imo my understanding he can pull the plug on MSC at will!

Yes, with the recent breakthroughs by the dev (with Class B & C transactions (see it here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=265488.msg3408731#msg3408731) and the "approval" by the bitcoin core dev leader Gavin, the project mastercoin discards a great threat that was hanging over it.