That Sunday health episode just goes to show that Hillary Clinton's secrecy, while understandable as insulation against right-wing slander, poses a more pervasive problem for her than a bout of pneumonia.
Antibiotics and rest will usually work against infection. But there is no known pill on the market to cure an addiction to privacy in a public profession.
Actually, there might be some kind of chemical-altering substance that would let down hair and inhibition temporarily. Actually, I've known gin to do that.
But goodness knows Hillary would never hear the end of availing herself of that.
Gin smells on your breath. And it can cause a loss of balance more regularly than sun-baked dehydration. And it might cause Hillary to say what she really thinks of reporters and Donald Trump, and to do so before parents could get their children's ears covered.
Any casual observer of Hillary has a very sound hunch as to what happened Friday.
Continuing to be plagued by a cough attributed to allergies, Clinton submitted to a follow-up doctor's examination. A chest X-ray was ordered. A spot showed up indicating pneumonia, probably a relatively light touch.
The doctor said here are some antibiotics and you need to rest for a few days. Your campaign can put out a statement that I'll happily make.
And Hillary scoffed.
She said, oh, heavens, no, I can't do that. You don't know modern politics, doc. The right wing is saying I have Alzheimer's or Parkinson's or some other neurological disorder and that I lack the energy to be president. They'd just say I was lying about pneumonia, and the rumors would become more credible and abound. And Sunday is the commemoration of the 9/11 attacks. If I missed that event, I'd never hear the end of it.
No, Hillary surely said, this has to be our secret and I must show up at that event Sunday morning. And let's keep everything else on the schedule. I can't admit I'm sick. I just can't. They'll crucify me.
Aides might have argued otherwise, but George Stephanopoulos and David Gergen could tell you how effective aides can be--which is not at all--when crossing Hillary.
And she was right, you know. Trump would have responded to such a public statement by doubting it and saying, aha, I told you so, and adding something cute and irresponsible such as that when the hot line rings at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, you need a president who is not napping.
Thus Clinton went to the event Sunday morning, stood in the sun for 90 minutes, and felt ill. She left conspicuously and got captured on a smartphone in an alarming image of knee-buckled swooning that led even her most loyal fans to wonder if maybe there might not be something seriously wrong with her after all.
It's simple: When the only person standing between us and the apocalypse cannot herself stand, it's big news.
What ensued was six hours or so of a media frenzy and rampant nationwide rumor and speculation.
It was a cautionary tale about the perils of running for president in secret.
An authoritative, doctor-sworn public statement on Friday detailing a light touch of pneumonia--an understandable infection considering her travels and public interaction--and announcing a few days of rest ... well, in retrospect, and almost always, that kind of disclosure would have been best.
Bill and Tim Kaine could have picked up her schedule.
The campaign even could have released images of the chest X-ray. It could have released more of the candidate's medical records, contrasting them with the silly amateurish letter that an odd doctor put out as a supposed disclosure of Trump's supposed robust health.
It comes down to this political calculation: A poll surely would show that a nagging feeling you're never quite getting the straight skinny from Hillary Clinton is a bigger political problem for her than either the truth or the lies.
It's better to put it all out there yourself, and promptly--the pneumonia, the Rose Law Firm billing records, the emails, the commodities-trading wizardry in the late 1970s.
They say we tend to bring on ourselves the things we fear most. That seems true in Hillary's case.
What she fears most is the opening of her book that she squeezes hard to keep closed.
For others, imagining what's in it is worse than a full reading of it.
Then, sure as the world, the book is going to fly open anyway.
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John Brummett, whose column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, was inducted into the Arkansas Writers' Hall of Fame in 2014. Email him at [email protected]. Read his @johnbrummett Twitter feed.
Editorial on 09/13/2016