I’d be a bit sorry if this lawsuit ended up putting National Review out of business, but it sounds like a valid suit and, anyway, National Review is now more another cog in the Fox-Limbaugh machine than an independent voice. Just as long as they don’t cancel K-Lo’s twitter feed…..
Climate scientist Michael Mann is suing National Review and Mark Steyn, one of its leading writers, for defamation. It’s a charge that’s notoriously hard to prove, which is no doubt why the magazine initially refused to apologize for an item on its blog in which Steyn accused Mann of fraud. Steyn also quoted a line by another conservative writer (Rand Simberg) that called Mann “the Jerry Sandusky of climate science, except that instead of molesting children, he has molested and tortured data.” (Simberg and the free market think tank for which he works, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, are also named in the suit.)
[….]That’s not all. On Christmas Eve, Steyn (who regularly guest hosts Rush Limbaugh’s radio show) wrote a blog post in which he excoriated Judge Combs Greene, accusing her of incompetence, stupidity, and obtuseness. As a result of this outburst, the law firm that had been representing National Review and Steyn (Steptoe & Johnson) has dropped Steyn as a client and reportedly has plans to withdraw as counsel for the magazine as well. (Now representing himself in the lawsuit, non-lawyer Steyn continues on the attack here and here.)
[….]It’s doubtful that National Review could survive either outcome. Small magazines often lose money and only rarely manage to break even. They certainly don’t have substantial legal budgets, let alone cash to cover an expensive payout. Indeed, in 2005, Buckley said the magazine had lost $25 million over 50 years.
Cervantes
Not me.
Fester Addams
Pffe. Someone’s underestimating the capacity of Wingnut Welfare to prop up a reliable propaganda outlet.
Bobby Thomson
Yeah, right. Like that rag has ever been anything but a wingnut welfare hobby horse for absurdly wealthy douchebags.
cleek
if you listen closely, you can hear the wee little violin as it plays such a sad and mournful tune.
c u n d gulag
Even though this is like putting Al Capone in prison for tax evasion, I’ll TAKE IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
maximiliano furtive, formerly known as dr. bloor
@Fester Addams:
This. Getting kicked in the legal/financial junk by a climate scientist will turn them into martyrs. Very well-financed martyrs.
scav
@cleek: The violin is so small it seems to disappear entirely, much as the hypothesized “little” in between “now” and “more” in the first sentence. Wee little choirs of doleful angels provide backup.
dmsilev
Why?
Betty Cracker
Fool for a client, etc.
DougJ
@dmsilev:
I don’t like magazines to go out of business because of lawsuits. It sets a bad precedent. Makes me worry the Koch brothers could put TAP, the Nation, etc. out of business with a lawsuit too.
Amir Khalid
@Fester Addams:
I’m sure Koch Bros. or someone with similar ideological motives and financial means will welcome the opportunity to keep the National Review in business.
MattF
Too bad about NR. But magazines change over the years, and often not in a good way. NR’s flirtation with the neocons was the beginning of the end, IMO, and there’s reason to think that Buckley was aware of that at the time.
Tim F.
Letting National Review off the hook here would strike me as a kind of moral hazard. People who act with reckless disregard for the the law and consequences for breaking it should get a cold dose of reality once in a while. The senior editors who failed to put a muzzle on a loose cannon like Steyn deserve to suffer the consequences.
Tim F.
@DougJ: They threaten all the time. Those publications have an editorial staff who keep a close watch on fact checking and actionable content.
Tim F.
@MattF: Buckley was more than aware. He died shouting into a megaphone.
schrodinger's cat
@DougJ: Are you sad because you will miss a rich source of material for your blog posts?
SiubhanDuinne
@Betty Cracker: O/T, how are things going with your mother? Are you still with her? Have you had a chance to shower? Hope everything is going the way it’s supposed to go.
Also, your father-in-law.
Punchy
This is a joke, right? Sheldon Adelson or some other billionaire will just drop $50 mill on the magazine and keep it afloat. No way the Wingnut Welfare Makers let this pile of dogshit go tits up.
Edit: Looks like I should have read the comments first…about eleventeen peeps beat me to this
Knight of Nothing
What’s the use in looking if you don’t know what they mean?!
eric
@Punchy: nope. the current iteration will go into bankrutpcy and then the right wing douche will purchase the name (asset) for a very reduced price and then dump money back into it.
Tim F.
@DougJ: I should add that as Steyn pointed out, discovery goes both ways. Mann was not afraid because every damned inch of his professional and private life had already been discovered. I doubt the Kochs would feel the same way.
