They [FBI] had a lot of clippings, a lot of articles I'd written. And to me the - the funniest one was - I had done a piece for Playboy about J. Edgar Hoover.

In England, you have what I would call government-imposed euthanasia

The NSA has the capacity to keep track of everything we do on the phone and on the internet.[Barack] Obama has done nothing about that.

I was co-editor of the magazine called The Jazz Review, which was a pioneering magazine because it was the only magazine, then or now, in which all the articles were written by musicians, by jazz men. They had been laboring for years under the stereotype that they weren't very articulate except when they picked up their horn.

Malcolm X made it very clear that if somebody goes after you - whether it's cops or not - you have to defend yourself. But he was not an advocate for violence the way the Black Panthers were.

I write a column for The Village Voice, which I've done since time immemorial, and occasionally - and books. And I occasionally write minor notes for record albums and occasional articles.

My favorite story about O'Connor - one of them - is I was in Toronto at a pro-life conference.I had a session before he was to come on,I thought very moderately - that not have unwanted abortions was to have much more research on contraception. Two true-faith people came out of the audience, wrested the microphone out of my hand and said, `That is im - inappropriate, improper. Pro-lifers do not believe in contraception.' [John] O'Connor's watching this said,`I want to tell you I'm delighted that Nat is not a member of the Catholic Church. We have enough trouble as it is.'