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EP: What’s your take on Trump and Russia?
PK: I read one article where an unidentified Russian official used the phrase “useful idiot”. That’s really what it is.
It’s like J. Edgar Hoover; he stayed around for decades [via] blackmail. I think it’s the same thing. You don’t have to say it, you know. Hoover would just go to JFK and say, “We found some photo of you in bed with Marilyn Monroe. But don’t you worry, we’ll keep it in our safe.”
EP: You’ve lived through some Red scares; can you imagine any other time where this Russia stuff would be forgiven?
PK: I think foreign countries may have influenced previous elections.
I don’t know, but it was mostly before the technology of the Internet. So, if there’s no Internet, there ain’t no hackin’. It’s like there ain’t no divorce if you don’t have no marriage! Whatever deal was made, or hacked, I think Trump decided to run the night of the 2011 Washington Correspondent’s Dinner. Obama had such good jokes that night. But the camera was on Trump, and you could see that he was foaming.
EP: That shot of him is amazing. The video of Trump’s boiling back head. It’s really gorgeous.
PK: Humiliation makes a difference. You know, years before any of this, Trump developed his modus operandi for media/political success: You cheat. What pushed him into public profile was the stated success of his book, The Art of the Deal. But what I found out that is that he bought 20,000 copies of his own book from Random House, and that made it a New York Times Best Seller.
Similarly, L Ron Hubbard had his book Dianetics. He had a Scientologist working at The New York Times who had access to the details of their best sellers lists. Back then, there was a list of cities that the Times measured sales at particular book stores. So, Hubbard didn’t have to buy 20,000 copies, he just had his spy tell him where to buy several copies at those locations, and the Church of Scientology had an instant “Best Seller”.
EP: Earlier you mentioned two interesting words: “assassination” and “impeachment”. You have the benefit of having lived through Kennedy and Nixon.
PK: My earliest remembrance of a President was Franklin D Roosevelt.
EP: Do you remember him on the radio?
PK: Yes. He was famous for having his Fireside Chats. Which, through these decades, has evolved into tweets.
EP: Here’s a very pointed question: When Kennedy got shot — what’s your memory of that?
PK: Several memories. One was my first wife was out shopping, heard it on somebody’s radio, and immediately bought a TV set. That’s one thing I remember, just being glued to the television…And I was getting calls, maybe not that day, but from people wanting to write an article about the conspiracy aspect of it. You know of Jean Shepherd, right?
EP: Of course.
PK: He was a big influence on me. He said, “This will change the whole country.” He thought it was a coup. And it turned out that the CIA had the Mafia do it. After all of my studying about it, that’s what it was. The Mafia were the puppets of the puppeteer in that.
I would listen to Jean Shepherd every night, and he said — he predicted – that America would have a dictator who won the presidency because he came out of show business. And it happened. You know, [Trump’s] not like Ronald Reagan, who came out of Hollywood, of course. But in Reagan’s case, he couldn’t make the distinction between reality and his movie roles. But he did say he was willing to take a senility test! Of course, the suggestion that he’d take a senility test is a suggestion that you already are senile.
EP: Right. That’s very funny.
PK: Jumping back to Trump. Along the same lines of the buying the 20,000 copies of his book, the first day of his presidential campaign, he came down the Trump Tower elevator. There were people with placards, saying “TRUMP 2016” — but they were all hired actors. Fifty of ‘em.
EP: You know, the success of that red hat really disturbs me. It’s so idiotic — but it really seemed to work.
PK: I agree. No other presidential candidate had a cap like that. And a slogan. I’ve seen people on TV asked, “What do you think about the election?” One elderly woman said, “Oh it’s wonderful! We’re going to Make America Great Again!”
EP: How could they win on a campaign of awful messages? Maybe Steve Bannon is some AD&D wizard, casting a spell that everything negative becomes positive. “Trust me Trump: kick babies instead of kiss them. It’ll work!”
PK: I agree that’s possible. But it’s narcissism that made Trump do this. Narcissism with skin so thin, it’s inside out.
That’s what he was doing, too, during the campaign. If your skin is inside out, then it’s projecting. Hillary “was a crook,” but he was. He called Bernie Sanders “crazy” and he was. “Lyin’ Ted Cruz”...
EP: Why do you think those nicknames were so effective? It seemed, once you were labelled by him, you were done.
PK: Bush had his nicknames, but they were favorable. He called Karl Rove his —
EP: “Turd Blossom”!
PK: Right, “Turd Blossom” ...and he was.
EP: The prettiest turd.
PK: Regarding Trump’s narcissism, here’s my favorite joke: Trump was in the elevator of Trump Tower. It stopped on one floor and a woman got in. She said, “Oh! You’re Donald Trump! Oh my, I would love to give you a blow job. I really would. I have a great reputation. I will make it that you will never forget this blow job. I really am good. I practice a lot. And I

[Cartoon Caption]: Cartoon by Wende, from The Realist #37, Sept. 1962.
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