteristics was split along political lines. Nevertheless, even many left-wingers could see that Lysenko’s “science” was wrong, and they said so. Should Lysenko have sued? (Fortunately for him, he didn’t need to sue. A word to Comrade Stalin, and naysayers in the USSR were sent to the gulag.)

          5. News papers can and have said anything they want regardless of the validity of their articles. A couple of political examples are Bush lied us into war for oil and McCain has a mixed race love child. The truth and media have a tenuous relationship at best.

            But using your example if violating tax reguoations could be demonstrated by publicly available information, then the newspaper would be within bounds. Considering the debunking the hockey stick graph has received, saying it is a fraud, a sham, a total distortion of history on a grand scale seems to be fitting.

          6. because they believe the accusation is true.

            I think it might come down to whether or not it’s reasonable to make the accusation of fraud, not whatever their “beliefs” might be.

            Or do you actually believe that Rand is secretly convinced that CAGW really is valid, and he’s just saying it’s all a crock because he’s malicious and eeeeevillll?

            This threatened action has nothing to do with whether or Rand, or even Mann, are convinced about CAGW.

            Why do you think he’s been refusing to release his data and methods for all this time?

            He hasn’t, the clue is in the critiques of Mann et al ’98. You’re confusing this paper with one produced by Phil Jones some years ago, and the charges of failure to reveal methodology in that case are both exaggerated and out of date.

          7. I think it might come down to whether or not it’s reasonable to make the accusation of fraud, not whatever their “beliefs” might be.

            It doesn’t matter what you think. That’s not how libel law works. If I believe it to be true, it is not a “reckless disregard for the truth,” and they lose.

          8. That’s not how libel law works. If I believe it to be true, it is not a “reckless disregard for the truth,” and they lose.

            Rand, is this your understanding or has an attorney confirmed to you that this is the case?

            My understanding was that while believing it to be true is a necessary condition for successful defense against libel it is not a sufficient condition. Belief must also be “reasonable”. For example, if I call O. J. Simpson a killer, I can probably prevail in a libel suit he might bring against me because I can show such a belief is reasonable even though he was acquitted of murder. Indeed, many commentators refer to Simpson as “the acquitted killer”. On the other hand, if I call you a killer, you would likely prevail in a suit since, even if I believed it to be true, such belief is not “reasonable”.

            But I am not a lawyer and would welcome professional legal opinion on the matter.

        2. Obama is a crook is one thing, if a newspaper were to falsely claim that in 1998 Obama committed tax fraud, to the tune of $160,985, and has since used his position and acquaintances to block investigation of that fraud would be something different, if a paper made such a claim (against the candidate from either party), with malicious intent just before the next Presidential election, I’d hope to God “free speech” wasn’t considered a fair defense.

          It is. The First Amendment’s funny that way. All’s fair in love, war and political campaigns. The solution to bad speech is more speech.

          1. No, Rand, it’s not, and you will find that out directly in court. There they will find out that your blog is inhabited by posters named Baby Glock who wax poetically about a scientist free America.

          3. My belief is not unreasonable, and easily defended.

            Is that supposed to be your opinion, a fact, or don’t you recognized that there might be a difference between your opinions and fact?

  3. People have trolled through the Emails, explanations have been offered for most, if not all of the comments and phrases that are seen as some sort of proof of fraud.

    Guess, we’ll have to wait and see, I suspect though that a court will have to look more carefully at both sides of the argument than any “skeptic” blogger ever has.

        1. Ok, checked the discussion. As Rand responded to Andrews question about the discovery process: Because it provides an opportunity to force him to disclose things that he has been withholding (e.g. the University of Virginia emails).

          Andrew above wrote:
          People have trolled through the Emails,

          What people Andrew? How did they get the emails that Mann and UVA is withholding from various FOI requests?

          I realize some of those emails were sent or received from others; but I see no reason a defense on libel would simply trust the words of the plantiff’s associates. I think the defense would want to read the emails themselves. That is why there is a discovery phase in litigation like this.

    2. Explanations? Rationalizations and obfuscations, rather. Which part of “hide the decline” did you not understand? As this guy explains:

      As Dr. Muller points out in the video …, the word “trick” is irrelevant. The important part of the phrase is “hide the decline”. For example, suppose Phil Jones or Dr. Mann had said: “To hide the deline, we used a mathematical artifice that would make Newton and Gauss proud.” The message would still be the same: We attempted to hide, suppress, obfuscate, blur, etc. the fact that the data we used to create the Hockey Stick took a sudden downturn, which, if shown, would at a minimum have cast doubt on our whole study. The “cleverness” of the procedure is irrelevant. If anything, however, the more clever the procedure, the harder it is to defend.

