I tend to trust, probably too much. I trust the elected officials to do the right thing, I trust the doctor to know what they are saying is best for me, I trust the mechanic, I trusted, well I'll stop there.

This year there has been a push for everyone to vote by mail.

Now if I were a conspiracy theorist, which I don't think I am, I just think sometimes believing everything I'm being told takes more faith then being an atheist.

For the first time in history, there is a huge push for everyone to vote by mail.

Again, because I trust, I don't think in Iowa we'd have a lot of fraud going on if everyone did that.

However, after every election, since at least the Clinton years, (I can't remember paying much attention before that) you hear of ballots being discovered AFTER the election.

Of course, the story is always "they wouldn't have affected the outcome of the election." At the same time, the same people that will tell you "every vote counts." I'm not sure which to believe, that one vote matters or it doesn't.

It seems like every day I hear or read something in the news that makes my jaw drop and my mind is saying, "I don't believe it...nothing surprises me anymore." I know the two statements together make no sense.

There is a website that writes satirical articles called the Babylon Bee. Usually, the stories are so obviously not true, but the knuckleheads at Facebook continuously "fact check" them and "warn" you that what you are reading is false. This is another rant, but I'll save it for another article that I probably will write but not publish.

So while driving I had the radio on and as part of the news, which is NOT part of the Babylon Bee, they had a story about how the US Post Office has instructed the mail carriers to just leave the mail behind if it will make them late on running their routes.

The jaw dropped. The mind said, "I don't believe what my ears just heard....nothing surprises me anymore."

So I got on to Google and found the Washington Post story and sure enough. "Postmaster General Louis DeJoy told employees to leave mail behind at distribution centers if it delayed letter carriers from their routes, according to internal USPS documents obtained by The Washington Post and verified by the American Postal Workers Union and three people with knowledge of their contents, but who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid retribution."

The story goes on to say that carriers can pick it up and deliver the abandoned mail the next day.

But my question is this. "What if they are running late the next day and don't have time to collect it all? And the next? And the next?"

It's already called "snail mail" I'm not sure what's slower than that.

The post office is running in the red already, they aren't making enough money because of the development of the internet, email, phones and text messages, and in general, there are many faster and more efficient ways to communicate excluding writing a letter.

And hey, it's better for the NSA if we use them all rather than write a letter. Oh wait, that sounds a bit conspiratorial.

So back to voting by mail.

Do it, don't do it. I don't care. But for me, in a Presidential year, I'm going to go to the polls.

Why? I don't trust some idiot in the postal system in some warehouse that thinks they don't have time to grab my ballot and deliver it.

If I DID vote by mail, I also know that I can get online and track my ballot, at least in Benton County you can, but I bet the majority of people DON'T know that.

But face it, there is nothing more patriotic for an old gal like me right now than voting, well, that and burning up my Facebook feed with information that makes me drop my jaw and say, "I can't believe this...nothing surprises me anymore."

So I'll be there, and hey, if you don't go to the polls you don't get an "I Voted" sticker. Hey, maybe this year we'll get an "I Voted" face mask...



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MH July 30, 2020, 3:42 pm Going on record to support my local friends in the Post Office and Court House. I have absolutely NO WORRIES about my ballot being delivered and counted. I’m grateful for the opportunity and convenience to vote by mail.

Editor's Note: Maybe I should clarify I don't doubt the integrity of the workers here either, it's just an observation.
TP July 30, 2020, 5:35 pm Hi Valerie, the USPS has already been slow for several years. We, our business, seldom gets 1st class mail on Tuesdays.
Here's a link to a story from 2015:

http://www.postal-reporter.com/blog/as-usps-slows-down-mail-delivery-some-letters-are-taking-even-longer-to-arrive-than-the-new-rules-allow/
PM July 30, 2020, 6:33 pm CBS just did a test of how ballots COULD work during the election. They found the same concerns, except in their test, ballots didn't even arrive! https://www.cbsnews.com/news/covid-19-vote-by-mail-ballot-counted-election/
DL July 31, 2020, 4:22 pm I feel the exact same way, Valerie. I think everyone should have the right to mail-in their ballots. But, I trust my vote at the polling location. So that's what I'll be doing.