1-2-3-4, Shafer Starts a Flame War

It's been pointed out to me that I was too easy on Slate's Jack Shafer regarding his attitude toward blogs and bloggers. That's true, but it was by design - the Dread Pundit Bluto knows all about chum and flamebait from his wasted days posting at Slate's Fray. Shafer obviously hoped to provoke intemperate diatribes so that he could poke fun at them in updates to his column. In fact, he's doing just that now, and it's amusing. What the Dread Pundit Bluto finds more amusing however, is Shafer's hypocrisy:

Shafer says, "I hadn't witnessed such public expressions of high self-esteem since the last time I attended a journalism awards ceremony."

Then Shafer says, "...much of what I do...resembles what most bloggers do, except that I get paid for it, and I tend to write twice or three times a week at 1,000 words rather than several times daily at a paragraph or three. The biggest difference between me and conventional bloggers is that I usually pause between first thought and posting."

Sounds like a public expression of high self-esteem to me, Jack.

The irony of this is that Shafer is fomenting a flame war with those he disdains in order to generate a buzz over his article about...those he disdains.

Update: Jack Shafer emailed me to point out that he hasn't poked fun at any of the bloggers' reactions he quoted. He is correct. The Dread Pundit Bluto withdraws that part of this post.