Mr. Fire switches back from whine mode to brag mode, 'cos that's the way he Rolls

As I mentioned a few times in a recent two-part post about New-Wage/McSpirituality luminary Joe "Mr. Fire" Vitale's pending divorce (see Part 1 in particular), Joe has been going through some tough times. He and his new "life partner," dilettante and self-described lightworker and authenticity expert Lisa Winston, have both published numerous Facebook posts and videos about the grueling experiences they've suffered for the past year or so -- particularly these past few months. Joe claims to have experienced trauma, grief, betrayal, and abuse, among other things. Judging from some of her own posts, Lisa has experienced health challenges and other stuff that almost made her want to hang up her lightworker hat. But the two are apparently staying strong, despite the fact that Lisa's main Facebook page seems to be missing, at least for me; I'm thinking that I am simply blocked, though for the life of me I can't figure out why. 

To my knowledge, Joe never publicly specified exactly how he had been abused or betrayed, and who did the abusing or betraying; it may or may not have had something to do with the divorce. I really don't know. But just in case you were worried about him, there's no need. He seems to be back to his old self, boasting about living the high life, and tantalizing his followers and customers with promises that he intends to spend even more of the money they've been throwing his way.

For instance, just yesterday he posted a short video on Facebook suggesting that his next "company car" is going to be a 2019 Rolls-Royce Cullinan SUV. The implication is that Mr. Fire is going to be using the car not only to show off how successful he is, but also to help him suck even more money from more people.

In the video Joe says that he first saw this car at an auto show when "we" went to Thailand. The other part of "we" would be the aforementioned Lisa W, who accompanied him to Bangkok late last year, not long after he had filed for divorce.

As he walks around the car, capturing it on camera from various angles and close up, Joe says, "I have fond memories of the Rolls-Royce Phantom that I had years ago..."

Oh, my, yes, so do I. (And here's another one; see under, "I paid five grand to ride in a Rolls, and all I got was this dumb blog.")

Salty Droid has fond memories too.

So does ABC News. You will most likely get an error message a few seconds after clicking on that ABC link, but at least you can see that ABC did cover this matter back in 2010, and not exactly admiringly.



And here's me, writing the following year about the 2010 segments and subsequent ABC News coverage.You might also find some other useful links here.

A former close associate and friend of Joe's, Mark Ryan, also remembers Joe's Phantom, and he even wrote about how Joe came to buy...er... lease it for a few years.

For the benefit of those who don't recall, and who don't feel like following any of the links above: Joe (in)famously used the Rolls-Royce Phantom for a few years to conduct pricey "MasterMind" sessions. The deal was that for only $5,000, you and another person with far more money than sense could ride in the back seat of Joe's Phantom, with him behind the wheel and one of his cohorts riding shotgun. The four of you would glide in comfort and luxury through area streets, gabbing about whatever you wanted to gab about, and he would treat you to dinner at the restaurant of his choosing. And the four of you would brainstorm all night about ways you could get rich. It was all supposed to be profoundly life-changing.

Alternatively, if you wanted Joe and his bud all to yourself for the whole evening, it would set you back not $5,000 but $7,500. Either way, you were responsible for all of your travel and lodging and miscellaneous expenses, including any therapy you might need later on down the road when you finally figured out what a waste it had all been.

After Joe's lease for the Phantom ran out and he had to return the thing, he continued to conduct his overpriced scam on wheels with other expensive brag-mobiles. (Here's a blog post he wrote while he still had the Phantom, but had decided to start offering MasterMinds in other vehicles.)

And now, if we are to believe his Facebook vid, Joe is contemplating a brand-new ultra-luxurious Rolls-Royce Cullinan SUV. Prices start at $325,000; in an October 2018 video CarTV described it as, "The World's Most Expensive SUV!" The comments for the CarTV video are amusing, with some saying that the Cullinan looks "hideous," "vulgar," "like a funeral car." It will come as no surprise that a couple of others accuse the critics of being jealous; one wrote, "Envious peasantry in the comments who can't afford it!" (Sound familiar?)

No matter. Joe's fans and followers rallied to him, praising his choice, congratulating him in advance, and even suggesting that he start up the Rolls MasterMinds again.

