This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
I just finished a book titled "Ghost Soldiers," about the rescue of American fighting men from a Japanese POW camp in the Philippines. The rescue unit doctor was wounded and, because of his condition, could not be carried out. His only hope of survival was to get to a hospital via airplane, but there was no airstrip.
The local people in the village spent the entire night digging out vegetation, some of them using their bare hands, in order to build a place for the plane to land.
Unfortunately the doctor did not survive, and, today, it seems, neither does the idea that life is precious, and people are worth saving, no matter what it takes — at least not in local and national GOP legislative circles.
I was deeply struck by the difference in attitudes of those humble heroes who tore apart an entire rice field in one night to save a stranger, and those of the people governing our state.
Their callousness and inaction reveal that they don't care what is happening to the ill, wounded and poor who are not getting proper treatment due to lack of Medicaid funding in Utah ("No Medicaid expansion deal reached in Utah," Tribune, March 13).
Becky Heiss
Salt Lake City