Reposted from National Review Online
Please support us in our fight against Professor Michael Mann.
By Jack Fowler
We’re being sued, and we need your help.
Let me recap: A lawsuit has been formally filed by Professor Michael Mann against National Review and Mark Steyn. You know Mann: The Penn State academic and self-proclaimed (and bogus) Nobel Peace Prize awardee best known, famously and infamously, for the “hockey stick” graph that allegedly proves that recent years were the hottest on record for more than a millennium.
Of course, he is also known for the scandal about embarrassing e-mails, pried out of the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit.
(Anything you want to know about “Climategate” can be found at the great site WattsUpWithThat.com. And if you want to get a load of Mann, visit his Facebook page for kicks and giggles and a look at self-promotion on steroids.)
In July, Mark wrote on the Corner about Penn State, much in the news for its institutional cover-ups, and Professor Mann. It was a Steyn classic, so it must have really smarted, and soon thereafter NR received notification of a pending lawsuit (here’s our response).
Like his claim to be a Nobel laureate, the charges against NR are baseless and very much worth fighting. National Review doesn’t look to get itself sued, but neither does it shy from a fight, especially one like this. Rich Lowry’s response to Mann’s legal threats exactly captures our mood and determination.
As many of you know, National Review is not a non-profit — we are just not profitable. A lawsuit is not something we can fund with money we don’t have. Of course, we’ll do whatever we have to do to find ourselves victorious in court and Professor Mann thoroughly defeated, as he so richly deserves to be. Meanwhile, we have to hire attorneys, which ain’t cheap.
The bills are already mounting.
This is our fight, legally. But with the global-warming extremists going all-out to silence critics, it’s your fight too, morally. When we were sued, we heard from many of you who expressed a desire to help underwrite our legal defense. We deeply appreciated the outpouring of promised help.
Now we really need it.
Please help National Review in its fight to kick Professor Michael Mann’s legal heinie.
Contribute here. Many thanks for your help.
As for Everard’s suggestion that Mann has a practice of pulling out after putting defendants to great expense, wasn’t it suggested in earlier threads on these lawsuits that is not easy to do once the suit is filed with a court? Wasn’t it suggested that it would be very awkward for Mann to not comply with a court order to produce documents demanded by the defendants, as part of the Examination for Discovery process? I’d expect judges are not tolerant of game playing. Doesn’t the court of jurisdiction have to agree with pulling out, or with an out-of-court settlement? But I suppose that if the defendant agrees the court won’t get excited about dropping the case as they have so many other cases to deal with – but note that “Rosco”’s report on Tim Ball’s cases indicates the court awarded costs to the plaintiffs who pulled out. (Refusal to comply with a court order, however, would be viewed very seriously.)
Canada and US practice could be different – is the NRO law suit in the US? (NRO is in US but Steyn is in Canada?) Tim Ball and the National Post newspaper, variously sued by the likes of Mann and Weaver, are in Canada. (Don’t assume AU and UK are similar to CA, each country has evolved in specifics. While AU, CA, UK, and US generally use the “British Common Law” system for civil matters, there are specific laws in each country. Canada is significantly influenced by US practice, due much interaction between people in the two societies. And BC, where at least one lawsuit was filed, has another wrinkle – a threshold of payment to the court, that someone must pay for the court to hear the case.)
I’ve kicked in – go hard guys!
Mann along with Hayhoe and Bill Anderegg spoke the other day.
http://dge.stanford.edu/people/anderegg
http://www.climate-one.org/blog/political-science
“Anderegg spoke of the evidence of longer fire seasons, larger fires, stress on water resources, snowpack and droughts. “We’re seeing the early signs, the tip of the iceberg, as to what these forests are going to do during stress.” He links rising temperature to a number of widespread massive tree-mortality events in the western U.S. and Canada over the past five to ten years. “And it’s fairly safe to say these are kind of the early warning signals of what’s coming for these ecosystems that a lot of local communities depend on.”
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What does the data really say about the temps and forest fires?
Financially thanking you.
Done!
NRO should send Mann’s lawyers a letter:
“We refer you to the reply given in the case of Arkell v Pressdram…” ☺
(Donation sent)
Add 50, fire for effect.
Done.
Is that a typo? 😀 ;p
oldseadog;
A petard is a sachel charge, or mine, or bomb. “Hoist” meant blown up. No ropes involved. “Petard” is currently French slang for “fart”.
For those asking: 50 Euros is about $63 USD; $50 USD is about 32 British pounds.