So for those of you who were seriously worried about Mr. Fire's well-being, all is well. He's clearly still raking in the bucks, and is ready to Rolls on down that Scamworld highway.

PS added 2 August, 2019 ~ In a new blog post published on August 1, Joe gifted his fans and followers with an update on his recent activities. He ran through the expected laundry list of the stuff he is still doing after all these years... traveling, speaking, creating, filming, "singing," grieving (for his dad, who died in April, as well as for other unspecified family tragedies), learning, clearing, reading... and growing. Of the latter, he wrote:

The past year has been the most turbulent of my life in decades. Not just grief, but anguish. I walked the streets many evenings feeling despair. Yet during the day I’d smile and post happy Facebook and Instagram photos and videos. It’s been intense. I imagine I’ve been the caterpillar struggling to break free. I’m ready to fly as a beautiful butterfly. It’s also a reminder that there is always inner work to do. We all need to keep peeling the onion and getting clear. Even you. Even me.

Even Joe, the Buddha of the Internet?!? I am shocked. He wraps up the list by assuring his readers that he is "Still loving":

Despite a turbulent year of uncertainty and change – and at age 65 – I am soaking up the joy of a divine connection with someone who wants love, lust and laughter as much as me. As circumstances unfold, I’ll share the specifics of this news with you. For now, let it be known that love is alive and love is good.

If you just can't wait to learn the "specifics of this news," no problem. As I mentioned way up above at the beginning of this post, I already posted the spoiler last month in a two-part blog post that begins right here. For the benefit of those who are super-pressed for time and don't feel like following the link in the previous sentence, or even like scrolling up to the beginning of this post, let me give it to you again in a nutshell (emphasis on the "nut" part): Last November, Joe skipped out on the former great love of his life, his wife Nerissa Oden, with whom he had been for nearly 20 years, and he cast his lot with a SNAG (sensitive new age gal) dilettante named Lisa Winston, who has branded herself as a lightworker, "intuitive mindset strategist," authenticity coach, TV producer, and "gifted vocalist." Together those two are apparently planning to conquer the McSpirituality/New-Wage world. Here is a link to their official portrait, suitable for printing and flaming... I mean, framing.

Joe ends his blog post with a parting (screen)shot at "critics," in this case a meme of a quotation by Theodore Roosevelt about how it is not the critic who counts but rather the dust-, sweat-, and blood-marred man who is in the arena striving valiantly and whatnot. If past history is any indication, this could almost lead one to believe that Mr. Fire is reacting to recent critical writings about him. To misquote Samuel Johnson, "Critic-blasting is the first refuge of a criticized scoundrel."

* * * * *

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ABC v MMS: from Humble beginnings to 20/20 investigation

I guess you could call it Six Degrees of Separation from Kevin Trudeau: tonight's episode of ABC News' weekly show 20/20 will feature a segment on a fringe "church," the Genesis II Church of Health and Healing, which has come under fire for pushing a "miracle cure" called MMS.

Here, from the ABC News web site, are articles related to the story that will be on tonight's 20/20, with Brian Ross reporting (10 p.m. Eastern Time, 9 Central).

• Shameless: The High Priests of Snake Oil Offer Miracle Cures
• Husband Says Fringe Church's 'Miracle Cure' Killed His Wife
• Wacky Church Under Fire Over 'Miracle Cure' for Autism

Judging from the noise on Facebook so far, it would appear that the villagers are surging forth with their pitchforks and torches. But they are not, as it turns out, pursuing Jim Humble or other purveyors of this "miracle cure." Instead they're after ABC, and Brian Ross in particular, whom they are accusing of being biased, deceptive, sensationalist, evil, unscientific, and (of course!) part of the Big Pharma plot to keep people from accessing real cures for horrid diseases. Take a look at the discussions here and here, for instance. The pro-MMS camp seems to be out-shouting the skeptics. They are a very passionately devoted group of folks, many of whom claim to have experienced the healing powers of MMS firsthand.

And Jim himself is leading the villagers, particularly on Facebook, it seems.

Familiar territory
I'm no stranger to this saga. I've written about Jim Humble, the main perpetrator of the MMS scampire and founder of that ersatz "church," a couple of times on this Whirled. (My favorite doctor blogger, Orac, aka Dr. David Gorski at Respectful Insolence, has also written about Humble and his MMS "cures" a few times.)

