To the Editor:
Our 55th high school reunion is coming up, and I know much of the conversation will revolve around the pandemic: our health, our families, and our curtailed activities over the long weeks and months that have stretched across nearly half a year.
We’ve taken dozens of walks on conservation sites across the Vineyard, walks both inspirational and healthy. We completed a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle, played innumerable games of Scrabble, and watched endless hours of Netflix.
One activity I’m not pleased with is standing in line at the Post Office. I understand we have a rash of summer visitors eager to receive their packages. I understand Amazon is in contractual disputes with UPS and FedEx. I understand the heat and humanity of enforced social distancing and masking up during the pandemic. I get it.
What I don’t get is word filtering down that the Post Office itself is intentionally slowing mail delivery through restructuring, cost-cutting measures, and curtailed overtime. Mail-sorting machines are being phased out. Mailboxes removed. Delayed delivery is the norm. These actions cause long lines at Island Post Offices, and add to the pandemic gloom and doom. It’s not individual employees: they’re doing their job; it’s the situation at the top, which filters down across the Island.
What further exacerbates mail delivery is the stated intent of the president: he opposes mail-in ballots because he considers them fraudulent. The fraud is installing a major donor as head of the Post Office months before the election with a mandate to disrupt service. The refusal to approve additional funds adds to the plan to defraud the ballots of millions of voters nationwide.
The president fears he will lose the upcoming election. He distracts the public from his leadership during the pandemic, the economic recession, and the racial reckoning prompted by the murder of George Floyd. The president now blatantly tries to cheat his way to re-election.
This is unconscionable.
While I’m eagerly looking forward to my high school reunion, I’m anxiously following the headlines and long lines at the Post Office. This situation must be acknowledged and addressed before it’s too late.
Thomas Dresser
Oak Bluffs