Devil’s Thumb and, also, reflections on the Mann/Steyn verdict

We just these past two days had opportunity to take advantage of a generous gift from our son and daughter-in-law to spend time at the Devil’s Thumb Ranch, in the lodge. It is a resort that sits outside of two small towns south of Rocky Mountain National Park, Winter Park and Fraser. We have been to the resort on several occasions before, but have never stayed there, as it is too pricey. We stayed in the nearby towns instead, and traveled out to cross-country ski on the 6,000 acres of trails, all built on roadbed, and many groomed. But this time, combined with a 30% discount by the lodge and a $300 remaining balance, we were able to stay there.

I made an important discovery on this trip: My XC ski equipment is not only outdated, but is old. I felt like Jed Clampett driving that old rig through Beverly Hills as I watched skiers my age zoom past me. It’s not that some of them were skate skiers, who are naturally fast, but regular Nordic skiers were going so much faster too. I talked to a gal at the rental desk before we left, and she said that over time XC skis have gotten much skinnier. Devil’s Thumb is mostly groomed, but I have to ski outside the grooves as the edges of my skis rub against the inside of the groove, creating friction. But I also noticed that skiing flat I could not generate much speed.

Time to buy new skis, I said. My ever-thoughtful wife suggested that when we go to DT, we rent. That would be twice a year, tops. Nordic skiing down where we live, near Conifer, is spotty at best. Even when we get good snow, which we often do, it usually turns to ice or mush quickly, as our normal winter temperatures are in the thirties or higher. Most people around here are snowshoers or fat bikers. Neither appeals to me, but they are adapted to the weather here.

Speaking of old but still useful (me), we own a 4Runner that we purchased in 2005 and that has 220,000 miles on it. In 19 years it has never failed us, or even failed to start. This year I put rock salt in the back for weight and safety, and we have all-terrain tires on it. So yesterday we awoke abut about 5:30 AM, and the Starbucks at Safeway, ten miles away, opens at 6 AM. It was snowing heavily, so much so that if I put bright headlights on, it was hypnotic. But we did not hesitate, even for a second, to hop into the 4R and head down the road. The 4R is that dependable, probably the best investment we ever made.

Which reminds me, as I am going to write about Michael Mann below. I have an idea for a vacation for him. I want him to fly to Bakersfield, California, and rent a vehicle, ideally an EV (electric vehicle), and then drive across Death Valley.

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I was stunned by the recent court case in DC wherein Mark Steyn, Canadian pundit, was ordered to pay $1 million in punitive damages to Michael Mann. I listened to reenactments of that trial for eight days straight, and came away after the verdict suspicious that Steyn had deliberately walked us into a trap. This cannot have been a real trial. It was like watching a baseball team where one team scored homers and doubles and feasted as its players circled the bases, only to have the umpires declare the game in favor of the team that did not score. It was that bad. The defense feasted on Mann’s team. They played poorly, scored no runs, and yet Mann was awarded a stunning victory. That does not happen in real life. This was a staged event, I am quite certain. But if it is consolation, the $1 million award is fake too.

My only puzzle is how a jury was selected that would come down with such a ludicrous verdict. The answer is simple, I suggest … they were mere spectators, hired to show up, nothing more. The verdict was written in advance, and on Mann’s side, it was understood that no matter how poorly they performed, they would win. This was the only reason why Mann even sat through it, as he was embarrassed and humiliated throughout. The $1 million is “punitive” damages, and that sums it up. Mann’s been raked over a coalbed in the years since his “Hockey Stick” came to be, with scientists deriding it as poorly constructed and designed to come up with a predetermined outcome. He was given a chance to punish his critics in a fake trial, and took it.

Several things that tend to add to this claim that the trial was fake:

The courtroom selected for the trial is small with low ceilings and poor ventilation. It was hot and stuffy throughout. Why not a better venue? No one cared about it. Finally, after repeated complaints from Steyn, they moved to a larger venue.

