Doesn't Mitt Romney even know that the US Post Office is a Private Enterprise?

The interesting thing about the USPS is that it actually turns a profit every year. The reason it appears not to have done so as of late is the 2006 mandate that the USPS pre-fund the retiree benefits of its employees. No other corporation or government agency is required to do this, and no one does it voluntarily, for the obvious reason that it is much less costly to grow a retirement package over time using long-term investment strategies than it is to make the payment up front. The USPS may not be perfect, but it is certainly not as broken as people like to pretend.

It doesn’t fit into his black and white thinking. He does not have the intellect of a Barack Obama. The two are light years apart. So, I’m not surprised.

Mitt Romney may or may not know that the USPS is a private enterprise. His knowledge is not important, because he’s campaigning to the tea party. These idiots don’t care if it’s making a profit, is self supporting, or benefits society. If the government has their hands in it at all, even something a simple as government oversight, then they want it destroyed and replaced with a corporate run replacement. Of course, the corporate run replacement then get government handouts for creating jobs.

The US post service is a modern marvel. For the price of what, 44 cents now? ... you can ship a letter to anywhere you want and it’ll show up in a tiny little box. I use the USPS quite regularly for packages off the internet, and I’ve never had any issues.

They’re going broke because by in large they don’t try to earn a profit. A letter that would cost you less than 50 cents at the post office would cost you over $2 at Fedex or UPS.. because they are trying to turn a profit.

The only root problem with the USPS is that letters are a dying thing. It will need downsizing sooner or later… which is basically what it’s current leaders are trying to do.

Mitt Romney is an idiot if he believed either of those things listed. I just changed my address barely a week ago. It wasn’t even a one page paper and I started getting my mail re-routed in barely 2 days.

The Postal Reorganization Act says:

The United States Postal Service shall be operated as a basic and fundamental service provided to the people by the Government of the United States, authorized by the Constitution, created by Act of Congress, and supported by the people. The Postal Service shall have as its basic function the obligation to provide postal services to bind the Nation together through the personal, educational, literary, and business correspondence of the people. It shall provide prompt, reliable, and efficient services to patrons in all areas and shall render postal services to all communities. The costs of establishing and maintaining the Postal Service shall not be apportioned to impair the overall value of such service to the people.

Wikipedia also explains:

The Board of Governors of the United States Postal Service sets policy, procedure, and postal rates for services rendered, and has a similar role to a corporate board of directors. Of the eleven members of the Board, nine are appointed by the President and confirmed by the United States Senate.

…and…

The USPS is often mistaken for a government-owned corporation (e.g., Amtrak) because it operates much like a business, but as noted above, it is legally defined as an “independent establishment of the executive branch of the Government of the United States”, (39 U.S.C. § 201) as it is controlled by Presidential appointees and the Postmaster General.

…and…

Article I, section 8, Clause 7 of the United States Constitution grants Congress the power to establish post offices and post roads, which has been interpreted as a de facto Congressional monopoly over the delivery of mail. Accordingly, no other system for delivering mail – public or private – can be established, absent Congress’s consent.

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Other that dithering about with semantics of legal terms, explain to me how it is that the President of the United States has no authority whatsoever in dealing with the USPO… because the POTUS clearly has access, input, oversight, and veto power here.

And for those who posted quips in support of the premise of the question, I suggest you go back and re-evaluate your intellectual position on the US Presidential race.

I don’t care who you actually vote for – just vote! – but I do care if you have your ideological blinders on. Because that’s really ironic seeing as that’s what the oft-made argument against the right-wing candidate typically is.

The Post Office is not profitable, actually. IIIRC, the Republikans, after they lost in late 2006/early 2007, decided to make it fund decades worth of pensions in ten years, so now the PO is running at a dangerous loss. Just in case anyone thought Republikans don’t hurt you just because they can.

If it weren’t for that, the PO would probably at least break even.

Yes, postal revenues are down, but politics also plays a huge part in the Post Office’s current financial situation. In 2006, in an attempt to bust the Postal Workers’ Union, George Bush signed into law the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006. This law required the Postal Service to pre-fund 100 percent of its entire future obligations for 75 years of health benefits to its employees – and not only do it, but do it within ten years. No other organization, public or private, has to pre-fund 100 percent of its future health benefits.

