Paul tore into Washington's profligate spending on Friday, suggesting if the US didn’t put a stop to its money-printing and -borrowing addiction, the market was liable to self-correct and leave Americans carting around wheelbarrows full of worthless cash, all because their country had wasted its money studying the ins and outs of obscure animals’ behavior, or whether smiling selfies made the photo-taker happy, or other dubiously useful hypotheses.

Not only was the country $28 trillion in debt, but there was no legitimate reason – according to Paul – to spend money on goofy projects like figuring out why lizards “waddle” when they walk or the exact words used by American astronaut Neil Armstrong when he made his historical statement upon landing on the Moon.

When the time came for annual budget requests, Paul explained, backed by a memorable poster from a National Institutes of Health study titled “Cocaine and risky sex habits of quail – $356,933.14,” researchers focused on one subject all call their friends to cash in favors. Cocaine and quail enthusiasts in line, the lead researcher would present his peers’ support as proof that the latest quail-sex-cocaine study would get however much money it asked for, making the point that budgets only move in one direction – up.

While Paul has rolled out the quail poster before, the connection is a legitimate one. The National Institutes of Health was the parent agency for both Fauci's gain of function research and the study of drug-induced quail orgies.

While many were outraged – or at least amused – to hear where their taxpayers’ dollars were going…

While many were outraged – or at least amused – to hear where their taxpayers’ dollars were going…

…Paul's nemeses came forward to denounce the quail/coke study as a dissertation in dishonesty.

Others defended using taxpayer dollars to study coked-up quail.

It sure beats starting wars, though, no? Though some complained about the ethics of wasting the “good stuff” on quail.