      1. From Realclimate:
        No doubt, instances of cherry-picked and poorly-worded “gotcha” phrases will be pulled out of context. One example is worth mentioning quickly. Phil Jones in discussing the presentation of temperature reconstructions stated that “I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) and from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline.” The paper in question is the Mann, Bradley and Hughes (1998) Nature paper on the original multiproxy temperature reconstruction, and the ‘trick’ is just to plot the instrumental records along with reconstruction so that the context of the recent warming is clear. Scientists often use the term “trick” to refer to a “a good way to deal with a problem”, rather than something that is “secret”, and so there is nothing problematic in this at all. As for the ‘decline’, it is well known that Keith Briffa’s maximum latewood tree ring density proxy diverges from the temperature records after 1960 (this is more commonly known as the “divergence problem”–see e.g. the recent discussion in this paper) and has been discussed in the literature since Briffa et al in Nature in 1998 (Nature, 391, 678-682). Those authors have always recommend not using the post 1960 part of their reconstruction, and so while ‘hiding’ is probably a poor choice of words (since it is ‘hidden’ in plain sight), not using the data in the plot is completely appropriate, as is further research to understand why this happens.
        http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/11/the-cru-hack/

        Note that the words “hide the decline” aren’t even Mann’s.

        1. Do you think there is a parallel to Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and Piltdown Man?

          From my perspective, the scientific evidence in support of evolution or at least against a Young Earth version of Creationism is compelling. On the other hand, the Piltdown Man “fossil” of a “missing link” in human evolution is generally and widely viewed in the historical record as an outright and intentional fraud. Nebraska Man is probably not fraudulent but the result of over-eager interpretation of fossil fragments (i.e. teeth).

          Both of these cases are the result of having a compelling scientific hypothesis (evolution) and over eagerness and overreach in finding evidence for it.

          Andrew W, answer me this. Is your reasoning that Piltdown man was “for real” and not a fraud and that the people who say it is a fraud are anti-evolutionists with a religious agenda? There is all manner of speculation regarding who perpetrated the Piltdown fraud and for what reason; perhaps it was vanity, perhaps it was a practical joke gone bad. Is it possible that Piltdown was fraudulent but evolution has an underlying reality apart from that episode?

          Would you accept that human CO2-driven climate change is a compelling hypothesis, but like the fossil record for human evolution pre Leakey and Oldavai Gorge, that direct evidence for it in the known temperature record might be iffy?

          1. I can offer several peer reviewed papers supporting Mann’s “hockey stick” graph, what peer reviewed work can you offer refuting it? What can you offer, in the way of peer reviewed work, that uses the same data that Mann used, that produces a different conclusion?

        2. Blow it out your ear, Andrew. In the first place, we all know the “peer review” system in climate science has been thoroughly corrupted, and any mediocrity can get published if he toes the Party line.

          Secondly, even with all that, here’s the Wegman Report and the original McIntyre & McKitrick paper to get you started on the contrary literature, of which there are dozens of peer reviewed papers available.

          See my earlier comment @ August 26, 2012, 7:12 am. Why are you trying to defend the indefensible? You cannot possibly believe that “hide the decline” means anything but that they hid the decline. This is NOT science, and if you hold with it, you are not anything close to being a scientist.

          1. I guess some people still think Piltdown wasn’t a human jaw stuck on an ape’s skull — or was it the other way around?

            My sense is we are talking about proofs of evolution in the 1920’s instead of now. There may be a strong underlying truth to CO2 and Climate Change, but the Hockey Stick isn’t it. These Arguments by Authority push me further in the direction that there is no there, there.

          2. In the first place, we all know the “peer review” system in climate science has been thoroughly corrupted, and any mediocrity can get published if he toes the Party line.

            Who’s “we”?

          4. I read the Wegman report when it came out, the most interesting thing about it is that, although it goes on at length about the short comings in Mann 1998 paper, it doesn’t actually show what the palio-temperature reconstruction would have looked like if Mann had followed all the methodology the Wegman et al believed appropriate, why? Because the resulting reconstruction would have been almost indistinguishable from the one Mann produced.

            The Wegman report was a document produced for a politician, (Barton) and like all such political documents it ‘s intent was to serve a political agenda, facts inconvenient to that agenda were omitted.

          5. Those of us who have been paying attention.

            Again you’ve resorted to chauvinism. Do you really have such a strong Simberg-centric view of the world that you can’t understand that others, with the opposite view to you, can also be paying attention? Especially when they will also claim to be those “who have been paying attention”?

