According to the LA Times, the USPS is in “crisis”:
🙄 🙄
This is supposedly a “news” piece, not an opinion, yet it is blatantly written from the Democrat perspective:
“WASHINGTON — Spurred by fears that President Trump is trying to eviscerate the U.S. Postal Service to help him win reelection, Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday abruptly summoned the House back to Washington this week to pass a bill aimed at rolling back administration cutbacks that could cripple widespread mail-in voting.”
Right, because everyone knows Nancy Pelosi would never play politics or put on a show. No sir-ee. All she cares about is Election Integrity™! Trump is the only one with an agenda.
“Congressional Democrats also called on the recently appointed postmaster general to testify Aug. 24 at an emergency hearing by a House committee about cost-cutting moves that led to steep slowdowns in mail service in much of the country over the last three months.”
Great, another sham hearing to provide Democrats a stage to thunder and grandstand. That’ll fix it.
“As election officials brace for a record number of mail-in ballots due to the COVID-19 pandemic, reports of worsening mail delays, shorter post office hours and greater service disruptions since May have raised alarms about potential voter disenfranchisement and political chaos after polls close Nov. 3.”
Any chance these delays, shortened hours and “greater service disruptions” could have anything to do with the virus. No, I’m sure it’s all Trump Subterfuge.
“In a “Dear Colleagues” letter, Pelosi called on the House, which is in summer recess until after Labor Day, to return to session this week to vote on a bill that would ban postal authorities from making “changes to operations or level of service” that were in effect Jan. 1, 2020.”
Guarantee you this bill is crammed full of other Democrat wish-list items and handouts to special interests, but the media will never mention that part.
The supposed insurgent renegade Bernie Sanders fell in line and repeated the Democratic talking points:
This is a “matter of life and death.” Be afraid!
It’s 24/7 fear porn from them now. Be afraid of the virus! Black people, be afraid of the police! Seniors, Trump is trying to KILL YOU! EVERYONE MUST LIVE IN CONSTANT FEAR!
House Whip Jim Clyburn:
Trump is “signing a death warrant for a lot of people!”
What’s really going on here? It can be difficult to keep up with the left and all their deranged narratives, because it seems like there’s a new one every week.
But as long as you start from that assumption–that it’s yet another B.S. deranged narrative–you’re fine: this is just the latest in a long line of Democrat hoaxes designed to delegitimize the President and prepare the left to furiously reject the results of the upcoming election.
First things first, USPS is not government-funded. Trump is not depriving it of funding. The USPS is self-funded. Meaning it covers its own expenses; it does not rely on annual funding like, say, the State Department or the FDA. This is why we have to pay for stamps and large envelopes, etc.
This should be obvious: anyone who has ever mailed anything knows you have to pay for it. It’s not free.
If the USPS was taxpayer-funded, you wouldn’t have to pay for anything. So right off the bat, the claim that Trump is withholding or cutting funding for the USPS is nonsense. The USPS funds itself.
Now, the USPS is indeed running out of money and wants a bailout, and there’s disagreement between the two parties over that, but that’s a very different thing from cutting or withholding annual funding. More on this in a bit.
Second, this idea that millions of people are going to die because they can’t get their Social Security Checks is also nonsense: the Treasury Department began phasing out paper checks in favor of direct deposit back in 2011, under President Barack Obama. It’s true:
“The U.S. Department of Treasury began phasing out paper Social Security checks and other federal benefit checks on May 1, 2011. It required anyone applying for Social Security checks and other federal benefits on and after that date to receive their payments electronically.
Those who began receiving Social Security checks before May of 2011 have until March 1, 2013, to sign up for electronic payments, the Treasury Department announced. Those who don’t sign up to have their Social Security checks direct-deposited by that date would receive their benefits through the Direct Express card program.
“Getting your Social Security or Supplemental Security Income payment by direct deposit or Direct Express is safer and more reliable,” Michael J. Astrue, the commissioner of Social Security, said in announcing the change.”
Sorry, Bernie. Not today.
