Restoring health will be easier than trust

Hillary Clinton became “overheated” and left the Sept. 11 memorial service abruptly after an hour and a half. Television cameras were rolling, allowing much of the world to see her being loaded into her van. She went to her daughter’s nearby apartment for a breather, emerged looking chipper, stopped for a picture with a child, and drove off.

If it had ended there, the incident would have been unfortunate but wouldn’t have altered the course of the campaign. Instead, the public learned later that Clinton had been diagnosed with pneumonia on Sept. 9 and neglected to tell anyone.

The lack of transparency played right into Donald Trump’s hands.

Clinton began her career as a staffer on the Watergate hearings, yet she has repeatedly ignored the central lesson of the scandal: It’s not the crime that gets you but the cover-up.

Pneumonia is hardly a crime and neither is a private server, but by covering up both she made them seem worse.

On Labor Day, she brushed off a coughing episode in Ohio merely as evidence that she is “allergic to Trump.” But four days later, a doctor put her on antibiotics for pneumonia and she didn’t find it worthy of comment. Too bad she didn’t get a prescription for truth serum.

Now the burden is on her to prove she’s fine. She would have to drop and do 20 push-ups to satisfy Trump that she is.

Just as he tried to delegitimize Barack Obama with birtherism, Trump has tried to Swift Boat Clinton by delegitimizing her physically. For months, the Republican nominee has been stoking the charge that something serious is wrong with her physical and mental “strength and stamina.”

Getting pneumonia doesn’t mean you’re unhealthy. It’s one of the many occupational hazards of the endurance trial a modern campaign is. But she’s going to have a hard time proving she’s healthy now.

Still, Clinton has nine lives. She has repeatedly turned adversity into triumph, not least by becoming the first first lady to leave the White House a year early and win a Senate seat. She’s now the first female candidate for president.

Memo to Trump and the men who love him: Misunderestimate her “strength and stamina” at your peril.

This story was originally published September 18, 2016 at 5:02 AM with the headline "Restoring health will be easier than trust."