Donald Trump's problem with the media isn't its bias against him, but in how it operates, and the GOP presidential nominee has to figure that out to win the White House, political analyst and author Dick Morris tells Newsmax TV.
"You simply can't go out there in a stream of consciousness, because they'll pick up the least important stuff, the least favorable to you, the stuff that most hurts you," Morris told "Hard Line" host Ed Berliner.
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Trump must keep his message focused on attacking Democrat Hillary Clinton's weaknesses and avoid battles with other Republicans or with people like the Gold Star parents who attacked him at the Democratic National Convention.
The media is "going to eat 10 pounds of meat every day," Morris said. "Either you feed it the meat and it's attractive and it eats it, or it eats your leg."
Morris said polls showing Clinton driving up her lead over Trump are accurate, and that Trump "handed" a lot of her success to her.
Instead, he said, Trump should be doing the things he suggest in his book "Armageddon: How Trump Can Beat Hillary."
"One: Put out new positive issued proposals that are detailed and interesting and command attention," he said. "Two: Unleash another negative on Hillary based on her extensive record and all of the material that she gives you. Three: Do paid TV advertising which structures the environment and therefore forces the coverage of the news media to be what you want it to be."
Trump's campaign team has reportedly been in disarray as he focuses on issues others than Clinton and his own agenda, and Morris said, looking at it from the outside, "You feel an itching in your palm wanting to get in there and change it. You feel a desperate need to help bring order to that campaign."
Trump can win, he said, "He absolutely can beat Hillary. The question is will he let himself do it?"
Morris is the author of the book "Armageddon: How Trump Can Beat Hillary" with Eileen McGann, which remains the No. 1 nonfiction book in the United States, based on Amazon.com ratings, and has debuted at No. 4 on the Aug. 7 New York Times nonfiction list.