Also, the jurors were perpetually late, slowing down the proceedings. Most judges would not put up with that, and in fact can levy fines for tardiness. The judge in this affair did nothing, perhaps because they were just actors, and he couldn’t do anything.

Mann’s team submitted false evidence to the jury, claiming that Mann had lost out on a $9 million grant due to the articles that led to the lawsuit. This evidence was shown to the jury. The real number was something like $112,000. The defense demanded the evidence be withdrawn and the jury told to ignore it. The judge did nothing. That’s grounds for appeal.

During jury selection, Bill Nye, the “science” guy, was allowed to sit with the potential jurors and cajole them about his very good friend, Mann. That by itself is grounds for appeal.

The words “punitive damages” were never to my knowledge uttered throughout the proceedings until the closing argument by the prosecution at the end, and in an “oh by the way” manner. I suggest he did this because he knew what was coming down and wanted it to be not out of the blue.

Anyway, it was a trial where all of the proceedings favored the defense in every way, and where the prosecution did nothing of note for its client, and where the prosecution won hands down. Fake, fake, fake.

But there cannot be an appeal of a fake proceeding, right? So this trial, fake as it was, stands as precedent and warning to anyone who wants to take on the climate alarmists. Even if their science is junk, be wary, as they are juiced, and backed by very powerful forces. They shoot to kill.

35 thoughts on “Devil’s Thumb and, also, reflections on the Mann/Steyn verdict”

  1. Regarding the Mann-Steyn trial, if it IS fake, does that mean the two podcasters who following the trial were in on it? Now I’m wondering if it even happened, as the podcasters had actors reciting the transcripts. Could that have been part of the joke?

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    1. I did not think of that. But I think they were real, the only journalists to offer coverage by except one from NPR, and that one only for a short while. After the verdict the news media was all over it.

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    2. Why all the speculative hypothesizing when you KNOW that Miles wouldn’t need three seconds to laugh the whole thing off as an obvious project with jewish actors playing every roles (including the ostensibly “died penniless” Ted Ball, whose bonafides I don’t trust.)? — Every longrunning legal spectacle ever looked at resolved to a project (e.g., that fat-ass fraud Alex Jones, etc).

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  2. Mark, thank you for taking one for the team and actually following that trial.

    They brought out Bill Nye the science guy as a buddy of Mann? Is there anything these popular scientists won’t shill for? I’m surprised Neil DeGrasse Tyson didn’t show up (or did he?)

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  3. Steyn is entertaining, funny and a very good radio personality and writer. His writing reminds me of Christopher Hitchins in a way that is supposed to confuse the ‘opposition’ into either agreeing, or becoming totally confused and categorically indifferent. A capable propagandist for the ‘conservative’ team, if there is any such thing in our unified, global-neoliberal-capitalist narrative ‘straightjacket.’

    Debate on big issues like imperialism, colonialism, ecology and capitalism are taboo.

    Social institutions are dysfunctional — all being controlled by capital. The ‘body politic’ is mostly illiterate, emotional and passively confused by dueling socio-ethnic nonsense designed to eliminate any threat (real or imagined) to the ruling class. There is nothing left that can be organized, no matter how obvious the perpetual ‘class war’ is to the dissenting minority. “Resistance is futile” is the mantra in 2024.

    I didn’t get the memo, so will try to ignore all studio-produced (massaged) narratives until ordered to comply and recite ‘hive-minded’ executive mandates at gunpoint, which are likely just around the next corner. Ain’t living in a sun-setting American empire grand?

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    1. I used to listen to Rush Limbaugh occasionally (better than NPR right?) back in the 2000-2015 years. Mark Steyn was my favorite guest host, very funny on air. Odd background though, a Canadian living in New Hampshire, my home state, with a British accent.

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    2. Rush was always mocking the global warming crowd, which was a pleasant diversion. Unfortunately him and Steyn were also used to sell the war on phony terror to the right and to conservatives. That was always a big turnoff. But at least those guys were half right, whereas the NPR crowd are wrong about everything.

