Rand Paul, unhappy over the budget deal cooked up in secret among Obama, John Boehner, and his very close friend Mitch McConnell,  announced with great fanfare that he is going to filibuster the deal.

The only problem is that friend Mitch manipulated the rules of the Senate to make that impossible.  So Paul's "filibuster," comments made on the Senate floor, lasted about 20 minutes.

Sen. Rand Paul’s so-called “filibuster” against the budget deal, a move his campaign hyped repeatedly and which the Kentucky senator used as a rallying cry at last night’s debate, wasn’t a filibuster at all.

In fact, it wasn’t even a long speech.

The presidential hopeful took to the Senate floor at 2:46 p.m. and ended his remarks less than twenty minutes later.

But that didn't stop Paul from trying to fundraise off his efforts to bring the Senate to a screeching halt for over 20 minutes, tweeting:

#StandWithRand during his debt ceiling filibuster! Donate $20.16 to send a message to the Washington Machine.

There are grounds for hypocrisy here, in three ways.

1) Rand Paul has never been a debt hawk.  In his short Senate tenure, he has been interested in two things: drugs and drones.  (And releasing drug dealers from jail.)  He's never spoken up about budgetary issues, content to go along with the crowd.

2) Rand Paul is very close friends with Mitch McConnell, the same McConnell pushing through this deal.  As McConnell has pushed the Obama agenda over the years, Paul has never seen it as enough of an issue to threaten their political alliance.

3) Rand Paul is trying to copy Ted Cruz's famous 21-hour stand in the Senate against Obamacare funding.  Paul popped his head in for a minute during Cruz's filibuster, but he didn't offer to stay and help, as only Mike Lee did.

Paul is far behind in the polls and seems to think that by copying Cruz, he may get some traction.  It's probably too little, too late.

Seeing Paul criticizing the work of his mentor Mitch McConnell is as discordant as listening to Jeb Bush say the word "anchor babies" or Donald Trump repeating, "I'm a Presbyterian" over and over.

This article was written by Ed Straker, senior writer of NewsMachete.com, the conservative news site.