In Defense Of David Shuster
David Schuster in my opinion is one of the best reporters working for the corporate media. He is a hard-hitting reporter that speaks his mind. He criticizes members of both political parties. During the Bush Administration, he has been appropriately critical of the numerous problems of the Bush Presidency. He was also very critical of the many problems within the Clinton Administration. I enjoy his work because he speaks his mind spontaneously despite the fact that his boss Chris Matthews is not my favorite. The following is the link from you Tube which caused his suspension from MSNBC: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2St8qoXx1g.
Specifically this is what he said while interviewing Bill Press:
DAVID SHUSTER: Bill, there's just something a little bit unseemly to me that Chelsea's out there calling up celebrities, saying support my mom, and she's apparently also calling these super delegates.BILL PRESS: Hey, she's working for her mom. What's unseemly about that? During the last campaign, the Bush twins were out working for their dad. I think it's great, I think she's grown up in a political family, she's got politics in her blood, she loves her mom, she thinks she'd make a great president --
SHUSTER: But doesn't it seem like Chelsea's sort of being pimped out in some weird sort of way?
Schuster asked appropriately whether Chelsea should be calling Super Delegates to convince them to support her mother. Bill Press compared this to the Bush twins working for their father. I like Bill Press but his analogy to the Bush kids is not the same. There is a difference between working for a parent in a political campaign and calling Super Delegates. Super Delegates are a critical part of the choice for the Democratic nominee. If I were an undecided Super delegate getting a call from Chelsea Clinton, I would have felt that her call was a subtle or not so subtle inappropriate use of a child to appeal to my emotions rather than my objective choice as to who I would support.
There are many important issues of advocacy in which I am involved. I have a beautiful and intelligent daughter who is Chelsea's age and I would never put her in a position to use her to try to compromise someone whose support I needed. Chelsea's knowing many of these Super Delegates because her father was President does not give the Clintons the right to use her in an advocacy role. In my opinion the use of Chelsea to call Super Delegates shows how desperate they are and to what lengths they would go to win.
I feel for Chelsea and as a parent have a lot of empathy for her. Hillary is a wonderful mother but Bill has caused much public humiliation for Chelsea at a time when she was barely out of high school in 1998 because of the Monica scandal. And the Clintons rightfully wanted the press to respect her right of privacy. When they interjected Chelsea into this primary, the Clintons changed the very rule that they wanted the media to respect. So David Schuster correctly pointed out the unseemly nature of Chelsea's use in this campaign and the utter hypocrisy of the Clintons desire to protect their daughter.
Schuster did not call Chelsea a "nappy haired hoe." He criticized the Clintons for using Chelsea in a weird sort of way for being "pimped out" by her parents. Pimped out is a phrase that means exploited to most. In urban vocabulary it actually is complementary. If Schuster had used "exploited" instead of "pimped out", his analysis would have been more mainstream. Although his choice of words was not good, his point was arguably valid. Clearly Schuster was referring to the Clinton campaign people and not attacking Chelsea.
Schuster knows how ruthless the Clinton campaign team can be. I know enough about them to make me question their strategy. The belligerent members of her team have managed to grasp defeat from the hands of victory by their inappropriate use of Bill Clinton and their exploitation of Chelsea. They ruined Hillary's campaign by injecting race and gender into this campaign. Now they want to exploit Chelsea whom I know hates to be in the public limelight.
Taylor Marsh wrote a Huffpo criticizing Schuster for being sexist in his comment about the use of Chelsea at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/taylor-marsh/msnbcs-david-shuster-ch_b_85649.html. She injected the gender card as the reason that Schuster was sexist. "Pimped out" is a phrase which has been used more about men than woman. When Bill Clinton protested, Taylor Marsh had her gender-biased response. Taylor seems to forget that Bill Clinton's behavior in the past is about as sexist as it gets. But, many women seem to give Bill a pass on this because of his enormous personal appeal. He has subjected his wife and daughter to a terrible personal humiliation. Bill of all people should have kept his daughter out of this for that very reason. I as a father would never had allowed it.
I do not understand why Hillary does not protect herself from her husband and his campaign team. She unfortunately has allowed her husband to dominate her campaign to a point where she is in serious jeopardy of losing. However, she allowed this to happen and must suffer the consequences. It is too bad that people cannot view this objectively and have made David Schuster the scapegoat for another Clinton indiscretion.
