Politics: The Power Of Media

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The media is an integral part of society’s political system. The media has vast power because just about all Americans get their news from the media. The media’s coverage can determine how Americans’ see the world and the media decides which issues are important and should be discussed. From the political standpoint, the media performs many functions important to the political process. The media not only reports the news, but it serves as the liaison between the people and the government. In politics, the media can either help or damage political opinions of the people. Many depend heavily on media outlets, such as television, radio, newspapers, the internet, and social media as their source of information for political events and issues
The
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Instead, it seems as many major organizations are taking one side of the political spectrum and at best providing relatively biased coverage and at worst acting as propaganda machines for a particular political party. Over the past few years there has been an increase in power throughout the media with regard to politics. The media 's original purpose was to inform the public of the relevant events that occurred around the world. The job of the media is to search out the truth and relay that news to the people. The media has the power to inform the people but often times the stories given to the public are distorted for one reason or another. Using slant and sensationalism, the media has begun to shape our views in society and the process by which we choose our …show more content…
Political officials can also use resources and various media outlets to help convince the public into supporting their causes or ideas. Take President Bush for example, during his time his office, the search for the alleged “Weapons of Mass Destruction” began. He and his officials used the media to spread the idea that Iraq was hiding weapons of mass destructions that needed to be found. Through various speeches, covered by many media outlets, Bush convinced the public that we needed to invade Iraq and find Saddam Hussein so we could find these weapons and keep them put of Iraqi hands. There have various reports on whether and WMD were ever found but a large consensus is that Bush used the media to rile up the public into supporting his hunt for Saddam Hussein.
As can be seen, the media has a large impact on media and politics. Politicians not only use the media to influence viewers, but they can also be influenced by it. If enough citizens come together and use the media to cover what they feel are important issues, the coverage can get around to politicians and political officials and it could persuade them to fight for the change the citizens

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