People who want to set up bitcoin exchanges, hate the Fed.. and are using this bitcoin currency concept as a way of working around our monetary system in order to destroy the Fed..

Thats the way I read it... The people who are involved with it, probably hate Postal Services and their Unions...

I have no idea what this is but I do know that once it is open to the public like it seems to be lately, money to be made is over and the only winners are the original investors and the rest get screwed typically.

The post office needs to be phased out. Private companies need to take over all package delivery. The Internet has eliminated the need for delivery of physical correspondence. We can all pay our bills online. We could set up a lifeline type service for Internet connections for the poor.

Did you take a wrong turn somewhere?

Or was your Big Wheel run over by a USPS truck when you were a child?

The postal service is no longer needed. The Internet can handle all correspondence and private companies can take over all package delivery. The USPS is going the way of the buggy whip.

I'm guessing you live in a major metropolitan area with a UPS or FedEx box on every street corner.

$6.95.

Actually UPS and FedEx contract with the USPS for non-urban deliveries.

For others I just post a note on their Facebook page. I haven't sent a greeting card in ten years. I haven't paid a bill through the mail in ten years either. 99% of my family, co-workers and friends do all their correspondence and bill payment online also. Have you ever heard of a smart phone?

You are aware that over the next 15 yrs tens of millions of jobs will be replaced by computer and robotics. They are even developing robots that will be able to pick crops. The robots will work 24 hours a day for no pay and little maintenance.

How's Mr. Spacely treating you at the office?

"Little maintenance"?! Seriously?!

If someone had told you that passenger ships would no longer be used by 99% of travellers you would have had the same reaction. You can't stop progress. Now don't confuse today's cruise ships for leisure with passenger ships of old that were the only way to get to lands between large oceans.

False analogy, but interesting.

Glad you're not a ship's captain, dude. You've steered this thread WAAAAY off course. Watch out for icebergs.

I do not agree with your "fuck the poor" attitude.

BTW, UPS and Fedex both failed miserably over the holidays while the USPS delivered exceptional service.

What does the USPS have to do with the poor? We can set up DSL service for millions of Americans for $10 a month. A book of stamps cost $9.80.

Package delivery can be handled by the private sector which will employ people also. We don't need hand delivered correspondence any more.

Who is gling to supply the pcs that you need for use with that cheap internet?

I'm getting you hate just about all things government, so what company is going to give all this stuff away?

You dream of magic and unicorns with your eliminate the post office ideals.

USPS is far cheaper and more reliable than private competitors. Eliminating the USPS would be a serious burden on the poor.

I take it you didn't notice Christmas 2013, when the only parcel delivery service that DIDN'T totally blow it out their ass is the USPS.

The Internet cannot handle all correspondence - try scenting an e-mail to your lover with your perfume and see how far you get - the private sector cannot take over all package deliveries, and buggy whips are made today by six different companies. (Google "carriage driving whips.&quot

on every count.

You should rethink your position. This is a democratic forum. Most of us would like to save the post office, not destroy it. It's an American institution with a rich history and it needs to be preserved.

Hating the post office is like hating America.

and maintains the largest fleet of automobiles and trucks in the world.

Even better. It needs to be preserved, and Issa and his gang need to back the fuck off.

if Congress would just get the hell out of their own way.

I just recognize that the need for the physical delivery of correspondence is no longer needed. The USPS could set up a secure email service on the Internet, but we don't need to have tens of thousands of people driving auto-mobiles to deliver written correspondence to homes everyday when we can do so very the Internet. All package delivery can be done by the private sector.

I ask you, do you order things over the Internet? Do you pay bills over the Internet? We can set up a lifeline type system for Internet access for people with low income. In my area we provide second hand computers via non-profits and private vendors to low income people and sign them up for $10 a month for DSL. In fact the laptop I am typing this on I bought for $50 with Linux Installed and have the $10 per month DSL service.

Another item that is going to be phased out over the next few years is the wired plain old telephone service with an Internet system.

viodi.com/2014/02/02/fccs-all-ip-network-transitions-trials-what-to-expect/

Thinking the loss of the USPS would not affect anyone, simply because it MIGHT not affect you (directly), is the very definition of "privilege."

No, sorry, try again.

