A Premiere Report, The Opposition Revealed, Dr. Tyson Again, Same Old Routine, A Pleasant Surprise, and In Closing…

Reader Robert Matic of Melbourne, Australia, reports to us on the Tuesday, 8 July, 2008, premiere of what has been advertised there as “a search for Australia’s most gifted psychic.” That’s much like saying, “a search for the least incompetent guesser,” in my opinion. It’s titled “The One,” and has now emerged on prime-time commercial television. This is the show we mentioned at tinyurl.com/5uuq52. Robert writes:

We were promised from the outset, by host Andrew Daddo, to receive a balanced program with one of the two judges being a believer (Stacey Demarco – Witch) and the other a skeptic (Richard Saunders – Australian Skeptics). Although the judges were given equal time to comment on the results of the tests – approximately ten seconds each per test! – the editing of the show heavily and predictably leaned towards the believer’s point of view. After introducing the seven psychics competing for the title – with loads of anecdotal evidence from clients, of course – the first episode went through one “controlled” test and, later, an open display of the psychics’ powers in front of the live studio audience.

An Encouraging Development, The Netherlands Scene, Tattoo Time, Tantric Tantrum, Next Episode Down Under, I’m Shaking in My Boots, and In Conclusion…

Our readers will recall a tedious matter that occupied this site for several months. It was yet another “dowsing stick” farce, this one headed up by a Paul B. Johnson, CEO of the “Sniffex” company. Johnson eagerly sued the JREF when we published the facts about the fraudulent toy he was marketing as a bomb detection device, obviously hoping to benefit from the growing public concern with security. In fact, in September of 2006, he actually changed the name of his company to “Homeland Safety International Inc.,” keeping up to date with the latest media headlines, and perhaps hoping to imply connections with federal government agencies. He issued a series of 33 news releases that contained mostly false information about the product and about the company's financial situation. This maneuver drove the share price of the stock from 80 cents to about $6, earning a combined $32 million in illegal profits.