“No one prefunds at more than 30 percent,” Anthony Vegliante, the U.S. Postal Service’s executive vice president, told reporters last year.

The new law forced the postal service to come up with about $5.5 billion a year for the ten years following the bill’s passage. In 2006, before those payments kicked in, the USPS generated a small profit. Not surprisingly, the USPS is now basically broke.

It is exactly like @SavoirFaire says. Congress inserted a “poison pill” to over fund retirement to make it appear that the Post Office is loosing money. That way they can sell it off to their friends that will make fortunes and raise the price to send letters into the $4_5 range. It is obscene what they are doing but, unfortunately, that is the way corporations run government. We might as well get used to it because the time of representative government for the citizens has passed. We are now owned and operated by large foreign and domestic corporations.

I wonder what’s next. I bet it is some sort of death panel to get rid of the baby boomers.

@Ron_C Have you talked to a doctor, lately? That’s exactly what Obamacare will do. Seniors are not going to be able to get the services, tests, procedures, they do now. That’s how the program “saves Medicare dollars,”——- it just is not going to cover stuff. A doctor shared this disastrous news with me a while back.

Of course not. When you have a horse who does ballet, you tend not to. Just look at how amazed he was that a grocery store has an automatic sandwich making machine. Wawa.

Is it that Romney doesn’t know, or that he uses the fact that most other people don’t know, to his advantage. . . it’s all rhetoric.

The only way Mitt Romney can win is by lying and he knows it.

@SavoirFaire That’s another inconvenient truth. The claim is the post office is losing money hand over fist because the dumb “Gumbent” can’t do anything right. Make that Congress, and you might have a good point. Congress created the current problems the USPS is facing, and they did it deliberately in hopes of destroying jobs and boosting campaign contributors that own the private, for-profit delivery services.

@mattbrowne One thing Romney does understand if the grasp of facts that his base has (or lacks).

@GladysMensch Sadly true.

@tedd The drop off in mail volume would be easy for the USPS to handle. The poison pill the Republican Congress fed the USPS, as covered above by @SavoirFaire and @bolwerk, is what’s killing them and threatening both jobs and continued mail service.

@robmandu Nice try, but I did say 30 years ago, not 42 years ago. The legislative change I was referring to came in 1982, not in the 1970 law you cited

@Ron_C Looks like the death panel Big Lie still has its believers. Anything but the truth. Of course, when you have a law that’s nearly 1000 pages long and is full of references to lots of other laws, the public has no idea what’s in it and will, as @PurpleClouds illustrates, pretty much believe whatever some authority figure tells them. Here’s analysis of the Medicare changes.

@mazingerz88 Sandwich machine? Hell, the guy didn’t even know what doughnuts are called.

@mrrich724 I think @dabbler has it right. The reason political parties resort to Big Lie propaganda is they know if they told you the truth, there is no way in Hell you’d vote for their policies.

@ETpro Oh I agree they could handle it… But long term mail is going the way of the dinosaur, so sooner or later they would have to downsize.

@ETpro, whatever you think you’re citing from 1982 that the USPS is a purely private enterprise that has no government, specifically Executive Branch, oversight doesn’t actually say that. THE PREMISE OF YOUR QUESTION IS FLAWED.

While the USPS can conduct its operations in some ways that are similar to a private business under Title 39, Section 401 of the U.S. Code, it is still subject to Congressional directives (hence the pre-funded retirement plan everyone is whinging about) and of course, nine of the eleven Board of Governors are appointed by the President of the United States.

Now realize that I am not implying that the POTUS would have day-to-day micromanagement of the USPS. Like most things in life, the answer lies in between. The President certainly has influence over the operations of the USPS… but not unilateral control.

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In trying to understand your point, the only reference I can find so far where Romney blasts federal workers is captured here in this Washington Post article.

Nowhere can I find any reference to Romney campaigning to shutdown the USPS or fire over 574,000 people. Which brings me back to THE PREMISE OF YOUR QUESTION IS FLAWED.

Are you just making this all up to whip up a false frenzy to make yourself feel better?

