Blogging and Politics

This election year is very important. What's even more important to the candidates is including bloggers as a crucial part of their campaign.

Bloggers are the new journalists. Blogging is the new journalism. No longer do you need to work at a newspaper to state your opinion for the public to read. Now, everyday Joe's can place their opinions places where millions of people will read them.

Senators Barack Obama and John McCain understand this. That's why the RNC gave out credentials to 200 bloggers to attend the Republican National Convention to,

"Get Senator McCain’s message out to more people.”

Obama's camp is taking similar measures, and had also handed out blogging credentials.

Most people don't get their news from conventional sources anymore. Newspapers aren't the only place people can go to, to find out the latest news.

Personally, I read Twitter several times a day, and get quite a lot of news from the people I follow. Many others also rely on blogs for their news, so not including bloggers this election season would be a bad decision for both candidates.

It's amazing to me that in four short years, since the last election, so much has changed. The world of social media has evolved, and politics are evolving to include these new phenomenons, while still embracing the old.