Third, the USPS has been in bad financial shape for years. It has not turned a profit since 2006, and even then it was just barely:
Since 2006, the USPS has lost over $80 billion. What do you do when your business is losing billions of dollars per year? You cut spending. Those freaking out about the Postmaster General cutting spending act like this isn’t Business 101. The Postal Service is losing tons of money, and cutting spending is a means to stay afloat, not sabotage the mail-in voting operation for the election.
The reason the USPS is losing money is because Americans are sending less and less mail with each passing year. In 2009, Americans sent over 176 billion pieces of mail. In 2019, they sent 142 billion pieces of mail:
So it’s not as if the USPS was in terrific financial shape until very recently. It has been in bad shape for a while now.
Fourth, there is no “Postal Service crisis” that needs to be addressed immediately in time for the election. This is pure fiction. The USPS is definitely in bad financial shape, but it will be solvent for several months beyond the election:
“The sharp reduction in mail delivery caused by the pandemic initially threatened to plunge the agency into even more dire straits, with the Postal Service reporting $2.2 billion in net losses in 2020’s third quarter.
The Postal Service now projects that it will run out of money by April 2021 if package volume returns to pre-pandemic levels and by October 2021 if package volume stays at 15% above pre-pandemic levels, Federal News Network reported.“
The Plannedemic is the reason the USPS took a nosedive. Anyone should be able to connect those dots. The Democrats are flat-out lying in claiming this needs to be addressed with legislation now.
Another part of the problem the government can’t figure out how to float the USPS is because the Democrats are–and I’m sure this will come as a shock to you–making some unreasonable demands. Of course the Business Insider article is openly on their side, acting as if anything the Democrats demand should be granted without opposition and any disagreement is unreasonable:
“While the stimulus bill extended the Postal Service greater flexibility to borrow up to $10 billion from the federal government subject to Treasury Department approval, it didn’t extend the agency any emergency government funding or forgive $11 billion in outstanding debt to Treasury, two of the measures that congressional Democrats called for.
I love the casual tone the article takes toward forgiving $11 billion in USPS debt as if it’s no big thing. “And those Mean Republicans wouldn’t even write-off the $11 billion the USPS owes the Treasury! Can you believe it? What assholes!”
And the last part, as if it’s inherently bad that the stimulus bill wasn’t entirely dictated by the Democrats. There’s zero skepticism at all about the Democrats’ demands. The author just takes it on-faith that the Democrats have all the answers.
“The Post reported that while Congress initially came to an agreement on giving the Postal Service a $13 billion grant, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin quashed the grant, telling lawmakers, “You can have a loan, or you can have nothing at all.”
What?! A loan! How unreasonable!
Byron York has more on the legislation at the center of this:
“The House HEROES Act would give $25 billion to the Postal Service in what is essentially a bailout. The bill mentions nothing about helping the Postal Service handle the upcoming election or any other election. Indeed, the only stipulation at all placed on the $25 billion is that the Postal Service, “during the coronavirus emergency, shall prioritize the purchase of, and make available to all Postal Service employees and facilities, personal protective equipment, including gloves, masks, and sanitizers, and shall conduct additional cleaning and sanitizing of Postal Service facilities and delivery vehicles.” If the House Democrats who wrote and passed the bill intended the money to be spent specifically for elections, they did not say so in the text of the legislation.
Separate from the Postal Service provisions, the bill would give $3.6 billion to the Election Assistance Commission for distribution to states “for contingency planning, preparation, and resilience of elections for federal office.” There has been some confusion about that; some discussion of the current controversy has left the impression that Democrats want $3.6 billion for the Postal Service for the election. In fact, the $3.6 billion would be for the states’ election use. In neither the CARES Act, which is now law, nor the HEROES Act, which has been passed by the House but not the Senate, is there any money given to the Postal Service specifically for the election.
In any event, the Postal Service has the capacity to handle the election and does not need any additional money specifically to do the job.”
