A right pair

Are Stewart Lee and Frankie Boyle publicly egging each other on? It certainly looks that way - and Guardian readers are the definite beneficiaries.

First, Lee crafted one of his elaborate extended metaphors to skewer the self-interest and lack of humanity that characterises British attitudes to immigrants and asylum seekers. It's just the thing to shove under the noses of Daily Mail readers and those complaining about their Mediterranean holidays being ruined in the hope it might shame them into showing a modicum of compassion (if they're capable of understanding the metaphor, that is).

Then, two days later, Boyle pondered the possible connection between Dylann Roof and US foreign policy, which is just the government "trying to protect us from terror. In the same way that someone banging a hornets’ nest with a stick is trying to protect us from hornets". Boyle's article itself has proven to be a prodding of a hornets' nest, but the general thrust of his argument is, I think, sound.

Here's hoping this unofficial duel continues.