UPDATES below – some confusion afoot by differing newspaper versions has been discovered. The print version appears to be online.
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Letters to the editor are one of the oldest free speech venues for public opinion in the United States. They go back to the times of the revolutionary war. The Chicago Tribune aptly calls Letters to the Editor “Voice of the people“.
This morning my interest in a letter to the editor was piqued when I read at Tom Nelson’s website, this headline: Remember when it was really important to leave Michael Mann alone to concentrate on his climate hoax research? Now he’s got time to write a rant for the Vail Daily
Dr. Michael Mann’s letter to the editor, a response to a previous letter by Dr. Martin Hertzberg, at the Vail Daily is online here. Excerpts:
It’s hard to imagine anyone packing more lies and distortions into a single commentary. Mr. Hertzberg uses libelous language in characterizing the so-called “hockey stick” — work of my own published more than a decade ago showing that recent warming is unusual over at least the past 1,000 years — as “fraudulent,” and claiming that it “it was fabricated from carefully selected tree-ring measurements with a phony computer program.”
…
Mr. Hertzberg then continues the smear by lying again about my work, claiming that “when those same tree-ring data actually showed a decline in temperature for the past several decades, Mann and his co-authors simply ‘hid the decline’ by grafting direct measurements (inadequately corrected for the urban heat island and other effects) to his flat tree-ring line.”
So I wanted to see what got Dr. Mann into such a tizzy, because sentences like the ones quoted in the paragraphs above are all over the Internet, especially after Climategate broke. I wanted to see the full context in Dr. Hertzberg’s letter.
So I Googled the offending phrase Dr. Mann cites, and got this result:
Imagine my shock when I discovered that the Google link goes nowhere. Dr. Hertzberg’s letter has been deleted from the newspaper.
Wow.
Dr. Hertzberg’s letter appeared on Friday, September 30th, and Dr. Mann’s letter appeared the next day, quite a turnaround:
One wonders if the address given for Dr. Mann is a typo, or a geographic misrepresentation to help get the letter published. Either way, the Vail Daily editor looks pretty darn sloppy since this appears in the last line of Dr. Mann’s letter:
Michael E. Mann is a professor in the Department of Meterology at Penn State University and director of Penn State Earth System Science Center.
Dr. Hertzberg does in fact live near Vail, in Copper Mountain, CO. and he would presumably be served by the newspaper of record for that area, which is why the letter appeared in that newspaper. As far as we know, Dr. Mann does not live in Vail or nearby.
The policy and online form for submission and publication of Letters to the Editor at the Vail Daily is worth noting:
Letter to the Editor
Guidelines
Before you use the online form below to submit a letter or guest column to the editor, please read the guidelines below.
The decision to print any submission is completely at the discretion of the Vail Daily editor. Letters and columns must include the author’s name, hometown, affiliation (if any) and phone number (for verification of authorship only). Form letters and letters considered libelous, obscene or in bad taste will not be printed. Anonymous letters will not be printed. The Vail Daily reserves the right to edit all letters. Because of space constraints, please limit your letters to 500 words. Thank you/kudos letters are limited to 150 words and letters containing long lists of names will not be printed.
So, apparently, the letter from Dr. Hertzberg passed the newspaper’s tests for “letters considered libelous, obscene or in bad taste” and was in fact printed, but when Dr. Mann sends a rebuttal, all of the sudden Dr. Hertzberg’s letter no longer passes those tests? I suspect that maybe Dr. Mann may have offered some legalese in some form to go with that letter, and the editor caved to censorship demands rather than upholding free speech.
The Wikipedia definition for freedom of speech:
Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak freely without censorship. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used. In practice, the right to freedom of speech is not absolute in any country and the right is commonly subject to limitations, such as on libel, slander, obscenity, incitement to commit a crime, etc.
It may be possible that libel was committed by Dr. Hertzberg (whose credential Dr. Mann doesn’t even acknowledge in his rebuttal letter), but without the original letter from Dr. Hertzberg, how would any independent observer be able to judge?
And, in choosing the headline for the rebuttal: Vail Valley Voices: Global warming denier’s claims are falsehoods did the Vail Daily in turn libel Dr. Hertzberg by labeling him a “global warming denier”?
Clearly then, this is a matter best settled by the courts.
I encourage Dr. Mann to file a lawsuit, so that we can finally get complete discovery (something not done by the “independent reviews” Dr. Mann cites frequently) and find out once and for all if Dr. Mann’s work holds up when all of the data, math, methods, and correspondence are laid bare for scrutiny.
