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Craig Nixon's avatar

More on the current Medicaid debacle...

๐“๐ก๐ž ๐–๐ก๐ข๐ญ๐ž ๐‡๐จ๐ฎ๐ฌ๐ž ๐‰๐ฎ๐ฌ๐ญ ๐Œ๐š๐๐ž ๐Œ๐ž๐๐ข๐œ๐š๐ข๐ ๐–๐จ๐ซ๐ค ๐‘๐ž๐ช๐ฎ๐ข๐ซ๐ž๐ฆ๐ž๐ง๐ญ๐ฌ ๐„๐ฏ๐ž๐ง ๐–๐จ๐ซ๐ฌ๐ž

โ€œ๐ผ๐‘กโ€™๐‘  โ„Ž๐‘Ž๐‘Ÿ๐‘‘ ๐‘›๐‘œ๐‘ก ๐‘ก๐‘œ ๐‘กโ„Ž๐‘–๐‘›๐‘˜ ๐‘กโ„Ž๐‘Ž๐‘ก ๐‘กโ„Ž๐‘’ ๐‘๐‘Ÿ๐‘ข๐‘’๐‘™๐‘ก๐‘ฆ ๐‘œ๐‘“ ๐‘กโ„Ž๐‘’ ๐‘๐‘œ๐‘™๐‘–๐‘๐‘ฆ ๐‘–๐‘  ๐‘กโ„Ž๐‘’ ๐‘๐‘œ๐‘–๐‘›๐‘ก.โ€

Federal Medicaid work requirements are being implemented as part of President Trumpโ€™s so-called One Big Beautiful Bill, a budget and spending bill which is also cutting nearly a trillion dollars from Medicaidโ€™s budget over the next decade.

Under the interim final rule, people with certain conditions who are already on Medicaid will no longer be automatically considered โ€œmedically frail,โ€ a classification that exempts them from work requirements; they must provide further proof, beyond their diagnosis, that they are โ€œgreatly impairedโ€ from working. The new federal rule is notably stricter than what was implemented in Nebraska, a GOP-dominated state that voluntarily enacted work requirements eight months before the deadlineโ€”but which at least retained a list of conditions considered automatically exempt from work requirements for those on Medicaid.

While the federal interim rule is harsh, it is not final: there is a 60-day public comment period, after which states have until the end of the calendar year to implement (or, in Nebraskaโ€™s case, modify) their Medicaid work requirements.

โ€œItโ€™s going to be very costly in terms of time as well as money,โ€ Wagner said, โ€œand, realistically, states are not going to be able to do this accurately by January 1.โ€

There is no way to implement Medicaid work requirements without disabled and chronically ill people losing their access to the program, despite the claims of Republican politicians like House Speaker Mike Johnson (Rโ€“La.).

โ€œItโ€™s hard not to think that the cruelty of the policy is the point,โ€ Boulder economics professor Chloe East said. โ€œAdding work requirements to Medicaid is part of a massive shift in our safety net in this country under this administration to make it as small and hard to access as possible.โ€

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/06/hhs-medicaid-work-requirements-health-care-federal-rule/

Matt Rudow's avatar

It sure looks like he got a few of those 30 seconds of happiness hanging out with a sex offender before he told everyone Epstein was no big deal without disclosing it!!

TootsStansbury ๐Ÿ‡บ๐Ÿ‡ฆ's avatar

David Brooks is a dweeb. A lightweight.

Tetman Callis's avatar

I can't say I have ever read David Brooks. I think I probably have, but nothing really stuck with me.

I couldn't have said what might be annoying about him until I got to the part of Dok's story where he cites to the Newark Airport story. Yeah, I remember that. Brooks showed himself to be almost infuriatingly clueless.

OneYieldRegular's avatar

David Brooks is the Bill Maher of William Bennetts.

Tecolote's avatar

I subscribe to the NYT, but didn't know that Brooks had retired from the paper, because, as is the case for many Times readers, you just stopped reading him years ago.

Three Raccoons In A Trenchcoat's avatar

Even thinking about that man makes me want to scour the inside of my eyeballs with bleach.

Yopi's avatar
8mEdited

Just like Franรงois Duvalier, Augusto Pinoche, Ferdinand Marcos, and others, our orange orc is going to hold to power. That ballroom is for nobody else. No plans to leave the WH ever.

MRK's avatar

He can dream whatever he wants. We don't have to accept it.

Sun's avatar

To deal with what a moral philosopher deals with, though, you actually have to, um, be a moral philosopher. Which takes years of specialized training. We already have plenty of excellent moral philosophers.

pstokk's avatar

Willing to bet Brooks' current wife hires the interns now.

Sun's avatar

Why do these guys keep failing upward? A woman of comparable mediocrity wouldnโ€™t be allowed to succeed. Et tu, The Atlantic?

zuludaddy (seamonkey!)'s avatar

here is a true story

in the 1980s at an unnamed university in New England,

the professor of ethics, who had been carrying on with the wife of the professor of aesthetics, who in turn had been carrying on with the wife of the professor of ethics

divorced his wife and married his lover, as did the professor of aesthetics

wheeeeeeeeee!

TerseNurse's avatar

I'm waiting for the part with the surprisingly well-endowed anesthesiologist

MRK's avatar

Sounds like the set up to a logic puzzle.

marcus816's avatar

โ€œYeah, itโ€™s not hate; itโ€™s just deep, abiding irritation.โ€

I would have to care a lot more about him to hate him.

Heโ€™s not a despicable character like Weiss or Taibbi, just tedious.

(I have to admit, though, that I admired him briefly when he got verklempt at Bidenโ€™s inauguration because he, like myself and so many others, thought that the Giant Orange Pervert was gone forever.)

Dave's Not Here's avatar

"Sometimes a cheese sandwich really hits the spot"

By David Brooks

Mysterysurf's avatar

Lead singer Levi Stubbs of the Four Tops was born on this day in 1936. Here's their recording of "Standing In The Shadows Of Love" from 1966:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ahs5_CrbC0

And here's the group in 1967 performing "Bernadette":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJ0_gbofahM

Tetman Callis's avatar

I will go to those links and watch and listen. I've always liked "Bernadette."

pstokk's avatar

Countdown to Douthat boinking his intern and leaving his wife. But in a moral philosophical way of course.

MRK's avatar

Didn't he move to Hungary because the US was too woke? Or am I getting him mixed up with some other dipshit?

pstokk's avatar

Other dipshit I think. Douthat has his little perch at the NYT where he is a very, very serious person.

TerseNurse's avatar

I can't tell these dipshits apart anymore, and I no longer wish to expend the energy to google them and figure it out