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    3. Steyn is a crypto-jewish (as is everyone not overtly jewish gifted the least morsel of fame) actor (and therefore agent) tasked with selling the propaganda that telling the truth publicly will only reward you with a decade of misery (i.e., so shut up your sniveling, you peasants).

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        1. I agree. The “Jews or crypto Jews did it” is part of the divide and conquer psyop. It runs cover for all the other organized religions participating and cooperating, the secret societies and the legal and structural control mechanisms, that prop up the artificial and real power structures.

          Claiming one tribe or one race is to blame, draws attention away from examining the hierarchy, control mechanisms and power structures.

          Banking, trade and finance are secondary control mechanisms.

          The faux laws enable and simultaneously protect all the faux nation states.

          All governments and all courts are privately owned corporations: Legal fictions.

          An artificial person or legal fiction (corporation) cannot have lawful authority over humans or humanity.

          The cryptocracy use every color and creed to populate these legal fiction, authority constructs – governments and courts.

          The private ownership and control of corporations masquerading as governments is what allows the banking, trade and finance monopolies.

          There’s a reason why so many “founding fathers” were esquires and why so many politicians are lawyers or attorneys.

          Natural law was usurped by man made laws that aren’t lawful and have no authority. That’s the crux of the fraud.

          Read Lysander Spooner for clarification.

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  5. Not sure I understand why “they” would rake Mann over the coals – a PR victory for “climate deniers” sort of, at least in media sources that slant that way – and then a judgment in favor of Mann, so technically a victory.. and vice-versa media coverage I guess, if anyone is even covering it. Just puzzling what the angle is to the whole thing, or what it all really amounts to.

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    1. The whole of climate alarmism is built around deceit, with crap science bolstered by a corrupt and controlled media. Most importantly, those of open mind and scientific insight are silenced – the “97% consensus”. They are intimidated by loss of pay, promotion, even livelihood, and grants and inability to publish. They are attacked with venom, as with Mann claiming that Dr. Judith Curry “slept her way to a PhD.” (Why the HELL did she not sue? That lie severely damaged her career, forced her to leave Georgia Tech.) But there is significant dissent that comes from non-“scientists” and retired scientists, and the alarmist crowd (their powerful backers, referred to by Mann as “our closeted friends”). This verdict, fake or not, sends a message, STFU. Even little old me and my tiny blog … I had to write it in such a way that Mann could not single me out for destruction.

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      1. Yes, I get that, but I wonder what would be the point then, of giving a partial victory to Steyn.. and smearing egg on Mann’s face. It just seems like there’s often some unnecessary subtlety to the scripting that leaves me scratching my head a bit. (The narratives can be very clunky in other ways of course, and absurd or farfetched.)

        Maybe it’s just part of the “dialectic,” if Mann and Steyn are both just figureheads for their respective sides, then maybe they wanted to fuel both sides of the propaganda battle. I would be curious what the coverage is like, say at wattsupwiththat, or heritage foundation, epoch times, vs left leaning outlets. I haven’t come across it anywhere but here, not even naked capitalism which gets into the weeds on climate issues a lot.

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    2. When I see things like this, I can’t help but feel like each story is created for multiple reasons and for totally different levels/hierarchies of purpose. I feel like on the lowest, most basic level, the reason is to simply dictate, control, and provide all opinions on any and all narratives – the narratives that they created to begin with. Whether you’re for or against something, you only learned your opinion from their soapbox and so they are still always, and constantly, in control (you in general, not you specifically btw, lol). We would never even know about this concept of “climate change” if they hadn’t given it to us. And you don’t know why you’re for or against global warming as a concept, you only believe what you do because they gave you the opinion, gave you the words, gave you the emotion, gave you the passion. They gave you the very idea itself. Most humans wouldn’t care either way about anything like this – they wouldn’t be for or against something they can’t see happening in their real, daily life – so they have to be given the words, the thoughts, the views, the feelings, the emotion. Whether for or against, the opinion came from an external source. Their thoughts are now yours. Your talking points, your opinions, your feelings around this topic, came fully from them. You wouldn’t even have to be “against” climate change if they never introduced the topic and the talking points in the first place. They have fomented outrage, regardless of what side of the fake fence they created you sit on. And outrage is the goal. It’s never a lofty, beautiful, wonderful, or even neutral emotion they try to foment in the public; it’s always anger, hatred, paranoia, and despair. Both sides of every debate they create feel these negative emotions, because they told you to feel them.