So what's the deal about Kevin Trudeau and those six degrees and so forth? Well, maybe it isn't even six degrees.

Humble first captured my interest because among many other things, he is a vanity book publisher who publishes the German-language works of the deranged "Dr." Leonard Coldwell, the former Bernd Klein of Germany and an all-too-frequent guest on this Whirled. (Coldwell unsuccessfully sued me last year for writing about him.) Humble also publishes or distributes the works of other quacks, including works by the late Hulda Clark, a supposed expert on cancer cures, who died of...I hate to say it... cancer. Through his German-language web site, Jim Humble Verlag, he not only peddles books and other info-frauducts but also sells a slew of supplements.

And Coldwell, as those of you who have been following this blog for any length of time almost certainly know, first caught my interest because he is a former cohort of imprisoned serial scammer Kevin Trudeau, whom I've written about numerous times and whose shenanigans have also been previously documented by ABC News. Coldwell was a big part of Trudeau's scammy Global Information Network (GIN) until he got fired in spring of 2012. Ever since then he has been a rabid critic of Trudeau.

Here is one previous post where I wrote about Jim Humble; the part about him is actually at the end, in a May 2015 update. It was mostly in the context of my earlier speculations about a "Heroes of Cancer" European book tour that Coldwell had claimed he was going to go on along with two much better-known cancer quacks, Stanislaw Burzynski and Tullio Simoncini. In fact that "book tour" turned out to be a "health congress" (frauduct expo) in Kassel, Germany, sponsored by none other than Jim Humble. The "congress" was originally scheduled to be held on different dates in several cities in Europe as well as the UK, but most of the events were cancelled, most likely because of skeptics' protests and trouble with health authorities. (And according to a very recent report on the ABC News site, one of the "bishops" of the Genesis II "Church" in Ireland has been convicted on charges related to pushing the MMS frauduct.)

Coldwell, who as you probably also know is not and never has been a real doctor of any sort, claims to have "the only answer to cancer" and he boasts that he has a 92.3 percent cancer cure rate. He has gushed about his close friendship with Jim Humble, whom he considers to be a fellow warrior for truth: one who, like Coldwell, is continually being unjustly hounded and pursued by the medical establishment, Big Pharma, the New World Order and of course the evil mainstream media. Or so goes the "help, help, I'm being repressed!" narrative so fiercely embraced by the Brave Maverick Doctors/Healers and their loyal fans.

Phony churches offer no sanctuary
Like Jim Humble, Leonard Coldwell also had a "church" for a while, the Church of Inner Healing, LLC, which, in the spirit of Jim Humble et al., he apparently used to protect himself from liability for doling out medical advice. The business is now listed on the business data sites as "no longer active," or "dissolved," though the "church" is still listed as a chartered member of Universal Ministries (see South Carolina, Mount Pleasant on this link). As well, Coldwell has numerous other LLCs and other types of businesses both in the US and his native Germany, so he presumably has plenty of ways to funnel his money and avoid not only tax liability but also legal liability for his fake-doctorin' shtick.

As for Humble's Genesis II "Church," here's what one of the ABC reports has to say:

It would be a violation of federal law to sell such a “miracle cure,” but ["Archbishop" Mark] Grenon claims he is protected because he is part of a church and the “miracle cure” is a sacrament that is not being sold but is offered for a “donation.”

“It’s a get-out-of-jail-free card to sell snake oil,” said [Dr. Steven] Novella [of the Yale School of Medicine]. “You make a donation to the church and you get it as a sacrament? Who really believes that?”

Federal prosecutors have already convicted one distributor of the “miracle cure” who shipped the solution through a company he formed.

And officials say the claims of religious freedom will not prevent prosecutions for sales of such cures.

“The cloak of religion does not protect illegal conduct from prosecution,” said Ben Mizer, the U.S. principal deputy assistant attorney general, in an interview with “20/20.”

