No. I am not getting a ballot in the mail. This is the application to get one to vote in Presidential Election in November. It is going out to every registered voter in Illinois. My wife and step-daughter also received one. Good. This makes it easier to vote. It should be easy to vote. For everyone.
Damn right, the Postal System should be helped, saved, rescued, bailed out, or whatever it takes to keep the 200 hundred plus years of Benjamin Franklin’s brainchild up and running.
It’s long been the dream of the wrong-headed GOP and brain-fogged others to privatize a lot of things including the Social Security, Medicare and the United State Postal Service.
The guy in the Oval Office doesn’t like that Amazon cut a deal with the Postal Service. The current Postmaster General (appointed by the same guy in the Oval Office) has no experience in the system and has ordered sorting machines shut down, overtime stopped, and a whole bunch of other measures that seem intent on slowing services down. Given the pandemic and that more people will want to vote by mail rather than risk congregating in voting lines, it is not unreasonable to assume that that guy in the Oval Office would like very much for the Postal Service to fold up its tents.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but my experience with USPS has always been a good one.
As a kid I wrote a lot to my two oldest cousins, Whitey and Greg. Both of them were in the Navy. I loved that their replies always came via Air Mail. It got me started on a short-lived attempt at collecting stamps. I had a couple of stamp books, never filled them, but did learn how to steam a postmarked stamp off an envelope. I never had anything valuable, and they went the same way as old baseball cards. I always looked forward to writing them and their letters back.
I also looked forward to watching Elmer work. He was our letter carrier on Latrobe Avenue. He was a large jolly man who always had a friendly word for everyone on his route. This was a time when, at least in Chicago, the mail was delivered door to door by the carrier pushing a cart, and Elmer was a magician at it. He would start at one end of the block, with a handful of letters meant for the first house.
He’d give the cart a shove, walk quickly to the mailbox on the house, place the handful of mail in the box and walk to the next house before the cart stopped rolling, grab the next batch of letters, give the cart another shove, and continue this for the entire block. To this day, I don’t understand how he did it every day. Whenever he was on vacation, the mail always arrived a little later.
I used the mail service to file for my conscientious objector status with the draft board. I used the mail service to file my first taxes, and still do that today. One of my nieces works for the Postal Service. And one of America’s greatest songwriters, John Prine, started writing songs on his route, and for some time was known as the singing mailman thanks to an article by Roger Ebert. https://www.rogerebert.com/features/john-prine-american-legend
Prine released an album that alluded to his background.
The other day, I ordered something from Target. Unfortunately, I didn't change my address on my Target account when I moved two years ago. The item was headed for my old address, so I was dutifully tracking it, thining I could head to my old address and get it. This morning, the tracking information said that because my forwarding information was expired, the package was going to be returned to the sender.
I called the local post office where I used to live. The very nice worker there said I might be able to call the courier center and gave me the phone number. There I was connected to another very nice worker who simply asked if I had a tracking number. I did. He looked on his machine. He told me that if it was still at the center, he could forward it to me. He put me on hold, went and checked to find the package. It was. He took my new address information and I should get the item tomorrow.
My favorite experience with the postal system occured with my first wife. I wish I had saved it, but it is the stuff of family lore. I know it will sound impossible, but believe me, it happened.
Her family lived, as they say in Wisconsin, "Up Nort." Grandpa Ed and Grandma Josie lived in a small house in Mishicot, Wisconsin. We lived in was our third apartment in Racine. Grandma Josie was not one to mince words, and was concise at all times. She used to make wine and her specialty was made with her home grown rasberries. She labeled it, "Rasp Drink."
She send us a card to congratulate us on the birth of our daughter. She put a stamp on the envelope. The return address said, Grandman Puta, Mishicot. She addressed it to us as, and I told you'd think it impossible. as this: Tim and Cathie. Racine. We got it two days after it was postmarked. Maybe they had a whole crew of people like Elmer working that day.
So, yes, the Postal Service may have some problems, not entirely of their own making, thanks to the negligence or intent of the current people in charge. It doesn't help that Congress requires the postal system to prefund its pension plan. Yes, there are some problems right now. Yes, it's the first time in forty years that USPS has asked Congress, and taxpayers, for assistance.
But it's not a source of voting fraud despite the claims of the guy in the Oval Office. You can still put a stamp on a piece of mail and it will get there in a relatively short time. UPS and FedEx will never be geared to send Christmas cards or cards from Grandma Josie. In the trillions of dollars the government has spent on coronavirus aide and tax relief for the rich, the amount they need is piddling.
That absentee ballot? I'll probably request one, and then decide what to do with it. Either I'll take it to the voting site or still go in person. But if I do mail it in, I know it will get there and be counted.
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