      So on the lowest level, it seems sometimes like one reason they allow their own pet projects to be torn apart is because the talking point they created is supposed to have a pro and con, a for and against, to make it seem real. And since they create it from whole cloth, they have to create the teams from whole cloth too. It wouldn't seem very realistic if there was no "other" side to a story. They want to know that if you disapprove of their story, it's only because they told you to, and you're only repeating their own arguments - not because you have actually thought about it yourself. And if you disagree with it, it means you're still playing along because you're spending time arguing how reindeer could never lift Santa's sleigh, using science and math to disprove something nonsensical to begin with. You're still totally in their fake reality, arguing over how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. For or against, you're still absorbed within their completely made up narrative. All that life force, that energy, that intelligence, and power, could be spent doing anything else - but instead it is plugged in completely to their own fake story lines, arguing over whether their fake storylines are real or not. Imagine if you could get the entire world to argue over whether the sky is blue or yellow. There is no real argument, but you created it, and everyone's life force is spent wasted on an asinine premise. (Like the current gender "debate"). To win the game, you disengage completely from their traps. To argue or get involved in any way is still losing and giving in. Well, in my opinion anyway lol!

On a level a little more zoomed out than that, I feel like another reason could be that they want to simply humiliate you, which builds on the last level. What was that quote - that communism was never to get you to believe their mantras, only to get you to chant them when you didn't believe them, and therefore humiliate you? I feel this is very true, easily seen recently in regards to covid and the whole tranny thing and "race realism" thing going on now. They don't actually expect or even want you to believe that there are more than two genders, that a man can get pregnant, or that a woman chopping her boobs off is now a man. They don't expect or want you to believe that white people are evil, that men are the scourge of the earth, that fat is beautiful and beauty is just white supremacy, anyway. They just want you to say it. They want you to lie, like they do. They want you to sell out. They want you to admit they are your master. They want you to destroy your integrity and say something that you know is not true. If you believe it, it defeats the point. They want you to know that climate change is fake, but go along with it anyway. That's power. That's domination. If a child believes in Santa, how can you feel power over them? How does the child feel you are more powerful than them if they genuinely believe what you are saying is true? The child doesn't feel they are giving any power to you, because they don't realize that you are lying. But if you can get a grown man to look you in the eye and say "Santa is real", not because he believes it, but because he is terrified of disobeying you - that is power. They did this with covid, they do this with everything. They rip apart all of their own stories and then see if you have the guts to deny it to the crowd. They prove to you that their own stories are impossible and fake, and demand you say they're true anyway. It is humiliation. They don't want you to truly believe 2+2=5, they just want you to pretend; because once you've done that, you've sold over your integrity and essentially your soul, your acknowledgement of right and wrong, and of reality; you have declared where you stand in the hierarchy of souls. You have put your tail between your legs, rolled over onto your back, and said 'uncle.' You have given your power over to them. They never steal it, it is always readily handed over. That is true power - power handed over, willingly. That's one reason I feel like they have to tell us the truth. So that the power is readily handed over, which is the point, it seems. It has to always be a choice. Vampires can only come in when invited. 

