What Ever Happened to Miss Cleo?

Most remember Miss Cleo as the star of infomercials for pay-per-minute psychic phone lines. (Those who don’t can read my review of the Miss Cleo infomercial and watch the video clips at that end.) But after the “Jamaican” Miss Cleo was exposed as a Los Angeles native named “Youree Dell Harris” and her employer was shut down for unseemly business practices, she seemed to drop out of sight.

So what ever happened to Miss Cleo?

Miss Cleo “came out” as a lesbian in 2006 and did voice-over work in the video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. She lives in Lake Worth, Florida and has a website at www.The-Real-MsCleo.com. Miss Cleo does a radio program called Vee Radio; she explains how the show got its name: “Then we noticed a pattern. Voodoo begins with a ‘V’. Vibrations begins with a ‘V’. Voice begins with a ‘V’. Vagina begins with a ‘V’ (after all, Cleo is a Lesbian). Long meeting short, Vee Radio was born!”

Miss Cleo is still speaking with a “Jamaican” accent and still claims to have mystical powers. According to the Palm Beach Post, “…she doesn’t call herself a psychic. Rather, she says, she is a voodoo priestess.” (Yeah, that makes things better.) On her website she offers various supernatural services, including Tarot readings, “energy cleansings,” and “house cleanings” (to remove disruptive spirits, not dust mites). Oh, and she also does wedding ceremonies starting at $350.

Miss Cleo appeared in a movie called Becoming Psychic. This thing looks like a student film where the director just called all of his lesbian witch friends and put them in front of a camera:

At the end of last year, Miss Cleo offered her predictions for 2009 on one of her radio shows. You can listen to the radio program for yourself. (The predictions start at the 9:45 mark.) For the most part, these predictions are vague and boring—nothing like the bold and daring psychic predictions that used to be published every year in the National Enquirer. These are more like the “predictions” at the end of each episode of The McLaughlin Group.

Here are a few of Cleo’s predictions for 2009 followed by my comments:

• “I also saw a cruise ship having some problems at sea. The cruise ship’s registry seems to be Italian, and that’s all I can tell you. It was a vision I got.”

My cousin’s friend’s grandmother went on a cruise and said the shrimp cocktail didn’t taste too fresh. That’s “some problem” but I don’t know if the ship had an Italian registry.

• Mercedes will “introduce” a luxury electric car in 2009; it will be on the road no later than mid-2010.

• “Today’s bailout…will negatively impact the adults and individuals working in 2033 and the economy in 2033.”

I’ll just say this once: DUH! People working in 2033 will be paying out 98.5% of their income in taxes so that all those greedy grannies get prescription drugs and luxury electric Mercedes free from the government.

• “One of the cast members of the show Taxi is lost this year.”

I’ve had Tony Danza in my celebrity death pool for years—finally it’s going to pay off!

• “We may lose one of the original Rolling Stones.”

Keith Richards has actually been dead since 1997 but no one’s bothered to tell him.

• Coins will be eliminated from our currency by 2011 as part of the stimulus package.

Darn! That means I won’t be able to use Sacagawea dollars in the Psychic Kisok in my local shopping mall.

Sometimes Miss Cleo’s problem isn’t predicting the future; it’s predicting the present:

• “Drew Peterson will be charged for his third wife’s murder. Not for Lacey’s [sic.], but for his third wife’s murder. That son of a bitch is just a little too arrogant for me.”

This prediction turned out to be exactly right, but Peterson’s fourth wife was named Stacy, not “Lacey.”

• “I am predicting a quite violent coup in Nigeria. Mugabe’s rule will be brought to an end.”

Robert “Comrade Bob” Mugabe is the president of Zimbabwe, not Nigeria!

• “Madoff will not serve one day in jail…Mark my words, that man will not spend one day in jail.”

WRONG: http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=7458833

But the most intriguing prediction for Miss Cleo fans is this one:

• “Miss Cleo will be returning to television in 2009.”

She gave no further details on the broadcast, but an article in Boca Raton Magazine says Cleo’s show will be “about relationships and break-ups.” I can’t wait!