Matt McEntire misunderstands and misrepresents the Social Security issue in his column of 8/25/08. Social Security is not going bankrupt. The annual report by the Social Security Trustees for 2008 reaffirmed that the program is in fine fiscal shape over the near term, and will be able to pay 100 percent of promised benefits for over three decades. By 2041, if nothing more was done, the program’s income would be able to cover only 78 percent of benefits. But the trustees concluded that modest revenue increases would cover the projected shortfall for 75 years and beyond, and that Social Security is structurally sound and not in need of drastic changes. A problem McEntire doesn’t mention is that Congress began dipping into the Social Security Trust Fund (the surplus that the program accumulates each year – yes, it is in surplus) to cover up deficits generated by the Bush administration. This is money the government owes itself, in effect, but it reflects the general irresponsible fiscal policies of the GOP, as does the assertion of a Social Security “crisis” to justify the beginning of privatization of the program. Private accounts are valuable for retirees, but not as a substitute for Social Security. The private accounts proposed by President Bush would have been deducted from the current system. It’s a strange way to protect a system’s solvency by taking MORE money out of it. Social Security is a guarantee, not a risk program. McEntire cites an example of private accounts getting large returns in the 1980s, but fails to mention the current stock downturn. Retirees who put their Social Security savings into stocks over the last couple years would have lost most of those benefits. McEntire should educate himself just a little before calling Mary Landrieu a “half-wit.”J.D. Daigle