My Cousin has a disabled child in a wheel chair with Down's Syndrome. He is on Medicare and Medicaid and he cannot work. She works full time at Wal Mart and still get's Medicaid because Wal Mart doesn't pay her enough to get her over the poverty line, so while she is working forty hours a week she is still eligible for Medicaid. Her wages are very low and the Robber Barons of this country will not pay people a living wage. Neither she nor her son will be able to work any more and I think that the Republicans will be surprised to find out that very few people are taking advantage of Medicaid. My best friend is recovering from Lung Surgery. He had Lung Cancer and is 60. He had a restaurant in LA for thirty years and just went bankrupt and lost his business to pay his hospital bills, EVEN THOUGH HE HAS HEALTH INSURANCE. He lost his business. Now he is unemployed and I am sending him bags of groceries every week to keep him alive. Republicans are living in a fantasy land. HARD WORKING PEOPLE still can't afford health care.
Medicare for all would cost half our currant national healthcare expenditure... But then the Oligarchs and Private equity corporations would be left wanting. Can't have that, now, can we?
What is really happening is "corporate welfare". Walmart does not pay its employees enough for them to exceed the poverty line. THEY should be providing health benefits to their employees and pay them a living wage. Therefore WE pay while Walmart makes massive profits.
Yep…and Walmart wins every time because people continue to shop at their stores. If we want to enact positive change, specifically with Walmart, stop shopping there.
I realized how evil Walmart’s business plan was some 30 years ago. It was the only time I shopped at a Walmart and I haven’t shopped in any of their stores since. Ask yourself, ‘do I really need their cheap crap anyways’?
Thank you, my friend with Lung Cancer and my Cousin are both very hard working people, working full time if not more. He worked double shifts just to keep his restaurant open during Covid and now it's all gone. Thirty years just disappeared and his life savings and retirement totally GONE. My cousin works full time at Walmart and then has to take care of her son in the wheel chair. What more do the rich want from them? Do they find this entertaining, watching people suffer?
Solitaire, as to your question of what Republicans want, to see them suffer, the short answer is, "yes!" No empathy is permitted in the Republican ranks. If it shows up, even in a small way, it is pumped out by Toddler-Trump and his goon squad. Trump does not understand empathy or caring about anything but himself and never worked a day in his life, so he simply doesn't care and those collected around him don't care either. It's EVIL!
Victor, if we had universal healthcare, we wouldn't need Medicaid either which would be a really good deal. Living wages would be good too because that would be fair!
Yes, and if the 1%era paid their fair share of tax, the distribution of wealth would help to fund universal healthcare. It’s not capitalism that’s destroying the US, it’s the element of abject greed with capitalism that’s making life difficult.
💔 You’ve nailed it. They haven’t a clue. This great country of ours has never willingly taken care of its citizens. To me caring for the less fortunate is the purpose of government. You are a good friend.
I pray more kind of like meditation. Mike Johnson is the opposite of anything good or christian, that a rabbi Jesus came up with , Johnson is an anathema to all I believe
He also, ( Johnson)because of a phone call from someone who was not yet in the government, Mr Trump, nixed the immigration bill that was about to be law and would have taken that xenophobic crap out of the election. Now we have people being kidnapped off our streets. I am so unforgiving of Mine Johnson. A truly unctuous creep and evil, opposite of a spiritual person. Agghhh
Elizabeth, your word "evil" for Mikey Johnson, hypocrite-in-Chief II (under the full Hypocrite-in-Chief, Trump) is perfect! Mikey likes to wear his christianity like a sign around his neck proclaiming something, but the weight of the sign around his neck keeps him from doing anything that would demonstrate the truth of the sign.
Thank you Everyone, for your kind comments. My best friend set out 30 years ago to start his own restaurant in LA. He was a waiter and didn't have a trust fund and had to take out loans. He had a partner for awhile but then bought them out. His restaurant was in Los Feliz, which was just starting to get nice when he opened. He started out with nothing and built up his restaurant for 30 years and now that he has cancer he has lost it all and had to go bankrupt just to pay for his medical care. He is the American dream... working to create a small business out of the lower middle class, doing it all, working 16 hour shifts a lot of the time... and what does he get from America? Bankruptcy when he turned 60. Because he got cancer. That is how hard working Americans are rewarded now.
