kevin trudeau #2

[Guest guest]

What Trudeau doesn't want you to know

The author of the bestselling " Natural Cures 'They' Don't Want You to

Know About " claims to be a consumer advocate in the Ralph Nader mold.

But the infomercial king just wants your cash.

By Dreher

Jul 29, 2005 | Many a late-night channel surfer has been numbed to

sleep by endless infomercials hawking ab machines, penis enlargers,

psychic readings and baldness cures. But how about a 30-minute faux

talk show featuring a slick " expert author " who promises natural cures

for cancer, diabetes and chronic fatigue syndrome and who claims that

the FDA, drug companies and food industry have withheld such cures

from the public in order to keep making bigger and bigger profits?

Step right up folks, and tune in to the paranoid world of master

huckster Trudeau, whose book " Natural Cures 'They' Don't Want

You to Know About " climbed to the top spot on the New York Times

bestseller list for advice titles last weekend. The Federal Trade

Commission virtually banned Trudeau from the airwaves last year in an

attempt to " shut down an infomercial empire that has misled American

consumers for years. " But by shifting his business model from selling

supposed cure-all products to peddling books, which are protected by

the First Amendment, Trudeau has been able to slip past federal

regulators and continue to sell snake oil to the masses -- first

through his infomercial and now via mainstream book retailers like

Amazon.com and & Noble.

Reno R. Rollé, an executive consultant who handles U.S. retail and

international distribution for " Natural Cures, " says the book has sold

nearly 3 million copies since the infomercial debuted in September

2004, and he sees no end in sight to its success. " No one knows where

this thing is going to max out. We're just printing as many books as

we can, " Rollé says. " We're poised to make history here. What we're

doing could revolutionize the book publishing industry. "

Even before hitting the bestseller list, Trudeau, who is in his early

40s, had built a billion-dollar empire as a prolific infomercialteer,

selling various health and self-improvement products under the cover

of night. This despite a two-year stint in federal prison in the early

'90s after pleading guilty to credit card fraud, and a 1996 tangle

with the Illinois attorney general, who accused him of running a

pyramid scheme while working for a health-products company called

Nutrition for Life. Trudeau and a co-defendant settled that case,

paying $185,000 to Illinois and seven other states; during that time,

the U.S. Postal Service and Securities and Exchange Commission also

investigated his business dealings.

A close look at Trudeau's later run-in with the FTC, in 1998, during

which he and seven cohorts were accused of making " false or

unsubstantiated " claims in advertisements on radio and television

infomercials, sheds much needed light on his character and says a lot

about how seriously (or not) we should take " Natural Cures. " Ads for

the " Sable Hair Farming System, " Trudeau's own " Mega Memory System, "

" Doctor Callahan's Addiction Breaking System, " " Action Reading, "

" Eden's Secret Nature's Purifying Product " and " Berg's Mega

Reading " all came under scrutiny they could not withstand.

" We're going to be sharing Dr. Callahan's revolutionary breakthrough

that he discovered while studying quantum physics, " the addiction

infomercial went, before claiming that the system cured compulsive

eating, as well as alcohol, cocaine and heroin addiction, and led to

weight loss without dieting or exercise. " This technique will take 60

seconds to apply and works virtually 100 percent of the time, " the FTC

noted as another claim. It said that the " videotape sold in the

infomercial showed Dr. Callahan demonstrating his technique -- a

series of gestures, including tapping the face, chest and hand;

rolling the eyes; and humming, which, if mimicked, were the supposed

addiction cure. " The claims were false, according to the FTC.

Another Trudeau product, " Berg's Mega Reading, " offered a home

study program guaranteed to boost reading speed and comprehension 10

times over. " I have a letter here from a girl who has brain damage, "

Berg confided in another infomercial. " She was in a car accident and

half her brain stopped functioning. It was electrically dead. "

According to the FTC, " he then claimed that after using his system for

a brief period -- as long as a coffee break -- her reading speed

increased from three to 600 words per minute... " Not surprisingly, the

FTC deemed the Berg program bogus as well.

And Trudeau's own " Mega Memory System, " which asserted that everyone

has an innate photographic memory that could be tapped into with his

help, was unmasked too. To show how fraudulent the system was, the FTC

cited snippets of the infomercial, such as: " Trudeau's

breakthrough techniques were developed while working with blind and

mentally handicapped students. Their recall ability increased from 15%

to 90% in just 5 days, " as well as the infomercial's claim that the

system was " guaranteed to work for you. "

In the end, Trudeau settled the case; he was fined $500,000 in

consumer redress and warned against making false product claims in the

future. But this didn't deter him. In 2003, the FTC charged Trudeau

once more, this time citing another product, Coral Calcium Supreme.