Likewise, Dr. Hertzberg may have a court case for denial of free speech, along with libel by the use of “global warming denier”.
The questions of “who libeled who?”, and “was free speech denied?”, can only be answered in a court of law.
UPDATE: As we all know from vast experience, the Internet has a memory. I’ve discovered what appears to be Dr. Hertzberg’s letter to the editor on a website called “pastebin” which you can see and read here. Dr. Hertzberg’s letter was apparently a response to a previous letter, five days earlier:
Since I am a long-time denier of human-caused global warming and have been described as an “inaccurate” and “irresponsible” “fool” by Scott Glasser’s commentary in Monday’s Vail Daily, I feel compelled to respond.
Since Dr. Hertzberg describes himself as a “doubter” (in the original I saw) it seems the bias of the Vail Daily editor in choosing “denier” for the headline was in fact an editorial decision.
I wonder how long the letter will exist on “pastebin”.
UPDATE#2: It appears that at the same time as I was writing this essay, the Vail Daily decided to reinstate the letter from Dr. Hertzberg. Note the out of sequence date at time for the title:
From this page: http://www.vaildaily.com/SECTION/&profile=1065
Before I made this story I did quite a bit of checking, and the removal was also noted by other websites, for example:
Rabbet Run: Ethon flew in from Colorado with news from one of the bunnies. It appears that the Vail Valley Daily had published a now defunct letter from one Dr. Martin Hertzberg, who appears to live thereabouts. The article which, as the saying goes is no longer to be found, must have been a doozy,
And I looked for it myself by searching the Vail Daily website. I could not find it. For example, it does not show up in search:
UPDATE3: The plot thickens. It appears the restored version on Vail Daily here:
http://www.vaildaily.com/article/20110930/EDITS/111009984/1021&parentprofile=1065
Is missing some key sentences found in the version on pastebin here:
The name of Dr. Mann has been scrubbed from the letter as are the sentences Dr. Mann objected to in his rebuttal letter.
There’s no mention of this edit in the restored version of the letter. It is still dated Sept 30th. Perhaps Dr. Hertzberg was told to revise it?
Now he claims he’s a “denier” where before he says doubter? Strange things going on.
UPDATE4: Larry (Hotrod) points out in comments that the original print version is still archived by the newspaper here.
UPDATE5: It appears we are witnessing the real time editing of this article in online archives. The original with the phrases Dr. Mannobjected to are disappearing from the main web page and archives and are being replaced with edited versions.
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Hertzberg’s letter is available as a link under “Related Articles” under the Mann piece: http://www.vaildaily.com/article/20110930/EDITS/111009984/1021&parentprofile=1065
REPLY: Interesting, you are correct, that links works. Perhaps it has been put back. Before I made this story I did quite a bit of checking, and the removal was also noted by other websites, for example:
Rabbet Run: Ethon flew in from Colorado with news from one of the bunnies. It appears that the Vail Valley Daily had published a now defunct letter from one Dr. Martin Hertzberg, who appears to live thereabouts. The article which, as the saying goes is no longer to be found, must have been a doozy,
And I looked for it myself by searching the Vail Daily website. I could not find it. For example, it does not show up in search:
http://apps.vaildaily.com/utils/search/index.php?SearchCategory=%25&IncludeNoDateArt=1&daterange=19980101%2C20111002&crit=hertzberg
Perhaps it has been moved, reindexed, and/or restored. Clearly though at one point it has gone missing.
Follow up: it appears that as I was writing my essay, they put it back, note the out of sequence date:
From this page: http://www.vaildaily.com/SECTION/&profile=1065
– Anthony
oooooh gremlins.
c
I guess the Vail Daily Blab wanted to beat the Wayback Machine.
At least Mann acknowledges that it may have been warmer 1ooo years ago. This certainly is not supportive of the ideology he promotes.
GIYF (Google is your friend)
the original article
Down the Memory Hole, Winston! For those who are curious where that term came from, it’s from Orwell’s 1984. What he meant if for was a warning, not a playbook!
Letter still exists in their archive.
http://vaildaily.co.newsmemory.com/
Look for edition 9/30/2011 and pages A4-A5, and A6-A7
You can download and print as PDF
Larry
There is a strange kind of cycle in scientific bias and the defense of dominant theories that purport to be beyond rational debate. WUWT needs to add a science history reference page on the defunct ether theory of physics to layout the progression of that earlier drama before Einstein added the final nail to the coffin.
