'Friday Night Massacre' at US Postal Service

Introversion · Aug 8, 2020

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/08/07/friday-night-massacre-us-postal-service-postmaster-general-major-trump-donor-ousts

Common Dreams said:
Government watchdogs, Democratic lawmakers, and pro-democracy advocates declared it a "Friday Night Massacre" for the U.S. Postal Service after news broke in a classic end-of-the-week dump that Louis DeJoy—a major GOP donor to President Donald Trump and the recently appointed Postmaster General—had issued a sweeping overhaul of the agency, including the ouster of top executives from key posts and the reshuffling of more than two dozen other officials and operational managers.

"Trump is actively sabotaging the election under our noses—this isn't theoretical, it's happening RIGHT NOW.”

According to the Washington Post:

The shake-up came as congressional Democrats called for an investigation of DeJoy and the cost-cutting measures that have slowed mail delivery and ensnared ballots in recent primary elections.

Twenty-three postal executives were reassigned or displaced, the new organizational chart shows. Analysts say the structure centralizes power around DeJoy, a former logistics executive and major ally of President Trump, and de-emphasizes decades of institutional postal knowledge. All told, 33 staffers included in the old postal hierarchy either kept their jobs or were reassigned in the restructuring, with five more staffers joining the leadership from other roles.

Click to expand...

Already under fire for recent policy changes at the USPS that mail carriers from within and outside critics have denounced as a sabotage effort to undermine the Postal Service broadly as well as disrupt efforts to carry out mail-in voting for November's election amid the Covid-19 pandemic, the moves unveiled late Friday were viewed as an overt assault on democracy and a calculated opportunity to boost Republicans' long-held dream of undercutting or privatizing the government-run mail service while also boosting their election prospects in the process.

...

lizmonster · Aug 8, 2020

Unconscionable, unsurprising.

There will be a cascade of awful between now and November, for sure. This one, though, has the potential to affect the election, maybe even more than the Russian interference they refuses to do anything about.

Roxxsmom · Aug 8, 2020

They are very likely trying to set up a situation where many mail-in ballots are delayed, so final counts will be delayed in critical swing states. This will be particularly relevant if early exit numbers seem to favor Trump, but Biden gains as mail-in ballots are tallied. If they can establish some kind of cut off, even for ballots mailed before the deadline, or if the post office or local election officials manages to "lose" a bunch of ballots, well that's perfect, right? Maybe the courts will side with them, and there's no precedent for dealing with ballots that simply go missing without a trace.

This is what scares me the most at this point.

If Trump gets a second term, the shit we've endured during 2020 will be mild compared to what's coming.

BenPanced · Aug 8, 2020

To anybody who said we overreacted when tRump was elected and we're still overreacting: fuck you.

Fuck you long, hard, loud, and sideways.

We KNEW shit like this was coming. We KNEW there'd be a near irreparable power grab by the entire fucking GOP.

And it's happening.

I take small joy in knowing it's going to affect EVERYBODY, even some of his most faithful, but the damage is done. It's going to take us longer than one Biden term to completely recover.

Anybody want to come back with some line of "whataboutism"? Fuck off.
Anybody want to come back with "well, yeah, but Obama..."? Fuck off.
Anybody want to come back and tell me how things would have been worse under Hillary Clinton? Fuck off.
Anybody want to come back with what they think is a reasonable explanation this isn't fascism or authoritarianism or a dictatorship? Fuck off
Kindly fuck off if you think I can have an intelligent, mature discussion about this. I'm old, I'm tired, and I'm more fearful for my life than I ever have been. Even during the Reagan/Bush years, I was never as scared as I am now.

Bring down the ban hammer if you must, mods. I couldn't give two shits right now.

Brightdreamer · Aug 8, 2020

Terrifying. Inevitable. And apparently unstoppable.

At this point, I'm not sure I see how they don't steal the election. And if/when they get away with that - that's it. All she wrote. Dictatorship dynasty installed.

lizmonster · Aug 8, 2020

Brightdreamer said:
At this point, I'm not sure I see how they don't steal the election. And if/when they get away with that - that's it. All she wrote. Dictatorship dynasty installed.

That isn't it, though. It would be terrible, yes. And they'd absolutely work toward dictatorship. But the US is big, and sprawling, and an awful lot of the everyday stuff we depend on is controlled locally.

We can find allies. We can band together. We can work around the nascent dictatorship. At least for a while.

Will a *rump victory shatter the country? Absolutely. But it doesn't have to be a successful dictatorship. There are still ways we can fight.

cbenoi1 · Aug 9, 2020

lizmonster said:
There will be a cascade of awful between now and November, for sure.

It will get even worse between November and January if Trump loses. This will be the ~~lame duck~~ scorched earth time period.

-cb

shakeysix · Aug 9, 2020

Have a lifelong friend, a retired postal worker, who voted for Trump in 2016 because he thought the country needed a change. Just NOT this change. He won't be voting for Trump in November and he is pretty vocal about his change of mind.

Roxxsmom · Aug 9, 2020

Interesting to note I've run across a few people, at least, who voted for Trump in 2016 and are having buyer's remorse in 2020. I haven't run across anyone who voted for Clinton last time who is voting for Trump this time.

The number of undecided voters is smaller at this point than it was in 2016 too.

I also don't know any Democrats who are experiencing unbridled optimism about the outcome in 2020. You get burned so badly once, well, hope is a scary thing.

Tepelus · Aug 9, 2020

I spoke with a woman I know the other day who is in her 70's and she admitted to me that she's never voted before. She decided to register to vote this year so she can vote for trump because she likes what he's doing for the country. It made me really sad to hear her say this. Where I live is very conservative and I see trump/pence signs all over and only a couple of Biden signs, so it doesn't surprise me any that she's leaning that way. Every voter who is able to vote and is thinking to vote Biden must make it their mission to do so by any means necessary. This country will not survive another four years of what we have in the WH right now. I'm scared for the future of this country. I asked, jokingly but half seriously, my friend from Germany to smuggle me into his country. He replied, if only he could.

Roxxsmom · Aug 9, 2020

Tepelus said:
I spoke with a woman I know the other day who is in her 70's and she admitted to me that she's never voted before. She decided to register to vote this year so she can vote for trump because she likes what he's doing for the country. It made me really sad to hear her say this. Where I live is very conservative and I see trump/pence signs all over and only a couple of Biden signs, so it doesn't surprise me any that she's leaning that way. Every voter who is able to vote and is thinking to vote Biden must make it their mission to do so by any means necessary. This country will not survive another four years of what we have in the WH right now. I'm scared for the future of this country. I asked, jokingly but half seriously, my friend from Germany to smuggle me into his country. He replied, if only he could.

That is sad. There are folks voting for the first time to vote against him too, and of course people who voted for him last time and aren't this time, but it's still sad to see someone "woke" to politics by White Nationalism.

'Friday Night Massacre' at US Postal Service

Introversion

Pie aren't squared, pie are round!

lizmonster

Possibly A Mermaid Queen

Roxxsmom

Beastly Fido

BenPanced

THE BLUEBERRY QUEEN OF HADES (he/him)

Brightdreamer

Just Another Lazy Perfectionist

lizmonster

Possibly A Mermaid Queen

cbenoi1

shakeysix

blue eyed floozy

Roxxsmom

Beastly Fido

Tepelus

And so...

Roxxsmom

Beastly Fido