Analysis By Nick Assinder BBC News Online political correspondent

Sun: Kennedy as a reptile

Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy awoke on Tuesday morning to headlines in the Sun and Mirror newspapers branding him, respectively, a threat to the nation or a hard-line Tory in disguise.

And he could probably not have been more delighted.

If one thing appeared designed to give him a high profile and ensure his party conference is brought to the attention of those who might otherwise be supremely indifferent, it is coverage like this.

The message also seemed to be that the once widely-ridiculed third party is suddenly being taken seriously as an electoral threat to the two main parties.

As far as Mr Kennedy is concerned, then, job done.

We have arrived

"The Sun attack alongside the Mirror attack, where one thinks we are ludicrously right wing and the other ludicrously left wing, show we are probably getting it about right.

"We have arrived and this is three party politics," he declared with a twinkle. Well, maybe.

This is certainly the conference where the Liberal Democrats got serious.

The old image of sandal wearing flat-earthers was already well out of date.

Mirror: Kennedy as Thatcher

Now, even the off the wall conference motions have been abandoned, the hall is packed with respectable-looking delegates clearly intent on doing the business.

And there is a genuine atmosphere that maybe, perhaps this time, just possibly, the times really may be a'changing.

Mr Kennedy has already warned his party that, as their electoral fortunes improved, so their enemies would start subjecting them to the sort of scrutiny they were previously spared.

When once it was headlines along the lines of "what a bunch of nutters - ha,ha" it is likely to be "what a threat to society."

That has been proved accurate. The party's spending plans have been trawled over amid claims they simply do not add up.

The party leaders strenuously deny this, of course, but it is a tough message to get across.

Every policy is analysed to the point of destruction and every bit of personal behaviour is under the microscope.

It is what happens to grown up politicians and it can only get worse.

Armour plated

Inevitably, a continuous diet of this can have a damaging effect, particularly if the attacks are rooted in fact.

Probably the last political leader to be subjected to similar scrutiny was former Labour boss Neil Kinnock.

He believes it did him and his party serious damage. His critics claim, with more than a little justification, that the party, the policies and the individuals have to be armour plated.

If they are not, then they probably do not deserve success.

How Mr Kennedy and his troops react to the new position they find themselves in may have a major bearing on how the Liberal Democrats fare from here on in.