Solitaire, I do feel bad for your friends and family in this situation. Republicans like their fantasyland and want to expand it as long as they are not the ones suffering. Their constituents may suffer, but the only thing those in office need from them is their vote. Trump told them that to their face. The really sad thing is that those folks will continue to vote for the people who do harm to them and will find themselves making up a story of their pain being the fault of Biden or Obama or some other Democrat or Independent. Just can't be their Baby Donnie, can it? The answer is "yes," it is their Baby Donnie and his rich friends who would prefer them all to be providing slave labor if they could figure out a way to make that legal.
Use this spreadsheet as a resource to call/email/write members of Congress, the Cabinet and news organizations. Reach out to your own reps, as well as those in other states on a specific committee important to a topic you’re sharing. Use your voice and make some “good trouble.”
Kicking people off Medicaid serves another purpose. It makes people fearful, worried, less robust and less likely to speak out in protest. If you must spend time filling out forms to justify your health coverage, you have less time to attend to what the regime is doing.
The bullies in the Trump organization want us to spend our time being afraid. Making others hurt gives bullies a thrill. Let us all help each other neighbor to neighbor.
Patricia, yep, Republicans in Congress, but elsewhere too have slid downward into evil. It is not clear if there is any way to bring them out of the EVIL they are soaking in, probbably basking in. How do we get the Republicans in the real world to see what is going on and that they, the Republicans/MAGAs in power are the cause of their troubles?
I am one of those primary caregivers who is on Medicaid. I'm not sure where the classification came from that we "do not work" but that is misleading. As a primary caregiver for my 90-year-old stroke-afflicted father, I work hard! My hours never end. It's a 24/7 job. I've been at it 6 years now. I am fortunate enough that my father can afford help for 20 hours a week, when an aide comes. That reduces my workload from 168 hours a week (24 hours x 7) to 148 hours. I'd like to hear from others who put in that many hours of work a week. Further, when am I supposed to find time to fulfill a work requirement?
I just don't understand how anyone could read some of these real life struggles people have and not feel one ounce of empathy for how hard some people have it.
Those of you who have the courage to share your stories really make me sad that there are people in the world who have the means and funds to help others and all they do is want more money.
I wish I had money to change someone's life for the better and not so I could have a bigger house or more expensive car, or a gold fireplace or whatever the hell these people are unfulfilled about, but to know I helped someone who needed it more than I did. Why don't any of these billionaires ever want to pay it forward?
Correct! I tried, and FAILED at three jobs, before I realized I could no longer work. One was my old job I worked at before a sledding accident shattered my skull too.
At least THOSE unemployable monsters that are trying to MURDER me and my ilk were gifted millions by their daddies! (Most useless billionaires became so because of inheritence.)
Republican bosses despise the poor, especially the dark ones. The work requirement implies that the recipients are poor because they are lazy. The scrooges always find a way to justify their stinginess.
Penny, those rich inheriters never had to develop empathy because they could have whatever they wanted, never had to work a day in their lives, and were raised to believe they are superior to everyone else; they're not, just had richer parents.
Thank you Professor Reich! I’m so exhausted with all the right wing stations, CBS, NBC, ABC, and other news stations that haven’t or won’t go through this “BIG BAD RECONCILIATION BILL instead of just briefly going through Medicaid. They don’t emphasize the big tax credit to the wealthy and ultra wealthy ! They definitely don’t discuss that the bill would not allow the judges to hold the Trump administration in contempt and accountable for their illegal actions!
Making hoops too cumbersome to jump through for medical remedies that all human beings should have access to, is just another deplorable tactic to oppress people under the blanket of greed. This is not the land of the free and the brave. This is the land of the greed and grave.
