ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the role of media culture in US politics and society over the past decades. It examines the politics and ideology of presidential politics in media culture from the Reagan to Bush II administrations, and demonstrates how the media culture of the era produces narratives concerning successful and failed presidencies and argue that presidential reputations depend importantly on representations in media culture that are always subject to contestation and revision. The chapter focuses on news and infotainment as a contested terrain in which political and cultural battles are waged in media culture. Celebrity is dependent on both constant media proliferation, and the implosion between entertainment, news, and information in which celebrity culture infuses every sphere of life. Barker’s documentary shows various administration officials implementing that approach, and discussing their foreign policy decisions, thus providing an interesting look at the people who worked behind the scenes during the last year of Obama’s presidency.
