Exotic Weaponeer vs. Skeptic Supremo in DR Showdown

Most of the time, it's all trolls and foamy mouths. But every so often, some rather interesting characters stop by Danger Room's comment boards. Take Nathan's item on Claiborne Pell, "The Senator Who Fought the 'ESP Gap.'"

First, we had skeptic supremo James "The Amazing" Randi leave a note, making fun of Pell's 1987 meeting with psychic Uri Geller. "I was there. And Pell's preoccupation with silliness like Geller is an important part of the Pell story. He was naive and he believed just about any sort of woo-woo material," Randi quips.

Not so, writes back retired Colonel John Alexander. The former Green Beret is famous in military circles for pushing all sorts of exotic arms -- from weaponized psychics to less-lethal ray guns. "James Randi was not present at the [Pell] meeting in the U.S. Capitol
Building. I was there and in uniform at the time," he comments.

*I know Randi and would have spotted him in a heartbeat. As a matter of fact, this meeting took place in a SCIF (classified facility). The topic... had nothing to do with psi or a pyschic gap (though a spoon was bent). Uri was concerned about the plight of Jews living in the Soviet Union. That was the topic. Both *Time *and the *Washington
Post's shameful obituary [of Pell] got it wrong.