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Here's my problem with your Obaminator. For months now his campaign (and all the folks in the media that have fallen in love with him) has been playing the race card card, i.e. accusing the Cintons of playing the race card.
Somebody alludes the Barack's past drug use... they're playing the race card.
Bill suggests that Barack's anti-war credentials are overblown... why, he's playing the race card.
A campaign worker claims that the black and hispanic voting blocks are separate... he's playing the race card.
Hillary doesn't have any black questioners at a town hall meeting... of course, she's playing the race card.
Hillary has a black moderator for the same town hall meeting... she's playing the race card.
Of course, the history of this couple could hardly be more supportive of black interests, but nobody cares. The narrative is set. If Hillary complains about gender based mistreatment, well she's just a whiner. But if anybody on her side makes any remark, however innocent, however tangential, that somebody can twist into some kind of racial context, then she's David Duke in a dress.
For all I know, Obama may be the more electable, and maybe he will make a better president. But this tactic sucks the big one, and makes me rather enthused about the possibilities of his success.
I volunteered on Bill Clinton's first presidential campaign, & was a decent enough financial contributor to get 8 "White House xmas cards" from the Clintons. I supported him through his Impeachment.
I now support Barack Obama. (Oh, I'm a white woman.)
I lost RESPECT for Pres. Clinton when he LIED about Senator Obama's stance against the Iraq war, likening it to a "fairytale". It sounded like Karl Rove instead of President Clinton saying "Jesse Jackson had won in S. Carolina as well. "
I was disgusted when in one of Senator Clinton's "town hall" meetings people & questions were "planted" in her audience. (She did that on her Hallmark special the night before Super Tuesday. Despite being caught the first time, "a planting we will go" -- and no black people there as she had lost the black vote by then.
I agree that David Shuster's choice of the word, "pimping", was in poor taste, I understood what he was saying: if Chelsea's campaigning then she should no longer be off limits to the press.
And finally, to Senator Clinton and President Clinton, all this hand-wringing over 27-year- old Chelsea who was with only one word spoken about in poor taste. Need I remind both of you of MONICA LEWINSKY, who was only 21 when she was involved with the President?
And while everyone managed to survive that debacle: Pres. Clinton a renowned Ambassador of peace, fund-raising, etc. -- Mrs. Clinton, now Senator, running a very close Presidential campaign -- Chelsea earning several hundred grand a year at an investment company -- Monica Lewinsky GOT NOTHING. NO MONEY -- not even a face-lift. Her life, FOREVER RUINED. Talk about the "pot calling the kettle black" Clinton family. I wonder how her parents feel about your hysteria over this misguided phrasing by a very good reporter, while their daughter will always be the butt of jokes.
I am so sad over the loss of my admiration and respect for the both of you.
I understood the Clinton's reaction to John McCain's and Rush Limbaugh's terrible comments about a 12 year old Chelsea Clinton; however, she's now a strong, adult woman. Hillary Clinton is way out of line asking for David Shuster's firing -- he made a mistake and has apologized and has been punished enough for his unwise choice of words.
This middle-aged feminist has already sent support for D Schuster to MSNBC.
If I were Chelsea's mom, the last thing I would want would be to stir up a tempest in a teapot on this to advertise it to the world.
What seems especially strange is acting as if Schuster's passing analogy in clear context was to be taken literally.
I am worried that the campaign is angling for kid glove treatment in the debate.
I agree with all your observations, including the mysterious affinity of some feminists with Bill Clinton.
This middle-aged feminist has already sent support for D Schuster to MSNBC.
If I were Chelsea's mom, the last thing I would want would be to create a tempest in a teapot to publicize this to the world.
It seems particularly strange to act as if a passing analogy in clear context was meant literally.
What worries me is that the Clinton campaign may be angling for kid glove treatment in the debate.
I agree with all your observations, including the mysterious affinity between some feminists and Bill Clinton.
First of all, it wouild greatly enhance your street cred if you spelled the name correctly of the reporter you mean to defend. It's 'Shuster'. You could look it up, and you should have. Second, how did you arrive at your expertise as to the uses of the verb 'pimp' in inner city settings? From a police drama? MTV? From some of your best friends, who are Black? I've lived in NYC for close to 30 years, and I don't think it would fly in civil conversation regarding anybody's daughter here in the 100's on the Upper West Side or points north either...
