Obama’s Fainting Woman Was A Plant (Or She’s Pregnant And Has Diabetes)

Remember the woman who fainted during President Obama’s big speech this week? She was a plant, the whole thing was staged! That is, if you believe the latest conspiracy theory.

Before you ask, the answer is yes. There is a conspiracy theory for everything.

Anyway, the story went like this: President Obama was explaining to the nation why the Affordable Care Act’s insurance exchanges marketplace website is such a lemon. During his speech, Karmel Allison, a pregnant woman with Type 1 diabetes standing right behind him, lost her head and fainted.

President Obama reached back and caught her as she collapsed, becoming everyone’s hero that day (even though his website doesn’t work).

Fast forward a few days, The Weekly Standard flagged a blog post by someone who believes that the entire thing was a hoax. Here’s the gist:

“You will see in the following video that the pregnant woman is standing with a friend who is holding her hand with her arm wrapped around her waist. That is until she starts to ‘faint.’ Then she steps slightly aside and never even looks at the women she is holding. She smiles a nervous smile for the camera because she has done her part in this extremely poorly orchestrated drama.”

“Why would they come up with this transparent attempt to manipulate the low information voters? Who knows? Did it make anyone feel warm and fuzzy for our hero President? Probably. There are a lot of idiots out there.”

The post has been passed around a lot on the right-wing fringe (more on that here), and it was even briefly mentioned on Fox. But interestingly, even some of the more extreme Tea Party figures know not to touch this with a ten foot pole.

Did I say “know not to touch this with a ten foot pole?” Oh, I meant “understand perfectly well that this is a hoax, but use it as ammunition anyway.”

Yes, I’m talking about Sarah Palin, who shared the conspiracy on Facebook with only a mild debunking that went something like:

“With the Obama White House’s total lack of transparency, it’s no wonder that some will ask whether they staged even a fainting lady in the Rose Garden. What was once a major leap in logic has become a single step because President Obama has lied so often and so blatantly.”

If you want to check out the “fainting woman” hoax video, it is below. What do you think? Was Karmel Allison’s faint a staged incident in order to somehow make us forget that the Obamacare website doesn’t work, or is it just more likely that she’s pregnant and has diabetes?

[h/t – Mediaite]