The FTC argued that claims made in Trudeau's infomercial by Dr.

" Bob " Barefoot that calcium derived from coral reefs near Okinawa,

Japan, could treat or cure cancer and other ills -- such as multiple

sclerosis and heart disease -- went far beyond existing scientific

evidence concerning the health benefits of calcium. Trudeau settled

that case as well. But this time, in addition to being fined $2

million, he was also banned from " appearing in, producing, or

disseminating future infomercials that advertise any type of product,

service, or program to the public " forever.

Afterward, Trudeau loudly complained that the FTC was censoring him

and started a Web site called The Whistleblower, on which he tries to

fashion himself as a new Ralph Nader -- a selfless consumer advocate

opposing powerful institutions and defending regular folk. But

Trudeau's claims of persecution and martyrdom are hard to swallow for

many. " He wasn't censored -- that's just total fantasy, " says Dr.

Barrett, a health-fraud expert who runs a network of watchdog

Web sites, including Quackwatch. " What's happened is that he's just

not allowed to sell products with false claims. That's the only

censorship going on. "

" Trudeau is the undisputed king of false infomercial advertising, " he

continues. Barrett's alarm over Trudeau's tactics heightened with the

coral calcium infomercial. " It was just one lie after another, all

orchestrated by Trudeau, " Barrett says. He isn't any more impressed by

Trudeau's current infomercial for the bestselling " Natural Cures

'They' Don't Want You to Know About. "

The book, which Trudeau self-published, is a paranoid mixture of self-

evident and widely known health facts with very few, if any, natural

cures. It is almost amusingly campy -- except that the information is

so odd, and alarmist. " Natural Cures " is poorly sourced and peppered

with jaw-dropping absurdities, such as " The sun does not cause cancer.

Sun block has been shown to cause cancer " or " All over-the-counter

nonprescription drugs and prescription drugs CAUSE illness and

disease. " Or, this tribute to logic and language: " If you read the

labels of everything you put in your mouth, you would see the name

[sic] of various chemicals. All the chemicals listed are dangerous man-

made chemicals. They are poisons. If you were to take any of those

chemicals and ingest a large amount at one time, you would probably

die. Therefore they are in fact poisons. "

His prose style mimics the gibberish favored by online spam

advertisements, and he frequently uses SCREAM CAPS to emphasize

OBVIOUS POINTS. At one point, Trudeau implies that he was an

undercover government agent and that, because of his inside knowledge,

the government and powerful corporations are out to get him -- though

he doesn't share what any of his highly prized knowledge is. And

always lurking somewhere is the nefarious " They " of the book's title

-- the FDA and the FTC, who are in cahoots with the drug companies,

which hold back the real natural cures because they won't make any

money if you're healthy.

On every page, he stokes the paranoia and anger generated by recent

high-profile corporate and government scandals, as well as the ire

against the health insurance and pharmaceutical industries. But don't

worry, not only will his book save you, but you can also go to his Web

site, NaturalCures.com, for more information and for the " real cures, "

all for a lifetime membership of $499 or a monthly fee of just $9.95.

In essence, the infomercial sells the book, which sells the Web site --

which nets Trudeau tons of money.

But there's nothing strictly illegal about Trudeau and " Natural

Cures. " Hippsley, assistant director for the division of

advertising practices at the FTC, who supervised the commission's case

against Trudeau, explains: " Books are fully protected speech. He can

author a book and voice his opinions ... The line is: Informational

materials, OK. Products and services, banned. "

Peer-review systems -- like the one in place on Amazon.com -- do their

best work in warning potential buyers of bad or faulty products. On

the Amazon site, over 500 people have weighed in on " Natural Cures " so

far. Yet, although reviews have been almost overwhelmingly negative --

in Amazon's " star rating " scheme, the book is averaging a two -- sales

haven't slowed. Despite headlines like " 'Scams they don't want you to

know about " ; " Trudeau is worse than the drug companies! " ; " Left

feeling totally duped " ; " Natural Cures he Contiunous [sic] Not to Tell

U About " ; and " The Book Just Simply Sucks, " " Natural Cures " hovers at

the top of the Amazon bestseller list week after week.

Indeed, all the negative Amazon reviews in the world probably won't

keep people from checking out " Natural Cures. " " What's driving sales

is not people buying the book but people buying the infomercial, " says

Sam Catanese, president and CEO of Infomercial Monitoring Service,

which tracks the direct-response television marketing industry. In

fact, according to Catanese's data, " Natural Cures " was recently the

most-run infomercial on television -- 139 times in one week. (The

runner-up was a distant second, appearing 96 times.)

