First, you should split your essay into two parts. These
should be the elements of news as one section and the sources of news as the other. A
good source for things like this is Lance Bennett's News: The Politics of
Illusion.
Within elements of news, you might
want to talk about the inherent bias of the news in favor of reporting things that are
easily understood and that have a good story line. For example, political news tends to
focus on who won and who lost in various incidents (like the current discussion over the
debt ceiling) rather than on the actual merits of the various proposals. This is
because people understand conflict and the idea of who won and who lost makes for a good
story with a beginning, middle, and end.
As far as sources,
one of the most important facts about this is that journalists tend to rely on official
sources. These are the most (allegedly) credible source of news and journalists need
access to officials so that they can get news. This reliance on official sources leads
to a bias in favor of official versions of the news.
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