Because there is no way – zero possibility – that any US President in this era is going to shutdown the Post Office. Ain’t gonna happen. I don’t care if a Libertarian were to get elected even. No-one is gonna campaign on that and they’d certainly not actually do it.

@PurpleClouds actually, I have seen a doctor lately and have just turned 65. I am now covered by medicare, Veteran’s Admininstration, and my private policy. Obama’s plan gets more healthcare to people especiallly the ones that were uninsured or uninsurable. If you believe anything else you need to stop watching Fox news.

@robmandu The premise of the question is not flawed, and your picking at irrelevant details that do nothing to dispute the premise is flawed. The question refers to Romney’s stump speech railing against the inefficiencies of the Postal Service because it’s a government funded entity. It is not. For 30 years now, it has operated just like a for-profit business. And except for the poison pill Republicans fed it in 2006, it would be profitable today. That fact coupled with the board being partially appointed by the President flies straight in the face of what Romney is saying—that government is fundamentally flawed and should do essentially nothing. It does NOT support his lies.

Campaigning about the evils of a government run Postal Service sounds to me like campaigning to privatize it. Maybe you know Romney’s really lying about that as well. If so, please share your proof.

@ETpro, do you realize that it has been disclosed that MSNBC edited the tape and that what Romney said is twisted and taken out of context? It is shameful. That isn’t the journalism I use to know. People wakeup!

@bkcunningham No one has mentioned MSNBC. Note that @ETpro referenced an article from The Atlantic in the OP, and that the part of the speech he is discussing is the part that MSNBC removed. When we just look at Romney’s comments about Wawa, he looks a little out of touch. Quite frankly, I think that impression remains even if you see the speech in full. But I also think it’s irrelevant: why should we expect Romney to be intimately familiar with a store operating in only six states? It may be familiar to his audience, but that doesn’t mean it is familiar to everyone.

Restoring the context, however, actually makes things worse. Whereas the Wawa comment reveals an understandable lack of familiarity, the USPS comment reveals a more serious ignorance. It also shows a refusal to fact check when inconvenient since it is extremely easy to verify the size of a change of address form. So while I agree that what MSNBC did was stupid—albeit extremely common on all news channels, as they are more interested in creating the news than reporting it—the furor over it is itself just another attempt to keep people from doing any genuine analysis of the issues.

@SavoirFaire, the article @ETpro linked has a video of Andrea Mitchell with MSNBC and the doctored video. Have you seen footage of his remarks that weren’t edited?

In the unedited version of Romney’s speech, the reference to the USPS isn’t about a simple change of address form.

@bkcunningham Yes, I’ve seen the unedited version. In my opinion, it makes Romney look worse. It’s not just the change of address form; I mentioned that only as one example. There are broader problems, such as the one we’re discussing on this thread. In any case, the linked article has a the video because it is commenting on the controversy. Whether we like it or not, MSNBC’s editing raised the question of whether or not the Wawa comment makes Romney look out of touch.

How can lying raise a question about anything except the fact that someone lied? That is insane, @SavoirFaire. Andrea Mitchell’s segment was based on untruths and she created what you are discussing as controversial. The comments you are discussing that Romney said aren’t true. What part of that don’t you understand.

EDIT: I mean, go on and discuss the USPS, but to say you are discussing Romney’s comments based on the video and the article posted means you are discussing something that isn’t true.

MSNBC is looking for your vote for your news-watching eyeballs. You can turn them off and pick an alternative tv station or other news source any day you want. The Supreme court said it’s legal for “news” organizations to lie and force their presenters to lie. We should expect TV to lie to us by now. Who cares? How can anyone pretend to be outraged or even surprised if it happens?

Mr. Romney is looking for your vote for POTUS, and if he is chosen (by voters or the Supreme Court or Diebold) it sticks for four years, affects far more people far more seriously. History shows us on plenty of occasions that if the POTUS lies the consequences can be deadly serious. That is certainly worth discussing.

Mitt Romney and lying go together:
About trade agreements.
About Obama’s huge majorities in congress the first two years.
About attempts at immigration reform.
About ‘Obamacare’, taxes and spending.
“How can lying raise a question about anything except the fact that someone lied?” Indeed, question and discuss!

How can lying raise a question about anything except the fact that someone lied? That is insane, @SavoirFaire.