          6. “Because the resulting reconstruction would have been almost indistinguishable from the one Mann produced.”

            Ah, no. See Figure 4.3. The AGW vested interests insist that the fact that the MBH methods do not always produce a hockey stick from random red noise. But, that is entirely beside the point. It does so in the majority of cases. But, even if it did so only in a substantial fraction of cases, it would show that the methodology is not robust.

            The notion that others using the MBH methodlogy obtain similar results somehow proves it yields reliable estimates is bizarre. If everyone does things the same wrong way, of course it will always be wrong in similar fashion.

            Why are you defending the indefensible, Andrew? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?

          7. Dropped part of a sentence:

            Ah, no. See Figure 4.3. The AGW vested interests insist that the fact that the MBH methods do not always produce a hockey stick from random red noise somehow refutes the conclusion. But, that is entirely beside the point. It does so in the majority of cases. But, even if it did so only in a substantial fraction of cases, it would show that the methodology is not robust.

          8. “Because the resulting reconstruction would have been almost indistinguishable from the one Mann produced.”

            Ah, no. See Figure 4.3.

            1. Mann acknowledged the error in not centering the PCA reconstruction

            2. That reconstruction was from M&M

            3. It was not a reconstruction of the “hockey stick” graph, only of a series of tree ring proxies.

            The AGW vested interests insist that the fact that the MBH methods do not always produce a hockey stick from random red noise somehow refutes the conclusion.

            Ah, no, the refutation is in the fact that using the same data with any recommended statistical methodology produces the same graph, a graph omitted from the Wegman report.

            Just to make things easier for you, you can find that graph here:
            http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/07/the-missing-piece-at-the-wegman-hearing/

          9. Bart, in your August 26, 2012, 12:23 pm comment you link to a Wiki page, I urge you to read your own link.

          10. “Ah, no, the refutation is in the fact that using the same data with any recommended statistical methodology produces the same graph, a graph omitted from the Wegman report.”

            As I started above, the notion that others using the MBH methodlogy obtain similar results somehow proves it yields reliable estimates is bizarre. If everyone does things the same wrong way, of course it will always be wrong in similar fashion.

          11. Perhaps you could actually read my comment, or the Realclimate link, it mentions Rutherford et al who used the same data, different methodology, got the same graph.

            the notion that others using the MBH methodlogy obtain similar results somehow proves it yields reliable estimates is bizarre.

            Indeed, that would be bizarre, and it’s a claim I’ve never come across, so sounds like you’re serving up a straw man to me.

            If you’re suggesting the fault is mainly with the data, rather than the methodology, as you’ve been told before, since MBH98, several reconstructions have been done using more recently available data, they show essentially the same graph. Go look at your own Wiki link if you don’t believe me.

        3. As for the ‘decline’, it is well known that Keith Briffa’s maximum latewood tree ring density proxy diverges from the temperature records after 1960 (this is more commonly known as the “divergence problem”–see e.g. the recent discussion in this paper) and has been discussed in the literature since Briffa et al in Nature in 1998 (Nature, 391, 678-682). Those authors have always recommend not using the post 1960 part of their reconstruction, and so while ‘hiding’ is probably a poor choice of words (since it is ‘hidden’ in plain sight), not using the data in the plot is completely appropriate, as is further research to understand why this happens.

          Good grief! Do you really believe this is a valid defense?

          … while ‘hiding’ is probably a poor choice of words (since it is ‘hidden’ in plain sight) …

          It was NOT hidden in plain sight. The data points were omitted, and they were omitted in such a way as to leave the impression that they were plotted on the graph but obscured behind trend lines that supported the “hockey stick” claim.

          … not using the data in the plot is completely appropriate, as is further research to understand why this happens.

          Not using all of the data in the plot would have been appropriate. Using only the portion of the data set that supported the hypothesis and deliberately discarding the data points that did not support it is not acceptable science. They say themselves that they don’t know why those data points don’t support the “hockey stick” … so why do they think the data points that do support the claim have any validity? In my opinion, the statement you quoted constitutes an admission of scientific fraud all by itself, since this is not acceptable scientific methodology.

          1. That bears repeating, again, and again, and again:

            It was NOT hidden in plain sight. The data points were omitted, and they were omitted in such a way as to leave the impression that they were plotted on the graph but obscured behind trend lines that supported the “hockey stick” claim.

      2. Now why would the authors recommend not using the post 1960 part of their reconstruction? Because their tree ring data shows temperatures declining since 1960. That would mean that either global warming is completely false or that their tree ring data set is a completely unreliable proxy, and therefore scientifically useless.

