This is beginning to feel like a concerted attack

First Burnham and Carter and now Hazel Blears. It does seem that labour have decided that the bloggers are a threat. There do seem to be some distinct problems with their attacks. Firstly the idea that blogs are not adding any value and are making people cynical; er, I don't think so, I think people writing about political topics on the Internet are the people most engaged in the process and those that want to spread their views and get people round to viewpoint. Even Guido Fawkes picked out as a for the poster child for the worst on the net isn't promoting nihilism, he is just putting the ruling class on all sides under a microscope. He will probably hate the comparison, but he is just the Private Eye of the blogosphere.

Secondly they use the argument that this is a tool of the right to attack labour, I'll not do a full breakdown of just how wrong that argument is, there is already on Liberal Conspiracy. They just think that everyone is against them because they are currently the entrenched establishment.

As for "Blogs have only existed under a Labour government" what a hoot, the word and the accessibility is new but keeping a diary or journal online outdates the mass availability and popularity of the internet and the world wide web^[1] itself.

As the momentum on this grows it makes my paranoia worry if there is any connection with the news that BERR are looking closely at the independence of Nominet.

^[1]Mostly this was on Usenet, but it happened across other protocols as well, such as getting id Software news by fingering John Carmack.