Amir Khalid
@DougJ:
The Kochs would need something to sue a publication over. It was suicidal foolishness on The National Review‘s part to let Mark Steyn post a defamatory statement on its blog. Editors are there to guard against such things; where were The National Review‘s?
Somehow, TAP and The Nation strike me as rather more careful than that. I don’t see them publishing anything anywhere near as reckless as what Mark Steyn wrote about Dr Mann.
Roger Moore
@c u n d gulag:
I don’t see it that way. This is getting them for their core business: spreading Republican lies. Maybe it would be sweeter somehow if they could be put out of office for backing the Iraq war, but defaming climate scientists in an attempt to help the fossil fuel industry destroy the world seems like a worthy cause for destruction.
jibeaux
@Tim F.: Yep. They had a chance to run a retraction and offer a reasonable settlement. They decided to double down instead. You pays your money, you takes your choice. Even on the wingnut welfare circuit, you might be hard pressed to raise victim money if your donors think you’re too hot-headed to do anything with it but lose it to the enemy in a lawsuit.
Betty Cracker
@SiubhanDuinne: I’m still hanging in there and have thankfully had an opportunity to shower! My siblings and I are keeping a 24/7 eye on her. We’ll know more over the next couple of days (about both mom and FIL) and are trying to remain optimistic. Thanks for asking. ;-)
Glocksman
Steyn has made a career out of skating right up to the line of actionable speech and then playing martyr when anyone dares to call him out.
Shit, even in cases he wins he can’t resist insulting and belittling the officials involved.
The ironic thing to me is that when he’s not busy cranking up the Wingnut Wurlitzer to 11, he’s actually a decent writer.
Most of the right wing pundits aren’t all that good at writing, but Steyn is.
Aimai
@Betty Cracker: xxoxo to all of you. Frim the registration line for car stickers in dmv hell.
kbuttle
Just read Rich Lowry’s pompous dickish editorial/open letter to Mann after Mann complained, and all those feelings of remorse will slip away, DougJ.
cmorenc
@Fester Addams:
National Review might indeed be foreced out of business. To be quickly replaced (with Koch and/or other wealthy sugar-daddy help) by a similar publication with many of the same people writing articles etc, minus Steyn. Publishing doesn’t require much in the way of infrastructure to start-up, what it requires is capital to pay the writers and out-source printing the well, print version of the publication, and pay for website hosting and internet connections for the online version.
Gin & Tonic
Don’t know much law, but isn’t Steptoe & Johnson like the upper crust of the upper-crust law firms?
El Caganer
But this means I might never get the chance to rub elbows with a drunken Pantload on the NRO cruise!
C.V. Danes
They’ll just change their name and come back as rebranded voice for the conservative blog-o-sphere.
Whack-a-mole.
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: Thanx for the update Betty. Keep us posted.
schrodinger's cat
Just watch the GOP self immolate over immigration reform if it ever comes up for a vote in the Congress, that should be fun. If they don’t do anything they are screwed with the Latinos and other new immigrants if they do they are screwed with their bigot base. My prediction they will continue to stall and do nothing.
eric
steyn however may not find refuge in the bankruptcy courts because i do not believe intentional torts are dischargeable. not 100%, but pretty sure.
WereBear
@Betty Cracker: Glad to hear you have sibling support, too.
Ash Can
@DougJ: The precedent here isn’t a magazine being sued out of existence. The precedent is assholes destroying the magazine from the inside out because they think they know more about the law than people with actual and extensive legal training and who make the law their life’s work. The precedent is, once in a legal hole, breaking out the backhoe and drilling rig and blasting caps. If TAP, the Nation, etc. were to pull the same stunts that Steyn is pulling, they’d fucking well deserve to be fined out of business.
National Review can just be thankful that it operates in a country with a First Amendment, and not a country in which all the white supremacists on its staff would long since have been thrown in jail.
ETA: I’m betting that schroedinger’s cat @ #16 hit the nail on the head.
Betty Cracker
@Aimai: Thanks! Good lord, the DMV. I’d rather be punched in the nose.
scav
Still, hiding behind a Freedom of the Press! Journalism as Unique Bulwark of Freedom Invincible Shield for the entire outfit over individuals spewing of bile, invective and lies in (nominal) print seems a bit, well, off. Red Tops / tabloids in the UK sometimes play that card, while the next one in their hands is often, “oh it’s opinion and held to different standards and you fascist for squelching free speech!” or my current from the hacking trial:
If you’re just making things up, why bother with the listening in? Faux plays similar games of three card justification for doing whatever they please without penalty.
