A Trump presidency scares me to death
IF THERE’S one man who would seem immune to fear, it’s Stephen King, the best-selling author and master of horror fiction.
But after more than 50 novels, hundreds of short stories and numerous film adaptations of his voluminous work, the 69-year-old still gets spooked.
The author’s personal boogie man is not a supernatural clown or a zombie, as it turns out – it’s Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.
“A Trump presidency scares me more than anything else,” King told Ron Charles, editor of The Washington Post’s Book World, during a Facebook Live interview last Saturday. “I’m terrified that he’ll become president.”
King frequently lends his voice – and tweets – to contentious political debates. In recent months, he has also been a vociferous critic of Trump.
In a June interview with Rolling Stone, he discussed Trump as more of a phenomenon than person, calling the real estate executive “the last stand of a sort of American male who feels like women have gotten out of their place and they’re letting in all these people that have the wrong skin colours”.
He added that Trump’s popularity stems from people who desire a world in which there was no question “that the white American was at the top of the pecking order”.
During his interview with Charles, King offered a related explanation for Trump’s popularity, one that the author appears to understand better than most: fear.
“The key chord to all of this is fear,” he said. “We’re afraid the government is going to take away our guns, we’re afraid that Mexico is going to invade the US, we’re afraid of this, we’re afraid of that, we’re afraid of taxes, we’re afraid of transgender bathrooms – the whole thing.
“As long as people are fearful it’s hard to have a rational discussion,” he said.
What makes Trump most scary is that he’s got a realistic chance of winning the election, the author said.
“I would have laughed three or four months ago, but I think that Trump has a real shot,” King told Charles. “I think that Hillary Clinton has been a lacklustre candidate, frankly, and there’s been a sense of entitlement about her campaign like, ‘ah, it’s my turn and I’m running against a buffoon, therefore I am already president’.”
King admitted that he’s already considered the possibility of moving to Canada to escape a Trump presidency because it “scares me to death”. It’s not far, he noted, from his home in Bangor, Maine.
Charles asked whether he would write a book about Trump in office.
“No,” King replied, “I wrote one called The Dead Zone.”
TV STAR CJ Cregg stood in the bed of a pick-up truck in Ohio alongside her fictional co-workers from the West Wing. Will and Grace reunited on the set of their old apartment, unseen on screen since the finale a decade ago. And Iron Man pulled together his band of Avengers – and a bunch of other famous people – to talk about saving the world in November from a presidential candidate who, they said, “could permanently damage the fabric of our society”.
They appeared on different screens but all shared a common purpose: to get Americans to vote on November 8.
More specifically, to get Americans to vote with her.
It’s not uncommon for celebrities to unite behind a presidential candidate, especially if that candidate is a Democrat. Hollywood has earned its stereotype as a place for left-leaners, and actors and actresses who identify as such have been taking on political causes for decades.
But this year, it seems it’s not just belief in Hillary Clinton that is motivating these famous faces to join forces.
Equally so, it’s their disdain for her Republican opponent, Donald Trump, who is not without his own celebrity endorsements – including Hulk Hogan, Omarosa Manigault, Ted Nugent, Kirstie Alley and Lou Ferrigno. They’ve spoken with reporters and tweeted their support and posted videos on YouTube.
But none, for Trump or Clinton, have gone so far as this: After a 10-year hiatus from TV screens, the cast of Will & Grace came together for a 10-minute mini-episode centred entirely on convincing Karen, old pals with Trump – whom she affectionately calls Donnie – and Jack, who is an undecided voter, to cross over to team Clinton.
It was released online on Monday, the night of the first 2016 general election debate between Trump and Clinton and the eve of National Voter Registration Day.
In the episode, actors Debra Messing, Sean Hayes, Megan Mullally and Eric McCormack manage to cram in references to “Hamilton”, “deplorables”, Brangelina’s divorce, Ann Coulter, Clinton’s pantsuits, Trump’s wall, a butt double in 50 Shades of Grey and “dusting” classes at Trump University.
When Jack barges in, admitting he isn’t voting for Trump but isn’t voting for Clinton either, Will and Grace seem shocked.
“Well, who are you voting for?” Grace asks incredulously.
“I don’t know, Grace,” he says. “Maybe I’ll stay home on December 1.”
In the end, after a rousing speech from Grace about breaking through the glass ceiling and giving little girls an example to work toward, Jack is admittedly unconvinced. He particularly dislikes Clinton’s pesky habit of wearing pants.
“I still haven’t heard the one thing that’ll convince me to vote for one candidate over the other,” Jack says.
Will approaches slowly, gripping his shoulders. “Katy Perry,” he says, “likes Hillary.”
“And bingo was her name-o!” Jack exclaims. “Sorry, Karen. I’m with her.”
The internet gleefully celebrated this on-screen reunion, which the cast had been teasing for days on social media. At the end of the mini-episode and across social media, the cast encouraged viewers to register to vote – and use the hashtag #votehoney.
Fans of the political drama, The West Wing, which was created by Aaron Sorkin and aired on NBC from 1999 to 2006, were equally elated to learn that during the weekend some of the actors who starred in the show’s lead roles would be reuniting in Ohio to campaign for Clinton. The show followed the twoterm presidency of Jed Bartlet, a Democrat from New Hampshire known for his rambling, yet rousing monologues on the sanctity of democracy, liberty and civic discourse.
It was idealistic, like much of Sorkin’s writing, but created a political world where the right and the left at least tried to work together, where the parties were respectful and good triumphed evil.
That, the cast told People magazine, is why they amassed for Clin-