I'll declare my interest upfront: David Shuster has been one of my closest friends for 26 years, long before we got into journalism. So if you want to dismiss this whole post, a priori, feel free.
No matter how much the term pimp has become mainstreamed, it is was a poor choice of words. But the efforts to paint Shuster as a malicious misogynist are way off-base. He has been a scrupulously honest and fair reporter for 18 years—at CNN, at ABC's Little Rock affiliate, at Fox News Channel, and MSNBC—and he richly does not deserve the storm of criticism and pressure being rained upon him.
Context, of course, is everything. As the Clinton campaign noted, there has been a "pattern of behavior" of on-air hosts at MSNBC and other outlets making derogatory references to women in general, and to Hillary in particular. Critics have charged that Chris Matthews, the anchor of MSNBC, is an offender in this regard. The cable news landscape is filled with men who let their bile-filled ids run rampant. CNN's Glenn Beck is Archie Bunker without the comic timing. Bill. O. Reilly. But these clowns are largely condoned—no, encouraged—by their bosses. And they never apologize. And they're never suspended.
Shuster, who has been suspended by MSNBC, apologized on the air—twice. On Friday, he tried to apologize personally to Hillary and Chelsea—on the phone and via e-mail—but was rebuffed. On Saturday, the Clinton campaign released a letter to NBC head Steve Capus declaring that "no temporary suspension or half-hearted apology is sufficient." In effect, a U.S. senator called for General Electric, a publicly held company with all sorts of interests in front of the government, to fire one of its employees.
The Clintons' refusal to accept an apology is strange given that they are among our era's great forgivers. Hillary has forgiven Bill for the enormously public humiliations he inflicted on her and Chelsea in the late 1990s. All the Clintons have shown an ability gracefully to reconcile with their implacable foes. In recent years, Hillary has buddied up with vast-right-wing-conspiracy progenitor Rupert Murdoch. Bill Clinton broke bread with Richard Mellon Scaife, who devoted a chunk of his fortune to destroying the Clintons in the 1990s—and nearly succeeded. And they've also shown a remarkable ability to grant indulgences to people who make nasty remarks about their only child. Remember John McCain's 1998 joke about Chelsea being so ugly because her father was Janet Reno? McCain apologized for this bit of straight talk, and the two senators have since bonded over shots of vodka in Estonia.
So, why are the Clintons, who have always excelled at burying the hatchet, now trying to bury it between my friend's shoulder blades? Well, it's a lot easier to be a mensch when you're winning than when you're losing. Consider, again, the context. On Tuesday, Clinton and Obama fought to a draw in the primaries. Then came news that while Obama had raised $32 million in January, Hillary had been forced to loan her campaign $5 million, and that senior aides were working for free. (Hillary has since reported a $10 million month.) On Saturday, as the candidate was signing her name to a memo declaring Shuster beyond the pale of forgiveness, Obama was eating Hillary's lunch in Washington, Louisiana, and Kansas, and the Clinton campaign was shaking up its top ranks. Another butt-kicking in Maine followed. In recent weeks, umbrage has joined inevitability and experience as a recurring Clinton motif. And Shuster's misuse of a bit of slang has functioned as a heaping portion of that umbrage.