Noam Chomsky nails the ‘acid satire’ of Trump conducting foreign policy off Fox & Friends bulletins

Noam Chomsky doesn't see any evidence that President Donald Trump is pursuing a hidden strategy on foreign policy, but instead reacts on a daily basis to the flattery and provocations that come though his favorite TV show.

The famed linguist and political scientist pointed to a recent piece by Deadspin editor David Roth, who described the "spectacle" of experts trying to parse Trump's actions as "pure acid satire" because there was no hidden meanings or strategic vision to examine, reported Truthout.

"That seems generally accurate," agreed Chomsky. "This is a man, after all, who dismisses the information and analyses of his massive intelligence system in favor of what was said this morning on 'Fox and Friends,' where everyone tells him how much they love him."

"With all due skepticism about the quality of intelligence," he added, "this is sheer madness, considering the stakes."

The idea that a president could see the world through a TV show is not without precedent, Chomsky said. After all, Ronald Reagan sometimes confused the movies he'd watched or acted in with real-life events.

"All of this tells us something about modern politics," Chomsky said. "But Trump can’t be compared to Reagan, any more than farce can be compared to tragedy, to paraphrase Marx."

Trump does hold a strategic vision for foreign policy, Chomsky said, but it's vanishingly small.

"There is one policy that emerges from the chaos — the kind we would expect from an egotistical con man who has one principle: Me!" he said. "It follows that any treaty or agreement reached by predecessors (particularly the despised Obama) is the worst deal in history, which will be replaced by the Greatest Deal in History negotiated by the most accomplished deal-maker of all time and greatest American president. Similarly, any other action carried out in the past was misguided and harmed America, but will be corrected by the 'stable genius' now in charge of defending America from those who are cheating and assaulting it on all sides."

Any policy Trump pursues has only a superficial outcome in mind, and those small gains are washed away on a near daily basis.

"It makes no difference what the consequences are — terrible, decent, indifferent — as long as the imagery is preserved," Chomsky said.