How George W. Bush Killed the Post Office

This Jim Hightower piece about what's really wrong with the U.S. Postal Service is required reading. If you're too busy to read the whole thing right now, here's the nut:

The privatizers squawk that USPS has gone some $13 billion in the hole during the past four years — a private corporation would go broke with that record! (Actually, private corporations tend to go to Washington rather than go broke, getting taxpayer bailouts to cover their losses.) The Postal Service is NOT broke. Indeed, in those four years of loudly deplored "losses," the service actually produced a $700 million operational profit (despite the worst economy since the Great Depression). What's going on here? Right-wing sabotage of USPS financing, that's what. In 2006, the Bush White House and Congress whacked the post office with the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act — an incredible piece of ugliness requiring the agency to PRE-PAY the health care benefits not only of current employees, but also of all employees who'll retire during the next 75 years. Yes, that includes employees who're not yet born!

There's a good discussion about this over at Reddit. We need a good Democrat or two to stand up for the USPS and lead a SOPA-style campaign to repeal the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. Once the USPS is gone, we're never going to get it back.