Bill in Section 147
Thank the goddess Hybris fierce-hearted mother of full-fed Koros. Although I prefer the Roman name for her, Petulantia.
I pray to E′Leos for any of the non-wingnut support staff.
Sadly this will only make the worst of them wingnut heroes.
Just because I am a liberal it does not mean my heart bleeds for evil doers. What is best in Life? To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women.
Ash Can
@Betty Cracker: Glad to hear that you have siblings helping out. You and your family are in my thoughts.
schrodinger's cat
@Betty Cracker: Can’t you do your DMV stuff online?
maximiliano furtive, formerly known as dr. bloor
@Betty Cracker: Self-representation is your only course of action when every other lawyer on the planet knows you’re a fool as well.
Someguy
@scav: Still, hiding behind a Freedom of the Press! Journalism as Unique Bulwark of Freedom Invincible Shield for the entire outfit over individuals spewing of bile, invective and lies….
Yeah, it’s disgusting that these Koch employees would try to hide behind the First Amendment. As far as I’m concerned, if you are in the position to be widely publicized if you say something vicious or dishonest or misleading, you ought to be held to account for it. The First Amendment shouldn’t protect you from the consequences of misleading others on an issue of public importance.
RSA
But think how many conservative writers were supported for half a million dollars a year.
boatboy_srq
The chief difficulty with dealing with evidential, experiential, scientifically-documentable reality in modern society is the capacity of those unwilling or unable to accept what’s provable. The chief difficulty with that unwillingness/inability is its regular failure to withstand close scrutiny or spirited, ethical opposition.
There are multiple outlets for the wingnuts to spout their denial of the world in which they live, but each single one can be handled with relative ease. Changing the debate will only happen one propaganda machine at a time; it’s a slow process, but a process where progress can be viewed and charted. This hydra may have many heads, but lopping one off does not necessarily trigger spawning replacements. Sooner or later the wingnuts will run short of adherents, funds or defensible arguments.
So while I’m sure that there will be a successor to National Review, I fully expect the suit to be short, to the point, and final, and that it will be less sorely missed than many.
jonas
@DougJ:
Despite popular misconceptions about the ubiquity of “frivolous” lawsuits, you actually have to have standing and grounds to bring a lawsuit. So unless someone at the Nation starts writing about how the Kochs run a global child pornography ring or something, I’d say they’re pretty safe. The NR is being purely hoist by its own petard.
Frankensteinbeck
@Ash Can:
Sure, but not through Wingnut-O-Vision. Bear in mind the conservative movement’s obsessive kindergarten ‘Nuh uh, YOU!’ mentality. There’s a real chance that if a climate scientist sues one of their papers out of existence, someone with money to waste on the conservative side will target a ‘liberal’ paper to frivolous lawsuit out of existence. You can bleed an awful lot of money from someone on legal fees, and if they succeed on one they’ll launch a campaign to bring down as many as they can because, well, kindergarten bully mentality.
All that said, I do not think we should be afraid to sue or prosecute them when they cross over the legal line. The bully wants most for you to back down.
EDIT – @jonas:
Man, I hope you’re right.
dedc79
The saddest part is that the NRO (and especially The Corner) commentariat make the writers (including nutcases like Steyn) sound like Bernie Sanders by comparison. I tell myself it’s just the same ten crazy bigots commenting over and over. I hope that’s the case.
SiubhanDuinne
@Betty Cracker:
I have to say, for all the hate that’s heaped on Georgia (often for very good reason), our DMV offices — the county offices for license tag/decal renewal, and the state offices for driver’s licenses — are the best I’ve ever seen. Clean, efficient, fast-moving lines; good systems for letting clients know how long their wait will be; pleasant, competent staff.
Amazing, but true.
scav
@Someguy: Yep, were back again to is a company allowed exactly the same license as an individual, especially as they are claiming limited liability as a corporate entity out of the other side of their mouths? There are freedoms that should be respected, of course, but they are not absolute and they’re not to be donned and doffed at will, ignoring the responsibilities that go along with their protected-status role. I object to the Calvinball almost more than anything.
schrodinger's cat
@dedc79: They don’t allow comments, do they?
Gene108
Right-wing publications do not exist to turn a profit. They exist so the rich guys, who own them have a media platform from which to demand for tax cuts by starving the poor because the “free market” should not subsidize entities that cannot support themselves.
Napoleon
@Gin & Tonic:
yes
Napoleon
@Gin & Tonic:
PS, I wonder if they were hired by an insurance carrier.
