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American Morning
John Edward Claims He Can Communicate With Dead, But is He For Real?
Aired May 10, 2002 - 09:43 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: He is a medium with a message. John Edward claims he can communicate with the dead, but is he for real? The world-renowned psychic and host of the TV show "Crossing Over" has millions of true believers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN EDWARDS, HOST, "CROSSING OVER": Who was asphyxiated? Who had the problem where they couldn't breathe?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My husband.
EDWARDS: OK. Is that how he passed?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
EDWARDS: Okay, just use him as a description.
Catherine is who?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Me.
EDWARDS: You're Catherine. OK, that's validated enough for me.
And February, it was the month of February?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That's my brother's birthday.
EDWARDS: The one that passed?
OK. OK. Why is Niagara Falls significant?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We were just there.
EDWARDS: You were just in Niagara Falls, OK.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Me and my daughter.
EDWARDS: Did you find a feather there? And did you tell your daughter that was from daddy?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
EDWARDS: OK, that his message for you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZAHN: Still, in spite of what you just witnessed, Edward is not without his critics, who say that his claims of "Crossing Over" crosses the line, and John Edward himself is here in the studio this morning to defend himself and talk a little bit more about what he does.
Good morning. Nice to see you again.
EDWARDS: Good to see you again.
ZAHN: Walk us through what you did with that young woman in your audience.
EDWARDS: Basically, whether it is you know, on "Crossing Over," the show, in the gallery, during a seminar around the country or in my office one on one, I sit with somebody, and I'm able to open myself up to the energies people who have crossed over, and I just tell them what I'm seeing, hearing and feeling. Sometimes they get it right. Sometimes they get it wrong. But ultimately, I tell them what I'm getting, so that I can try to help them understand the process of survival of consciousness, that even though somebody left us physically, my belief is that they are still connected to us.
ZAHN: Now, is this done visually?
EDWARDS: It comes for me in three different ways. I see, hear and feel the energy, so it's kind of like, you know, like a TV station broadcast signal, and TV stations around America right now are watching this, and it's like I've become that TV, and they are the TV station broadcasting their energy.
ZAHN: Let's talk about an article "Time" magazine wrote, owned by our parent company, of course, "The Infamous," in March of 2001, and that suggested that you actually might put microphones in the audience to get advance information, and that you edit your tape to manipulate the responses. Is that true?
EDWARDS: Absolutely not. You know, one of the things that is really important to just go on record saying is that article was written without any input from the show or from me, so it was completely written by somebody who just wrote an article based upon what they believe, or if I can use the same word "allegedly" say, you know, this guy claimed. All those words that are adjectives that are describing my work, I can now put back on the (UNINTELLIGIBLE). He never came to the show He never interviewed me, and it was like this is what they speculated as to happened, which I actually take as a major compliment, because if they say that we have go to those great lengths to get that kind of information, I sit back and say, you know, I'm good enough at what I do then.
ZAHN: I want to come back to the charges that have been made about cold reading, too. I want to apologize, we have some breaking news right now. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
