RAGE: Dr. Fauci "killed millions of people?"

TUESDAY, AUGUST 4, 2026

Tommy Tuberville's rage: For better or worse—we'll guess for worse—the prevailing rage of the current era was directed at Dr. Fauci last week. 

It was directed at him in a Senate hearing. That said, in certain essential ways, the story of this tribal fury had been told long before. We return to Book One of the Iliad, in which the disastrous rage of Achilles emerges.   

As we noted yesterday, this is the way that story begins, as rendered by Robert Fagles in his 1990 translation:

BOOK ONE
The Rage of Achilles

Rage—Goddess. sing the rage of Peleus' son Achilles,
murderous, doomed, that cost the Achaeans countless losses,
hurling down to the House of Death so many sturdy souls,
great fighters' souls, but made their bodies carrion,
feasts for the dogs and birds.
and the will of Zeus was moving toward its end.   
Begin, Muse, when the two first broke and clashed,
Agamemnon lord of men and brilliant Achilles.

What god drove them to fight with such a fury?   

At this point, we're told about the first step toward the destructive rage which would eventually cost so many lives: 

Agamemnon, lord of men, has stolen the daughter of a priest to Apollo to serve as his "slave." Now, the young woman's father has come to the Achaean camps to get his daughter back:

Yes. Chryses approached the Achaeans' fast ships
to win his daughter back, bringing a priceless ransom 
and bearing high in hand, wound on a golden staff,
the wreaths of the god, the distant deadly Archer.
He begged the whole Achaean army but most of all
the two supreme commanders, Atreus' two sons,
"Agamemnon. Menelaus! All Argives geared for war!
May the gods who hold the halls of Olympus give you
Priam's city to plunder, then safe passage home.
Just set my daughter free, my dear one. Here,
accept these gifts, this ransom. Honor the god
who strikes from worlds away—the son of Zeus, Apollo!"  

The priest was willing to let Troy be sacked if he could win his daughter back—his dear one. 

The troops were inclined to respect the priest. But Agamemnon, lord of men, responded with one of his familiar rages:

And all ranks of Achaeans cried out their assent:
"Respect the priest, accept the shining ransom!"
But it brought no joy to the heart of Agamemnon.
The king dismissed the priest with a brutal order
ringing in his ears: "Never again, old man,
let me catch sight of you by the hollow ships!
Not loitering now, not slinking back tomorrow.
The staff and the wreaths of god will never save you then.
The girl--I won't give up the girl. Long before that,
old age will overtake her in my house, in Argas,
far from her fatherland. slaving back and forth
at the loom, forced to share my bed!
Now go,
don't tempt my wrath, and you may depart alive."

I won't give up the girl! Tragically, but familiarly, this is where European literature begins. 

At any rate, Agamemnon has flown into one of his recurrent rages. As the famous poem continues, an old man walks away, terrified, though the story will hardly end there:  

The old man was terrified. He obeyed the order,
turning, trailing away in silence down the shore
where the battle lines of breakers crash and drag. .
And moving off to a safe distance, over and over  
the old priest prayed to the son of sleek-haired Leto,
lord Apollo...

Terrified, the priest walks away.  But as the story continues, he continues to pray to Apollo, and a plague will soon descend on the Achaean camps.

We're looking here at a first act of rage. In this case, it's the rage of Agamemnon, commander of the Achaean forces. The death-dealing rage of Achilles hasn't been triggered yet. 

That's how the Iliad starts. A similar scene was perhaps on display last week as Dr. Fauci, 85 years of age and a long-honored public servant, sat before a furious Senate committee. 

Rage! Even as the hearing was taking place, Senator Tuberville (R-Alabama) was being interviewed by Newsmax. Justified or otherwise, he voiced the rage to which his Republican colleagues were giving voice inside the hearing room.   

From 1999 through 2008, he'd been head coach at Auburn. Last Wednesday, rightly or wrongly, he turned from the chalkboard with this:

SENATOR TUBERVILLE (7/29/26): He should be locked up before he leaves this building today and put in prison, and then put on trial in front of the American people.

We lost twenty to thirty thousand people in Alabama alone, and I hope every one of them sues this Dr. Fauci—puts him in court.

If we can’t put him in prison, let’s put him in court every day for the rest of his life, where he where he has to be punished and listened to the death that he caused. 

[...]   

I promise you one thing, we will find out if there’s a possibility that we can bring him to Alabama, to put him in front of a court and a jury, to see if we can put this guy in prison. He killed millions of people, folks. I mean, this was a catastrophe.  

Tuberville wanted Fauci sent to prison, then later put on trial. Along the way, he claimed that Dr. Fauci "killed millions of people."

In fairness, one claim was clearly true! The Covid pandemic was indeed a catastrophe. But sometimes, catastrophe can also emerge from acts of fury, not excluding acts of tribal rage. 

Tuberville was speaking with Newsmax from the building where the hearing was taking place. The hearing was chaired by Senator Paul. Back in May, he had tweeted this:   

SENATOR PAUL (5/7/26): He lied to Congress about NIH funding dangerous gain-of-function research in Wuhan and engaged in the worst cover-up in modern medical history. The American people want Fauci behind bars.   

Do we the people really want Dr. Fauci behind bars? Surveys say the answer is no, but the fury has been general over the Republican caucus.  

As we've suggested before:

It seems to us that we can possibly see ourselves more clearly, at this point, through the auspices of literature. The world is perhaps a bit too much with us, given the relentless madness of the present age.

The rage was general over the Republican senators who took part in last week's hearing. Many claims emerged from their fury, but did their furious statements make sense? 

Tomorrow: Furious voices prevail