Because virtually all the rural radio and TV stations are owned by the conservative right wing. Many of the newspapers have right-wing owner or have gone under because of the Internet.
I saw someone call it the “billionaire bailout bill” which I think fits it perfectly as well as The Lincoln Project which call it “The Murder Bill”. Either way they win and we lose just so they can pad their pockets. They are also definitely going after ACA since they are trying to tweak the language. What I don’t understand is how some of the things that they have slipped in there have to do with the budget- they don’t- so how can they use the budget reconciliation in order to go around the democrats vote?
I would like to remind us that universal single payer health care for all is cheaper and more efficient than the chaotic for profit system we have now. And if ya want the red carpet and ya got the money fine. This how they do it in the EU, Canada, Israel, Australia I believe and they like it.
Nationalized healthcare here gets labeled as a socialist system and it's a shame this country can't see that it isn't and it works.
Europe has nationalized healthcare and isn't socialist. Japan has nationalized healthcare and isn't socialist. Countries in Europe or like Japan can be very conservative and still have nationalized Healthcare. Conservative parties there support national Healthcare. These countries came out of the most devasting event in human history (ww2) and realized "hey if we take care of our people, then our country grows, our economy grows, our power grows, and we are better off." Now it's a fundamental right there because it works.
Yes, Miriam. Medicaid is a leftover from our apartheid era. Ironically, now many whites rely on it. Medicaid and Medicare must be integrated into a singly federal program (Medicare for All), but would current Medicare recipients vote for it?
No Matter The mere FACT that the Republicans/ MAGA are so inhuman and Crule is unbelievable because a lot of the Trump Supporters will be effected badly in the Red States where they as I said Voted for him and of course those who didn’t no one deserves Not to have needed Medical help for any reason or have their other benefits taken away
So it's really an attack on the poor, along with the attacks on Trans people, gay people, people of color, etc. To me it signals a breakdown of human society. Climate chaos, AI, all the big threats that are not being addressed.
I just now heard that horrible whiny sing-song voice of Trump's in a newsclip, assuring the interviewer that most of the tax cut will benefit the middle class. I was sitting at my desk on the computer and heard that hated voice lying. I jumped up to run into the tv/livingroom and damn near threw a book at the flatscreen. SUCH A FRIGGING LIAR. Every word that issues forth from those anus-shaped lips is a LIE.
My Cousin has a disabled child in a wheel chair with Down's Syndrome. He is on Medicare and Medicaid and he cannot work. She works full time at Wal Mart and still get's Medicaid because Wal Mart doesn't pay her enough to get her over the poverty line, so while she is working forty hours a week she is still eligible for Medicaid. Her wages are very low and the Robber Barons of this country will not pay people a living wage. Neither she nor her son will be able to work any more and I think that the Republicans will be surprised to find out that very few people are taking advantage of Medicaid. My best friend is recovering from Lung Surgery. He had Lung Cancer and is 60. He had a restaurant in LA for thirty years and just went bankrupt and lost his business to pay his hospital bills, EVEN THOUGH HE HAS HEALTH INSURANCE. He lost his business. Now he is unemployed and I am sending him bags of groceries every week to keep him alive. Republicans are living in a fantasy land. HARD WORKING PEOPLE still can't afford health care.
Medicare for all would cost half our currant national healthcare expenditure... But then the Oligarchs and Private equity corporations would be left wanting. Can't have that, now, can we?
Oh, and that would fund it for the whole citizenry. It could cost even less if we did some sane tweaks.
What is really happening is "corporate welfare". Walmart does not pay its employees enough for them to exceed the poverty line. THEY should be providing health benefits to their employees and pay them a living wage. Therefore WE pay while Walmart makes massive profits.
And there, you have it! Take the profits and socialize the risk.
Yep…and Walmart wins every time because people continue to shop at their stores. If we want to enact positive change, specifically with Walmart, stop shopping there.
