NY Times gives John Edward a platform

[Questioninggeller]

TITLE: Making a Connection on a Direct Flight
PAPER: New York Times
BYLINE: JOHN EDWARD; as told to JOAN RAYMOND
PUBLISHED: November 10, 2008

...
Apparently, so did the attendant. She was looking at me as if she recognized me. I thought that maybe she knew me from TV.

I went to my seat, and I didn’t think anything more it. But after we took off, she approached me and asked me whether I knew her family.

I asked her some questions, like where they were from. But nothing clicked. I didn’t know them.

During the flight she came up to me several other times, asking me whether I was absolutely sure I didn’t know her family. I kept saying that I did not.

Finally, she approached me again and said that she thought I was connected to her father in some way.
...
A few minutes later, another flight attendant approached me.
...
We sat in the galley area, and I told her how I wanted to give her a hug when I got on the plane, even though I didn’t know her. And then something amazing happened. I started talking to her about her dead father. I knew his name and the names of other people in her family who were with him on the other side. I told her about all the feelings he had for her and for his family. But most of all I told her he was O.K., and he wanted her to be well, too.
...
But sometimes, what I can do brings some closure to people who need it.

Source

At about the same time Australianstage.com.au reported:

Due to overwhelming public demand from a sold out national tour late last year, JOHN EDWARD is set to return to Australia in November 2008. It seems Australians cannot get enough of John’s entertaining, yet moving events.
...

His tie to Australia:

TITLE: Rare medium with a stake in the other side
PAPER: The Age (Australia)
PUBLISHED: November 18, 2008

NOT long after Steve Irwin died, John Edward had a private meeting with Irwin's widow Terri. The psychic medium, best known for his television series Crossing Over, had known the Irwins for almost a decade. Even their children were friends; Bindi and Bob loved playing with Edward's two young kids. So when he heard of Irwin's death, he was keen to help.

New York-based Edward, who performs in Melbourne tonight, will not reveal what the Crocodile Hunter said to his wife, but he claims that Terri can now converse with her late husband whenever she wants.
...

Source

I think the Sydney Morning Herald highlighted Edward's main issue:

TITLE: John Edward
PAPER: Sydney Morning Herald, Australia
PUBLISHED: Nov 6, 2008

JOHN EDWARD sees dead people - as a lucrative source of income.

And, as one of the world's most famous television psychics with his shows Crossing Over and John Edward Cross Country, he says honesty is the best policy when dealing with sceptics who question his trade.

On one occasion, a US tabloid reporter quizzed Edward about how the best-selling books, sold-out seminars and globally syndicated television shows might just stand to bring in a lot of dollars.

"The answer he expected was that it's not about the money, it's about the spiritual work and blah, blah, blah and then that would have led him down the path to all these other questions," Edward says.

"So I looked at him, smiled, put my hands up in the air and waved them towards me and said: 'Baby, back up the truck because if anybody works nearly as hard as I do, they should make a sh*tload of money."'

Source

Tickets for his recent tour are 131.65 (Aus) each.

 

[interwaff]

I want to get John Edward together with John Edwards for a grand lying contest.

Quality and quantity will be judged.

In the case of a tie, a sudden-death "Lie Off" round may be necessary.

 

[CFLarsen]

Evidence that the more exposure they get, the more exposed they are.

 

[The skepTick]

There have been a number of times when someone on a cellphone glances at me, and then a split-second later I hear, “Oh my God, there’s the guy who talks to dead people.”

I just shrug. But I really am the guy who talks to dead people.

What a sleaze.

 

[The skepTick]

There have been a number of times when someone on a cellphone glances at me, and then a split-second later I hear, “Oh my God, there’s the guy who talks to dead people.”

I just shrug. But I really am the guy who talks to dead people.

What a sleaze.

 

[Brown]

I am reminded of Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part I, (Act 3, Scene 1) in which Hotspur is trying to forge an alliance with Glendower. Hotspur is something of a hot-head, and Glendower is something of a blowhard. Glendower makes a series of claims, and Hotspur basically labels them as B.S. Although Hotspur may have been on good skeptical ground, he angered a person he was trying to make his ally:

GLENDOWER. ... [A]t my nativity
The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes,
Of burning cressets; and at my birth
The frame and huge foundation of the earth
Shaked like a coward.

HOTSPUR. Why, so it would have done at the same season, if
your mother's cat had but kittened, though yourself
had never been born.
...
GLENDOWER. I can call spirits from the vasty deep.

HOTSPUR. Why, so can I, or so can any man;
But will they come when you do call for them?

So a person says he can talk to the dead. Why, so can I, or so can any man; but will they answer when I do talk to them?

 

[dudalb]

This racket in it's various forms has been around for a long time.
Houdini spent a lot of time exposing these frauds.
Houdini is a good example of a true skeptic in this regard: he wanted despertely to beleive in the power to contact his deceased loved ones, but he never allowed his desire to overcome his logic and demand for evidence.

 

[Drudgewire]

There have been a number of times when someone on a cellphone glances at me, and then a split-second later I hear, “Oh my God, there’s the guy who talks to dead people.”

I just shrug. But I really am the guy who talks to dead people.

If I ever see him, I SWEAR I will pick up my cellphone and say "Oh my God, there's the biggest douche in the universe" loud enough for him to hear.