It is my honor, as a humble writer of fiction, to interview the power behind the Presidency. He stands before me, an imposing figure, hooded and draped in a black flowing robe. Most are afraid to acknowledge his presence and even fewer dare to address him. He is known as the Trump Whisperer. And he has agreed to this interview which follows:

Sir, I’m not sure how to address you. Do you have a name?

I am who President Trump is. He is my physical representation, what I want the world to see. You know, the one who can make America great again!
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Yeah, I’ve heard that line before. Then you and the President are the same? How does that work?

You’ve never heard of an alter ego? I write the tweets. When I’m silent, you see the pantomime of a President sitting in the oval office or reading from a teleprompter. That’s one image, but I’m the reality. I’m showtime!
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Are you saying that prepared speeches and staged events are just image stagecraft and have less real content than the tweets and off-the-cuff remarks which are the main event, the show?

Your question reveals your naivete. The show, as you call it, is always top billing . . . the greatest show on earth. The media companies would go broke without me. Who wants policy initiatives or detailed analysis of legislation. Americans want to hear that their President is “for the working man,” “against illegal aliens taking their jobs,” and “focused on protecting the American people from foreign threats and trade rip-offs.” My presidency is probably the greatest of all time. It IS the greatest. We’ve accomplished more in our first year than any Presidency in history: tax cuts, court appointees—including the Supreme Court, record highs in the stock market, record high employment, and the return of American power throughout the world. America was dying. I’ve saved it. Only I could’ve done that!
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But policy initiatives that contradict your taglines undermine their message. I can illustrate this contradiction for you. For example, tax reform that increases economic inequality and increases the national debt by 5 percent per year is a reality that will have a negative effect on low and middle-income Americans. Also, undocumented workers contribute to the economy and pay taxes while foreign trade tends to keep inflation under check by providing low costs goods. Besides, America has been at full employment since before your Presidency. We are still riding the wave of recovery from the worst recession since the Great Depression and World War II. That recovery lasted for the better part of two decades. Your recent tariffs and tax policy threaten the current recovery. While the nation’s budget devotes 600 billion dollars to national defense, there is practically nothing in the budget for job re-training or for stimulating any wage increases. Your policies hinder or even decrease support for public education, business competition, reduction of college tuition costs, protection of our natural resources, fair housing practices, healthcare reform, and the liberal international order that has helped secure the peace for the last 70 years.

Americans don’t care about your liberal “order.” They know what counts. And they support what I’m doing. The stock market is up; we have the highest employment in history; an overseas outfit is relocating to Topeka like so many other companies; employers have increased their Christmas bonuses; and many great things are happening. You liberals don’t understand what makes America great. But I do!
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Okay, I’ll take the bait. What does make America great?

Wealth! We need money—lots of money—circulating throughout the economy. That’s why we encourage investment and business growth. It’s just that simple. The people who’ll contribute to my re-election know this. My voters know this. The men I’ve put in my cabinet know this. Everybody knows this—including you. And my Republican colleagues know this too. They have no choice but to support me. Democrats can complain. But they have no voice in this Administration unless they play by my rules. Most Americans with 401Ks also know we’re on the right track. They’ve done well, unbelievably well. And that’s thanks to me! Only I can do what I do.
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Most Americans don’t have 401Ks. As the President of all Americans shouldn’t you be focused on the general welfare? After World War II, the government gave tax incentives to promote education from K-12 to the G.I. bill, affordable housing, and job growth for millions of returning soldiers and depressed households who sacrificed to maintain the war effort. The top tax rate then was 90%. But the wealthy class still prospered. The country experienced one of the greatest economic expansions in its history. Does it not make more sense to promote the general welfare? Is not the benefit of the many also the benefit of the few?

No! Look, I’ve made billions. Probably I’m the only one who can make America great again. I’ve created jobs for thousands of people. My buildings provide services for many more. What do you know? You write fiction books, right? Did you make any money with those books?
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You’ve got me there. Is it alright if we change the subject? Two days from now you will be meeting with Kim Jong Un to discuss denuclearization of the Korean peninsula. What does denuclearization mean to you? And does it mean the same thing to North Korea’s Supreme Leader?

Are you a journalist? Is that supposed to be some kind of tricky question? Everybody knows what denuclearization means: no nukes and no missiles, especially ICBMs that can reach us. President Un knows that we can annihilate North Korea.
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No, I’m not a journalist, just a poor novelist. But I must point out that the North Korean Supreme Leader—or, as your counterpart, President Kim—has never shown any interest in denuclearization as we may define the term. In fact, he has continued the development of the nuclear program started by his grandfather and continued by his father. Why would he give up his nukes now?

He has no choice. No previous President—and especially Obama—had the guts to back up our words with actions. I brought Kim down a notch with sanctions. And I reminded him that I have a bigger nuclear button—a much bigger nuclear button-than his.
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You do know that previous administrations also sanctioned North Korea. Clinton, Bush, and Obama did so. Also, Clinton and Bush brought North Korea to the negotiating table and even signed agreements, which the North Koreans quickly violated. They agreed in bad faith: took billions of dollars from the West and continued development of their nuclear capabilities. Unlike the Iran deal, there never was a verifiable program to assure their compliance. How will you obtain a realistic verification agreement that will assure compliance?

