A Few More Details and Derails

Well, I had great intentions for tonight's episode, but the research caught me off guard and it's not the simple investigation I was planning on. More about that in a moment.

G-d bless PBS NewHour. Tonight they ran an interview with Grant Lally, publisher of the North Shore Leader, the paper that broke the Santos story last September. I loved what Geoff Bennett said: "...after a bombshell report by the New York Times last month, but the Times wasn't the first to report on Santos' fabricated biography..." Nowhere in the original NYT article does it mention that. And that, folks, pissed me off. 

Lally told PBS interviewer Geoff Bennett:

Well, look, he was a prominent personality while he was running for office. And we're pretty attuned to the political activities of folks on the North Shore.

 

So, a lot of people with a newspaper and a lot of people I knew outside the newspaper were following him and tracking him and looking at what his claims were. And what we all concluded was that he was a fraud. He was making things up and lying and boasting and putting people down, claiming he was such a rich man, when he clearly wasn't.

 

And so we all smelled a fake, and we started looking through his campaign finance reports. And we saw a lot there that looked fraudulent, really over-the-top fraudulent.

Watch the interview with Greg Lally. It's quite enlightening. The segment begins at -28.00:

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...........

USPS seems to be imploding before our very eyes. I no longer get mail on a daily basis. Even with Informed Delivery, they tell me mail is coming, but it rarely shows up when it's supposed to. I've had three packages showing "out for delivery," but never delivered. One came 10 days after the tracking notice showed it was out for delivery. I actually wrote to my congresswoman, Angie Craig, and was assured I was not only not alone and she was starting a formal complaint process with the Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy-less. 

Here's the thing: the PG is actually appointed by the USPS board of governors. He does not serve at the pleasure of the president, although the president often nominates the candidate. DeJoy was nominated by Feckless Loser despite known conflicts of interest with the Postal Service. From the outset, he has done more to damage the USPS than to help it, despite his claims to the contrary. 

A dear friend who works in a rural post office in another state sent me the following:

I had hoped to talk to my friend SXXXXX, who's been a letter carrier for 37 years, as to what he sees as different. I know there's been new--expensive--sorting machinery, which, like most of DeJoyless's ideas, didn't work. 

The consensus is that the man is trying to destroy the USPS, and it's working. I read the "customer satisfaction" surveys every day.  Customers are swearing off the USPS in droves. 

Since it is an absolute nightmare of a place to work, we can't hire enough people. Particularly difficult roles to fill are the delivery people, whose work week is 7 days. I know he's hired many new people--who have no more idea how a post office works than how to make mayonnaise.

I've heard tales from the front lines who report sorting machines that worked were pulled and not replaced, leaving the ones that were there flooded beyond capacity. On the few days I actually do get mail, much of it isn't mine or my neighbors...it's for different buildings on my block. I don't know what anyone else does, but I drive around and deliver the mail. That's what I hope someone would do with my mail. 

So I started researching DeJoy, USPS, and some of the peripheral issues. It wasn't a can of worms...it was a veritable snake pit.  Here's the thing: USPS is an important agency and one that is mentioned in the Constitution under Section 8: The Powers of Congress. It includes the following statement:

To establish Post Offices and post Roads

Which basically means postal service is a constitutional right. And yes, the post service should attempt to be self-supporting. And yes, I know all about mail levels dropping and shippers creating ties for package delivery. Di-dah, di-dah, di-dah. That's what the research is about at the moment. And before you blame Amazon for USPS non-delivery of your Prime orders, understand that it's contracts with Amazon, UPS, and Fed-Ex that might just be keeping the post office afloat. Still, that does not relieve the Postmaster General of his responsibility to keep USPS mail delivery on track. 

So enough for now. It's been a challenging week here and it ain't over yet. 

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

I understand we Minnesnowtans are not alone with USPS issues.

but I do have a request of you, gentle readers: 

if you are NOT getting normal mail delivery,  please leave a comment,

or send an email to me with your town, state, and zip code.