The most important thing she'd learned over the years was that
there was no way to be a perfect mother
and a million ways to be a good one.
Jill Churchill
Chart of the Day: ObamaCare Hasn't Reduced the Underinsured
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| Via Independent Institute |
Rand Paul is AWESOME!
The Natural Right to Self-Expression vs. the Speech Fascists
A Well-Raised Child
Facebook Corner
(Rand Paul). Caption this
"And-stay ith-way and-Ray"
(FEE). Today, Venezuela’s inflation rate is over the top.
No wonder they've run out of toilet paper: the government needs to print bolivares...
(Citizens Against Government Waste). USPS is a "money pit"
Ir's comical watching all the postal union whores spamming these threads with the same old same old complaints. The fact of the matter is that the USPS maintains a government monopoly with an obsoleted failing business model, which threatens to unload unfunded employee/retiree liabilities on the taxpayer vs. postal customers. And despite repeated debunked USPS gripes about prefunding by GAO and OPM: "unlike other federal entities, the USPS was created as a self-sustaining organization. Thus, it has a unique obligation to pay for its own liabilities rather than pass that expense onto the taxpayers. Similarly, while private companies are not always required to prefund such obligations, they do not enjoy the USPS’s federal guarantees, and the law does not require taxpayers to cover their debts."
Furthermore, despite the protests by USPS propagandists, "What [the USPS spokesman] does not mention in the commercials is that the Postal Service has special preferential borrowing privileges with the federal government. He does not mention that the monopoly power of the Postal Service to jack up stamp prices without fear of customers turning to competitors is a kind of government-backed power to tax. He does not mention that stamp prices might go down, as do the prices of many other goods and services, if the Postal Service were subject to competition. He does not mention that the USPS has billions of dollars in unfunded pension liabilities backed by the federal government, that is, by American taxpayers. He does not mention that, unlike private enterprises, the Postal Service is exempt from most taxes." Whereas the government is responsible for some issues, e.g., not empowering the USPS to shutter thousands of money-losing facilities, corrupt protected union contracts that account for roughly 80% of costs, at least 50% above its limited competition for certain market niches (where the USPS has a government-guaranteed pricing advantage), the fact is that the USPS, like all full or quasi-government entities, simply can't compete, period, and has repeated failed. Recall the great nineteenth century libertarian Lysander Spooner who pointed out, unlike the earlier Confederation, the Constitution did NOT establish for a "sole and exclusive" post office, "Spooner continued to successfully and cheaply deliver mail for seven years before the US government shut down his operation. The 12¢ stamps sold by the USPS were no match for Spooner's 3¢ stamps, so the US government, in order to oppose the inevitable, officially declared that all city streets were to be deemed post roads, available only to the USPS in letter delivery."
While private sector companies have had to compete by radically improving speed and costs, "skip ahead to the 1900s and we see that the price of a first-class stamp increased 633 percent in only 27 years, and this number is supplemented by a 10 percent speed decrease in 15 years. " And that's despite things like increasingly delivering to cluster boxes (like my parents have had to use a few hundred yards from their house). Not to mention "before 1950 the mail was delivered twice a day, or a dozen times week. Soon postal customers can look forward to just five deliveries a week. Unless there is a holiday, of course."
(Citizens Against Government Waste).
Bad customer service is costing the Post Office big time...
I love my post office and it's employees!!!!!
I hate my post office, its arrogant, self-serving employees, long lines, horrible service and bloated pricing.
I love every post office I have ever walked into, in the several states I have lived in. In my 36 years, I have had ONE problem with them.
I was actually punched to the kidneys behind my back by one of a group of postal employees in an El Paso post office (around 1989) as I argued with a postal manager over reimbursment of a postal insurance claim. (An Illinois-based software company with a product guarantee did not want to acknowledge receipt of the package. The USPS told me it was my, not their, responsibility to obtain their signature, subject to prosecution of fraud, the business did not receive the package. The business had no incentive to respond to me, and I was arguing the USPS needed to provide me with confirmation they delivered the insured package.)
Political Cartoon
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| Courtesy of Michael Ramirez via Townhall |
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| Courtesy of Scott Stantis via IPI |
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| Courtesy of the original artist via Reason |
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| Courtesy of Eric Allie via IPI |
Cat Stevens, "Morning Has Broken". His second straight A/C #1.