The Iran deal was the worst deal in history. Iran cheated. They got billions. We got nothing.
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The verification regime imposed on Iran was the strictest ever imposed on any signatory of the Non-Proliferation Pact. And it was verified by the Atomic Energy Commission of the United Nations. Its compliance was concurred by all signatories, including the intelligence institutions of the United States.

That Iran deal—the worst deal ever made by a U.S. President—never addressed Iran’s behavior in the Middle East. Look at what they’ve done in Syria and the threat they present to Israel, our closest ally.
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Does your position then intend to stop North Korea from selling their nuclear technology to other rogue regimes and attacking countries, including America, with their cyber espionage as they have done in the past?

Yes, of course . . . all that stuff has to stop. Remember, I’m giving them a path to rejoin the world community and to rebuild their nation. Imagine a Starbucks in Pyongyang, even a McDonalds.
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Boeing just lost a potential contract with Iran due to your action in canceling the Iran deal. Before that deal, America had very little trade with Iran. Because America holds the world currency, we were able to freeze their credit. Iran’s capital held in world banks was not only frozen but used to pay off accumulated interest. The Iran deal allowed them to reclaim their money but at a significant lost. It also allowed them to resume trade with Europe, their main trading partner, and to gain the promise of trade with America. Given North Korea’s isolation from world markets, how would we convince our Western allies to create trade markets that they never had with North Korea? Or do you propose that the U.S. alone could equal or supplant China as a major trade partner?

China is their main trading partner today. But the U.S. market is much bigger. We have more to offer. And North Korea is one of the richest countries in untapped reserves of minerals and other resources. If they agree to denuclearization, their future will be great, really beautiful. Just look at South Korea. What we’ve done with the South, we can do with the North. I offer Kim a future. But he can choose annihilation instead . . . that’s his choice.
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After America dropped out of the Iran deal, do you expect the world will believe or support any North Korean deal you negotiate? Perhaps more relevant, why should North Korea believe you would keep any promise, unless they just want to string along negotiations for whatever gain they can obtain? And, given China’s trade relations with North Korea, do you expect them to support any deal the U.S. can obtain without China’s support in the negotiations? And, finally, would you expect Russia to assist with the negotiations or altruistically to support any deal the U.S. can obtain? Remember China and Russia are nuclear powers who share a border with North Korea. And both countries have supported North Korea: China provides a life line of energy and vital resources; and Russia supplied the missile technology that enabled North Korea to develop ICBM’s, well ahead of our intelligence community’s estimates of 3-5 years. They succeeded just last year.

Xi Jinping and Putin have been supportive of what I’m doing. And European leaders want a denuclearized North Korea. They will follow my lead. Look, Kim Jong-un has no choice. He has no choice. We can make North Korea a wasteland. He has no choice.
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So far in this discussion, you have made no mention of South Korea or Japan. South Korea is particularly vulnerable. Even if the North agrees to some level of denuclearization, Seoul faces decimation from hundreds of howitzers aimed at its heart. And the rest of South Korea would suffer millions of casualties from a conventional war. Likewise, Japan is in range of thousands of short range missiles which have already been tested in fly-overs of Japan’s cities. Would any nuclear agreement with North Korea address this conventional military threat to our allies?

This summit is on, for now. Let’s see what happens.
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Since the Korean War, the North has never relented on its mission to conquer the South and reunite all of Korea under its rule, would America sign a Peace Treaty without assurances that North Korea would not and, most importantly, could not invade the South?

There would not be a Peace Treaty without those assurances.
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But how would we assure that North Korea abides by such an agreement? Would we continue military support of the South? Considering the likelihood that North Korea would never sign an agreement that allowed an American military presence on the peninsula, would we not be forced to demand a de-escalation of North Korea’s military threat to the South? Mutual de-escalation of both conventional and nuclear weaponry would be required. And how would we verify both their denuclearization and military de-escalation? Would we seek third party support—from the U.N., South Korea, China, or even Russia?

We’ll see what happens.
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Finally, Mr. President, you have said that you have prepared for these negotiations all your life and that you will know in the first minutes of your face-to-face meeting with Kim Jong-Un whether he is serious about a deal. If in that initial moment, your gut told you he was not serious, would you quit the summit?

Of course. I’ve already done so once.
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Then what recourse would there be for any attempt to denuclearize Korea?

Let’s see what happens first.
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With those closing words, the Trump Whisperer vanished, like Hamlet’s ghost. I felt it was “most like” what Horatio saw and described, “It harrows me with fear and wonder.” It did, however, have “that flair and warlike form” which promised a death-dealing tragedy would most likely follow its appearance. What was it really?

Well, it could be living proof that Julian Jaynes’ theory of the bicameral mind can still appear as an evolutionary aberration or throwback to the late second millennium B.C. Humans, according to Jaynes, were then not capable of conscious discernment as we know it now. The collateral transmission of representative thought to conscious speech had not yet evolved in the human brain. So, humans then heard voices, like the Trump Whisperer, that dictated words and actions without any judgment or intermediary reflection in the frontal lobe. If true, then the President cannot be held accountable for what his Whisperer says and does.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the rest of us. Sad!