My mom recently moved to a smaller place, necessitating a review of a lifetime of stuff. Among the goodies, we came across two copies of the booklet produced for her older brother’s wedding.
I packaged one of the booklets in a kraft envelope, with a piece of cardboard to protect it. At the Post Office it weighed in at 1.2 ounce, and, cost just $4.50 to get it to my cousin in Chesterfield.
Yes, $4.50.
The postal service has reclassified mail and since the kraft envelope (the same height as a #10 envelope) had that cardboard protector, well, it became a First Class Parcel with a minimum charge of $4.50.
Speaking of mail, last Tuesday as the weather deteriorated, our mail came early – what there was of it. No grocery ads, no pension check for my wife and not even the common offer for a free dinner to talk about our retirement. I didn’t expect to get mail on Wednesday and Thursday seemed iffy (despite a puff piece of KMOV about the mail carriers preserving despite the weather). No mail came on Friday, either. When I heard the mail truck Saturday I expected the box to be stuffed. It wasn’t, just four pieces and two of those were junk.
Sunday I picked up my mom’s mail at the old house. Doing a quick sort, 95%+ consisted of begging requests from charities – most of them I didn’t recognize. Knowing she wouldn’t care, I opened the “Official Business” letter from the ELECTIOIN FRAUD TASK FORCE, AN EMERGENCY PROJECT OF [the] UNITED STATES JUSTICE FOUNDATION.
It had a fancy seal on the left side of the envelope and a faux post mark with the Statue of Liberty. Inside the appeal letter explains…
Widespread election fraud will destroy America if it ever happens again, whether in the mid-terms in 2022 or the next presidential election in 2024…
Just as they did in Georgia, billionaire leftists will try to steal votes in 2022 and 2024.
The answer, or course, is to send them money.
Oh yes, the United States Justice Foundation only earned one star from Charity Navigator and on their 2019 IRS 990 form [available at GuideStar] they raised just under $1.5 million that year: they spent $316,244 on fundraising, $504,402 on printing, $263,830 on postage, $181,208 paying their executives and $71,963 renting lists of targets. Under program expenses (you know, ‘doing something productive’), well, maybe that’s in the $58,668 for “other” expenses.
Now, as I mentioned, I spent $4.50 to send a 1.2 ounce booklet from Oakville to Chesterfield. Super mailers like the justice foundation pay as little as 14¢ a letter (up to 3.3 ounces) to clog mailboxes. The postal rates encourage scuzzy “charities” to bombard our mailboxes. In the same way, the Postal Service grants special low rates to credit card companies and other for profit businesses sending out millions of pieces of mail a week.
This is by design.
The current Postmaster General, major Donald Trump donor Louis DeJoy, came into office with the intent on making the Postal Service less efficient. As repeatedly noted in the media, he abandoned sorting machines. He wants to trim the post office work force and ban overtime, even if that means leaving mail on loading docks. He wants fewer mail boxes to collect mail. And, he’s pushing the postal board of governors for even higher postage rates.
In other words, he’s starving the beast he’s charged with nurturing.
What will be left is a glorified bulk delivery operation dedicated to getting quasi-charity and credit card solicitations to middle class and upper income homes. Want to get a Birthday Card to your aunt? Not our job.
Oh, my cousin did get that booklet. And I’m sure the justice foundation will scoop up some money from gullible seniors.
I’m still waiting on last week’s mail.
Glenn Koenen