Reply #13: I don't think he should be fired, but it took him 3 times to get his apology right

[Tom Rinaldo]

And that to me means that this wasn't just a careless lapse into slang that slipped out which Shuster immediately regretted when the implications of it were pointed out to him.

I think he should receive a real suspension - multiple weeks, and if he is left dangling for a little while before that gets worked out I don't mind that either. My position on this hardened a little when I read the email exchange between Shuster and a Clinton aid that took place after he made his on air comment about Chelsea being pimped out. Shuster was asked to apologize and instead he was defiant and defended his remarks to the Clinton campaign instead. He still was trying to leverage being hard on Chelsea into getting an interview with her. That was blowing it the second time, after saying something gross in the first place.

Then in the morning he introduced his "apology" as "housekeeping" and defended the words he used as slang. It was a classic non apology apology. "I understand how some may have misunderstood what I said and if so, and if they experienced my words as offensive, then I apologize for that" (not his actual quote - just my sense of the Friday morning apology).


Finally on Friday night he made a real apology. Had he done that immediately on Thursday night, or even on Friday morning, I strongly suspect Shuster would not be in nearly as much hot water as he is in now.