Today the U.S. Postal Service will default on its retirement obligations.
And, who is to blame? Well, Congress of course.
The NALC has issued a statement blaming congress for its default. The statement can be found here: http://www.nalc.org/news/latest/2012-07-27_default.html
One might ask; “What did Congress do to force a default of the Postal Services obligations?”
One might reply; “Great Question!”
Congress passed legislation forcing what is called “pre-funding” of the Postal Services Retirement Benefits. The rest of us call this “saving so we can retire”… but I digress.
The Postal Service Union (NALC) leader Fredric Rolando is angry because no other government entity has such rules enforced upon them by law.
While I agree with him… it IS wrong, I’m not sure we would find ourselves in total agreement.
Mr. Rolando feels that these requirements should be lifted so he can run the same Ponzi schemes the rest of our government conducts each and every day. That seems “fair” to him.
As you might suspect, I would propose that all government entities have such rules enforced by law placed upon them so they cannot play the Ponzi game ever again, or people go to jail. That seems “fair” to me.
This is a terrific example illustrating the stark, cavernous, differences between governing theory.
On one side you have the wailing and gnashing of teeth over having to be fiscally responsible and meet their budget. In other words, “it’s not fair we can’t waste taxpayer money like everyone else!”
On the other side (my side) you have a group of representatives who having placed a fiscally responsible plan in place years ago who are looking at their “child” and with folded arms saying “What are you going to do about it now?”
It is valuable to understand who people like Mr. Rolando are. These are the people currently running the country. These are the people at the highest levels of our bureucracy… they run the GSA, the EPA, the State Dept., the Treasury, the DOD etc. These are the people you can find making up an entire Democrat party and much of the Republican party… although this is changing. These are the people with exactly the wrong mindset to be involved in any way with our money or our future.
The bottom line?
The Postal Service needs to meet their obligations or default. No bail out. If it is to survive it must be overhauled by individuals like Fed Ex’s Fred Smith or others who demonstrably know how to do it and absolutely not associated with any Union.
It’s time to pull our heads out of our Collective rear ends and think. (As your rear end is where your head always ends up when you give legitimacy to any Collective idea…)
It’s time to reward those Letter Carriers who perform well and allow those that do not to find more fulfilling work. Simple.
It’s time to stop making promises you know you’ll never be able to deliver but you wont be around to have to… Union Leaders… and some business leaders (GM comes to mind).
It’s time to care about the wasting of our tax dollars on idle people sitting and waiting for their bloated pensions.
This is a lesson for all of us in every sector.
Yes, I will be sad if the Postal Service goes away… how will I light my fireplace without my mandatory allotment of (ie. I can’t cancel deliver of… I have tried.) crap that the Postman shoves into my mailbox?
makeaneffort 