Blogging and the Scottish elections

Here is an interesting story in The New York Times about two bloggers who are part of the campaign team of John Edwards, one of the Democratic candidates in the US presidential election.

The story is interesting enough in itself but it led me to wondering about the parties in our own elections. As far as I am aware, none of the parties has any formal links with Scottish bloggers. The SNP has Davie from North Leith and Tartan Hero (and several others) to watch Alex Salmond's back, even if they are not (I assume) officially included in the campaign team. The LibDems and the Tories also have their blogging supporters, although again there appear to be no formal links.

But what if Labour came under sustained cyber-attack? Who would man the electronic ramparts in defence of McConnell? (El Tel is hardly up to the job.)

Perhaps the various party HQs should start thinking about this. Though I hate to encourage them, they should remember that that there are attack-bloggers as well as defensive ones. The recent blogspat (see here) between Tim and Guido/Iain Dale illustrates the techniques involved.