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I found a good account on the Skepchick's blog about Rebecca recently attending a Sylvia Brown performance. (For entertainment purposes only).  I can't believe they get away with fraud, ripping people off with no consequences and the masses just eat it up.

"The show began with cold reader “psychic barber” Gordon Smith warming up the crowd with a big steaming plate of bullshit. He moved through the crowd doing standard cold reading junk, some of it more despicable than the usual. Then Sylvia came out and did a “lecture,” which was like an hour of ramblings from your demented aunt your mother makes you go see once every other month. I was half expecting her to offer us hard candies.

Then she led the crowd through a collective meditation. They played new age music while Sylvia talked in a soothing manner . . . well, as soothing a manner as she can get I guess. Imagine being sung to sleep by a mutant bullfrog. Then the bullfrog bites you on the eyeball. It was like that, only much, much worse.

After we all woke up refreshed from our journey into our inner consciousness, Sylvia called wristband numbers to choose who got to ask a single question of her.
...
On a purely professional level, I must admit that this tactic was brilliant. It’s like cold reading, but the other person doesn’t even get a moment to respond. For those who aren’t familiar, cold reading is a method that magicians and “psychics” use to throw out names or ideas at a person and judge his reaction. It’s why psychics always start out a bit general (”I’m getting a ‘J’”) and then work their way in to the specifics they pick up off their subjects. In this case, though, Sylvia can say anything and get away with it by just moving on to the next person. At one point she told a man to eat less carbs. When he objected and said he didn’t eat carbs, she laughed and told him to stop lying to her, she’s psychic. The audience laughed and applauded and the next person began asking her question. There were even two different microphones, one on either side of the stage, to facilitate this. Brilliant."

These people know exactly what they are doing.  It is sad that we haven't managed to pin the sort of suspicion and perceived shadiness we seem to reserve for used car salesmen.
The rest of Rebecca's account is here.

In other news, this was a brilliant take on the problems in Iraq.  Following recent conservative comments about sectarian violence being the fault of Iraqis (no damn shame at all), Michael Kinsley had this gem.

"Second, you don't get to assume the success of your intentions then plead a shrugging “Who knew?” when they don't pan out. I also am in favor of toppling dictators, establishing democracy and watching it spread painlessly throughout every region where there is no experience of it. Not only that: I am in favor of turning sand into ice cream and guaranteeing a cone to every child in the Middle East. But you can't turn sand into ice cream. That is not a defect in the execution of the idea. It is a defect in the idea itself. Although Perle and Adelman and others may think they are dissing the Bush Administration when they talk about its incompetence in failing to turn sand into ice cream, they are also displaying the Bush Administration's key vice, which is assuming that things are how you wish them to be and not how they are."

Don't assume things are how you wish them to be.  The skeptic must keep this reproach always at the front of their thoughts.  Whether its life after death, a reassuring omnipotent father-figure, a miracle cure, an ultimate justice to everything, an ultimate purpose to our existence, or a way to get great abs in only two weeks.  Don't assume things are how you wish them to be.

The Southern Fried Skeptic