FormerSwingVoter
@DougJ:
That’s not how law works. Yes, this would set the precedent that magazines can’t explicitly lie about people with malicious intent. That’s what libel is, and it’s been illegal for a very long time.
Glocksman
@Someguy:
The irony here is that the ‘Jerry Sandusky’ comments are protected speech, as the writer can credibly claim it was hyperbole and an opinion.
Steyn on the other hand made statements of fact.
If Mann can prove that Steyn acted in reckless disregard of the truth, then he’s halfway to winning the suit.
IANAL, but I think in the end Steyn will skate on this due to the fact that ‘acutal malice’ is damn hard to prove.
Omnes Omnibus
@Glocksman: How is Mann a public figure?
MomSense
@Betty Cracker:
Oh no! I missed all of this. Sending you hugs and support.
Cervantes
@DougJ:
The Nation has survived lawsuits (I mentioned one here yesterday, having to do with copyright law).
Mann and other climate scientists have had to cope with death threats, etc. If Steyn (and NR) made claims about Mann that were knowingly false, or made with reckless disregard for the truth, what, if any, consequences would you like to see?
You agree that the lawsuit is “valid” and the court has said it’s not frivolous — so I suppose you’re just questioning what the settlement should be, or what damages should be awarded — which is, I agree, a reasonable question.
Glocksman
@Omnes Omnibus:
It’s wikipedia, so caveat emptor
IANAL, but Mann seems to fit into the involuntary public figure category.
Cervantes
@Amir Khalid:
Remember, these are the clowns who publish Jonah Goldberg.
WereBear
@Gene108: Nicely summed.
dedc79
@schrodinger’s cat: See, e.g. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/369917/obamacares-unpopularity-rises-among-uninsured-andrew-johnson
Omnes Omnibus
@Glocksman: I don’t think he has acquired that level of public exposure. Especially since he exposure he has received has come primarily from the right wing attacks on him; it would be illogical to use the defamation as a reason that he could not recover.
Cervantes
@Gin & Tonic:
No, it’s a prominent firm, but I wouldn’t call it “upper crust.”
Glocksman
@Omnes Omnibus:
That’s possible, but every article I’ve read on the trial raises it as an obstacle he has to overcome.
I guess it’s up to the courts to decide if he is a public figure or not.
GregB
Fuck Steyn and *beat him over the head with the corpse of William F. Buckley. The magazine existed to keep fascism alive until a friendly enough patina was built up to bring it back into polite company.
Steyn is a racist putz and hopefully he’ll have to pay for his lifetime of character assassination.
*Figuratively
Cervantes
@Omnes Omnibus: Judge Weisberg’s order includes the following (in a footnote):
So for now, that’s the assumption.
XeckyGilchrist
@Punchy: Looks like I should have read the comments first…about eleventeen peeps beat me to this
The Balloon Juice motto!
Soonergrunt
@Cervantes: Isn’t Jonah Goldberg one of those clowns?
Cervantes
@Soonergrunt: Well, you’re right, he’s “editor-at-large” (now, now) of NRO. Is he implicated in the current imbroglio? (I had thought not but, you’re right, I don’t know the answer.)
Roger Moore
@Cervantes:
For the purposes of this particular ruling. What the judge is saying is that the lawsuit still has merit even under assumptions most favorable to the defendants. It’s the kind of thing judges do to strengthen their rulings against appeal. If the judge can show that the ruling is still valid even under the assumptions most favorable to the losing side, it makes undercuts a grounds for appeal.
schrodinger's cat
@dedc79: Thanks, but I’d rather not read the comments of the clueless and the crazy.
geg6
@jibeaux:
Apparently, Lowry wrote, at the time the suit was being filed, that he would fight this to the death and that Mann should just BRING IT ON!eleventy1!
Well, Rich, he sure did.
johnny aquitard
@Ash Can: This.
And then there’s that precedent where you can’t write nasty shit about a person who is not a public figure unless and only unless it is the truth. That’s the only defense they got: it better be true.
It ain’t, and they are rightfully fucked.
And boo-fucking-hoo to the editors at NR for running the piece. It’s on them that they agreed to act as brownshirts for their rich conservative asshole overseers.
Omnes Omnibus
@Glocksman: I also happen to think that actual malice is present here.
johnny aquitard
@Omnes Omnibus: A public figure is anyone who writes or says or does anything that disproves any of the lies Right has spent so much effort and money to make into conventional wisdom and public policy.
Like an abuser, the Right believes you bring it on yourself by doing things that makes them hit you.
Omnes Omnibus
@johnny aquitard: Unfortunately for the NR, that definition is not legally valid. Excuse me while I find my tiny violin.
