“No American president has ever counted himself fully satisfied with his press coverage,” the historian Harold Holzer writes in the introduction of “The Presidents vs. the Press.” “Their belief that they are better than their bad press, and that they bear a nearly sacred obligation to counter or control criticism, has remained fixed since the age of bewigged chief executives and hand-screwed printing presses.”

Lewis H. Lapham speaks with Harold Holzer, author of “The Presidents vs. the Press: The Endless Battle between the White House and the Media—from the Founding Fathers to Fake News.”

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