I realized how evil Walmart’s business plan was some 30 years ago. It was the only time I shopped at a Walmart and I haven’t shopped in any of their stores since. Ask yourself, ‘do I really need their cheap crap anyways’?
I call it Trump’s ᗺig ᗺackassward ᗺoondoggle (ᗺᗺᗺ).
https://kathleenweber.substack.com/p/trumps-ig-ackassward-oondoggle
WOW they have to apply for Medicaid TWICE a year? The Elderly and Disabled too?
I will pray for them
Thank you, my friend with Lung Cancer and my Cousin are both very hard working people, working full time if not more. He worked double shifts just to keep his restaurant open during Covid and now it's all gone. Thirty years just disappeared and his life savings and retirement totally GONE. My cousin works full time at Walmart and then has to take care of her son in the wheel chair. What more do the rich want from them? Do they find this entertaining, watching people suffer?
Solitaire, as to your question of what Republicans want, to see them suffer, the short answer is, "yes!" No empathy is permitted in the Republican ranks. If it shows up, even in a small way, it is pumped out by Toddler-Trump and his goon squad. Trump does not understand empathy or caring about anything but himself and never worked a day in his life, so he simply doesn't care and those collected around him don't care either. It's EVIL!
If business paid living wages people would not need to rely on Medicaid, which is perennially underfunded.
Victor, if we had universal healthcare, we wouldn't need Medicaid either which would be a really good deal. Living wages would be good too because that would be fair!
Yes, and if the 1%era paid their fair share of tax, the distribution of wealth would help to fund universal healthcare. It’s not capitalism that’s destroying the US, it’s the element of abject greed with capitalism that’s making life difficult.
💔 You’ve nailed it. They haven’t a clue. This great country of ours has never willingly taken care of its citizens. To me caring for the less fortunate is the purpose of government. You are a good friend.
They are sociopaths who don’t care about the suffering of others. Only care about themselves like Trump
maybe Mike Johnson will also pray for them them. If you are a Christian pray for his soul and let him know.
Isn't that an oxymoron Victor? Mike Johnson, Christian?
I pray more kind of like meditation. Mike Johnson is the opposite of anything good or christian, that a rabbi Jesus came up with , Johnson is an anathema to all I believe
He also, ( Johnson)because of a phone call from someone who was not yet in the government, Mr Trump, nixed the immigration bill that was about to be law and would have taken that xenophobic crap out of the election. Now we have people being kidnapped off our streets. I am so unforgiving of Mine Johnson. A truly unctuous creep and evil, opposite of a spiritual person. Agghhh
Elizabeth, your word "evil" for Mikey Johnson, hypocrite-in-Chief II (under the full Hypocrite-in-Chief, Trump) is perfect! Mikey likes to wear his christianity like a sign around his neck proclaiming something, but the weight of the sign around his neck keeps him from doing anything that would demonstrate the truth of the sign.
Ha Ruth, great comment, gave me a real nice emotional boost. Bless ya!
Victor, I'd rather tell Mikey Johnson, "well, bless your heart!"
Thank you for helping your neighbor. Diseases hit randomly. You are kind and good.
Appreciating your humanity,
A nurse.
Thank you Everyone, for your kind comments. My best friend set out 30 years ago to start his own restaurant in LA. He was a waiter and didn't have a trust fund and had to take out loans. He had a partner for awhile but then bought them out. His restaurant was in Los Feliz, which was just starting to get nice when he opened. He started out with nothing and built up his restaurant for 30 years and now that he has cancer he has lost it all and had to go bankrupt just to pay for his medical care. He is the American dream... working to create a small business out of the lower middle class, doing it all, working 16 hour shifts a lot of the time... and what does he get from America? Bankruptcy when he turned 60. Because he got cancer. That is how hard working Americans are rewarded now.
Solitaire, I do feel bad for your friends and family in this situation. Republicans like their fantasyland and want to expand it as long as they are not the ones suffering. Their constituents may suffer, but the only thing those in office need from them is their vote. Trump told them that to their face. The really sad thing is that those folks will continue to vote for the people who do harm to them and will find themselves making up a story of their pain being the fault of Biden or Obama or some other Democrat or Independent. Just can't be their Baby Donnie, can it? The answer is "yes," it is their Baby Donnie and his rich friends who would prefer them all to be providing slave labor if they could figure out a way to make that legal.
