Thread by @ClimateAudit

Feb 2004. Responding to our Nature submission, Hughes recognized issue that we had raised relating to Mannian PCs. Mann blows off Hughes saying that our issue with his incorrect methodology was "distracting technical argument".
HughesEmails, 92. #MannEmail

July 2000. Bradley rejects proposed draft by Mann on grounds that it "will only provide ammunition to sceptics". Results presented only if they support narrative.
page 973.

June 1001 (p 976) reference to "Mann no-dendro". I don't recall seeing this - maybe in Earth Interactions. Check-

"no dendro" appears to be diagram on page 994. Article "RECONCILING BOREHOLE AND PROXY-BASED ESTIMATES OF TEMPERATURE TRENDS IN PAST CENTURIES" doesn't appear to have ever been published.

March 2005 (p 1191) Hughes "if we flag all of the long western US ITRDB series as contaminated by non-climatic information" i.e. stripbark bristlecones to which we had objected in MM05 articles, overweighted in Mannian PCs, known to be problematic within discipline

Dec 2003 (p 1217). Hughes, annoyed, said that we "made exactly the use of my email to you that I predicted" and that email should not have been put on FTP site. Hughes said that they did not know whether Vaganov chronologies met standards that Mann had asserted.

Dec 2003 (p1223) Hughes annoyance arose from our Materials Complaint to Nature. Mann had claimed that dendro data "carefully screened" for quality control, but Hughes' email had said that some QC was "wild guess" and Hughes recommendations not followed

Mann flanneled Nature. He told Nature that their procedure with ITRDB series was "quite objective and quite rigorous". Maybe, maybe not, but watch the pea. Hughes' email was about Vaganov data NOT at ITRDB. Nature wasn't used to such sleight-of-hand.

Mann also flanneled Nature here: "As noted by MBH98 (and references therein) non-climatic influences related to intrinsic tree growth trends... make the lowest frequency .. variations potentially somewhat suspect in studies that rely heavily on dendroclimatic indicators".

If you go to citation Mann et al 2000 journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.117… , the quoted phrase doesn't occur. Rather than saying low-freq variations "potentially suspect", it said opposite: that low-freq bias due to non-climatic influences "is not problematic", giving now dead link.

the now-dead link web.archive.org/web/2005121714… contained Mann's quote to Nature, but said that they had avoided potential problem by supposedly careful selection - care of which undermined by "wild guess" in email. I've discussed this very deceptive note in past.

Mann told Nature that "as noted by MBH98", long-term variations were"potentially somewhat suspect", but MBH98 itself had said opposite. Forcefully discussed by Brandon Shollenberger here hiizuru.wordpress.com/2014/09/11/mic…

Just noticed sly phrase, While Mann said that results robust over and over, he inconsistently and slyly alluded to possibility that "only a limited subset of indicators" may "anchor in" longest-term trends. Suggests that he already knew of and didnt report CENSORED results

p1224. More flannel. We observed that some series used in NOAMER PC region also were used in duplicate version as individual proxies. This is matter of fact. Mann's blustery denial was untrue.

p1224 Item 10 observed that Mann did not use "conventional" principal components (Centered on mean). He instead centered on short calibration period, which caused his algorithm to mine for HS in data by overweighting and flipping. Mann's answer unresponsive. Watch the pea.

p1270. Some more falsehoods. I asked Mann for FTP location of MBH98 data. He said that he forgot, referred me to Rutherford. Rutherford said that it wasn't in any one place. I wanted data as used. Did not request re-arrangement, nor did I want it.

p1270. Mann claimed that dataset with 2002(!) timestamp had been "generated [in 2003] for [us] and only for [us]" and that us pointing to 2002 timestamp showed "lack of understanding" on how matlab files are dated. Such BS. Nature was unoffended by the BS however.

p1270 when we reported various problems with dataset on Mann's FTP site to which we had been directed, Mann deleted it. I kept a copy.

some old unresolved issues discussed in letter. After McIntyre McKitrick (2003) published, Mann said that we had incorrectly used 112 proxies, whereas the "right" number was 159. We asked him to identify the 159. He refused. Thus, our complaint to Nature who were also confused.

p 1297 a variation of a figure that looks new to me (Stahle-SWM line). If reconstruction doesn't include questionable stripbark bristlecones, you get elevated early 15th century from MBH proxies and methods - as we had pointed in MM2003 (without fully understanding why until MM05

p1299 Mann directed Rutherford to put draft of proposed new Nature SI at FTP site as "offline/non-public until we're sure we're ready to make it public!" Mann had pretended that MBH98 had been public online for years, but it hadn't been. It had been in non-public FTP URLs.

p1304. @RossMcKitrick , this is interesting. On Sep 30, 2003, at same time as we sought information, Briffa and Esper separately asked Mann how many chronologies used in MBH99, noting slight discrepancy. Mann asks Rutherford to investigate

Rutherford looks up file noamer-itrdb-ad1000.txt in directory /p0/tape/big2/MULTIPROXY/DATA/TREE/ITRDB/NOAMER/BACKTO_1000

subsequently, this directory structure and file were used in MBH98 data that suddenly materialized as "public" dataset after our article. Mann claimed it had been online all along, but we were too stupid. This email shows real location /p0/tape/big2/MULTIPROXY/DATA....

