In Massachusetts, we have an important primary coming up on September 1st. I was planning on in-person voting, but to be on the belt-and-suspender side of things - what if I was indisposed on September 1st? - I requested a mail-in ballot. Just so I'd have the option.
At a rally in support and defense of the US Postal Service, I attended last Saturday at the Massachusetts State House, a woman said that she had mailed her ballot in on August 13th and it hadn't arrived at City Hall until the August 20th. This was a distance of a couple of miles. (There's an app for checking, and that's going to come in handy.)
So I figured that, once I got my mail-in ballot, I'd walk it in to City Hall. Then, when the mail-in ballot didn't show up, I decided to just go and do early voting at Boston City Hall.
When I got there to check in, the officials were well aware that I had requested to vote-by-mail, and I had to sign some sort of affidavit waiving my write to mail it in. I was then able to early vote.
Phew. As I mentioned, this is an important election, in that we have a hotly contested race for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate. My vote counts for something, in a way that my vote for Biden in November really won't, given that there is zero possibility that Trump would carry this state. (For the record, now that Pink Slip has taken something of a political turn in the Time of Drumpf, I'm voting for Ed Markey over Joe Kennedy. There was no reason - other than pure, unadulterated entitlement - for Kennedy to jump in here and challenge a progressive incumbent, in a safe Dem seat, with the result that millions of dollars in campaign dollars are being squandered on this election when it could have been better spent trying to elect more swing-state Democrats to the Senate.)
Other than my mini-scare over voting, I haven't experienced much by way of problems with the Post Office. Oh, my mail comes a bit later in the day most of the time. And sometimes my New Yorker shows up on Friday rather than Thursday. But my mailman remains just wonderful. Folks have received the cards I've sent them. The packages I've mailed in the past month have arrived safely.
But, other than voting - and I always have the in person option - nothing I'm doing with the mail is "mission critical." My bills are emailed to me. Whatever income I have coming in is directly deposited. I get a couple of magazines, more than a couple catalogs, political flyers, an occasional thank you note, and - of course - Bed, Bath & Beyond coupons. Sometimes packages from Etsy or Amazon (last mile). Nothing that can't wait.
Unlike those who rely on timely mail delivery for medications, for money, for the operation of their business.
Let alone for those who ship and receive "live animals, including chicks, crickets, lizards, frogs and even scorpions."
The Postal Service has over 100 years of experience shipping live animals, starting in 1918 when it began allowing live day-old chicks to be mailed. Newly hatched chicks are uniquely amenable to mailing as they can survive without food or water for 72 hours after hatching, according to a bulletin by the Poultry Welfare Extension, a project of several public universities. For those businesses, a shipping delay is often a literal matter of life and death. (Source: Washington Post)
Pretty much the definition of "mission critical," I'd say.
I hadn't thought much (in fact, I hadn't thought anything) about critters being shipped via the US Mail until I read about thousands of baby chicks sent to poultry operations in Maine that were Dead on Arrival.
And now I've learned that there are all sorts of sometimes quite specific rules and regs around shipping live animals:
Bees, for instance, may not be shipped via air, with the exception of queen bees, who may travel by air “accompanied by up to eight attendant honeybees.”
Poultry can be shipped, as long as they're no more than a day old. All sorts of poultry, including emus. As for other birds, adults can be mailed, as long as they don't weigh more than 25 pounds, "which is enormous for a bird — approximately the size of an adult pelican." Just in case someone has reason to ship an adult pelican.
Big relief here: No need to worry about poisonous animals. Only scorpions used for medical research or antivenom. Scorpions can't fly, so there'll never be a "snakes on a plane" sitch.
Baby alligators, as anyone who ever read the ads in the back of a comic book is aware, can be sent via mail. But they have to be less than 20 inches long. I suppose that a 20 incher could break free and bite the mailman, but that shorty probably couldn't take a limb off.
All kidding aside, the deliberate Postal Office slowdowns are hurting a lot of folks. And they're killing live animals. Chick hatcheries are being impacted, and frog and gecko vendors, as is "a business that produces live roaches that are fed to bearded dragons, hedgehogs and other insectivorous animals."
Chalk it up to unintended consequences when all you really want to do is suppress the vote (oh, and, along the way, mention privatize the mail system). I suppose if that's your game, you really don't give a damn if a bunch of chicks, queen bees, and live roaches have to sacrifice their little lives.
Once again, American Exceptionalism in action.
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