What I observed was that when people got more stable health insurance through the ACA their ability to maintain a stable work life improved.
Use this spreadsheet as a resource to call/email/write members of Congress, the Cabinet and news organizations. Reach out to your own reps, as well as those in other states on a specific committee important to a topic you’re sharing. Use your voice and make some “good trouble.”
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/13lYafj0P-6owAJcH-5_xcpcRvMUZI7rkBPW-Ma9e7hw/edit?usp=drivesdk
Great Megan! Thanks!!
You’re welcome! Thanks for speaking up right now!
Thank you so much for this!
You’re welcome! Thanks for using your voice right now!
Megan, keep spreading this around. I have shared it with my politically-motivated friends.
I will! Over and over! Thank you for helping share it!
Thank you for the information
I printed this last time I saw it and now keep on my kitchen counter. Grab the phone while cooking and make a few calls.
Thank you for speaking up! Way to go!!
Kicking people off Medicaid serves another purpose. It makes people fearful, worried, less robust and less likely to speak out in protest. If you must spend time filling out forms to justify your health coverage, you have less time to attend to what the regime is doing.
Exactly. Old saying: "In chaos there is control."
The bullies in the Trump organization want us to spend our time being afraid. Making others hurt gives bullies a thrill. Let us all help each other neighbor to neighbor.
Yup, and I'm sure they know that-not for their smarts, just he level of evil they cruise in!!
I call it Trump’s ᗺig ᗺackassward ᗺoondoggle (ᗺᗺᗺ).
https://kathleenweber.substack.com/p/trumps-ig-ackassward-oondoggle
Patricia, yep, Republicans in Congress, but elsewhere too have slid downward into evil. It is not clear if there is any way to bring them out of the EVIL they are soaking in, probbably basking in. How do we get the Republicans in the real world to see what is going on and that they, the Republicans/MAGAs in power are the cause of their troubles?
I am one of those primary caregivers who is on Medicaid. I'm not sure where the classification came from that we "do not work" but that is misleading. As a primary caregiver for my 90-year-old stroke-afflicted father, I work hard! My hours never end. It's a 24/7 job. I've been at it 6 years now. I am fortunate enough that my father can afford help for 20 hours a week, when an aide comes. That reduces my workload from 168 hours a week (24 hours x 7) to 148 hours. I'd like to hear from others who put in that many hours of work a week. Further, when am I supposed to find time to fulfill a work requirement?
I just don't understand how anyone could read some of these real life struggles people have and not feel one ounce of empathy for how hard some people have it.
Those of you who have the courage to share your stories really make me sad that there are people in the world who have the means and funds to help others and all they do is want more money.
I wish I had money to change someone's life for the better and not so I could have a bigger house or more expensive car, or a gold fireplace or whatever the hell these people are unfulfilled about, but to know I helped someone who needed it more than I did. Why don't any of these billionaires ever want to pay it forward?
Jared Huffman (CA District 1 Rep) has named "it" the Big Billionaire Boondoggle (Budget Bill). Seems like a good frame.
Jared is awesome and isn't afraid to call it like it is! We are so fortunate to have him.
Correct! I tried, and FAILED at three jobs, before I realized I could no longer work. One was my old job I worked at before a sledding accident shattered my skull too.
At least THOSE unemployable monsters that are trying to MURDER me and my ilk were gifted millions by their daddies! (Most useless billionaires became so because of inheritence.)
I've noticed that too. They feel entitled and have little or no compassion
Republican bosses despise the poor, especially the dark ones. The work requirement implies that the recipients are poor because they are lazy. The scrooges always find a way to justify their stinginess.
