Chris Stigall Column - Call Jimmy Kimmel! Have the Pickle Jar Ready!
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- It's not a conspiracy anymore. It can't be described as a kooky, fringe YouTube movement any longer. We're less than two months out from a presidential election and one of the major candidates isn't well. We saw it for ourselves, and it was deeply disturbing.
By now you've likely seen the video of Hillary Clinton abruptly exiting a 9/11 commemoration in New York City Sunday. It needs no defining. Clinton's wobbling body propped up against a concrete pillar awaiting a Secret Service vehicle to make a sudden, unscheduled pickup. Once the vehicle is in place with its doors open, Clinton goes completely limp. Falling forward off the curb and into the awaiting van.
A team of a dozen people shares the job of both lifting Clinton and shielding the spectacle from view.
Also caught on the now infamous video was Mrs. Clinton's shoe falling off her foot and rolling under the van as she's dragged inside. There's no delicate way to say it. Hillary Clinton looked like a corpse. More disturbing? The team of people around her didn't seem remotely alarmed at what was happening. Instead, they seemed very familiar with this "drill."
Of course, this is speculation. But how can anyone watch this video and assume something else? Ever been around someone who's passed out cold? Suddenly? What's the reaction of people nearby? "Oh well? Ho-hum?" "Quick, let's throw the body into a vehicle and whisk it away to a relative's apartment?"
That's what they did with Mrs. Clinton, by the way. Took her to her daughter Chelsea's apartment. Not the hospital. Not even an awaiting private plane to go home. Her daughter's apartment. Which, I guess we must assume is a living space/ makeshift ER for ailing relatives?
Two hours later, Mrs. Clinton emerges from the apartment building un-aided, smiling widely, shouting how much she loves New York, and how great she feels. Clinton even greets and hugs a perfectly lovely little girl who approaches her on the sidewalk for a completely honest, authentic, and in no way scripted moment.
Forgive my vulgar incredulity here, but what the hell is going on?!
Lest anyone make the claim I'm being sexist, or ageist, or whatever "ist" one can charge, I'd remind you it is Mrs. Clinton herself that made her health an issue. She put her health front and center when she told the FBI her 2012 concussion caused amnesia.
So, let's recall all we know about Hillary Clinton's health:
— She has been diagnosed with hypothyroidism
— She fell and broke her elbow in 2009
— Mrs. Clinton has been diagnosed with deep vein thrombosis. She's had two clots in her leg, in 1998 and 2009. She had a blood clot in her head causing her to fall and become seriously concussed in 2012.
— She takes Coumadin - a powerful blood-thinner. Blood-thinners prevent blood from clotting, making falls extremely dangerous.
— Her parents— who lived long lives— had cardio-vascular issues. Her father died after suffering a stroke. Her mother died due to congestive heart failure.
— Finally, she has a disturbingly wicked, chronic cough that she said wasn't triggered by an infection; rather she's blamed on allergies. Until she blamed it on pneumonia, which we discovered two days after she was diagnosed with pneumonia. Which, we only discovered after she passed out cold – which, she initially blamed on overheating - until she blamed it on pneumonia.
To put it mildly, Hillary Clinton doesn't appear to be in good health. Again, she's claimed a concussion from a fall from a blood clot in the brain caused severe memory losses. We've learned from emails her aide Huma Weiner described Mrs. Clinton as "often confused."
Jimmy Kimmel hosted Mrs. Clinton a couple of weeks ago on his TV show. Everyone had a good chuckle at the "crazies" like me who dare question her health. In a "hilarious" moment to show her virility, stamina, and health – Kimmel asked her to open a pickle jar and, viola! She did it! As though the skepticism surrounding her health involved arthritis.
This was meant to mock and dismiss any lingering skeptics about her health. To bring it up now would be really loony, right?
Until, that is, video surfaces of her collapsing like a wet sack of cement on Sunday. Now she's vanished from the campaign trail for another couple of days to recover and we're told once again, "no big deal."
Of course Hillary's coughing fits, falling, prior concussion, memory loss, blood clots, family history, blacking out on videotape, and not disclosing her prior "pneumonia" is a big deal and should be to every American voting in November.
She'll have to do better than opening a jar of pickles on a talk show to prove otherwise.