Indeed, another MMS peddler, 45-year-old Louis Daniel Smith of Spokane, Washington, was sentenced on October 27 to more than four years in prison. The Department of Justice web site says:

After a seven-day trial in June, a jury convicted Smith of one count of conspiracy to commit multiple crimes, three counts of introducing misbranded drugs into interstate commerce with intent to defraud or mislead and one count of fraudulently smuggling merchandise into the United States.  Evidence at trial showed that Smith operated a business called “Project GreenLife” (PGL) from 2007 to 2011.  PGL sold a product called “Miracle Mineral Supplement,” or MMS, over the Internet.  MMS is a mixture of sodium chlorite and water.  Sodium chlorite is an industrial chemical used as a pesticide, for hydraulic fracturing and for wastewater treatment.  Sodium chlorite cannot be sold for human consumption, and suppliers of the chemical include a warning sheet stating that it can cause potentially fatal side effects if swallowed...

... According to the evidence presented at trial, Smith created phony “water purification” and “wastewater treatment” businesses in order to obtain sodium chlorite and ship his MMS without being detected by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or U.S. Customs and Border Protection.  The government also presented evidence that Smith hid evidence from FDA inspectors and destroyed evidence while law enforcement agents were executing search warrants.

So it would appear that the Church of the Holy Bleach has its first real martyr, even though Smith reportedly was not a church member.

As for Jim Humble, it appears that ABC had a "contentious encounter" with him. Here's more from the article quoted directly above:

Asked about allegations that he is more a con man than a religious leader, Humble said they “ain’t true.”

He also said he is living in a small apartment, barely making ends meet because other church leaders in the United States have failed to send him his “cut” of the money raised from training seminars.

In a newsletter sent to his followers after the “20/20” encounter, Humble backed off his claims that the church sacrament cures any disease.

“Today, I say MMS cures nothing!” he wrote. Now the founder of the church, who spent the last dozen years promoting MMS as a cure-all, says MMS is just one of a number of “important health tools, to combat the ill effects of poor foods, and chemicals that make us sick.”

Yup. And ol' Jim just happens to sell a bunch of those "important health tools" through his online store, and through no telling how many other sites, organizations and individuals in no telling how many countries. So if I were you, I wouldn't spend too much time weeping for Humble because those other "church leaders" in the U.S. are screwing him out of frauduct proceeds. My guess is that, notwithstanding his cries of poverty, he is doing just fine on his own.

My hope is that ABC -- or someone! -- will dig a little deeper into Jim Humble's offshore scams and hustles as well as the U.S.-based ones; I think that if they were to do so they would be able to scare up some evidence that Humble is far from the poor man he claims to be. My further hope is that maybe they'll snare Humble's pudgy little pal Coldwell in their investigative nets as well. That investigation is long, long overdue.

ABC, are you listening?

* * * * *

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ABC tackles Kevin Trudeau -- again!

[Originally posted on Tuesday, May 28; updated Wednesday, May 29]

Here is a link to a page that has a good-quality promo * for the upcoming ABC story on Kevin Trudeau. The segment will air Wednesday night, May 29, at 10:00 PM Eastern, 9:00 Central. This will be the kickoff segment for a new ABC summer series, "The Lookout" (formerly called, "Two Truths and a Lie"), focusing on consumer issues. The new series is under the umbrella of ABC's long running investigative series, Nightline.

If all goes as scheduled, and no natural disasters or political scandals or dire world affairs throw it off course, the first half of the premiere episode will be devoted to the scammy Mr. Trudeau and his scammy Global Information Network (GIN), long a favorite topic of this blog. Then the ABC investigators will discuss fat-burning machines, bedbugs, and other vital consumer issues.

In contrast to previous lame attempts at grabbing and sharing a promo for the ABC story (you can see Peter Wink's reflection in the screen on this one)...

... the one I linked to in the first sentence of this post comes straight from the source.  Despite Loony Lenny Coldwell's predictions, this ABC story will almost certainly not mark the end of Trudeau's 20 year "rein" of fraud and deception. After all, Loony has been known to be wrong before. Such as last October (if you'll pardon my redundancy)...

Then there's this, from Wednesday, May 29 (take anything Lenny says with a grain of salt, particularly since he can't even spell "trial" or "Guzman")...

And by the way, here's a recent post about that Guzman criminal trial, originally scheduled for June 3, but now... um... maybe not.

At any rate, tonight's "Lookout" segment should be a good story. And ABC has done numerous other stories about Trudeau over the years -- such this 2006 story (and here is a video). Then there is this 2011 story. So this newest segment is in keeping with a fine network tradition. It probably wasn't very difficult to convince ABC it was high time to do another story about KT.

