the "house...dog" phenomenon

New on the Web: Politics as Usual - New York Times: A piece on bloggers coming in from the cold.

"You might think that with the kind of rhetoric bloggers regularly muster against politicians, they would never work for them. But you would be wrong.
Over the past few years, bloggers have won millions of fans by speaking truth to power — even the powers in their own parties — and presenting a fresh, outsider perspective. They are the pamphleteers of the 21st century, revolutionary “citizen journalists” motivated by personal idealism and an unwavering confidence that they can reform American politics.
But this year, candidates across the country found plenty of outsiders ready and willing to move inside their campaigns. Candidates hired some bloggers to blog and paid others consulting fees for Internet strategy advice or more traditional campaign tasks like opposition research."