        So they did several things that should never be done with data. They spliced two completely different data sources together, then they cleverly hid the post 1960 line with another line so it looked like it was continuing upwards underneath the other color.

        They’d already cherry picked data sets until they found a small subset of their samples that showed little change until the present, working to erase the existence of the Medieval Warm Period (whose global existence and severity has been confirmed and reconfirmed by other researchers) and written custom statistical routines that produced the hockey stick they wanted even when fed random pink noise, so their research was a steaming pile of scientifically and mathematically invalid BS.

        They’ve since gone on to try and shut down journals that dare to print scientific articles that refute their results, tried to fire editors and researchers who question their methods, etc. That’s not science, and the scientific community should not tolerate such behavior.

  4. Left-wing loons imagine their own dysfunctional psyches to be normative. This is called projection in the psychiatric trade. These people are born with kaleidoscopes in each eye.

  5. My experience with progressives is that they project constantly.

    They ASSUME that anyone who disagrees with them is just as ruthless, just as incompetent, just as unethical and non-trustworthy as they are but can’t admit since their persona is one of false caring, egotism and superiority in all things.

    If they think skeptics are command and control, it’s because that is what THEY are doing.

    1. This may well be the comment of the month! Seriously, what you wrote describes so many so well, and it also fits with my experience of such folks, as well.

    2. It may be in part a matter of projection because there is a nexus of coordination between AGW activist groups but they actually do believe that all opposition is a paid front of people who advocate on behalf of the oil industry and are not real people with their own views.

    3. My experience with progressives is that they project constantly.

      They ASSUME that anyone who disagrees with them is just as ruthless, just as incompetent, just as unethical and non-trustworthy as they are but can’t admit since their persona is one of false caring, egotism and superiority in all things.

      If they think skeptics are command and control, it’s because that is what THEY are doing.
      Your comment is just bizarre and stupid and self serving beyond belief. The “alarmists” and “denialists” are two sides of the same coin, each accuses the other of corruption, having financial incentives, dishonesty, lunacy, “unethical and trustworthiness”, “false caring, egotism and superiority”, “command and control” blah, blah, blah.

      From both sides it’s all just rationalizing BS to justify their own ideologically based position on the issue.
      I guess it’s all to be expected given human nature, people alive today are here because their ancestors spent millions of years fighting to survive, not fighting to be more ethical than their competitors, and if you can demonize the others fighting for the same hunting grounds, it’s a hell of a lot easier to kill them, so we instinctively demonize the enemy. Congrats on letting the primitive parts of your brain rule.
      http://www.actualfreedom.com.au/library/topics/instincts.htm

      The “hockeystick” stands, changing the methodology didn’t change the graph, increasing the number of proxies, to many, many more than Mann had in ’98 didn’t change the graph.

      Anyone can use the proxies to produce their own hockey sticks, but no one has produced anything of any quality that doesn’t replicate the hockey stick (I define it as a graph that shows a slow but steady decline in NH temperatures through to around the start of the twentieth century with a relatively rapid uptick since then).

      Mann’s methodology and data is public, despite numerous ignorant claims the the contrary, how else could Wegman have done his hatchet job?

  6. We await your orders to liquidate the enemy operative Mann with growing impatience. Guide us, Hiveleader Simberg!

  7. For some reason I haven’t received my marching orders from the Elders of Capitalism. What’s more, the black helicopters dropping bales of cash in my front yard seem to be late.

    Should I go over to the Freemasons?

    1. Oh that explains why I got two bales of cash this week. My neighbors were suspicious about the black helicopters but a couple Benjamins calmed them down. In fact, they were so accommodating that I now have them posting on several different forums so that nothing can be tied back to the collective. /muhahaha

    2. What’s more, the black helicopters dropping bales of cash in my front yard seem to be late.

      Did the Fed chairman miss your house?

  8. Rand, I advise you to give-up now before it’s too late.

    It’s clear that Dr Mann is of such high intelligence that he can seen through your cover and knows about your real masters back on Zeta Reticuli.

    Call up the ‘mother ship’ now and leave this planet, you know there was never enough chlorine in the atmosphere to make you feel comfortable!

    1. I fear you are confusing Rand with Dwayne Day.

      And now I will meander on for a while to satisfy the spam filters. Are we satiated yet?

      No, not yet. Mmmm . . .

      Apparently Google intends to make it impossible to do what I just did; they’re switching to the “new improved Google Groups” which has no advanced search capabiltiy and no apparent Usenet archive.

      Now are we satiated?

