As candidate for the biggest job in the world (that’s President of the United States, by the way), which commentators would keep you awake at night? The big journalist guns of the New York Times or Washington Post, perhaps? Or might it be a 61-year-old Pennsyvanian housewife and part-time (wait for it…) BLOGGER? Keeping journalists out of a recent Barack Obama campaign event in Pennsylvania clearly lulled the presidential contender into - well - saying what he really thought.  Unfortunately for him, the 37 cataclysmic words of his speech which included references to small town people being “bitter” and somewhat attached to “guns” and “religion” were reported on an influential liberal blog by Mayhill Fowler - an Obama supporter!

Within a day, the post had 100,000 hits and the Clinton PR machine was in full swing to capitalise on Obama’s comments.

Despite having zillions to spend on the best comms strategists in the business, Obama has learned the hard way about the new reality: in the world of citizen journalism, everything is fair game