The thing is that the climategate emails have several emails from CRU where they state that the medieval warm period was probably as warm as the present day and that they didn’t really believe Mann’s work. At some point they agreed to back it but were still unhappy at overegging the pudding.
However while Mann was largely fooled by his lack of knowledge about his data mining algorithm and remains too proud to admit it, Briffa seemed to be quite careful to avoid including the Yamal data that would have invalidated his own hockey stick. They clearly needed the hockey stick and were collectively involved – it wasn’t just Mann – his paper should have failed review or been debunked soon after if there hadn’t been a dishonest cabal of silence about its shortcomings.
I’m sure it brought in lots of funding for both CRU and Manns employers so money was actually made from it, which might put it into the fraud category. It needs to be tested in court. If someone wealthy would back Tim Ball then it might be.
I’d like the fossil fuel companies to grow some balls and actually do what they are accused of doing, Despite the disinformation, we do have an unfair fight here with oodles of cash available for pro agw and nothing for skeptics. Unless this actually goes to court, the scientists can lie as much as they want because there is no mechanism to stop them.