      It doesn’t look like these stupid spam filters are going to let me post anything with the actual link it it, but go into the old Google Groups and do an advanced search for author Dwayne Day, exact phrase Zeta Reticulan, and you’ll get there.

        1. I got so frustrated that the posting ended up pretty unintelligible. There was supposed to be an html link in there to a sci.space.policy article in which Dwayne Day made his original claim to be THE ONLY ZETA RETICULAN ON EARTH! (his capitalization and punctuation), and also referred to “Rand” as “just a monkey-boy ZR wannabe”. But I couldn’t get the system to stop telling me “we don’t want spam here”.

          2. and no apparent Usenet archive.

            I saw that coming when Google bought Dejanews. You’d think there’d be some kind of public domain access to Usenet archives, but Google probably makes sure it’s non-functional.

            This is the closest I can find (change “grups” to “groups”):

            http://grups.google.com/group/sci.space.policy/browse_thread/thread/d26996cfc19c3a99/db6ee4e88c2e5b59?hl=en&q=%22Zeta+Reticulan%22+author:%22Dwayne+Day%22#db6ee4e88c2e5b59

  9. Ahh, but the strawberries that’s… that’s where I had them. They laughed at me and made jokes but I proved beyond the shadow of a doubt and with… geometric logic… that a duplicate key to the wardroom icebox DID exist, and I’d have produced that key if they hadn’t of pulled the Caine out of action.

    A little known fact is that they kept a hockey stick in the wardroom.

  11. The strategic analysis complete ignores, or is ignorant of, Mark Steyn’s history as a litigant in “free speech” trials.

    Even if all else were correct, attacking the “conspirator” for alleged “libel” who is ALREADY widely viewed as a champion of free speech irredeemably ties the complaint to a similar attack on free speech. Very very poor strategy.

  12. A further thought. Since Flynt v Falwell, the sad unintended consequence of American defamation case law is that the more outrageous the slander, the safer. If I were to accuse Mann, (or Lomberg, just to be fair.) of mere bias in data selection in writing grant proposals for the sake of obtaining funding — well, that’s reasonable and plausible and therefore a dangerous (for the speaker, potentially defamatory) claim. Were I to claim Mann (or Lomberg) screws little boys while drunk in the shower and then blackmails a university to whitewash the subsequent investigation — well that’s obviously hyperbolic and satirical.

  13. Re: Andrew W: August 25th, 2012 at 10:40 pm

    That’s just pathetic. How to you not see how inadequate that is as an “explanation”? He’s just saying, “yes, they hid the decline, but it’s OK, because I say it is.” FAIL.

  14. Yep, the lawyers involved on both sides are probably already checking out the new S-Class at their local Mercedes dealers knowing they will have lots of extra money in the near future 🙂

    As for the lawsuit itself, I suspect that as with the Scopes Trial it will only push the two sides further to the extreme.

  15. “Mann’s strategic rational is based upon the observation CEI and NR published startlingly similar, startlingly abusive, startling ill-judged editorials”

    Oddly, it hasn’t occured to Mann that Steyn is plagiarizing Simburg. Wegman has been more or less successfully marginalized in the climate debates because, while his critique of Mann et al.’s statistical methods remain untouched, the background information discussing climate research appears to have been, by Wegman’s apprentice, copied from prior reference books without complete and appropriate attributation. This proves, in blogging comment circles, Wegman is a plagiarist, and therefore Mann has been exonerated.

    If Steyn were somehow proved to have quoted, without appropriate and complete attributation to, Simberg; it would make Steyn a plagiarist, too. Then whenever anyone ELSE accused Mann of being a fraud and a torturer of data, Mann could claim that third party was relying on STEYN, (ignoring Simberg) for the opinion — and because relying on a plagiarist is stupid, the claim is also stupid.

  16. Last thing, then I have to move on.

    Sir Rand, will you be allowed to comment on when you are formally served with the suit? That is, if Mann turns out to be bluffing after all, and some 30 days go by and we have not seen the topic addressed, are you able to say whether or not it was such a bluff?

  17. Sounds like Mann is trying the Prisoner’s Dilemma gambit. But the payoff for his targets standing strong looks too good for this to be a viable strategy.

  18. Oh my. Will Mann’s attorney actually depose dozens of people at CEI, NR, Heartland, etc.? If so, and if Mann does not have wealthy backers, his attorney will soon own his house.

    1. FC, that raises a good question. Maybe the University is paying for the attorney? Or maybe the attorney is hoping for a big win?

      Also, I’m seeing chatter in blog comments that Mann stalls discovery? Anybody know of any actual examples of that?

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