Quoner

Ah yes - another spirited round of my echo chamber RTed something so now I am an expert on it, followed by "Hang on - let me scramble for some quick links through 5 minutes on Google," followed by being a complete bitch when I get called out on both - or as Elton John might have called it, "The Circle of Lifer."

Is good discussion built around a block of butt hurt downvotes and victimhood, though? This is in no way directed at you - we can PM all day - but you're also a walking advertisement for the education gap that used to exist between Denton and Austin for several decades.

Internet keeps receipts.

You tried to position yourself as an expert vs. a guy also in the building to shout down others.

Dude...every single article you list mentions the intentional albatross placed by Congress and the failure to address it. The good thing about an op-ed that argues how awesome it will be to deregulate telecommunications as its example is we can currently look at how awesome its been to deregulate telecommunications. Spoiler alert - it sucks! Reason was wrong then - they just didn't have the evidence and case studies in existence yet. Also, if you're so desperate to deregulate something broken, I guess this is your big build up to announcing you want to privatize the police, too? Is it a driving philosophy of limited government or is it a burning desire to own those libs from a party and movement that can't stay true to its alleged one true principle?

In the sacred words of Pitbull: "uno, dos, tres, quatro..." We are legit agreeing it needs to be run better, I am just saying the Postal Service has been shot in the foot while being asked to fix real issues. We don't have to be adversarial about everything.

You've been touting medical credentials and expertise since coronavirus hit the news, so my apologies for taking you at your word. I feel 400% better about having a medical emergency during my next outing to your side of Texas. As for the budget report... So even in the report you posted, the liabilities and associated debt since the congressional act I referenced show up 3 times in the 3 main bullets. A service company like this can typically have around 50% of its total revenue tied up in comp and benefits (I'm not digging out a budget since we're already deep in an aside.) The plan to fix it I posted before also leaves room to fix the other issues by arguing to adopt generally accepted accounting principles to determine postal service liabilities. The business model when the last major legislature passed in 2006 has changed drastically (hence the losses), but the changes needed haven't happened because we're living in zero compromise Mitch McConnell land. So, outside of a spirited debate on whether price increases can make up the gap (and several experts are saying it won't because that reality is not coming back), the most direct and impacting action to fix this financial problem is to change the pension structure to reflect what is mostly used in the private sector. In the meantime, inaction is intentionally defunding the system to break it (like the patient we begun with), which has basically been the playbook for many social services since Reagan. I don't think privatization has been a homerun for aviation or telecomm nor do I see a scalable structure for private delivery that won't insanely destroy pricing for rural areas, but I'm open to ideas from any and all GMG infrastructure enthusiasts!

Doctor, if you take a critical patient off respirators and feeding tubes, do you call the patient a failure too? Starting with your quote above, does forever mean 2006? https://ips-dc.org/how-congress-manufactured-a-postal-crisis-and-how-to-fix-it/ Blaming is always fun, but the most important question is can we actually fix this? The three step plan below sounds fairly simple. https://news.nd.edu/news/postal-service-losing-money-because-of-congressional-mandate-not-low-prices-expert-says/

There's now hundreds of accounts that the boogeyman version of this is not true and a handful of conservative media sites demanding it really is that way. Why do you need the conservative exaggeration to be true so badly? You are being played.

You just linked to a NY Post op-ed from yesterday tied to the original rumors and the serious news arm of the Babylon Bee with quotes no one else has run and were confident this was a real gotcha moment. Sadly, this still might be one of your most informed posts.

By all means, tell me what facts have I missed here and I'll adjust accordingly. Ngo's credibility issues and willingness to edit reality for attention are well documented, but I'm open to anything else you've got - especially if it supercedes that first hand account (and updates from an entire office of coworkers in the city, plus members of my wife's family who live there. If they are being held and forced to report an alternate reality, I certainly don't want to sit here and pretend it is okay.)

Lying about violence and extortion to stoke the fears of your base is not a disagreement, even if you enjoyed lapping it up.

I mean... Tucker Carlson had some killer fan fiction on the topic just the other day and it triggered the president, so, turns out you can pretty easily.

