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Letter: The wish behind the Republicans’ fear

(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Robert Walton joins the fight in the Capitol rotunda on Monday, Jan, 28, 2019, on the first day of the Legislative session to rally in support of protecting Proposition 3, the Medicaid Expansion law recently passed by voters.

Both George Pyle's and Robert Gehrke's excellent columns Wednesday about the Utah Legislature ignoring Proposition 3 decry the Legislature ignoring the will of the people and their stated reasons for doing so.

A worthwhile question to consider is why the Republicans in both the State Legislature and in Congress have decried Obamacare from the beginning. One reason was that Obama was guilty of being “PWB" — "President while black.” But, on a more sinister level, the oft stated “reason” is that the federal government would run out of Medicaid funds, leaving the states holding the tab. This continues to be the stated reason right through today, despite almost 10 years of experience that it is not happening and not going to happen, unless, could the real reason the Republicans hold on to this idea so tenaciously be that as part of their overall strategy of "starving the [federal] beast," bringing the federal government to a close, not just in temporary shutdowns, but permanently, is in fact what they want?

Freud talked about the "wish behind the fear." Are the Republicans, through their alleged fear, simply revealing their wish?

Michael A. Kalm, Salt Lake City

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