Postal Service in Crisis

The Postal Service provides a vital service for all of us. Can you imagine what would happen if cheap delivery of mail and goods were no longer available? UPS, FedEx and other competitors are only able to maintain their level of services because when private deliveries were authorized, they were allowed to cherry-pick the most lucrative business.

The letter delivery service (especially to rural areas) is the most expensive and least profitable part of the Postal Service's business. Yet they still manage to deliver parcels at a competitive rate with decent services, despite being mandated to take on the most difficult and costly deliveries. It is true that the service is not perfect. But UPS and FedEx drivers routinely just run up to a customer's door and dump a package on the doorstep.

Many detractors of the Postal Service will cite the story of Lysander Spooner and the American Letter Mail Company. It is true that Lysander Spooner made a valiant effort to fight what he percieved as an unfair governmental monopoly on delivery of first class-mail. But Spooner had offices only in the largest cities (New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Boston) and only delivered in those cities. It would be easy to undercut the Postal Service by taking their most lucrative routes, without taking on the responsibility of delivering to Bastrop, Peoria, Wasilla, and other out-of-the way locales. That monopoly was imposed for a reason...because without it, letter delivery costs would spiral out of control in the "free market." Isn't that what has happened to health care costs?

Applying For A Job In The Modern Age

In this era in which resumes are routinely ignored by "job creators," maybe the resume needs to become a petition? You know, where 1000 people sign a statement that says, "X Company, you should hire Y because..."

"And BTW, we are all consumers of your product."

There's your keywords.

How To Ruin Music

"Musical Stockholm Syndrome":  Insane greedy sociopaths are out to fill a monstrous notch they tore into the fabric of society with whatever vapid extension of pop culture that they think will fly, just so they can buy more crack and helicopters. Creativity has been gunned down like a rival drug gang in Juarez.

Every once in a while somebody will show some documentary about some kindly old producer who brought us all this wonderful band that everybody loves.  Are you kidding? These corporate assassins of art are not promoting creativity.  They are stifling it.  They are using up the oxygen in the room with inbred mouth-breathers of the soul.  Yeah, they figure out just what the latest pop trends were, mix them all together, and stretch them just the right amount to create a new pile of dog turd that they can sell.  And they manage to convince the listening public that this is what they like.  The only envelope that is being stretched in this scenario is the one holding the big ugly wad of turd-covered cash.  And the turds are the only thing drippin' on you.