Dan

Calabrese

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February 11, 2008

Chelsea Clinton Gets Pimped! Maybe Fake Outrage Will Get Hillary Votes

Did you hear that Chelsea Clinton has a pimp? You did? Well then thank her mother for spreading the word.

It’s astonishing what Hillary Clinton will do to compensate for her own failings. With Queen Inevitable losing ground daily in her nomination battle with Barack Obama, let’s recount the tactics. Cry. Send out Bill to make thinly veiled racist innuendos about Obama. And when you’re still losing, sell out your daughter too.

And always, no matter what you do, try to intimidate the media – if only because that’s extremely easy.

The Clinton campaign is now threatening to pull out of an upcoming debate on MSNBC, because the network’s David Shuster, in a commentary about Chelsea making fundraising calls while being sheltered from all media interviews, said: “Doesn’t it seem as if Chelsea is sort of being pimped out in some weird sort of way?”

Clinton campaign spokesman Howard Wolfson led the fake indignation assault, calling the comment “beneath contempt” and adding: “I, at this point, can’t envision a scenario where we would continue to engage in debates on that network given that comment.”

MSNBC, following the usual media template of acceding to intimidation by the Clintons, immediately suspended Shuster – except for making him go on the air to apologize twice in a single day. This follows not long after “Hardball” host Chris Matthews apologized for suggesting that Bill’s philandering made Hillary’s political career possible. (Um . . . it did.)

In her usual shrill, clumsy manner, Hillary couldn’t help but give away that this is really all about her, saying during an event in Maine: “I’m a mother first, and a candidate next.”

Ah. Of course. Obama just swept Nebraska, Washington and Louisiana by crushing margins. Maybe the protective mother routine will work. Nothing else seems to.

It’s hard to imagine a more disingenuous fit of outrage, but then these are the Clintons – America’s specialists at phoniness. Let’s break it down anyway. If nothing else, it gives us an excuse to have fun with some suggestive words.

The classic definition of a “pimp,” of course, is a dude in a white suit and a fedora who arranges customers for prostitutes, then pays them meager wages and essentially controls their lives. I don’t actually know any, so if you want any further explanation, ask Bill Clinton.

But these days, the word “pimp” has become much more versatile. When you advocate strongly in favor of something, it is said that you pimp for it. Bob Dole pimps for Viagra. Tiger Woods pimps for Nike. Every Super Bowl-winning quarterback pimps for Disney World.

If you have a page on MySpace, you can make your profile look bitchin’ with the help of Pimp-My-Profile.com. On MTV, you can catch “Pimp My Ride,” where they take your dull, ordinary car and trick it out. On the Pimp My Ride Blog, you can hear straight from the peeps who got pimped.

I’m not really sure why David Shuster chose to use the word “pimp” to describe the Clintons’ disingenuous use of Chelsea’s services, but that’s mainly because the word has so many definitions, it’s hard to know which one he had in mind.

The last thing most people think of anymore when they hear the word “pimp” is a guy whose employees are prostitutes. It’s a common, if crass, expression in popular culture. And no one who heard what Shuster said would likely have made the connection between the word and what Wolfson pretended to infer – until Wolfson himself did so on behalf of Mrs. Clinton.

This is classic Hillary. When you’re losing, whine that you’re a victim. Accuse your debate opponents of picking on you because you’re a woman. And when you run out of ways to claim victimhood for yourself, by all means, shove your 27-year-old daughter out there.

You compared Chelsea to a prostitute working for a pimp? How dare you? What will people think?

No one would think anything if the Clintons weren’t running this up the flagpole. No one watches MSNBC. Before the Clinton campaign chose to turn this into a huge national story, there were probably six people who even heard what Shuster said – which is probably six more than thought the slightest thing was wrong with it.

But now, thanks to her mother, Chelsea Clinton is being mentioned across America in connection with prostitution. And it’s all to make it look like Hillary is being picked on, because there are no other reasons anyone would consider voting for her.

Ironically, Chelsea comes across as the one Clinton who is capable of handling herself without resorting to disingenuous indignation. I don’t know where she learned that, but maybe she could teach it to her mother. Because in the unlikely event that America actually elects this woman, this kind of whiny nonsense isn’t going to work too well with Al Qaeda, the Russians or the Chinese.

Maybe she could just offer to pimp their rides.

This is Column # DC151.  Request permission to publish here.