You likely saw previously discussed and proven liar/misrepresenter Andy Ngo giving you the real dirt. https://foxwilmington.com/headlines/andy-ngo-reports-from-seattle-hard-for-me-to-overstate-the-anarchy-that-is-on-the-streets/ Sounds scary! Call anyone in Seattle and they will confirm that is all fabrication.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.thecut.com/amp/2020/06/whats-going-on-in-chaz-the-seattle-autonomous-zone.html You're buying into a cultivated boogeyman - it's fine. It's 7 blocks of a demonstration (and I share CBL's concerns about the end game) and you're being fed performative outrage and filtered accounts. You're gonna survive it, I promise. Doesn't being scared, outraged or worried about every trivial thing conservative news focuses on get exhausting for you snowflakes? Between this, the great Paw Patrol outrage, Jade Helm, Obama's tan suit, the confederate flag and statues... I'd be constantly exhausted... and that's even before you get to things that actually matter. You guys truly deserve a well-earned break.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/11/us/seattle-police-autonomous-zone/index.html AND https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/11/media/seattle-antifa-protest-trump/index.html

From a UNT grad who lives in Seattle: "Have walked down to the zone three times. I was handed free burritos twice, offered bottled water, listened to a band, watched a little bit of a documentary and heard a great speaker. They gave my dog treats and the police I saw later on my route back were laughing and joking, too. If this is anarchy, sign me up."

I'm still learning, but the place I keep getting directed to is https://8cantwait.org/. Admittedly, some of it feels a bit optimistic and pollyanna, but I also have a lot here I don't know and want to learn. Even after only the simple steps of watching The 13th and going on to read a lot of thoughtful looks at the prison industrial complex, I'm at a loss for how anyone can think we just need a little bit of polishing around the edges. I would encourage everyone to spend a couple of hours with that one and leave some time to process it when you're done. As a teaser/incentive for our more conservative crowd, I promise you'll leave wanting to kick Bill Clinton in the dick.

They have legit all been cut already. Compare the ratio of a police budget to education and everything else of any city's totally budget. And it is not like those budgets are going primarily into pensions and higher salaries. The paramilitary equipment market is absurd and that is where you see suburban cities napping armed or insanely outfitted aircraft, armored vehicles, etc. There are militarized use of force programs that cost a pretty penny and a fundamental shift that needs to happen in training (and protections from unions and laws that can be rethought.) It's a fascinating conversation that needs a range of experts and perspectives to be done right, but as we learned from the attempt at healthcare, there's not a lot of good faith arguments and the MO seems to be to blow up the other side and break the wheel, then claim it would have never worked anyway. Hopefully, the momentum we're seeing is beyond that usual crashing point since, as CBL and the 13th pointed out, these reports and recommendations are a century old with no action ever taken. Instead, the system continues to work exactly it was always intended too and for some reason many people continue to pour their energy into "whatabouts" and fighting to preserve a pretty crappy status quo.

Buddy...I have terrible news.

Well yeah.... but almost every proposal or explanation of what this includes some of the funding - especially the funds currently used to repurchase decommisioned and new military or over-priced weapons - invested back in education. You're acting like the major city police budgets are going directly into the pockets of those who serve. You're also talking over direct quotes from two police officers that have said we are doing too much to just say, well yeah, that's life, better do your best. Would you say that to an HR leader who suddenly had to do a systems engineering role or would you try to find a systems engineer so they could do what they do best?

And in a new paradigm, they could figure out how to train specific roles to assist and reinforce her. I don't think any reasonable person is advocating for leaving social services on their own or arming them. There's a lot of nuance and discussion needed around what it looks like, but the aggressive language has the same people who brought you "lock her/him up," "show us the birth certificate," and "build the wall" chaffing their adult diapers because it sounds "too harsh and out there."

From a retired Baltimore police officer: https://gen.medium.com/trust-me-minneapolis-is-right-to-defund-its-police-force-8a1a515449ad I've heard these thoughts from a few police friends and yes, the defund label is extreme sounding when it is a really a reallocation/rethinking, but we also all heard David Brown tell us the same thing almost exactly four years ago and mostly ignored him. It wasn't an ask for more punisher flags or people to stand during anthems, it was an ask for a fundamental change to the system.

Counterpoint: Andy Ngo is a little bitch agitator masquerading as a journalist who is one of a handful of minorities making conservative boomers feel better about themselves while ignoring opportunities for self reflection and growth.