A Cheater Cheated

Bart Rathbone is in hot water - his fine-print coupons and rude treatment of customers have made him the target of radio host Bryan Dern, who plans a sensational exposé of the Electric Palace. Desperate to save his job, Bart asks Whit to defend him on the air, but Whit refuses and challenges him to try the Golden Rule instead. So Bart takes an internship at Whit's End, with Eugene coaching him through a hidden earpiece... and promptly bungles orders, insults customers, and quits within hours. Then Dern springs his secret source: Rodney, who has handed over forty-seven examples of his own father's dishonest tricks. Furious, Bart prints flyers trashing the radio station - just as it swaps Dern's report for a broadcast about a children's cancer fundraiser. Cornered on live radio and made to look like a man against sick kids, Bart finally grabs for the Golden Rule he mocked, and discovers that a single afternoon behind Whit's counter can't teach a heart to change.

Found on A Date with Dad (and Other Calamities) Album 46 · 12 episodes

The run See every episode

0580 Tales of a Small-Town Thug When a former gang member publishes a thinly veiled tell-all mocking the people of Odyssey, his targets must each decide how much truth - if any - to take from a hostile critic's pen.

0581 A Christmas Conundrum A well-meaning Christmas surprise at Whit's End sets off a chain of mistaken assumptions, as each friend scrambles to match a lavish gift no one may actually be giving them.

0582 Silent Night Stranded alone on Christmas Eve when a blizzard cancels his flight to a long-awaited family reunion, Whit finds his quiet house filling with memories of Christmases past.

0583 The Champ of the Camp While writing her memoir, Connie recounts the summer camp prank war that pitted her against a mysterious boy genius known only as Goggles.

0584 Dead Ends While searching for his long-missing father, Eugene follows a promising clue about the mysterious fax that led him to Africa - only to find that every answer raises harder questions about why his father has never come looking for him.

0585 The Poor Rich Guy A single Bible verse about camels, needles, and rich men sends the kids of Odyssey scrambling to save their wealthiest friends from heaven's fine print.

0586 A Cheater Cheated When a scandal-hungry radio host targets the Electric Palace's shady sales tactics, Bart Rathbone must scramble to learn honest customer service before his reputation - and his job - go up in smoke.

0587 Bringing Up Dads When his daughter decides she's too grown-up for his goofy antics, an embarrassing but devoted dad goes all-out to win back her laughter.

0588 Broken-Armed and Dangerous A broken arm and a broken blender leave two guilty consciences at Whit's End learning that owning up - and letting go - are both harder than they look.

0589 The Impossible With a make-or-break deadline looming, Whit's team races to finish an invention that could bring education - and faith - to children in India's most remote villages.

0590 Three O'Clock Call When silent phone calls start arriving at exactly three o'clock each day, a boy abandoned by his father dares to hope - while a visiting orphan prays he'll discover a Father who never leaves.

0591 Switch When two kids insist that adults have it easy, a forty-eight-hour family role swap puts them in charge of the money, the meals, and the bills.

0592 Now More than Ever When her best friend suddenly turns cold and secretive, Liz sets out to uncover what's really troubling the Straussberg household - and to learn what it means to stay a faithful friend.

Featured characters

Minor characters & crew 5 more roles

5 supporting roles

Boy Actor Unknown Woman Actor Unknown Customer (b) Actor Unknown Sister Mary Cathleen Actor Unknown Mr. Tanner Actor Unknown

Made by

Chris Anthony Host Nathan Hoobler Writer Marshal Younger Director · Producer Jonathan Crowe Sound Designer · Producer Bob Hoose Producer Dave Arnold Executive Producer

The story

Read the full synopsis 2 min

Bart Rathbone lures customers to the Electric Palace with coupons whose impossible conditions appear only in fine print kept inside the store. A customer challenges the deception while secretly recording Bart for Bryan Dern's radio program. Dern wants revenge because Bart withdrew his advertising and plans to expose the Electric Palace in a sensational report.

Bart is already furious with Rodney for losing the television remote and has grounded him for weeks. When the radio promotion accuses Bart of false advertising, insulting customers, and deliberately selling products that will fail, Edwin Blackgaard threatens to replace him as manager if the report damages the store.

Bart asks Whit to appear on the program as a character witness. Whit refuses because he cannot honestly defend Bart's treatment of customers. He urges Bart to stop viewing people merely as sources of money and to practice the Golden Rule by treating them as he would want to be treated.

Eugene suggests that Bart learn through an internship at Whit's End. Bart observes the shop briefly, then tries serving customers while Eugene coaches him through a hidden earpiece. He forces an unnatural conversation on Tom, wears a dirty apron backward, and serves a sundae that looks crushed.

Further instruction goes little better. Bart does not listen, knows how to make only strawberry shakes, puts his fingers in a replacement order, and insults a woman after serving her a banana split. Within hours he declares his training complete and quits.

Against Whit and Eugene's advice, Bart agrees to a recorded interview with Dern so he can announce a customer-appreciation program and prove that he has changed. Dern mocks every claim, then reveals his surprise source: Rodney.

Angry over his punishment, Rodney has supplied forty-seven examples of dishonest practices at the Electric Palace. He describes unavailable sale items advertised only to draw people into the store and lists the names Bart uses for customers. Bart immediately demonstrates the truth by denying one trick and then claiming the advertised stereos have just sold out.

Dreading the broadcast, Bart prints flyers calling Odyssey 105 and Dern's evening show garbage. What Bart does not know is that the station has received a lawsuit over another cruel report. Management cancels Dern's investigation and replaces it with a program about Cans Against Cancer, a fundraiser for a children's cancer ward that Whit helps sponsor.

Bart distributes his attack just as the charity program airs, offending a listener who supports the cause. Dern finds him outside the station and begins a live interview, asking why Bart opposes helping children with cancer. The radio host has turned Bart's own careless words against him just as Bart has repeatedly done to others.

Cornered on the air, Bart suddenly reaches for the Golden Rule he rejected during training. Dern twists even that into a joke about whoever owns the gold making the rules. Bart has tasted the treatment he gives customers, but his desperate answer shows that learning genuine love for a neighbor will require far more than one afternoon behind Whit's counter.