The worst senator on COVID picks the worst time for the worst message

Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky got into his own version of the holiday spirit by using wingnut media on Christmas Day to call for states to lose federal funding over public-health measures he doesn't approve of.

"You know, nobody ever intended that governors would be sort of czars or dictators in charge of the economy,'' Paul told The Epoch Times on Friday," according to nuthouse Newsmax.

"In my state, you can't have indoor dining, you can't have outdoor dining, and your kids are not in school. We're worse than New York City right now. In Kentucky, our governor has shut the schools down even though all of the science shows that — and all of the evidence — that you really aren't having a surge when you have the schools open.''

Then, with no apparent self-awareness, Paul inadvertently called for a halt to federal funds for his own state. Speaking of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill DeBlasio -- and apparently having forgotten he just said Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear was "worse" -- Paul offered this Christmas cheer:

"The only thing that will get de Blasio and Cuomo to finally open up is when they run out of other people's money," Paul said. "So I think that we shouldn't be passing out any money to the states, we shouldn't be rewarding their bad behavior."

Paul has had to defend his Senate title of Lunatic King against several untethered challengers. So while Donald Trump was home flipping through "2 Corinthians" -- or perhaps searching the phrase online -- it was fitting that the great champion of religious liberty was using the Holy Day to air his unholy drivel.

The Epoch Times wasn't about to remind Mr. States' Rights that having the big federal government dictate the policies of their respective state health departments was probably not what the Founders had in mind. But consistency has never been Paul's strong suit.

On Friday, for example, Epoch Times reported on his keen awareness of the public-health crisis: "'I lost two good friends this week to the virus. I'm not saying it's not deadly,'" said Paul, stating he understood the severity of COVID-19."

That statement would have served Paul better if mankind hadn't preserved a written history of events dating back as far, say, as nine months. On March 5, when Congress first passed coronavirus relief -- at the time, just an $8.3 billion bill -- the vote in the Senate was 96-to-1. Guess who the "1" was? Of course, it was Rand Paul.

Precisely 17 days later, Paul had singular status again: He announced that he had been infected with COVID-19, the first member of Congress to get it. But that small triumph for karma wasn't the big story at the time; this was:

"Senators blast Rand Paul's 'irresponsible' behavior," proclaimed no less a conservative outlet than the New York Post. It turns that Paul had spent several days while waiting for his COVID-19 test to come back interacting with other senators and aides, swimming in the pool, dining in the lunchroom and otherwise not acting like someone with a medical degree. Senator Kyrsten Sinema spoke for many with this tweet:

https://twitter.com/kyrstensinema/status/1241827416198254593?s=20

At the time Paul behaved so despicably, the nation had lost fewer than 500 people to the virus. Now, more than 330,000 American deaths later, he is still attacking public officials for trying their best to protect people's health, the one thing he couldn't be troubled to do when infected.

No wonder he picked Christmas Day for his message.