But although I decry Shuster's over-exhuberant adoption of the Chris Matthews style of narrative regarding Chlesea Clinton, I do agree he's about the best reporter on politics available on cable news, and was one of the only journalists actually working to uncover facts over the course of this disastrous administration. I look forward to his return as reporter, not fill-in host.
I also agree he needed some time off. He's a good reporter, but he made an ugly mistake. And really, that's abvout it, your defense of him notwithstanding.
See Sheldon Drobny's Profile
that's abvout it? and you criticize my spelling NY. Like many NY people I know you are OCD about spelling a last name. What about substance? Language is a useful tool when it is used properly.
Yes, language is a useful tool when it is used properly, and your opinion would carry more weight if you had bothered to get a not so small item correct: the name of your subject. If, as you say in your opening sentence
"David Schuster in my opinion is one of the best
reporters working for the corporate media."
you would know how to spell his name. It sounds more like you are offended that anyone would call any member of the media on their behavior. Just as I will judge Mr. Shuster's future work in light of this dreadful comment, I'll judge yours in light of this article.
Shuster is a highly paid commentator and should not be relying upon a 10th grade lexicon to express himself. Like Hawsie previously commented, Shuster is not a rapper trying to establish "street cred". His words were ill chosen and I'm glad he's taken heat for it. As for Chelsea's role in her mother's campaign, and the thing that's been lost in all of this that's clear to me, is that Chelsea's helping out her mom because Hillary is not polling as well as Obama with highly educated young women. Why isn't Hillary doing so well with that demographic?
Two quick questions:
At what age does someone cease being a child? Chelsea Clinton is 27.
Why didn't he say exploited? Why did he choose a phrase which also happens to have a very negative connotation (unless you're talking about having your car be featured on MTV's Pimp My Ride)?
All in all it seems like a bigger deal is being made out of this than it warrants, but I would imagine the issue is with his word choice and not his sentiment?
By using the term 'pimped out', Shuster was suggesting-however obliquely- that Chelsea is a prostitute. Shuster needs a new job. How about 'pimping' gas in Oregon where they won't let customers near the pumps?
"In urban vocabulary it actually is complementary."
---
funny. I've lived in urban America all my life,went to public school in the eighties (so I might be a little out of it compared to a you) and if someone was "Pimping" my daughter, I don't think I'd take it as complimentary. You would say, "Oh, thank you for pimping my little girl?"
Is shuster going broke and losing his carreer or something?
NBC FUCKED Peter Arnet... Fired him for telling the truth. ANY of you cry over that? I didn't a hear it.
I remember when words like, "Allegedly" were important to journalists.
Now the schools are teaching the correct application of "Pimp?"
And since when has the national media thought ANYTHING urban was good? I know they think we're all gangsters and hoes with nappy heads, and they think that our "culture" should be eliminated and all of us should be locked in jail... But to the national media, urban doesn't mean urban, it means "Black." Anyone watching the debate about whether Obama was "Black enough" should know that (talk about Clinton using "Code words"). The national media knows as musch as about urban America at street level as they knew about Iraq and WMDS in the run-up to the war.
Evidently this blogger didn't read Shuster's emails or is simply another man that just doesn't get it.
This doesn't have anything to do with Bill Clinton's history.
Shuster tried to make the issue about Chelsea Clinton not giving him an interview. He is a weasel who went malicious because he had been told no.
He thought he could get away with it because of the culture of hatred for all things Clinton on MSNBC.
NBC should have fired him.
I am concerned about you calling D Schuster a "weasel" and then going off on what you call "the culture of hatred...."
I have pages and pages of carefully thought out reasons to not support Mrs Clinton, but I keep running into this
knee-jerk defensive block dismissing any rationale as mere Clinton-hating.
My concern is, it reminds me too much of being blown-off as a mere Bush-hater when daring in the wrong company to quibble about the catastrophic policies, actions and lies of George Bush.
I'd like to think thoughtful liberals could listen to each other. Also there is this old psychology about protesting too much from a position of weakness.
Well, I'm sure you have put lots of thought into your support for Mrs Clinton.
Oh, Mr.Drobney, to be APPROPRIATELY vernacular about it, considering the venue:
B -F'N' - S.
