San Antonio College Library

An examination of the President's relationship with the public, from public opinion cycles to news media to interest groups.

Of all the founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson stood out as the most controversial and confounding, both revered and reviled during his lifetime. Martha Washington considered him "one of the most detestable of mankind." While Jefferson's supporters organized festivals in his honor, his detractors portrayed him as a dilettante and demagogue, double-faced and dangerously radical, an atheist and "Anti-Christ" hostile to Christianity. Characterizing his...

"When the American president cannot get his way with Congress on something of great importance to him, he often appeals "over the heads" of Congress, directly to the American people. This kind of appeal and the frequent use of the media to generate support for presidential policies face criticism (especially from policy critics) as an unconstitutional means of subverting the executive-legislative power balance intended by the Constitution. Melvin...

"The most powerful political tool of the modern presidency is control of the message and the image. The Greeks called it 'rhetoric, ' Gilded Age politicians called it 'publicity, ' and some today might call it 'lying, ' but spin is a built-in feature of American democracy. Presidents deploy it to engage, persuade, and mobilize the people--in whom power ultimately resides. Presidential historian David Greenberg recounts the development of the White...

"In The Global President: International Media and the US Government, scholars Stephen J. Farnsworth, S. Robert Lichter, and Roland Schatz provide an expansive international examination of news coverage of US political communication and the roles that the US government and the presidency play in an increasingly communicative and interconnected political world. This comprehensive yet concise text will engage and inform students in many intersecting...