When last we saw him, walking viral load Rand Paul was putting together a video encouraging “us” to rebel against the tyranny of public health. This got him bounced off YouTube. Senator Aqua Buddha has an interesting history with the current pandemic. He was one of its first celebrity victims. Way back in March of 2020, he got a positive test for the virus. Which, of course, did not keep him from his duties in the rebellion. These included wandering the halls of the Senate, wherein five of his colleagues were in their 80s, eating in the Senate dining rooms, working out in the Senate gym, and swimming in the Senate pool. The man was a super-spreader triathlete.

He has since gone on to a starring role in the mini-drama Blaming Dr. Fauci, prompting the good doctor to go all Joseph Welch on his hindquarters. He followed that with the video that made YouTube gag. However, it turns out that, back in the Paul manse, the one with the obstreperous neighbors, Mrs. Aqua Buddha found a way to turn a buck on the whole business. From the Louisville Courier-Journal:

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., disclosed this week that his wife, Kelley, invested money early last year in Gilead Sciences, Inc., which produces remdesivir, an antiviral drug that has been used as a treatment for COVID-19…Gilead Sciences' remdesivir has gotten U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorization to be used to treat COVID-19, although in fall 2020 the World Health Organization recommended against using it for hospitalized COVID-19 patients "as there is currently no evidence that remdesivir improves survival and other outcomes in these patients.”

You undoubtedly will be shocked to realize that Senator Aqua Buddha blew past the legally mandated deadline for reporting such transactions by a mere 16 months. His explanation? Well, golly gee, he filled out the form but forgot to submit it, as one does when one’s job requires as much paper-shuffling as a senator’s does. And besides, his spokesperson said, Kelley Paul lost money on the deal. I wish her as much luck with that excuse as the Clintons had with it vis-a-vis the Whitewater Investment Company.

Will his weaponed obtuseness on the pandemic be what finally rids us of Senator Aqua Buddha in 2022? He has made himself the congressional face of the anti-public-health resistance. That should be enough to get him ridden out of Congress on a rail. And, besides, Kentucky already has visited Mitch McConnell on the country. Haven’t we suffered enough?

Headshot of Charles P. Pierce
Charles P. Pierce

Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976. He lives near Boston and has three children.