Shuster has for yrs, been a part of coroporate mainstream broadcast media, and as such, he has NO store of public goodwill and professional journalistic capital from which to draw support. Where was the hard-hitting, in-depth, penetrating news coverage for the 8 yrs of Clinton and 7 yrs of Bush? NON-EXISTANT!!!! What we got with Clinton was petty, distracting, if not titillating, private sex and minor business scandals, and what we got with Bush was
... nothing. A big, fat, "0".
If we'd had benefit of the functional professional 4th Estate that you claim Shuster was a part of, perhaps our nation wouldn't be in the deplorable position we find ourselves today!!!!!!! Professional journalists are paid to use professional language, and to know exactly how much vernacular with which to pepper it, to sound current. Those who choose to play hardball and cross the line as Shuster did using the sexual and criminally charged term "pimping out" in that manner must be willing to risk getting smacked.
Just too bad Shuster & his collegues haven't done as the tiny handful of independent and public broadcasting journalists have done, and chosen to take those risks by researching and revealing facts of vital importance to Americans instead of chattering about the politics of personality and political horse races.
I have "0" sympathy for him and the network which employed him. Perhaps he will now find himself in stiff competition for a much lower paying job practicing real journalism at PBS, NPR, or the BBC.
Pimped out. "In urban vocabulary it is actually complementary." Did Drobny mean "complimentary"?
The first makes no sense, but the second is highly offensive to this urbanite. To suggest that urban dwellers either complement their lives or are complimented by the prospect of "pimping out" or being "pimped out" is as outrageous as Schuster's comment re: Chelsea Clinton.
The term "pimp", even in urban culture, does not refer to a sub-culture activity, because sub-cultures can be and usually are legitimate and respectable behaviors by members of the non-dominant culture. Pimping connotes an underworld activitiy that is neither legitimate nor respectable.
The Schuster's and Drobny's need to reconsider their propensities for assuming that the gangsta rap culture is the predominant culture of the "urban" community. It is not by far. Most "urban" parents do not allow the language, the music, the dress nor behavior of that culture in their homes, or they helplessly abide it with great frustration. They do not need legitimate media validating it by mis-aapropriating and mis-characterizing the language of that culture in positive terms for the larger society.
Indeed, as I have written before, when I travel through some of the streets of some urban areas, I will keep one eye out for children with guns and the other eye out for the Schusters and Drobnys of the world. They are all armed and dangerous - particulary the ones who shoot their mouths off half-cocked.
See Sheldon Drobny's Profile
I did not mean complimentary. I said that Schuster should have said "exploited." The use of pimp in street language was a point of interest not a support of his words. However, Scuster's message was a valid journalistic commentary as a host of a show. But, you do not seem to get it. Very few people watched Schuster substituting for Tucker Carlson. It was Bill Clinton who with political intent made it a nationwide story.
No, Shuster's message was NOT valid journalistic commentary, most esp IF he intended on continuing in his objective journalist position as a fact-based hard news reporter, or even a political reporter. He should have jealously guarded his professional stance and refused to sub for who was it, Tucker Carlson, a comedian.
And as for Bill Clinton taking the ball & running with it politically, SO WHAT??????
This is politics! It's a race! Kudos to him for thinking fast and making the most of a pile of CRAP! I'm in constant awe of Bill Clinton's many skills (as long as he doesn't ever corner me in a closet)! DUH!
You don't think MSNBC and their other craven corporate cronies capitalize on that sort of thing, if not hold off on "reporting" until that sort of thing happens, and claim they have a headline-driven- excuse to run their crap-for-news?
Oh, come on Drobny. You've been sipping the MSM Kool-Aid a bit too long.
The Clinton's reaction is just so insincere. This whole thing is just to keep the Clinton name in the headlines.
David Shuster isn't a rapper with a need for street cred. He is a fat white male who is supposedly paid for knowing how words work in real life. He messed up. He thought that he was cool. He isn't, he isn't particularly smart if he thought that that exchange shows his intellectual skills in anyway whatsoever. Your defense of him simply shows that you agree that a sexist attack is justified if the candidate is female and unjustified if she is in the traditional backseat role of 1st Lady. It is never justified and until the media talking/writing heads get that into their heads then you become increasingly insignificant in the decision.
Kudos...glad to see support for Shuster for comments that were taken out of context
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