Helen
@johnny aquitard: This. When the (still ongoing) Shirley Sherrod issue broke, the right was making the argument that she was famous, therfore the higher standard should apply. That the Breitbart video was the very incident that made her famous was totally lost on them.
Svensker
@SiubhanDuinne:
What’s going on with Betty’s mom? I missed that. Is that why she hasn’t been posting?
Good thoughts heading your way B.C.
Mnemosyne
I’m still snickering at the kind of arrogant idiocy it takes to publicly complain about the judge hearing your case while the case is going on. What kind of fucking moron does that?
Cervantes
@Helen: The reason the law takes a person’s fame into account in these matters is the theory that, because of their fame, they have more access to the media and can therefore defend themselves a little more easily (than some nobody with no access to the media).
When you look at it this way, the reason someone became famous is not particularly relevant — or so goes the theory.
RaflW
@Mnemosyne: What kind of fucking moron does that?
All they know is attack. Like a poorly cared for Pit Bull, they snarl and bare their teeth so many times that they lose all judgement and go after anyone, no matter the harm to self.
It’d be tragic, if Steyn wasn’t such a hateful lump of gristle.
taylormattd
Why would anyone be sorry if that quasi-white supremacist publication went out of business?
Glocksman
@Omnes Omnibus:
I do as well, but proving it is something else.
Who knows what discovery will unearth from Steyn’s correspondence.
MoeLarryAndJesus
Die, NRO, die.
Cervantes
@Roger Moore:
Actually, no. On a motion to dismiss, the judge is obliged to view the alleged facts in the light most favorable to the plaintiff (or the non-moving party).
Cervantes
@Omnes Omnibus:
I actually have one, 1/64th size, a relic from when the world was young.
I’d be happy to rent it out for the right price.
Tmiller
losing money in the right places. Sounds perfect for a bunch of trust funded twits.
Bubblegum Tate
Herr Comrade Obamao is crushing dissent again! First, they came for D’Souza, and I squealed like a child with a skinned knee. Then they came for Mark “The Human” Steyn, and I locked myself in my room.
Helen
@Cervantes: I’m not really talking about the reason. I’m talking about the timing. She was not famous the minute the video came out. The video made her famous. Are you saying that even though it was the video that made her famous, now that she is famous, she has more access to the media.
I also thought that the higher standard was that if you made yourself famous, then you put yourself out there to more scrutiny that a private person.
Glocksman
@Mnemosyne:
Some kind of eleventy millon dimensional chess game where he keeps pissing off judges and then either moving to have them dismissed because they’re prejudiced against him or they recuse themselves?
Wash, rinse, and repeat until he gets the sole wingtard that’ll rule in his favor.
Other than that, I got nuthin’
Bill Arnold
@Cervantes:
I see there’s a Tiny Violin app in the apple app store. (99 cents, i just bought it purely out of curiosity. Shake it, it plays a clip from one of 3 user selectable songs, one sad.)
Chris T.
Wow. Someone out there is willing to spend half a million bucks a year to keep the propaganda machine afloat?
The IRS says that if your business loses money all the time, it’s not a business, it’s a hobby. Some hobby!
goblue72
@Gin & Tonic</a@Gin & Tonic: Not quite upper crust of the white shoe firms. More AmLaw 100 than Top 50 or Top 25. They are definitely a prominent large firm though. They are a DC-based firm with a reputation for being strong in litigation and regulatory/governmental affairs, as well as some other areas (energy, rail, IP)
Regardless, getting kicked to the curb by them is a strong signal to the rest of the legal community, at least as far as corporate law firms are concerned. Steyn is gonna be lucky to get Dewey, Cheatum & Howe to represent him.
Mnemosyne
@goblue72:
Oh, Steyn’s not worried about finding new representation:
What’s the quote someone put above? A man who represents himself has a fool for a client?
grillo
@goblue72: Given that he hired Paul Murky to do his research, that would be about right.
Cervantes
@Bill Arnold: 99 cents? There goes my rental market.
drkrick
@goblue72:
aka Dewey Ballantine – they went out of business a couple of years ago.
When the judge who was originally assigned to the case retired, Steyn apparently thought he was free to call her whatever names he could think of. After all, as a rightwing pundit, namecalling is his stock in trade. Unlike the lawyers at Steptoe and Johnson, it didn’t occur to him that her former colleagues might not appreciate that.
Cervantes
@drkrick:
Dewey Ballantine is gone — but it had nothing to do with Dewey, Cheatem, & Howe, which is an old gag, most recently used by the Car Talk guys in (our fair city) Cambridge, MA.