PS ~ While you are waiting for the ABC story, here again is a link to Kansas City NBC affiliate reporter Ryan Kath's story of the May 21 court hearing.

And here is a link to the story that aired on the Chicago NBC station. This is the story that was originally supposed to run last week, but was delayed due to coverage of the tragic tornado in Oklahoma.

View more videos at: http://nbcchicago.com.

* Note: The link to the ABC promo may not work on all mobile devices, but it loaded fine on my desktop computer.

More True-dough on this Whirled:

• May 2013: Kevie goes a-courtin': pleading the Fifth
• May 2013: Kevin Trudeau: Justice...or just more paper shuffling?
• May 2013: Kevin Trudeau: Countdown to court date (or not)
• May 2013: Kevin Trudeau + Mark Hamilton = GIN with a twist of Neo-stink
• April 2013: Bankruptcy: GIN members await Level 7 while Kevin Trudeau files Chapter 7
• March 2013: Ryan Kath at KSHB-TV does Trudeau/GIN update, Coldwell & Wink continue to scam with cheap imitation of GIN
• February 2013: Kevin Trudeau's GIN: The sky is falling (again)...yawn
• February 2013: Loony Coldwell: Cheesy video and bad spelling
• February 2013: IBMS Master's Society Supreme Loony Coldwell strikes again
• February 2013: Faux heroes and hypocrisy in action
• February 2013: Meet the new scam, same as the old scam, Part 2
• January 2013: Vital signs: "Immortal" (former) breatharian Mony Vital dies on GIN cruise
• January 2013: Meet the new scam, same as the old scam, Part 1
• December 2012: 2012 ~ The Whirled goes on
• November 2012: Kevin Trudeau: justice delayed...again
• November 2012: Kevin Trudeau exposé on KSHB-TV: buzz, backlash, and big beginnings
• November 2012: Alien nation: just how crazy is Kevin Trudeau (not to mention his sheeple)?
• November 2012: Kevin Trudeau: KSHB-TV undercover investigation
• November 2012: Kevin Trudeau gets some more mainstream lovin'
• October 2012: Evil has not won
• October 2012: Kevin Trudeau: Rats in our heads, GIN down the toilet...and life goes on
• October 2012: Kevin Trudeau: The shape of things to come?
• September 2012: Leonard Coldwell and Fred Van Liew: Pot, meet kettle
• August 2012: Truth is better than GIN any day
• July 2012: Drunk on GIN, and you can too!
• July 2012: Kevin Trudeau's GIN: part of the big sick machine
• July 2012: Independence Daze
• May 2012 (updated September 2012): Paging Dr. C: Bernd bridges in Deutschland?
• May 2012: Can alien DNA save Kevin Trudeau's GIN?
• May 2012: Does a canary with a GIN hangover sing as sweetly?
• April 2012: Viva Lost Wages: Sin City Become GIN City for a weekend
• February 2012: A. Rose by any other name would shill as sweet
• December 2011: True-dough updates: Bad poetry for KT, hate mail for CC
• November 2011: A jumpsuit for Jimmy
• August 2011: First Amendment Stuporhero
• August 2011: Everything old is Nouveau again (or, Neo-scam by any other name) -- Part 2 of 2
• August 2011: Calling all lazy men: let's build a pyramid together!
• August 2011: Everything old is Nouveau again (or, Neo-scam by any other name), Part 1 of 2
• June 2011: Holy Guacamole! True-dough's racist rants
• June 2011: For he's a jolly good felon: True-dough speaks out for Death Ray
• December 2009 (amended several times in 2010): Illuminutty: the secret brotherhood of the chronically gullible
• November 2009: How to take over the world
• July 2009: Horse farts and related matters
• January 2009: Mr. Fire meets up with true dough

* * * * *

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Mean ABC 20/20 skewers (and crucifies!) gorgeous fitness model

“Being filmed in a Rolls-Royce with a gorgeous fitness model at your side is a lot different than being interviewed by a sharp mainstream TV news reporter.”
~ Joe "Mr. Fire" Vitale, February 7, 2010

