San Antonio College Library

This video provides a detailed review of political beliefs and behavior to help you prepare for the CLEP American Government exam and earn your best possible score.--Publisher.

"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...

Adams uses documents from foreign (primarily British) and domestic observers to state that the South was exercising the rights laid out in the Declaration of Independence against a fiscally-quarrelsome and commercial North, rather than maintaining lofty moral principles of slavery.

"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...

"Exploring family and community dynamics, Enemies of the Country profiles men and women of the Confederate states who, in addition to the wartime burdens endured by most southerners, had to cope with being a detested minority." "With one exception, these featured individuals were white, but they otherwise represent a wide spectrum of the southern citizenry."--Jacket.

Examines how Internet has affected news coverage and the mass media in the early twenty-first century, discussing the twenty-four-hour news cycle, and describing the ways politicians have learned to take advantage of the media to promote themselves.

Analyzes Barack Obama's behavior to explain the apparent disconnect between his campaign promises and presidential choices, drawing on factors from his past to illuminate the role of unconscious thoughts on the administration of his policies.

"In a mere one thousand days, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy created an entrancing public persona that has remained intact for nearly forty years. Even now, a decade after her death, she remains a figure of enduring - and endearing - interest. Yet, while innumerable books have focused on the legends and gossip surrounding this charismatic figure, Barbara Perry's is the first to focus largely on Kennedy's White House years, portraying a first lady far...

"A study of American attempts to come to terms with the legacy of the Vietnam War, this book highlights the central role played by Vietnam veterans in shaping public memory of the war. Tracing the evolution of the image of the Vietnam veteran from alienated dissenter to traumatized victim to noble warrior, Patrick Hagopian describes how efforts to commemorate the war increasingly downplayed the political divisions it spawned in favor of a more unifying...

This book analyzes the power of the American print and electronic press in the political process. Davis argues that the press has greater autonomy than at any time in the more than 200 years of U.S. history, but as an intermediary between the government and the governed, its greatest power is to set agendas, not to dictate political opinions on the agenda items. Despite recent gains in autonomy, the electronic media still are less free of government...