No the tree rings didn’t show a decline without the fake computer algorithm. When you take into account the equally fake infilling of 95% of the data, hacking off and replacing of the Schweingruber MXD series (hide the decline), combined with Luterbacher – trees with instrumental data pasted on, and an apparently random pre-selection process then you get a flattish line all the way through that is not distinguishable from noise.
“Imagine my shock”
Uh-huh. ;-p
Karl, the link you provide appears to be from another letter by MH.
Hmmm..Hertzberg’s article doesnt mention Mann at all? Is there another article or is Mann so used to refuting all criticism of his work that he reads it into everything?
This is not that surprising. I have had several letters to the editor published By The Stowe [Vt] Reporter. The ones on global warming were followed by editor notes that pointed readers to web sites that support the AGW claims. When I wrote to them refuting their sources they refuse to publish those letters. It was rare for them to publish editor note and I never saw them publish one under a liberal letter.
Karl Maki says:
October 2, 2011 at 11:11 am
The letter as archived has the Mann bits removed, when compared to the Pastebin version.
Once the Con Man has been running it long enough,
he has pretty much made himself forget it’s actually a Con,
so well-practiced it has become over the decades.
When presented with factual counter-arguments that expose the Con,
he replies with exaggerated indignation and over-the-top vitriol,
the mark of the fully Self-Deceived. (Normal people stay calm.)
And the Marxists accuse us of False Consciousness (!),
which by the way is nothing-but a dressed-up neologism for ‘Self-Deception’,
something that’s been discussed by philosophers for millenia.
Interesting…the article linked in the 1st comment is missing the sentences regarding Mann…but the next article linked has them….
Robert’s link is the same as Karl’s. That letter to the editor has no mention at of Mann. If that is the letter to the editor that Mann is referring to, then I guess Mann must be sending out form letters that just assume than anyone speaking out against the meme must be targeting him..
Mann O Mann:
“The highest scientific body in the nation, the National Academy of Sciences affirmed my research findings in an exhaustive independent review published in June 2006 (see e.g. “Science Panel Backs Study on Warming Climate,” New York Times, June 22, 2006, among many others).”
That’s why he links to … the New York Times, not the proceedings.
“Dozens of independent groups of scientists have independently reproduced and confirmed our findings, and more recent work by several groups shows that recent warmth is unusual over an even longer time frame.”
The Caspar Jesus paper? LOL
Mann’s desperation knows no depths.
@Karl Horrex Maki, the Hertzberg letter you link to does not mention Mann’s tree-rings or have any of the quotes mentioned in this article. Did Mann misquote him? Or is it a different letter than the one in question?
Mann has threatened legal action and the editor, unaware of the issues, M&M, Wegman and the climategate emails has, as the Brits would say, “bottled it” and withdrawn the article (To bottle – not have the courage to go forward).
I am certainly no fan of Mr. Mann and his fellow travellers, but one has to be very careful when using terms like “fraudulent”. Fraud has a rather exact legal definition, and if you start using such terms you are bound to raise someone’s hackles.
Having said that, I cannot find the passage that Mr. Mann complains about (“it was fabricated from carefully selected tree-ring measurements with a phony computer program”) in Dr. Hertzberg’s letter. I wonder if Mr. Mann was replying to a different letter to the editor, one that only he can see? ;->
Scott Glasser, MD. wrote on 12 September:
“I am merely an amateur. Now imagine how the world’s climatologists and researchers observe our environment. These are the brains that determine how fast the tectonic plates move and predict the path of hurricanes. They invent the machines that NASA shoots into space to rendezvous with small objects moving at thousands of miles an hour millions of miles away, and they dig the ice cores to study what the environment was like 800,000 years ago.”……
“Lastly this: While I truly appreciate the Vail Daily’s wonderful policy of publishing so many of our letters, I take issue with its continued policy of placing the comments of certain extremist individuals under large boldface type — headlining their often hateful, implausible statements and thereby falsely lending added credence to their rantings. It is unfair and irresponsible. The issues we face are daunting and important. Can we please level the playing field?”
Vail Valley Voices replied:
Dear Readers,
We’ve received your feedback, and are evaluating the options available for a different commenting system. One thing’s sure, the old system won’t return as it was. We still have lots of ways to share your opinion, including Letters to the Editor. Thanks for bearing with us.
Thank you!
This appears to be Dr Hertzberg’s original letter to the editor:
REPLY: This doesn’t match the one on pastebin, this appears to be a revised version – Anthony
The following is in the letter in the archives and I believe is the segment Mann is complaining about:
The letter by Hertzberg is responding to a previous letter by Glasser which included comments about Mann’s research.
Larry