And so the last little theory I've been thinking about is loftier - a spiritual thing. In the same strain as the last little theory, I feel there is some sort of test here, a choice to be made. The wide and narrow path, the wheat and the chaff, etc. I feel an even deeper reason for this whole trial thing (or the phenomena of them tearing apart their own theories and stories in general) is to present the truth to you, so you always have a choice. If you go back and look at any of the mainstream coverage of any fake story ever presented, back to the Napoleonic wars etc. (and beyond of course - but I doubt any history written before that time...), you can see how the markers, the nonsense, the ridiculous writing, the contradictions, have always been there. This is the MO. Create a crazy story, and fill it with the most ridiculous dime novel nonsense, but even less consistent and less believable. The other two little theories I suggested could explain that as well, their things work on multiple layers - but I feel it ultimately comes down to the concept that we are not where we think we are and we are not what we think we are. And I think a hallmark of this place is to constantly give you a choice. Will you choose the truth, or the lie? Will you, when presented with the truth, reject it, because everyone else is rejecting it? Do you have integrity, courage, love for truth, for beauty, and the good? Do you care more for the love of man and mammon than you do the truth? I feel the way TPTB constantly SHOW us - I mean CONSTANTLY - how absolutely fake all of their stories are - has a higher implication. Are they trying to control our opinions and also humiliate us? Sure, why not. But zoom out a little more and I feel it is a chance for us, as souls, to recognize the "bad cop" character when it presents itself to us. It's actually embarrassing how obvious we need the "bad guy" to make itself just so we can choose the right path. Because they make it really, really, really cartoonishly obvious that you're supposed to "hate them." It's even in their character design - how they look physically. They tell you every step of the way they are lying. The truth is not hidden in plain sight - it is simply in plain sight. They show us very blatantly the "vice" character, and it's up to you to choose to play the "virtue" character, if you so want, or roll in the dirt with them since "everyone else is doing it." And yeah, most people fall back into the fear of disobeying the ones in (apparent) power.

They choose not to see it. They don't want to take that narrow path. Or they do see it, and they choose the wide path because they enjoy and value vice and abhor virtue - they resonate and agree with everything TPTB are selling. Different strokes for different folks. I feel, spiritually, this idea of the free-will choice to choose truth or lies is what can help us understand where we are, what we are, and what we need to do to get ourselves properly aligned (assuming that's what someone wants). And it seems to me that the more you align yourself with virtue, truth, beauty, goodness, the more power you regain. The world starts morphing around you and the people too. It seems, from my experience anyway, that following truth, not just in what you say but in the actions (you will know them by their fruits, etc.) the world starts working to support and help you. The "agent smiths" stop bothering you and everyone seems enthusiastically on your side. The universe itself seems to bend around what you need. And I feel recognizing the purpose of their tricks and games may be part of that "regaining of power" - even giving any attention to their stories - especially our anger, disgust, and hatred - is giving them our power - our attention fuels them. Without our attention they would vanish like vapors. But I feel like they have a necessary part to play. They play bad cop so we can then seek the good cop. Without contrasts we'd never know, we'd never have a choice, and we could never grow. Without the dark they present to us, we may never even try to seek the light - may not even have a basis to understand where we stand. Integrity, I feel more and more, is a huge part of this place. It seems everything revolves around it. Will you stick up for what you know to be true or right, when the world around you is whipping you over the head to do the opposite? Will you stand up or give in? It seems all the stories we're presented with give us this choice. The implications of that are fun to think about, and I can't help but think we are here for a very specific reason, and I can't help but think that the matrix is part and parcel with the reason. We're not in a paradise for a reason... 

(Sorry for such a long response ugh!! I've only commented here a couple of times and every time I do it's a full on essay lol! These sorts of topics are just so intriguing to me and I don't know how to edit :P And btw they are all just conjecture and wondering and questioning and theories - I don't pretend to have any idea about what is really going on lol.)

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      1. Ugh it put most all of my comment into some annoying side scroll box. It did this before and I wonder if it’s because my comments are just too long lol! Well, thanks in advance to anyone who manages to read it through this super awkward format anyway haha! 😛

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      2. Sarah that would explain why I could care less about any pretty much any popular or political issue right now. In the past, after many years of indoctrination, I would have an opinion or side about some issue. At this point, my advice is for everyone to ignore all mainstream ideas and figure out how you think life and the world works for yourself. Also, I know for a fact we cannot do anything on our own to affect the “earth”, except harm it by trying to help it – carbon capture, solar panels, wind mills, electric cars, enough!

