Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 20, 1993 TAG: 9302240381
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOE KENNEDY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
READING ROANOKE
WORK hard and rest easy, Roanokers. Your future is secure.That's the reading from Ian Bliss, a seer from San Antonio who is sponsoring a Psychic Fair today and Sunday from noon to 7 at the Roanoke Airport Marriott.
Bliss, 46, pulled into Motel 6 this week with his mother and his mother's West Highland Terrier, Ezra Pound. On Tuesday he came by the newspaper office to talk about his career.
He wore black pants, black high top shoes and a Duke University sweatshirt pulled taut by his ample midsection.
He carried a briefcase that contained yellowing clips of stories in which he accurately predicted World Series and Oscar winners and successful candidates in elections in places where he has promoted other psychic fairs.
He smelled of tobacco, and asked if the office was a non-smoking area, as indeed it was.
Bliss said he has been a psychic all his life, but so is everybody else, whether they realize it or not. He went into the field not because he alone has the ability, but because so many other people never use theirs.
"I don't think psychics are all that big a deal," he said. "I'm just good at it."
He said he picked Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins to win Oscars in 1992 for the "The Silence of the Lambs." A clip from the Milwaukee Journal backed him up.
He said he picked the Twins over the Braves in the 1991 World Series, months before the season began.
In January 1990 he told the Houston Post that turmoil would strike the Middle East the following August and that Houston would be chosen as the site of the 1992 Republican National Convention. He was correct in both cases. He showed the clips.
He has missed a few calls, too. Two years before the last presidential election, he said George Bush would beat a Democratic dark horse. Bill Clinton won that race.
"A royal screwup," Bliss said. "You should never read for something that is really important to you."
Going slightly ballistic, Bliss blamed the result on the failure of the American educational system, and declared, "I'm starting to think that people shouldn't have the right to vote.
"I'm still in total horror over the whole thing. We woke up under Reagan and Bush without a formidable enemy in the world, with no viable nuclear threat. We'd opened up one-third of the world for trade, and the economy is coming back slowly."
For 40 years, he said, people named the threat of nuclear annihilation as their worst fear. Now it's been extinguished, and no one seems to notice.
Then he laughed. His political conservatism makes him an oddball among his fellow clairvoyants, he said.
Eventually he got down to business, making the following predictions:
The Pittsburgh Penguins will win this year's Stanley Cup. That's in hockey.
The federal deficit "is definitely going to come down," because of an upswing in economic activity, not because of any tax increases. But U.S. companies will have to go hard after new business in Russia and Eastern Europe.
The Atlanta Braves will win the 1993 World Series against the Baltimore Orioles. Outfielder Otis Nixon will be the hero.
The Los Angeles Raiders will be the next Super Bowl champions after defeating the Dallas Cowboys. The Raiders will be led by quarterback Frank Reich.
Bliss said he never researches a place before giving his predictions, because overanalysis can obscure his intuitions.
He said he opposes seers who ask their clients to make repeated visits, because that encourages dependency and can run into lots of money.
He said 20 psychics from Virginia and surrounding states will be at the fair. They'll do many kinds of readings and other metaphysical exercises. Admission is $5 and each reading is $10.
And he said there are two subjects he will not give readings for: illness and death. If you're sick, you should see a doctor.
And death? "Death is permanent, so who cares?"
Oh, he said one more thing. Duke will win the NCAA basketball title again this year.
You read it here first.
Things look real good, but watch out for that old-fashioned thinking . . .
\ Roanoke Valley's crystal ball\ Things look real good, but watch out for that old-fashioned thinking . . .
Predictions from Ian Bliss
The reopening of the Hotel Roanoke will be "a shot in the arm to Roanoke. The reason is that along with it will come other projects. . . . I see a lot of tourism coming in. This is going to be a special thing."
"The city fathers and business leaders are going to get together and have almost, like, festivals that last all summer, to show off what the downtown has to offer."
"Of late they've not been real active trying to get people to move here. This is going to change, especially for other businesses to come in."
"This is going to be a hub for low-cost insurance. A few companies are changing into low-cost insurance, and this will be a hub for it."
The banking picture following First Union's takeover of Dominion "looks pretty good. It's a transition thing. . . . When they see where they are, and the growth situation, a lot of jobs will be refilled," maybe within five months. But most of those laid off will have found other work by then.
"I see a real resurgence in the railroad business here," plus growth in textiles and furniture manufacturing.
A possible dark cloud: "The resistance to changing when times change - different methods of doing business and stuff. It used to be a fairly isolationist city, and now there's going to be a lot of interesting ties with North Carolina and other Virginia cities."
"I think politically it will come together, with everybody having a common goal."