Droid, there's little 'defense' of Kanye here, nobody's going out of their way to discuss the 'merits' of what he's doing, rather the goals. Hell, most of us can't even be bothered to look at the damn thing.
I will say in regards to your "a real plus" on the Brown/Cosby analogies is that while I agree with you that they're morally condemnable as people, it is MUCH EASIER in America for them to be demonized for that behavior than white men. Or was that Johnny Depp domestic abuse/divorce scandal where his ex-wife who's less than half his age gets her name dragged through the mud, and little to no public scandal a figment of my imagination or that amazing turn of events where domestic abuser Sean Penn can sue Lee Daniels for defamation of character and win for having the nerve to infer the well-known public knowledge that he beat Madonna? Is that not a country where Birth of a Nation is a cinematic tome to make black men the most ugly of people?
I don't hold nearly the degree of leniency or patience he has with Brown or Cosby, nor do I identify with them. But I've also never been a black man in America being publicly vilified, so I can't 'get it'. Its not an excuse, nor is it a defense. But its to point to why he'd even place Cosby in such a role.
And anyway, it isn't ever just words, the same way it isn't just videos. When we support him as an artist, we encourage him in all his degrees, and few if any took Kanye to task for his misogyny when he emerged. On the contrary, he was a 'breath of fresh air from the stereotypes of rap's vulgarity', and simply because he didn't make the kind of perceived 'mindless misogynoir' records people saw in other rappers. Never mind the Workout Plan is nasty about women deep down. He's been this way for fucking ever, and he's too successful to change, and the more and more grandiose he gets, the more his negative attributes emerge. This isn't to provide an excuse, but rather just say "Well the world gave him a fucking cookie for calling women money hungry she-devils, no shit his art forevermore wasn't going to have respect for women." Its a hypocrisy of us as a society (not to say we all made "Gold-Digger" a hit single or made College Dropout a canonical classic album PERSONALLY) to say he's crossed the line at any THIS TIME when he's been rewarded for doing it at women's expense in the first place.