AT&T has approval to implement "trials" for replacing POTS with IP-based service. You can be sure that this will be only in places with heavy infrastructure already in place. Rural IP service? Think more like 20-30 years. And the FCC is but one of the many regulatory agencies what control infrastructure rules. State level PUCs have widely differing opinions of the merit of eliminating POTS.

There are still places where you can get party-line service. Broadband simply does not exist in many, many places.

You continue to view the world as if it works exactly like what you personally experience. It's sad, really.

As for POTS, despite my household having three cell phones and my home office having an IP phone, I still keep *two* POTS lines. They are the only ones that provide true emergency service and consistent call clarity. Hell, my cell service is so bad here, I have to use a microcell and push the traffic over my low bandwidth DSL line, which runs on... wait for it... my POTS copper wires.

So, do you have any other bad analogies to try to convince us that USPS is dying?

The time for hand delivered correspondence is past. The second amendment and the USPS need to fade away.

Troll much?

Both together? All of a sudden?

Hold on, I think I just got whiplash.

The USPS works just fine, employs tons of people, and ensures fairness in legal document delivery. "The internet" hasn't eliminated the need for physical paper, nor its delivery from place to place.

As for private companies, this past Xmas demonstrated that the USPS kicked ass over the private sector delivery companies.

And for all of your "we" comments, there are plenty of citizens in this country who don't bank online (or at all), don't have computers, and can't get online. Just because "you" can do everything you need online (and good luck with those documents requiring original signatures) doesn't mean everyone is like you.

but 90% of the USPS package deliver from city to city is handled by private companies.

He's talking about trucking contractors and airlines.

but they don't deliver it.

The usps never operated or owned the railroads which carried mail as well, but contracted for those services.

Our new friend is mixing apples and oranges.

How they choose to handle their infrastructure is irrelevant to the unfounded points you keep making. All of the private companies do it too. Hell, UPS, FedEx, and DHL all contract *with* the USPS for last-mile delivery. So what's your (incredibly weak) point?

But keep throwing shit out there hoping something will stick.

they would need the computers (or tablets). And, based on where many of the poor live, a way to make them theft-proof.

Paying bills and such online also requires a certain amount of literacy, which not everyone has.

There's also the matter of the elderly (I'm sure many of us here still have parents or grandparents who, realistically, are never going to pay bills online), the distantly rural, and the remaining luddites (like my sister).

And has been pointed out, UPS and Fedex even use the USPS for the "last mile" in many areas. And those large package carriers are not cost-effective for very small items. To many people, an e-card is not the same as sending a real handwritten card. An online payment or Amazon coupon code is not the same as sending someone a check or a gift card. An emailed JPEG is not the same as sending someone a quality printed photo. etc. etc.

There are also communications that people don't want to send because of potential privacy concerns. The government or your boss might be able to monitor or access your emails, but it's still illegal for anyone to open a letter and read your physical mail without court authority.

So yeah, I'd say we still need the post office.

And good luck with that.

You know, I couldn't help being reminded of how your arguments sounded like the typical totally oblivious American who has no idea that there are poor people in this country who depend on the post office. Literally. People pay premium prices at convenience stores and these check-cashing robbery joints. The post office is pennies on the dollar. And I read recently that a family making around $15,000 per year would pay an average of $2400 on check cashing charges and fees.

- Government ain't about efficiency, per se. It's about keeping the playing field level because those fat bastards with all the money in their pockets keep tilting it......

i don't think you are in the right place

Since both are pyramid schemes.

I find it hard to believe they are seriously considering it. Betting on Bitcoin is a disaster in the making.

But banking/financial services otherwise unavailable to the poor and disenfranchised? YES, YES, YES.

They have the infrastructure to do it. They do it in other countries. It would be a godsend to the poor and a thumb in the eye to the Banksters who rob them (and the rest of us).

I agree with you on both counts. The post office can't afford to get tied up in something like bitcoin. If they could find additional revenue streams and get Congress to reverse the crappy law they passed about having to hold 75 years worth of benefits, it would be in really good shape. Probably could save rural post offices too.

Article I, section 8


To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;

To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;

To establish post offices and post roads;

http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articlei#section8

Did Congress regulate the value of bitcoins?

it would be ironic if alternative currencies put them out of business.