Because, as the chart above showed, the USPS handled over 142 billion pieces of mail last year, or 389 million pieces of mail per day. This year the number is inflated slightly due to stimulus checks and census forms being mailed out. But if you do some quick back-of-the-envelope math, the USPS will have no problem handling the mail-in ballots. A couple hundred million pieces of mail at most, over several weeks, are not going to overload a system that handles 142 billion pieces of mail per year.
York points out the real problem with mail-in voting:
“There are, of course, compelling examples of election dysfunction, most notably the mess New York made of some of its congressional primaries this summer.
Fifth, and I’ll keep this brief because this post is running long, the claim that Trump is removing mail sorting machines. Washington Post, of all places, with a dose of sanity (despite of the blaring FEAR PORN headline):
“Purchased when letters, not packages, made up a greater share of postal work, the bulky and aging machines can be expensive to maintain and take up floor space that postal leaders say would be better devoted to boxes. Removing underused machines would make the overall system more efficient, postal leaders say. The Postal Service has cut back on mail-sorting equipment for years since mail volume began to decline in the 2000s.”
But it’s not like facts matter to the Democrats and their minions in the media. In fact, I’m sure they’re all fully aware of this. But they’re also quite aware of the fact that they can fool people with easy (but untrue) narratives that appear to make sense: “Trump is removing the sorting machines to sabotage the election!!!!!!” If you’re predisposed to hate Trump, you’ll probably believe this without hesitation.
Whatever. As long as there’s more of us than there are of them on November 3…
If you have time, I would highly recommend reading York’s entire piece. He explains everything very well (in typical Byron York fashion). But I’ve gone over the biggest points here.
Ultimately, this does not have to affect the election at all: people simply have to go and vote in-person on election day. That, or request their mail-in ballot early enough.
You know: the way we’ve always done it.
If you can march through the streets shoulder-to-shoulder protesting the Evil Orange Man’s scheme to Destroy the Postal Service, you can go vote in person.
There is no Postal Service “crisis,” at least not one of Trump’s making. A decade-and-a-half decline in revenues compounded by the unprecedented disruption caused by the virus, have brought the USPS within a year of insolvency. But the USPS will be just fine handling the mail-in ballots this fall. If there are 200 million mail-in ballots handled (a higher-end estimate, and one which covers both outgoing and incoming ballots), that would represent an increase of 0.0014% over last year’s 142 billion pieces of mail.
I think we’ll be fine, Cassandra.
It’s the Iron Rule of Projection in the Trump-era: the Democrats are guilty of the very thing they are accusing Trump of. Always. This Postal Service nonsense is no different.
They’re trying to set up the narrative that Trump is rigging the election so that when they lose they will have a pre-made excuse.
Russiagate didn’t work.
The Plannedemic didn’t work.
The George Floyd Riots didn’t work (and in fact probably backfired massively on them).
Now, with time running out, their final act of desperation is to manufacture a built-in excuse for when they lose the election.
Many of us–mentally and emotionally battered by the past 8 months of fear porn and lies–were expecting their grand finale PsyOp of 2020 to be huge: aliens, all-out war, etc.
But it’s starting to feel like they’re out of ammo, and now they’re grasping. Notice the shift in the narrative: the Virus and the race riots were designed to turn the public against Trump, but this Postal Service “crisis” is about having a ready-made excuse for when they lose the election.
See the difference?
Everything the Democrats say is a lie. Everything. Don’t worry about what they say. You can safely ignore everything they say. It’s all bad-faith, dishonest and cynical.
You do not have to worry when they accuse Trump of something. They’re not going to “get” him or bring him down with a made-up scandal. Everything they say about him is a lie. Everything. It’s all they have at this point. They’re shooting blanks.
Just remember this and take heart: all their lying and gaslighting and psychological abuse is coming from a position of weakness and desperation. They are backed into a corner. They’re trying to lie, cheat and deceive their way back to power.
It’s clearly not working. They’ve shifted from trying to scare voters away from Trump to establishing a pre-set excuse to call the election results illegitimate. They’re panicking.