Gene Steinberg's Financial Shenanigans @ Paracast forums

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goblin

goblin

Noble
Kaidan said:
It's worth going back and listening to the early Podcasts with David Biedny. I started at the beginning and I'm midway through 2007. The episodes when he calls out Billy Meier's media guy and Sean David Morton are classic.

It's also great anytime David talks about his personal experiences in the field. The story about the spirit of the young girl he witnessed with his friend is fascinating. I'd love to know, David, if you've given that anymore thought in the years since recalling the story. I believe it happened 12 years prior to that podcast and it's been 12 years since you related the experience.

One of things I enjoyed about David's analyses of paranormal claims is that he's brutally honest, even when it angered the guest. I would imagine that if someone else told the story about the spirit girl he might speculate that it could have been a trick of the light, a weird reflection of a girl somewhere nearby and her ghost-like image appeared before David and his friend. Or could it have been a projection, someone experimenting with movie projectors or holograms?

I've had all kinds of paranormal experiences myself and most always think they're authentic at the time, then later I try to rationalize and usually come up with one or two more reasonable explanations. I still believe the events could be genuine, but I also consider the possibility that my brain has been food by some outside forces. Or maybe even those inside my brain.
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The Biedny era episodes of the Paracast were like a revelation to me. I had been ignoring paranormal topics - books, TV shows, etc., for a couple years at least, maybe longer. I decided to check out these things called podcasts toward the end of 2007, and somehow wound up listening to the Paracast. Sad but true I had never heard anyone engage with the topic the way Biedny did. I was used to tall tales, bullshit, delusions and mocking skepticism, but here was someone applying critical thinking.

Toward the end of his time on the show it did get hard to listen to. You could tell he was tired and fed up. His decision to move on was understandable but I miss his voice on the subject matter and am happy to listen when he's done the occasional podcast appearance over the years.

I believe I know what you mean about rationalizing possible paranormal experiences after the fact. I've had a few creepy seemingly paranormal episodes in my life - nothing hugely dramatic or life changing - and I certainly found myself rationalizing them away afterward. They were scary enough at the time I was experiencing them, though! Related, I think, I've had some non paranormal experience with how the brain decides what the eyes are seeing... I am not articulating this well but... I've had notable personal episodes of thinking I see something absolutely clearly then realizing I'm interpreting a false signal from visual 'noise'. Kind of humbling, but I can understand how people may decide they've seen something in a quick glimpse that they in effect didn't really see. A tree becomes a Bigfoot or what have you.
 
The shadow

The shadow

The shadow knows!
My big problem with Gene and his current plotline is this.
He was in an appartment for a whole year without paying rent.
he was in the LUXURIOUS Desert Marage for 3 months. when they decided to End the game. this established a pattern of behavior. Gene gets into a apartment and never pays.
But he gets to a hotel and suddenly he can pay barely day to day?
makes no sense.
 
GiantsBain

GiantsBain

Honorable
GhostofBiedny said:
To be fair Paul is more active on Twitter and over the last six to eight months he has been one of the most vocal critics of Gene. It's just that if you are on here you don't see it. Remember at some point Gene fooled us all. He is good at playing the helpless old man card. Once all the information came out on UFOtrail and SchemeGeneRC he realised the truth same way many of us did.
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Exactly. I think it's unfair to indict someone who associated with a person who is eventually outed as a dirtbag or discredited. It's what they do afterward in public that matters. Seems to me that Bishop and Ecker have stepped back just like Kimball. That they have not taken the further step of publicly condemning Steinberg is a personal choice and none of our business.

Like you said, Steinberg fooled a lot of folks. That's over and done. If a potential guest does not know or does not care, then that would be indicative of the quality of guest he and the Randallbot are capable of attracting.
 
goblin

goblin

Noble
The shadow said:
My big problem with Gene and his current plotline is this.
He was in an appartment for a whole year without paying rent.
he was in the LUXURIOUS Desert Marage for 3 months. when they decided to End the game. this established a pattern of behavior. Gene gets into a apartment and never pays.
But he gets to a hotel and suddenly he can pay barely day to day?
makes no sense.
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It doesn't add up or make sense. I think to explain it you have to consider that Gene apparently only pays a landlord when he feels that he absolutely has to pay them. To him that's a smart way to operate, I guess. Doing that with a small landlord I guess you might get to a place where you can string them along almost indefinitely. I believe Gene may have been in such a situation once, with a landlord he eventually declared a slumlord.

