Thursday
Mar202014
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill Mann latest
Mar 20, 2014 Climate: Mann Over at his blog, Mark Steyn rounds up the latest news on the libel suits he's sharing with Michael Mann. Mann says he can't allow Steyn to discover his documents until everyone else involved in the suits, including Rand Simberg and the National Review, allow him to get hold of their documents. And NRO and Simberg are not going to go through with document discovery while they try to get the case thrown out.
Quite why Mann can't comply in the meantime is unclear, but it may well be that we are seeing the legal process and the endless delays being used as a grinding down tactic by Mann and his "friends in higher places".
Reader Comments (25)
We have seen evolution in action! The ManBearPig has evolved into the MannChicken!
I have personally seen squirrels on the PSU campus that have done more constructive work than Mr. Mann has in the past ten years. The squirrels are also much more friendly and fun to feed. They have told me they would welcome higher temperatures, but they are somewhat skeptical. None of them spend their time Twittering or Facebooking, however. They have more important things to do.
Surely the way forward here is to agree a time when all documents requested by both parties are handed over simultaneously? The party who doesn't agree to this has something to hide.
My money is on the Mann.
As noted before, "delay is the deadliest form of denial" (C Northcote Parkinson)
First, love the turn of phrase at the end.
Second, it's clearly not helping to have fallen out so deeply with his esrtwhile ally and customer National Review. I'm not in a position to judge if it was unavoidable. I wish all parties well. Even Dr Mann. For only the truth will make things fully well for him, as for all of us.
Mar 20, 2014 at 1:12 PM Don Keiller
What, bring common sense into a legal system? Wash your mouth out.
Methinks the system needs judges paid on piece-work, not by the hour.
Is it possible to name those "friends"?
The longer Mann delays, obfuscates, and obstructs, the more likely it is that an abuse of process suit against him will be successful and result in a substantial damages.
Given Mann is a mere pretender when compared to the utterly dictatorial and unanswerable Canadian human rights council, which Styen buried, then I just don't have any hope for Mann in this case.
Mailman
Mann gets a little mention near the beginning of this daily space and Earth weather update:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RU0XKkyLE0&list=UUTiL1q9YbrVam5nP2xzFTWQ
jorgekafkazar: "The longer Mann delays, obfuscates, and obstructs, the more likely it is that an abuse of process suit against him will be successful and result in a substantial damages."
I don't think so. I think the system is working precisely the way it is designed to work. The lawyers and judges are complicit. The "grinding down" as the Bish phrases it, is very much part of the process. In the end, the lawyers and judges want you simply be grateful it's over rather than worry about the actual verdict. Truth and justice are not the goal, it seems. Delay, self-enrichment and preservation of a cumbersome, elitist form of justice are. The right to a speedy trial has become an anachronism.
The lawyers and judges look at these defamation suits as squabbles that the participants are too stupid and mule-stubborn to settle amongst themselves. And so they they think that whatever the cost, it's just desserts for both sides. It's unfortunate, but eventually the cost becomes too great for the potential payoff for one of the plaintiffs and he breaks under the strain and settles to his disadvantage. In other words, the person with unlimited funding has a much greater chance because of the inefficiency of the entire process.
It's a difficult problem, because if there were not exorbitant costs, the courts would be inundated by frivolous lawsuits. Of course that problem could be alleviated by strict judges who don't allow SLAPP suits and similar nonsense to even get started, but I don't see a lot of judges who think that way.
This will likely not change soon, because we elect these same lawyers to write the laws.
"...but it may well be that we are seeing the legal process and the endless delays being used as a grinding down tactic by Mann and his "friends in higher places”.
No doubt, However Mann finally picked on the wrong guy. The longer this goes on, the more determined Mark Steyn appears.
Godspeed Mr. Steyn.
Read and re-read theduke above. His is the most realistic brief portrayal I've seen of how it works here in the colonies.
I agree with Richard Drake's observation that a dose of the truth would be well for Dr. Mann.
My search for the Mann
email was fruitless. Can anyone help?harold -
Closest I could come up with is "supporters in higher places".
"a dose of the truth would be well for Dr. Mann"
I doubt he'd recognise it if it bit him on the leg, now. Whatever the legal outcome, he will go on believing his own hype; he will be buried with a hockey stick.
jamesp:
Can't you imagine a sarcophagus in the basement of a cathedral with our knight errant's image atop holding a hockey stick? This might be a bit premature for Josh, but ...
Thanks HaroldW for setting me straight. That was the one, with the typo (?) "closet colleagues".
At least Mann is consistent in his handling of evidence, be it legal or, allegedly, scientific.
Good grief.
And does he recant - not a bit of it.
Mann, is an arch manipulator of the truth and a very poor to amateurish statistician, all of which is in great contrast to his undoubted PR skills as the great promulgator of his own abilities. Ask yourself - along with his alchemy of cabalists, how much bother, mischief - has this arrogant but intellectual midget caused the taxpayers of the western world? I'll tell you - he was part of the reason him and his damnable hokey stick, part of the reason, that bolstered the political elite to cause, implement policies which pushed the western world to slither down the green tunnel into the depths, it is a scandal of almost unimaginable proportions and of wasted £$€billions on green indulgences - which is all they are and nothing else.
Apart from that - oh yeah he must be a good lad.
How much does Steyn have to pay lawyers with? Will he run out of money if Mann drags it out?
Heh, greatly enjoying watching Steyn, the strategist, at work.
O/T but remarkable. Channel 4 news yesterday had an expose on the queen's land being used for Fracking. Special report from (bless him) ex-beeboid Paul Mason saying that a Gas company which has been known to frack has plant on HM's land (been there for years) and has applied for and obtained planning permission for expansion. Cue soundbyte interviews with bewildered locals saying "ooh err....doesn't sound good".
Gets to the end of the segment and Mason announces HM's office says no fracking has been granted, that planning permission didn't include fracking and the company have shelved the expansion plans anyway. Thereby making the whole story balderdash. He then goes onto say that this will be a problem in the future.
After that ridiculous waste of time they then have a studio debate on fracking on royal land.
The whole thing was surreal.
Steyn has lawyered-up.
Praecipe to Enter Appearance Filed. submitted 03/24/2014 16:30.rp
Attorney: SONGER, Mr MICHAEL J (453727)
MARK STEYN (Defendant);
http://www.crowell.com/professionals/michael-songer