Penny, those rich inheriters never had to develop empathy because they could have whatever they wanted, never had to work a day in their lives, and were raised to believe they are superior to everyone else; they're not, just had richer parents.
you are so right. Money does not make a superior person!!!!!
It seems that the more money a person has the more he wants even more, hence the hatred of the poor.
Its a contest. Who is the richest, can they make more money than someone else...
we love you Daniel,you have much worth to us!
Thank you Professor Reich! I’m so exhausted with all the right wing stations, CBS, NBC, ABC, and other news stations that haven’t or won’t go through this “BIG BAD RECONCILIATION BILL instead of just briefly going through Medicaid. They don’t emphasize the big tax credit to the wealthy and ultra wealthy ! They definitely don’t discuss that the bill would not allow the judges to hold the Trump administration in contempt and accountable for their illegal actions!
Making hoops too cumbersome to jump through for medical remedies that all human beings should have access to, is just another deplorable tactic to oppress people under the blanket of greed. This is not the land of the free and the brave. This is the land of the greed and grave.
Red states are notoriously stingy with Medicaid funding.
That's ironic since they typically take more federal funds than they contribute. Funds that typically come from blue states revenue.
Thank you Robert for a succinct explanation of exactly why this work requirement is not the problem.
Yes, a biiger con job than I thought! But then, what isn't a huge con job with these maniacs!!
Why isn’t EVERY Democrat getting this information on every news station ?
I'm listening to a discussion of this very issue on the PBS Newshour as I read this. No wonder the administration wants to kill public media.
Because virtually all the rural radio and TV stations are owned by the conservative right wing. Many of the newspapers have right-wing owner or have gone under because of the Internet.
Cowardice and selfishness.
I saw someone call it the “billionaire bailout bill” which I think fits it perfectly as well as The Lincoln Project which call it “The Murder Bill”. Either way they win and we lose just so they can pad their pockets. They are also definitely going after ACA since they are trying to tweak the language. What I don’t understand is how some of the things that they have slipped in there have to do with the budget- they don’t- so how can they use the budget reconciliation in order to go around the democrats vote?
I would like to remind us that universal single payer health care for all is cheaper and more efficient than the chaotic for profit system we have now. And if ya want the red carpet and ya got the money fine. This how they do it in the EU, Canada, Israel, Australia I believe and they like it.
Nationalized healthcare here gets labeled as a socialist system and it's a shame this country can't see that it isn't and it works.
Europe has nationalized healthcare and isn't socialist. Japan has nationalized healthcare and isn't socialist. Countries in Europe or like Japan can be very conservative and still have nationalized Healthcare. Conservative parties there support national Healthcare. These countries came out of the most devasting event in human history (ww2) and realized "hey if we take care of our people, then our country grows, our economy grows, our power grows, and we are better off." Now it's a fundamental right there because it works.
Yes, Miriam. Medicaid is a leftover from our apartheid era. Ironically, now many whites rely on it. Medicaid and Medicare must be integrated into a singly federal program (Medicare for All), but would current Medicare recipients vote for it?
No Matter The mere FACT that the Republicans/ MAGA are so inhuman and Crule is unbelievable because a lot of the Trump Supporters will be effected badly in the Red States where they as I said Voted for him and of course those who didn’t no one deserves Not to have needed Medical help for any reason or have their other benefits taken away
So it's really an attack on the poor, along with the attacks on Trans people, gay people, people of color, etc. To me it signals a breakdown of human society. Climate chaos, AI, all the big threats that are not being addressed.
Name the bill contest: Big Bunch of Bullshit Bill
The Murder Bill because it will kill people.
I just now heard that horrible whiny sing-song voice of Trump's in a newsclip, assuring the interviewer that most of the tax cut will benefit the middle class. I was sitting at my desk on the computer and heard that hated voice lying. I jumped up to run into the tv/livingroom and damn near threw a book at the flatscreen. SUCH A FRIGGING LIAR. Every word that issues forth from those anus-shaped lips is a LIE.
Genetics gave him those anus shaped lips in anticipation of all the excrement that was going to expel out of his mouth.