Yesterday I attended the Modern Media Strategies Workshop at The Heritage Foundation.  There were many panels during the conference about how those in the political sphere can harness new and social media.

While blogging was one of many topics, many people from political organizations and congressional staffers asked the speakers about how one can find prominent blogs.  Panelists suggested Google Blog Search and Technorati, among other blog search engines, as places to get a general idea about different blogs.

I would like to add two other resources: e-newsletters and blog aggregators. 

Some newsletters track blogosphere chatter about a specific topic, and following this coverage is an excellent way to determine which blogs are influential.  The Exoro Group's Utah Policy Daily is a great example from my old stomping grounds.

Blog aggregators cull posts from a set of blogs focused on the same topic.  Thus, you can use these sites to easily track many blogs at once to determine which are the most prominent.  Staying close to my previous example, UtahPolitics.org is an example of a site that captures political blog chatter in the state. 

These are just two types of helpful resources.  What do you use to find important sites?