the CENSORED directories obviously interested me back in 2005. See climateaudit.org/2005/02/04/the… at beginning of CA. I figured out (like a detective) that Mann's censored calculations were PCs WITHOUT stripbark bristlecones. No stick. So Mann knew early on that results were a mess

p 1308 on Sep 18, 2003 at 2:13 pm, Mann mentions hurricane to Bradley and Hughes. It was Isabella. At exactly that time, Ross and I met for first time. Near Toronto airport as hurricane winds were starting to pelt Toronto.

p1442 Hughes, Oct 2002 notes that they were trying to figure out "how to include Schweingruber" data - these are tree ring density (MXD) with the decline. Rutherford,Mann et al failed to archive MXD. I obtained it thru FOI in 2008 from CRU. climateaudit.org/2008/10/02/mor…

Rutherford et al 2005 was interesting exercise in "hide the decline". They constructed gridded series in which tree ring densities after 1960 were deleted. Here's a quote that I recorded from their website shortly after data was placed online in response to my FOI.

The present archived webpage web.archive.org/web/2008100503… notes that they didn't use values after 1960 (since the results went the wrong way).

here's a quick plot of the average of the gridded MXD series sent to Rutherford by Briffa et al. In Mann et al 2008, deleted post-1960 values were replaced by "infilled" temperature data - the splicing that Mann so vehemently denied - to hide the decline.

p1454. July 2002. discussion of database logistics for ultimately Rutherford et al 2005. side comment that in phase 2 they will worry about "how to determine the number of PCs retained for particular sub-networks of treering data". This was battleground issue in 2004-5

p1460 July 2002. Mann et al decide to use ex post screening against trending temperature data to select proxies.

p 1539 Jones off to Canary islands

p 1431 Bradley off to Nice for Apr 6-11, 2003. I first asked Mann for FTP location of data on Apr 8 while Bradley in Nice

p1542 July 2000 Mann looking at forward extension of reconstruction to 1985 or 1990

p1545 Jul 2000 Bradley was convinced about Mann reconstruction by verification statistics, but realized that proxy relationship "decoupled" in recent decades and would fail. Mann appears to have concealed failed verification r2 in early steps from Bradley

p 1545 Jul 2000. This comment clears up long dispute. In Mann et al 2000 note on no-dendro (mentioned above re Nature) web.archive.org/web/2005022409…, Mann said that dendro and no-dendro similar for period shown (1700 on), silent on earlier period where statement untrue.

I've long pointed out it was implausible that they hadnt done similar calculation for earlier period and, having had failed results, they were obliged to show them. Mann defenders said that I didn't KNOW that Mann had done such earlier calculations and comment not false for 1700,

Bradley's email settles this in my favor. They had done calculations for earlier periods, but 1700 was latest for which statement worked. They slyly failed to disclose failed earlier periods (just as they concealed failed verification r2 results.)

p 1568 June 2000 Hughes asks Mann to find out from Tony Socci (EPA) of impact of "these guys on hill". (This connects to post-Climategate theory of Steve Easterbrook that Climategaters were in their labs and uninterested in and unused to political lobbying).

p1574 May 2000 this is interesting. Mann introduces Rutherford. Asks him to post MBH98 data on "an anonymous location on our server" where the elect, knowing exact URL, could access, but where it was inaccessible to unwashed. This is exactly what I surmised despite Mann's lies

p1598 earlier in May 2000. Mike Evans asks that Mann put MBH98 data on FTP site

p1598 May 2000. Mann asks Bradley about UMass location of MBH98 which he can't find.

p 1639 Nov 2003 Mann writes to coauthors saying Nature is being "harassed" about data availability

p 1640 Mann and Jones 2003 published in August. Mann pooh-poohed idea that bristlecone ring width proxy impacted by CO2 fertilization due to their adjustment. Wigley told him not to dismiss CO2 fertilization out of hand. Subsequent massive greening later attributed to CO2 fertztn

p1665 Sonechkin from Russia sent Mann a 2000 year reconstruction for comment. It has pronounced MWP, similar to modern period. Mann pissed all over it.

p 1671 Feb 2002 Irina Fast, student of Cubasch, politely asked Mann for code. Mann gave long winded response, but did not provide code.

p 1673 Jan 2003 Rutherford putting together Excel spreadsheet to serve as a master database description file. (Excel spreadsheets later become a source of controversy)

p 1676 Feb 2002. Luterbacher inquired about data. Mann directed him to two sites containing LISTS of data used, but not actual data.

p1700 June 2001. This is funny. Hughes asked Jacoby for some of their recent data.

Jacoby blew Hughes and Mann off, responding with an email salutation of "Dear Colleague".

Hughes noted the insult

p1714 Hughes: main characteristic of borehole data when plotted was their inconsistency.

A comment which can also be made of MBH98 data.

p1726 Sep 2000 Osborn looking for MBH98 data. Mann says that Rutherford already put it on "anonymous FTP" site for them. (Anonymous - not visible to unwashed who don't have exact URL).