Natural Enemies
             How does the president get to the eyes and ears of the public? How do we allow presidential policies and information to be transmitted? It is through newspapers, television, and radio that we as society get most of our political resources. The media is an essential part of yesterday and today's political scene. In Newsmakers: the Press and the Presidents, Howard Smith and Luanne Norris portray how the media affects individual presidencies, and what kind of concerns each side projects. Overall, the press plays a vital role in reflecting information between the president and the public.
             Together the press and the president create news and coverage, but through it all they have become natural enemies. It is a battle for each party because every president needs the press to inform the public of what he says. Policies need to be known by society and with the media being the natural conveyer there are bound to be issues.
             "The media agenda seems to have direct, sometimes strong, influence upon the policy agenda of elite decision makers."(Rogers, Deaning) This idea seems to ring truth. The media may influence attention by policymakers in less direct ways; however, the public's familiarity with political matters is closely related to the amount and duration of attention these affairs receive in the mass media. We don't tend to realize the capacity at which we rely on the media for direct information. It's in a sense like watching a television show on 20/20. The first side of the story is presented to us and we completely put all of our trust into it as if it were the only likely answer. We immediately adopt that side only to discover that the other alternative is just as powerful. The meaning behind this is if we were presented with both sides of every political issue or scandal we might be able to have greater effects on them.
             The press portrays each individual presid...