When you're dealing with a "heartless corporate landlord" (remember how he whined about that?) I don't think you have the latitude to string them along. They start piling on late fees and penalties, and they track those, and more they have a process they follow for non-payment that will eventually conclude in the constable's arrival. It may take awhile - a year even maybe if you shamelessly work the system to prolong your stay and delay the inevitable. Ultimately though you can't get them to let you stay just because you finally pay for one or two months of rent that you owe - you owe them for much more than that, the drop in the bucket you're offering them doesn't sound better than nothing. Getting your deadbeat nonpaying ass out of their unit is what sounds good to them. They're going to get a judgment against you and boot your ass.

At a motel though... I'm sure Gene will try as hard as he can to play on the management's sympathies, and who knows, perhaps he swindled himself a break here and there. But in general one would expect they make you pay or you have to leave (I think I read that in one of his emails once).

So, long-winded post here saying: I think it's possible he could've paid even for the fancy Desert Mirage, he just chose not to because that's how he is as a tenant. He follows his own rules about paying bills. This doesn't always work out well for him. The motel possibly forced him to have to pay for the "roof over his head", which in turn could've led to his actually having to drive some for Uber / Lyft, and certainly stepped his begging frequency up.

But then of course keep in mind, he's a liar, and he'll say whatever he thinks will get someone to give him money. Thus a lot of it may not make sense.
 
GhostofBiedny

GhostofBiedny

Celestial
goblin said:
It doesn't add up or make sense. I think to explain it you have to consider that Gene apparently only pays a landlord when he feels that he absolutely has to pay them. To him that's a smart way to operate, I guess. Doing that with a small landlord I guess you might get to a place where you can string them along almost indefinitely. I believe Gene may have been in such a situation once, with a landlord he eventually declared a slumlord.

When you're dealing with a "heartless corporate landlord" (remember how he whined about that?) I don't think you have the latitude to string them along. They start piling on late fees and penalties, and they track those, and more they have a process they follow for non-payment that will eventually conclude in the constable's arrival. It may take awhile - a year even maybe if you shamelessly work the system to prolong your stay and delay the inevitable. Ultimately though you can't get them to let you stay just because you finally pay for one or two months of rent that you owe - you owe them for much more than that, the drop in the bucket you're offering them doesn't sound better than nothing. Getting your deadbeat nonpaying ass out of their unit is what sounds good to them. They're going to get a judgment against you and boot your ass.

At a motel though... I'm sure Gene will try as hard as he can to play on the management's sympathies, and who knows, perhaps he swindled himself a break here and there. But in general one would expect they make you pay or you have to leave (I think I read that in one of his emails once).

So, long-winded post here saying: I think it's possible he could've paid even for the fancy Desert Mirage, he just chose not to because that's how he is as a tenant. He follows his own rules about paying bills. This doesn't always work out well for him. The motel possibly forced him to have to pay for the "roof over his head", which in turn could've led to his actually having to drive some for Uber / Lyft, and certainly stepped his begging frequency up.

But then of course keep in mind, he's a liar, and he'll say whatever he thinks will get someone to give him money. Thus a lot of it may not make sense.
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It's not just landlords. I think he basically plays chicken with every bill he has, trying to avoid paying as much as possible. I suspect he may derive some kind of bizarre thrill from doing this because he thinks he is screwing the system.

He then takes the money that he should have spent on those bills and uses it to buy computers, iphones, cars, restaurant meals and various other things that somebody on his income can't actually afford. When the money's gone and those bills become unavoidable he expects others to pay for them - even though the situation is entirely self inflicted and avoidable. What's most galling is that even when he is begging for help you know he is already planning on doing the exact same thing again.

The average person may do something like this once (maybe when they are a teenager and don't understand how to budget) and they swiftly learn not to do it again.

Schemey is unique in that he does it again and again. He never learns the lesson and that is because from his point of view there is no lesson to learn. He chooses to live this way.

He has grifted all his life and seems to think it is a respectable way of making money. Further he also thinks that only suckers pay their way. People like Schemey are leeches on society and divert funds from actual genuine people in trouble.

That is why he is a stinking human turd who only deserves contempt. I really hope the wheels are finally coming of his griftmobile.
 
Paul Kimball

Paul Kimball

Adept
I don’t owe anyone anything, but it’s a slow day at the office, so here you go.

