Larsen's forum certainly not open

The "open forum" on Social Security, featuring Rep. Rick Larsen on Saturday afternoon (Feb. 26), was anything but "open." I was the youngest person in that room by 20 years and truly wanted to know more about the pluses and minuses involving George Bush's Social Security plan. But instead of receiving information on the proposed plan, it seemed more like a Democratic rally to undermine proposed Social Security plan and mislead our local senior citizens.

In high school debate you are taught that statistics are nothing without information and factual evidence to back them up. Something Larsen failed to recognize. He read numbers and spewed off "estimated guesses" about the financial shortfalls of the Social Security plan, yet when a question was posed to contest his facts and figures, he would quickly move on, not giving the citizen time to ask his or her question.

My mom asked a clarifying question and was booed and told to be quiet by members of the audience, and my dad was cut off by Rick Larsen himself! Having done my own research on the proposal, I found a lot of what Larsen was saying to be blatantly misleading. This surprises me that an elected official would go out of his way to mislead the public, the same group of people that elected him to office. Next time there is an "open forum" on a government policy I hope the Skagit Valley Herald and the writer do a better job informing the community of what really went on.

Amanda Robertson, Mount Vernon

Letters to the Editor - Skagit Valley Herald