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  6. The personalities and the ‘science’ is a distraction from the real action: new markets, emerging markets, synthetic ‘futures’ markets. When wasn’t a hotly contested narrative war about selling, trading or producing something more or less worthless to the brainwashed masses? Think of all the ‘stuff’ we need to safeguard against the threat(s) of climate change.

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  7. At least you followed it and then called it out for what it was. 100% Fake. So kudos.

    Narrative: Little guy (whistleblower) goes up against the establishment, almost wins, then is pummelled in court.

    Let that serve as a warning to all of us “climate change deniers”. Self censor our thoughts, actions and words at all times.

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    1. I wonder if the climate change agenda is really a shifting of the grifting from nukes and space to “green energy”. Because both those industries, nuclear weapons and space exploration, are on their last faking legs, with 79 and 51 years respectively since humanity saw a nuke dropped on somebody, or trip to the moon. Even my mom now thinks the trip to the moon was a complete joke. Thankfully we can move all the needy rich kiddies to green energy and have them battling a never ending threat of the planet being boiled to death. Because honestly the fear of annihilation by nuclear weapons is getting really long in the tooth now.

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      1. Yes, exactly. Lucky you. My mom (and dad) still thinks the news is all real, all the time.

        Nukes and NASA are over exposed and so last century. Carbon credits are the new black, with endless grift permutations and novel opportunities for financial shenanigans.

        Unveiling the centrally controlled AI, technocratic bio-hazard, crypto-token, prison panopticon is the Brave New World that requires a save the planet script moment:

        Contagion meets Armageddon 2.0…

        It’s 90 seconds to midnight at a research station in Antarctica. If the temperature rises 1.3 degrees more, a highly contagious, airborne strain of tyranno-pox will be unleashed, causing a cataclysmic chain reaction and spontaneous species collapse.

        All faux nation states must join hands in The Great Cull. Coming soon to a FEMA camp under a Walmart near your 15 minute city.

        But seriously, the Rockefeller Scenarios for Future Technology and International Development lays out all the steps in their Grand Plan: 1. Lock Step 2. Hack Attack 3. Smart Scramble 4. Better Together.

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      2. Yes, NASA and nukes are so last century. Carbon credits and carbon taxes are the new black.

        The Rockefeller Future Technology for International Development lays out all the steps in their Grand Plan: 1. Lock Step 2. Hack Attack 3. Smart Scramble 4. Better Together.

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  8. “The foundation is being laid to create a totalitarian system to track, control, and tax carbon—an element that touches every activity of human life.

    Carbon credits are merely a way for governments, central bankers, and their allies to control the populace and secure continued seigniorage (sic) as the fiat currency system flounders.” https://internationalman.com/articles/carbon-credits-are-the-biggest-scam-since-indulgences-how-you-can-avoid-being-fleeced/#:~:text=Carbon%20credits%20are%20merely%20a%20way%20for%20governments%2C,scam%20since%20the%20indulgences%20of%20the%20Middle%20Ages.

    It’s the biggest scam since the indulgences of the Middle Ages.

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  9. An ode to Richard Lewis – star of Curb your Enthusiasm, I show I’m proud to have never seen. Here are the deep topics discussed in the latest season:

    Episodes of the show, which is now in its 12th and final season, feature Mr. Lewis’s character enduring the indignity of being carjacked by a New York Jets fan; convincing a deli owner to change the name of a sandwich from the Larry David to the Richard Lewis; and complaining about the unfiltered tap water at a dinner party.

    Really deep stuff, sounds incredibly hilarious. I feel bad not having kept up with Larry David.

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  10. Slow day so I’ll post the greatest parody ever on medical fraud and grifting, it never gets old: Thripshaw’s disease. “You are suffering from a disease so rare, it hasn’t got a name, not yet, but it will have, oh yes…”

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