While the right continues to hammer Joel Stein for his "I don't support the troops" op-ed column, and bloggers channel his possible response, Tabloid Baby thinks the piece was a put-on. Or another of Stein's LAT-sponsored gambits to score a lucrative Hollywood deal.

The word “snarky” was invented to describe him. He shouldn’t be allowed to write about serious stuff.

But Stein is an old person’s idea of young person’s point of view, so he managed to get a spot in Time magazine, and when Michael Kinsley took over and tried to “hip up” the L.A. Times editorial pages, a Sunday column there. It was the most useless, irrelevant and, well, “snarky,” LA Times column since Chicago sports writer Mike Downey temporarily moved to, then lost, the coveted page 2 spot....

The reaction has been scripted and played out many times before....He writes the columns, the right wing dunderheads stand on their bully pulpits and denounce him, the paper is flooded with letters, calls and emails and subscriptions are canceled, and Joel Stein gets to report that he’s received death threats. He’ll show up on TV, he’ll get on the lecture circuit-- heck, he might even sell a script in Hollywood.

I've linked to some blogs that are mad about Stein's column. Now here are some that liked it. Thought Crimes.org even calls Stein "a Bush apologist." Plus, here's a transcript of Hugh Hewitt interrogating Stein on the radio yesterday, an Editor & Publisher story, and an LATimes.com online poll with three choices: Yes, No and "Why did you hire Joel Stein again?"

* Enjoying the hoopla: (10:30 pm) LATimes.com is running yesterday's Reuters story about the Stein backlash in its top-of-page news slot, with links to the original column and a message board.