By skyforbes 
Dr. Oz is the current Administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services under the current administration. His recent comments about denying Medicaid to “able-bodied” Americans may not rise to the infamy of Marie Antoinette’s “let them eat cake” moment, but the tone-deafness is cut from the same gilded cloth. In an interview highlighted by Rolling Stone, Oz — who once ran for Senate and still holds sway in conservative media spheres — argued that people “who are able-bodied and not working” shouldn’t receive free Medicaid. The implication is clear: if you’re not part of the labor force, you don’t deserve basic healthcare. This aligns disturbingly well with the broader anti-welfare, anti-poor agenda advanced by Trump’s allies, even as they continue to style themselves as populist champions of “the people.”
But which people, exactly?
Bastille Day, celebrated every July 14th, commemorates the storming of the Bastille prison in 1789 — a flashpoint of the French Revolution and the embodiment of the cry for liberté, égalité, fraternité. The very essence of that uprising was a repudiation of aristocratic detachment and elite indifference. Dr. Oz’s remarks — and more broadly, the current GOP’s push to gut social safety nets — seem to represent the inverse: a doubling-down on class stratification, justified by an ideology of meritocracy that ignores structural inequities.
There is deep discord between this rhetoric and the reality faced by millions of Americans who struggle to access affordable healthcare, housing, and education in one of the wealthiest nations on earth. Instead of confronting the real costs of inequality, the Oz-Trump axis scolds the poor while courting billionaires. In that sense, it’s not just tone-deaf — it’s dangerous.
If Bastille Day reminds us of the power of the people to rise up against unjust hierarchies, then Dr. Oz’s commentary underscores just how necessary that reminder still is. The contemporary right has embraced a form of soft aristocracy: performative patriotism, billionaire worship, and punishing the vulnerable — all while waving the flag of liberty. But true liberty without healthcare is hollow. Equality without access to basic needs is a myth. And fraternity without solidarity is just another club for the wealthy.
In short, we should be wary of politicians who preach rugged individualism while standing atop the scaffolding of inherited wealth and influence. Let them not eat cake — but let them also not strip food and medicine from the mouths of others.