Here’s a newsflash that I know it will be hard for some people to accept... most people don’t spend all of their time looking into Gene Steinberg, or even thinking about him. I certainly didn’t (and don’t). Yes, I knew for years that he sent out the occasional letter asking for help, but I never got one, and I had no idea of the extent until Tim Binnall and Aaron Gulyas were here last year and we chatted about it over a beer. Gene asked me for a loan once many years ago after I had guested on the show when he was hosting with David Biedny - I said no, and told him not to ask me again... and he never did.

After chatting with Tim and Aaron, I read through Jack Brewer’s reportage that went well beyond the emails asking for help, and immediately told Gene to remove anything associated with me or my company, including a couple of episodes of one of the TV series we work on (the only one that has anything to do with the paranormal) that I had let him use as a loss leader to try and get folks to subscribe to the Paracast + so that maybe he could get some more stability to his financial situation. I even donated a little money to his GoFund me campaign once.

I know first-hand how it feels to face financial setbacks, because I faced them myself several years ago. I try to help folks when I can. I’ve run for public office, and ameliorating poverty was one of my priorities. I tried to do that for Gene, including offering advice on how to improve the Paracast that he never took, before I was aware of the extent of his activities over the years (and kudos to Jack Brewer for digging deep into it all). But as many others have discovered, Gene isn’t interested in real help, and he’ll never change his ways. C’est la vie.

I bear Gene no ill will. I don’t care about him one way or another. There are far worse characters out there - even within the cesspool of ufological frauds, he’s penny ante.

So there you go.
 
goblin

goblin

Noble
Paul Kimball said:
I don’t owe anyone anything, but it’s a slow day at the office, so here you go.
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No one said you owe anyone anything, but when someone says:

"You could always just ask one of us. We don’t hide behind pseudonyms, and we’re all easy to find.

Jebus..."

and then in response someone does in fact ask, not responding would seem particularly graceless.

I thought you had already talked about your history with Gene earlier in this very very long thread, fwiw.
 
Paul Kimball

Paul Kimball

Adept
goblin said:
No one said you owe anyone anything, but when someone says:

"You could always just ask one of us. We don’t hide behind pseudonyms, and we’re all easy to find.

Jebus..."

and then in response someone does in fact ask, not responding would seem particularly graceless.

I thought you had already talked about your history with Gene earlier in this very very long thread, fwiw.
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You’ll forgive me if I don’t react well to being told I should be ashamed, which was the original post I was responding to, or someone posting a skeleton just because I haven’t dropped everything to reply immediately. But you’re right - I’ve said my piece twice now, so I won’t comment again. Folks can believe what they want to believe.
 
nivek

nivek

As Above So Below
Paul Kimball said:
someone posting a skeleton just because I haven’t dropped everything to reply immediately.
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Sorry you can't handle a little humour, after all it wasn't immediate I posted that, it was the next day...:Whistle:

…
 
nivek

nivek

As Above So Below
nivek said:
Sorry you can't handle a little humour, after all it wasn't immediate I posted that, it was the next day...:Whistle:
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Oops, it was last night I posted that, apologies, but anyway I was having a bit of fun with the skeleton pic, sorry I offended you Paul, wasn't my intent...

...
 
goblin

goblin

Noble
GhostofBiedny said:
View attachment 6532
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That guest strikes me as more conspiracy oriented than UFO interested. Maybe I'm mistaken but... again, haven't really followed the Paracast since David Biedny was a host. Have they had many non-UFO interested conspiracy theorists on?

No reason they can't interview one now anyway; was just a little surprised. This seems a departure from what I expect of them but, I didn't pay much attention during the O'Brien years.
 
GhostofBiedny

GhostofBiedny

Celestial
humanoidlord said:
once again WTF does this have to do with forteanism in any shape or color?
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By now they are just looking for anyone who will come on the show. Doesn't matter if they are relevant, interesting or indeed completely crazy. As long as they don't care about Gene's shenanigans and will appear on the show the Paracrud will have them. It's a completely different show to the original Paracast. Gene has changed it into a podcast version of himself.
 
wwkirk

wwkirk

Divine
The Paracast is getting spammed! :Tongue:
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pigfarmer

pigfarmer

tall, thin, irritable
oxsnaard said:
I also realized posting after several shots of tequila is a bad idea.
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Bah. Nonsense. Much more entertaining than Gene's possible community center free fish taco or an explanation about subatomic physics that makes me want to dissolve into a particle foam and slip down through my seat.
 
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