"Being filmed in a Rolls-Royce with a boastful buffoon whose mailing list you paid THOUSANDS to get your hands on in order to expand your own scams is a lot different from being accosted in a parking lot by some bleeping mainstream TV news reporter wanting to quibble about the claims you've made in your infomercials."
~Jennifer Nicole Lee, gorgeous fitness model*

Y'all probably remember that last year Joe "Mr. Fire" Vitale had an actual celebrity guest on one of his famous Rolls-Royce Phantom ride-alongs, as opposed to the usual lineup of irrationally hopeful wannabes with more money than sense. The celeb in question was "Bikini Diva" Jennifer Nicole Lee, aka JNL, who's most famous for hawking an exercise machine called the Ab-Roller Pro, and the ride took place in early 2010. This was a true breakthrough for Joe. And it was right in keeping with one of his own passions, fitness; after all, besides being the Buddha of the Internet, he is also the Charles Atlas of the Internet. What made the whole thing even more thrilling was that ABC News went right along and filmed the historic ride.

In a March 2010 post, Joe breathlessly blogged:

I confess that when Jennifer booked her evening with me for the Phantom Rider experience, I wasn’t sure how I could help her. After all, she’s already successful. And she’d already read all my books and listened to all my programs.

What was left?

But she later told me — as well as ABC News — that she got her money’s worth within the first 15 minutes of our conversation. We generated new ideas and came up with money-making plans she hadn’t thought of before. She loved it.

It was all one big party. A little over a month before he wrote that post, Joe had written another blog post about "attracting ABC news. This is the one in which he praised the sharp reporter who grilled him, Dan Harris. Some of us haters and naysayers saw it as kind of a proactive move: we figured he was thinking that if he kissed up to Dan (after all, they have so much in common! They both love indie music!), the report that ultimately aired would show Joe in a flattering light. And if things didn't go his way, Joe could always blame the mainstream media for stubbornly refusing to see all the good that the selfish-help industry does, or for editing out all the good bits. Either way, he had his bases covered.

Meanwhile, there was all that link love between JNL and Joe (not to mention the probable list love going on in the background). I'm sure JNL did pick up some marketing tips from Joe, and if so I'm guessing -- but only guessing -- that they centered on a few basic hustledork/hustledorkess principles:

1. Say anything you think you can get away with. People WANT to believe (well, except for those nasty mainstream reporters and those hater bloggers).
2. Don't be afraid to change your story as frequently as possible to make your marketing more effective. People love stories, and they have short memories (well, except for those nasty mainstream reporters and those hater bloggers).
3. Don't be afraid to pick your customer's pockets.** Find out your customers' credit limits and work around that. Forced continuity is the key to a healthy bottom line. And remember: Upsell, upsell, upsell!

Months passed, and finally ABC aired the results of those interviews in June 2010. The first one seemed like a fluff piece on the surface. One could almost hear Joe breathing a huge sigh of relief as some of his critics wondered WTF. But some saw the piece as a straightforward depiction of the facts, and the facts spoke for themselves. ABC didn't have to expend any effort make a buffoon out of Joe or out of the people who really pay $5,000 or more to ride with him. (JNL, as you'll see below, claimed she paid TEN grand. If that's true, methinks it's that list-love thing again.) 

Anyway, as I've noted here before, despite all of Joe's kissing up by describing Dan Harris as tough but fair ("and I really liked him!"), ABC did not return the favor . The segment they finally aired on June 29, 2010 was mostly about James Arthur "Death" Ray, but it was also about the selfish-help industry in general, and Mr. Fire was showcased briefly and not flatteringly towards the end. (Here's Salty Droid's take on it: http://saltydroid.info/death-ray-mind-games/ ) 

So I imagine Joe rued the day that he ever agreed to be interviewed by ABC. But he showed them. As another proactive measure, he'd had his wife Nerissa record the entire interview with her flip camera. And he provided a link on his podcast blog on July 12, 2010, in a brief post entitled, "ABC News TV interview -- not aired." He wrote:

ABC news interviewed me for almost an hour early this year. But what they aired six months later was about one minute of the 47 minute interview.


Of course, they did their best to mislead, distort and stay negative. You can listen to the entire unedited interview right here. It's sincere, positive, and complete. This was recorded by Nerissa as she held a flip camera in my office.
Enjoy.
Joe

And now, after watching last night's 20/20 segment, I'm thinking that maybe the lovely fitness model Jennifer Nicole Lee doesn't like ABC so much either. She even threatened to have them arrested.

