One of my reports on my e-mail correspondence with Academic Researcher Wade Pfau described an e-mail to Wade in which I stated: “I put up a post describing Greaney’s tactics and Lindauer’s role of linking to Greaney’s board each time a new poster dared to post honestly.” One of the Goons asked for a link to the post. I provided the link in the comments section of that blog entry. 

The post appeared in a thread at the Morningstar.com site at which long-time community members were asking why so many abusive posters had recently begun participating in the discussions. Here are the words of my post:

Look at 49451 and see someone with 2 morningstar posts that has nothing to add except a wise crack.

For those not playing close enough attention to understand what is going on here, I will provide a brief bit of background.

There is an individual who got an important number wrong in a study that he published on the internet. He has elected not to acknowledge the error. Because he has his own web site, he has a number of supporters who are willing to do just about anything to block any discussion board on the face of the internet from engaging in honest and informed and reasoned discussions of the topic addressed in the study in which he got the number wrong.

I was aware from my own research that this individual got the number wrong. I reported this to a board at which I posted, and that post generated the most exciting discussions that board had ever witnessed. My position was vindicated beyond any reasonable doubt when we discovered what Bill Bernstein says about the subject matter of the study in his book “The Four Pillars of Investing.”

I put up a post entitled “What Bernstein Says” that reported on Bernstein’s position. The response from the individual who got the number wrong was to threaten to send one of his goons to my house with a baseball bat to kill my wife and kids. Motley Fool banned me because their lawyers are concerned that some crazy supporter of this individual may actually take action on this insane threat and that they could be held liable. The site administrator has said that he would love to have me back on the board (Motley Fool co-founder Tom Gardner wrote one of the blurbs that appear on the back cover of my book) if the individual would “permit” it.

This development caused every effective on-topic poster at that board to leave the board within a matter of months. There is no longer any on-topic posting worth taking note of at that board.

Those interested in the subject matter of that board went on to form four other boards at which they hoped to be able to engage in honest and informed and reasoned posting on the subject matter of the board. As each became successful, the individual sent his goons in to destroy every one of them.

Mel has linked to this individual’s web site on several occasions. The individual’s supporters have interpreted this as an endorsement of this individual’s tactics for “dealing with” the statements put forward by Bernstein and a host of others on what the historical data says re how valuations affect long-term stock returns (a topic closely related to the topic addressed in the study in which the individual got the number wrong).

Rob

In the comments section of the earlier report, one of the Goons asked to see the correspondence that I engaged in with the Morningstar.com site administrator. Set forth below is the text of the first e-mail that I received from Morningstar. I will post the text of my response tomorrow.

hocus,

Please direct us to the specific posting where you were threatened with violence by another Morningstar poster.  In Thread #49557, post 9, you quote a threat from another poster.  Please direct us to that thread and post.

Thanks,

Mstar Casey