I made an observation, not an endorsement. What I said is that it is now a fact that people are discussing it. Do you deny that? I hope not, as it is manifestly true. Whether it should be true is another matter entirely—and not one on which I commented. Furthermore, I said that the reason the video is included in the linked article is because Mitchell’s piece led to it being discussed. This is also manifestly true. If you have a complaint, it is not with me.

Andrea Mitchell’s segment was based on untruths and she created what you are discussing as controversial.

What I called controversial was MSNBC’s editing of the tape. Do you not think that is controversial? Also, we should be more precise. Mitchell’s segments are based on misrepresentations, not untruths. Romney actually said the things she attributed to him. It’s on tape. The problem is that they were taken out of context.

The comments you are discussing that Romney said aren’t true.

This sentence is too ungrammatical for me to respond. As written, it says that Romney made false claims and I am discussing them. I doubt this is what you meant, however. I take it you mean something like “Romney didn’t really say the things you are attributing to him.” The problem with this, however, is that I haven’t attributed anything to Romney except statements he made on tape. I’m quite confident he really said the things I saw him say. And since I’ve seen the full video, I’m not worried about the context. Regardless, I haven’t made any significant comments with regard to Romney’s speech. I said that I don’t care about his lack of familiarity with Wawa, and that the change of address form was a poorly chosen example. These are fairly modest opinions to state, I think.

I mean, go on and discuss the USPS…

That’s all I’ve been doing. I could not care less about what Romney thinks of Wawa.

…but to say you are discussing Romney’s comments based on the video and the article posted means you are discussing something that isn’t true.

Again, this is too ungrammatical for me to respond. In any case, you’ll notice that I did not say I am discussing Romney’s comments based on the video. The only substantive thing I’ve mentioned is independent of both: the USPS actually makes a profit, though it is hidden by trick accounting forced upon it. My other comments were limited to correcting your misreading of other posts (a trend that is continuing in your responses to me).

@SavoirFaire, I apologize. I thought you were discussing the article and edited video that @ETpro posted. I didn’t realize you were discussing something else.

I agree with @SavoirFaire that the entire WaWa segment makes Romney look even more clueless than “awe” of a scanner, or whatever. The fact that he’s trying to compare a business with practices that are already in place with a tee-tiny business making some changes is comparing ants and gorillas.

For another thing, he lied about the 33 page change of address form. Per this source the Federal change of address form is 4 pages long, not 33. Of those 4 pages, two are instructions and two are to be filled out.

Besides, I would hope that the allocation of our taxes would have more stringent requirements than selling sandwiches.

But I am very disappointed in CNBC.

@PurpleClouds In fact, I talked to my doctor yesterday. I originally had an ordinary appointment to look at an on-going condition. His office called and said that they want to make it a complete physical because of the changes Obama made to our health care. If this is Obama care, bring it on. I guess this is the pre-appointment before I see my death panel.:)

I have a friend who is rabidly anti-Obama. She has dropped life-long friends who support Obama. She turns purple at the mention of his name. She was complaining about the ACA. She said poor people who can’t afford insurance will be penalized. I quickly said, “No, it’s people who can afford insurance but don’t get it who will be taxed. The poor people will have some assistance from the government getting insurance. She paused, then said “When my husband retires (in a couple of months) I’m not going to be allowed on his insurance any more! I won’t have any insurance!” She made it clear that she blamed Obama. Talking quickly, I was actually able to explain to her that it was people like her that the ACA was designed to catch, instead of letting them fall through the cracks. I also was able to quickly get in that it wouldn’t go into effect until 2014. I also explained (very quickly) that because of the current changes Obama pushed through early on, no insurance company could turn her down for a pre-exisiting condition. Which she has. She actually went quiet.

@Dutchess_III: No, she didn’t “actually went quiet.” She actually shut the fuck up!

It’s rare to be able to talk to someone like that into a stand still! I just hope that meant I got through to her. In the end I can hear her saying, “Well, maybe the Healthcare things isn’t so bad….but that doesn’t change the fact that he’s still black!!” (Yes, I do believe that has a lot to do with her hatred.)

Haters will hate, no matter what.

Sad.

Hate crowds out any hope of rational thought.