20/20 and Consumer Reports teamed up for a report on infomercials and some of the top infomercial stars. One of the ABC reporters caught up to JNL in a parking lot outside of her tanning salon to ask her about some of the claims on her infomercials for the Ab-Roller Pro.

She apparently did not like the questions.

"You're obviously trying to skewer me!" the distraught but gorgeous fitness model cried, more than once. She also said more than once that ABC was trying to crucify her. Or at least it appeared that she said these things more than once. It could be that the nefarious ABC editors looped it back around to make it appear that she was just repeating herself because she didn't have any credible answer to the reporter's questions. You know how those "gotcha" media types like to twist people's words around and take them out of context. It's too bad Nerissa wasn't there with her flip camera.

Of course Salty Droid had already skewered and crucified JNL -- as well as her Phantom mentor -- nearly one year previously, but important gorgeous fitness models like Jennifer Nicole Lee don't pay attention to those negative naysayer hater blogs. Evidently gorgeous fitness models, like New-Wage hucksters, are too busy inventing new frauducts and flopportunities, and then making up new stories about how they became successful by using the new creation. The stories they tell vary depending upon the frauduct or flopportunity they're promoting. 

F'rinstance, a few short years ago Jennifer said, on Oprah, that she got skinny partly by an exercise routine that included "Baby Squats." She used her toddler Dylan as a weight while she did squats. Later when she began peddling the Ab-Roller Pro she ditched the kid from the backstory and said she she got skinny and fit just by using the Ab-Roller Pro. (That word "just" was apparently one of the main points ABC questioned her about.)

And even though ABC didn't mention this bit, I'd like to point out that even later, JNL decided to make it sound as if she got skinny and rich by hanging with overpriced success gurus, as quoted by Salty in the "Phantom Menace" blog post I linked to above:

“My name is Jennifer Nicole Lee, and I went from fat to fabulous, from poor to rich all from coaching and watching those who succeeded in their own lives, and then applied their trade secrets to my own life.

I recently enjoyed a chance of a life time being coached by Dr. Joe Vitale …

I gave myself the treat to visit with him, and purchased his “Rolls Royce Mastermind Meeting”, which I paid a hefty price of $10,000. And it was worth every penny!”

Alas, ABC had to go spoil things by asking her about the inconsistencies in her various success stories, as well as grilling her on whether or not the before and after pics in her promo material were Photoshopped -- and, to add insult to injury, questioning her claims that she got her fab body by working out a mere three minutes a day. That darned mainstream media again. 

During the parking lot "grillfest," JNL finally said she'd had enough, and told the crew they could schedule a sit-down interview that very day. So, according to the reporter, the ABC folks waited...and waited...and waited... (apparently JNL simply sat in her car and drank bottled water while they were waiting). Finally ABC heard from Jen's lawyer, who told them never to contact her again, and if they even tried to do so, Jen would have them arrested.***

Take that, mainstream media!

"Dr." Joe Vitale, who of course is also known for changing his own "success" stories as the mood suits him, could have told her there would be days like this, and he probably did. In fact, another star of The Secret, David Schirmer, aka Shameless Schirmer, aka The Mini-Madoff of Melbourne, aka The Wanker of Oz, could have told Jen the same thing. After all, he got skewered by the equally mean Australian media, which resulted in some investigations into his business affairs by the ASIC (the Oz equivalent of the SEC), which ultimately resulted in his getting banned for life from practicing in the financial trade in Australia.

Maybe Jen and Joe can take another ride in his Rolls and whine about it together over Vitale steaks in the Vitale Cigar Bar. And if there's room for two more, maybe they can invite David Schirmer.

* She hasn't said it, but I bet she's thinking it. And in all fairness, Joe probably wanted her list too...or something.
** "Don't be afraid to pick their pockets" is actually advice that Joe gave me years ago, more than once.
*** Interestingly enough, though, some of the questionable claims (and photos) have since been modified in the Ab-Roller Pro infomercials. This is probably a combined result of numerous consumer complaints and the ABC grillfest.

PS ~ Here's the vid of JNL and ABC. You can also watch it (and the rest of the infomercial episode) on http://abcnews.go.com/2020/.

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