I'm running out of words to express my gratitude for all your support in my legal troubles, and in particular your generous patronage of our new SteynOnline gift certificates, which may yet have to fund us all the way to the Supreme Court. But don't forget we're seeking not just your dollars but also any ideas you have for Discovery requests as we move toward trial. Any and all suggestions welcome.
As for the day's developments, the leftie wallahs at ThinkProgress have a piece on the Mann vs Steyn trial of the century, and by comparison with the excitable Pajama Boys of last week (latest to Xerox the party line: Philadelphia Magazine) it's a pretty fair statement of where we're at (and even the comments - Fox News, big-money donors - are comparatively genial). The author is Andrew Breiner, who unlike his colleagues took the trouble to seek a response from the accused:
Steyn told ThinkProgress via email that he felt his lawyers should have pushed back harder against the case's "procedural fiasco," which was related to their firing.
"Obviously, I'm giving serious thought to future legal strategy," he said, "and I certainly don't rule out hiring someone with a law degree downloaded from an online diploma mill in Kazakhstan."
Hmm. I've been reading me for a long time and sometimes even I don't know when I'm joking.
Until recently, National Review Online was displaying an appeal for contributions to a legal defense fund for Mann's lawsuit. As Steyn said, the defendants had already lost, by having to spend 15 months of time and money on the case. But he didn't see the magazine's demise as likely. "In a turbulent world, a lot of things could potentially doom National Review," he said, "but this frivolous suit won't be one of them."
Though Steyn clearly disdained the fact that he was having to deal with the case, there was one idea he seemed to relish: "I think I'd want to reserve the cross-examination of Dr Mann for myself."
No joking there. CEI and National Review are appealing Judge Weisberg's decision not to dismiss to the DC Court of Appeals, but not me. I've had it with the sclerotic dump of American "justice" and want to get on with the trial. Hershblogger at The Other Club is far too kind to me and my modest contribution to keeping lit the guttering lamps of free speech, but he does grasp the stakes. Michael Mann has got an awful long way simply by threatening to sue relatively minor and impoverished targets - in Minneapolis, Vancouver and elsewhere. Many of his fellow scientists deplore the one-party state he's turned climate science into, but they do so privately, for fear of what happens when, like Judith Curry, you speak out. So simply to end the climate of fear he has to be dragged into court and lose, big.
Meanwhile, blogging at Random House of Canada, John Michael McGrath has also weighed in on the case:
No, the real victim here is the National Review, whose most recent blunder was its decision to publish Mark Steyn. Steyn, playing to the room, decided to branch out from his regular shtick of terrifying the National Review's senior, whiter readers about brown people who worship in a different tongue and tried to dabble in climate science denial.
Gee, if only my prose had that sparkling touch I could be writing for Random House like Mr McGrath. Oh, wait, does that sound self-pitying?
Steyn is taking this in his usual stride, writing self-pitying columns about how not even the National Review is defending his right to reproduce horrific defamation on other people's dime.
Actually, come to think of it, Random House of Canada offered me a two-book deal just a few weeks ago. Good to see, even before I've had a chance to say yes, they're already working on the publicity campaign. ("If you read only one self-pitying racist climate denier this year...")