Linda McMahon and ‘Fragile X Syndrome’ (Part 5)

PREVIOUS POSTS IN THIS SERIES:

Introduction

Chris Benoit’s Son’s Medical Condition Sets Off a Media Frenzy

Linda McMahon Goes on “Good Morning America”

Let’s Go to the Videotape

THE DA AND WWE BACK OFF; WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?

With the current state of the public record, it is impossible to say for certain whether young Daniel Benoit had Fragile X Syndrome. In CHRIS & NANCY, I suggest that he probably did – a conclusion that has not exactly earned me brownie points with the Benoit family survivors, most especially his in-laws.

It just doesn’t make sense to me that the woman in Vancouver would make up the story about her late husband talking to Chris Benoit about becoming a Fragile X spokesman. Benoit’s turndown of that request is consistent with the consensus portrait of him as ultra-private. Possible secrecy about his son’s condition, including shielding the information from close family members and friends, is also common in the whole heartbreaking dynamic of how parents try to cope with the disorder.

For me, the clinchers are:

(a) DA Scott Ballard may have been loose-lipped but I don’t think he’s nuts.

(b) Daniel, at age 7, had just graduated kindergarten. I have not heard a good explanation as to why he would have been in kindergarten at 7; most kids do it at 5.

(c) Nancy Benoit’s friend and next-door neighbor confirmed that they had conversations about some unspecified medical condition of Daniel’s.

So I don’t think Linda McMahon and WWE planted this story.

I do, however, believe they covered themselves in disgrace by furiously and haphazardly exploiting it to direct attention to everything but the elephant in the room: the tremendous stash of drugs in the Benoit home and the tremendous quantity of drugs in Chris Benoit’s body. The latter already had been found in WWE “Wellness Policy” drug tests, which were trumped by a “therapeutic use exemption,” and soon would be confirmed in post-mortem toxicology reports.

Did the spinmeisting by Linda McMahon in her Good Morning America interview – half-baked assertions, almost immediately withdrawn but not until they had served as a temporary but important diversion – add up to the skills and qualities the people of Connecticut would like to see in their next United States senator? We’re about to find out.

END OF SERIES

Irv Muchnick