As for the television broadcasters' responsibilities in this issue,

they've turned a blind eye to Trudeau and his type. " [The Federal

Communications Commission] has never been inclined to take anyone's

licenses away because the industry they nominally regulate actually

regulates them, " says Todd Gitlin, a professor of journalism and

sociology at Columbia University. " The industry is too powerful to

contend with, and regulation is largely farcical, except when there's

political teeth biting, as in the case of Janet . "

It was Reno Rollé who initially urged Trudeau to combine his extensive

experience in infomercials with the book business. " I suggested he

focus less on hard products, ingestibles, and more on information and

newsletters, " he says. " That way he could find a safe harbor under

First Amendment protections. " They teamed up to see if, and how, it

would work. " No one knew how a book would behave, " he says. " Initially

we treated the book as just a product that shouldn't behave

differently than a stomach exerciser or kitchen utensils. " It's a

strategy that paid off handsomely.

" The infomercial business is very standardized, " Rollé continues. " You

put the product on TV first to create awareness and sell a large

number of 'units.' Then, after a period of time, you pull trigger and

head out to retail. " And once a product hits retail, as " Natural

Cures " did just four weeks ago, Rollé says, the industry standard is

to sell two to 10 times as many " units " as were sold on TV.

Although Rollé could not give figures about the amount of advertising

time being purchased for " Natural Cures, " one source in the direct-

response industry who asked not to be named estimated that Trudeau is

spending a million dollars a week on national cable and could also be

spending another half a million on broadcast channels. The source

suggested that Trudeau's return from that investment would be about $2

million to $4 million a week. " He's got the formula down and he knows

how to trick people, " says the source. " And he's got enough money to

do it. The FTC can't stop him because the amount they fine him is

nothing compared to what he takes in. "

Besides reader complaints on Amazon, there's other evidence that

buyers of " Natural Cures " are feeling ripped off. Tim Young, an

Alabama-based publisher of community maps and local directories, has

had trouble for the last four months because Trudeau's marketing

company that " publishes " " Natural Cures " chose the same name as his

business, Alliance Publishing Group. Young has received hundreds and

hundreds of calls about the book from booksellers, distributors and

agents -- but mostly from angry readers. " I don't even answer my phone

anymore if I don't recognize the number, " Young says. " I'm getting all

this e-mail from people who are pissed off because they bought the

book for cures and there's no real info in the book and they have to

go to a Web site and pay money to learn anything. "

Trudeau isn't hoping to cash in on only one book, either. A few months

before " Natural Cures " was released for retail sale, Trudeau contacted

publishing giant Harper about an early-'90s version of his

infomercial spin-off " Mega Memory " book, which was on their backlist.

Harper has repackaged the book to resemble Trudeau's current

bestseller and it will be re-released in mid-August, when " Natural

Cures " will certainly still be hot. Harper has also slapped " As

Seen on TV! " and " By the bestselling author of Natural Cures They

Don't Want You To Know About " prominently on the book's cover.

The FTC's Hippsley told Salon that while her agency will continue to

keep a careful eye on Trudeau's publishing activities, the

Constitution does offer him protection. " He can put that book out

there, and if consumers choose to purchase it, that's lawful.

Unfortunately, there are individuals out there whose career is to do

consumer frauds. "

But some First Amendment experts point out that there are limits.

" Nobody has a right to engage in fraud, even when the fraud takes the

form of speech, " says H. Fallon, a professor of constitutional

law at Harvard Law School. " What, if any, laws does someone break when

[engaging] in false or misleading speech? Generally none, because the

First Amendment wouldn't allow punishment for [that]. But one of the

exceptions is that false and misleading speech can be prohibited or

prevented when that speech is closely tied to commercial activity, " he

says.

Meanwhile, Trudeau recently filed a lawsuit himself -- against the

FTC. In it, he maintains that its September 2004 press release

announcing his ban from infomercials contained false and misleading

information, implying that Trudeau was banned from all infomercials

and didn't distinguish his literary allowances.

Trudeau continues to spin his career as a struggle against the

censorship of a vengeful FTC and the tyranny of legal groups that

won't let him lie in commercials or bilk consumers. But now, Trudeau

is shooting even higher than emulating Ralph Nader. He recently told

BrandWeek, " Parks and Cesar Chavez and Gandhi and Luther

King " are the figures he looks to for inspiration. We can only hope he

has less success than those civil rights heroes.

http://dir.salon.com/books/feature/2005/07/29/trudeau