I’ve been upset about it all for quite some time. I want people to be aware and if necessary mad; just be mad for the right reasons!

(Are there likely to be negative consequences on the voting by mail front? Sure, I get that, though what’s being ascribed is… I just can’t deal with it now.)

The people full on about how this is all intended to undermine elections, I ain’t gonna be able to convince them of anything regardless of facts. There’s too much echo chambering on that front. So I picked my places, heh. Hopefully wisely.

The point of my commenting was more to push back against the frustratingly prevalent interpretations ascribing malicious intent to this specific action. I never intended to post on this platform (why my profile is blank); I just hate bad info being pushed, and I figured I’d save you some trouble 😆

Agreed. Responded in other sub-thread as to the likely tipping point 😆

I mean, processing consolidation and the disconnect/lag between dropping mail in a blue box and postmarking has been increasing for decades. It’s really the “milk runs” for rural areas: Regional Transportation Optimization that’s messing with especially rural areas, that made this really necessary.

It’s good that more people are being made aware of how the system actually functions. Annoying that it’s necessary. This actual action didn’t change the way any of processes actually work.

I agree that it stinks and I hate USPS’s ever-degrading processes.

Yes, and if they say they don’t or can’t hand-postmark an item they’re misinformed; it’s spelled out in their manuals that this service is provided at every retail operation.

Not gonna change. If they try to push you for a Certificate of Mailing they’ve been misinformed.

Nothing actually happened. USPS defined ‘postmark’ in the Federal Register and basically spelled out that, increasingly due to longer lags in the process of picking up and transporting mail, a postmark does not mean what you think it might mean.

There was plenty of notice and a public comment period, but on this platform people seem intent on mischaracterizing what actually happened here, which was just USPS defining ‘postmark’ in the Federal Register—not actually modifying any of their [increasingly shoddy transportation] processes.

Thank you for posting an actual properly informed statement. There’s way too many shoddy misinterpretations floating around on this platform.

Thank you; I’ve been fighting the misinformed notions on other social media platforms, but Bluesky has been too much. Lots of attribution of nefariousness where there is none. Sigh