On a federal level the same is occurring with Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare.   People see a big pile of citizen wealth/resources, and they want to take it away and use it for themselves and their rich corporate masters.    They talk a good big pile of blather about all their justifications, but there isn't anything deeper to their actions than plain old exploitation of the many to enrich the few.  That's it.   That's what they do.    And they don't care who they hurt.   

Paul Ryan, who benefited from Social Security after losing his father as a teenager, who used it to pay for his college education, now wants to diminish Social Security benefits for others.  http://www.truth-out.org/buzzflash/commentary/government-programs-and-taxpayers-financed-paul-ryan-he-didn-t-make-it-on-his-own