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BREAKING NEWS: Two postal inspectors at JFK Airport sickened by nerve gas after opening package

The email service reportedly used by surveillance whistleblower Edward Snowden abruptly shut down on Thursday after its owner cryptically announced his refusal to become "complicit in crimes against the American people."Lavabit, an email service that boasted of its security features and claimed 350,000 customers, is no more, apparently after rejecting a court order for cooperation with the US government to participate in surveillance on its customers. It is the first such company known to have shuttered rather than comply with government surveillance."I have been forced to make a difficult decision: to become complicit in crimes against the American people or...

The United States Postal Service is operating according to a paradigm set up 100 years ago. In spite of protected monopolies and immunity from paying taxes or even parking tickets, the USPS is losing business and losing money. The problem is that the paradigm is technologically obsolete and has lost its usefulness. I gave up receiving bills in the mail years ago. I pay all my bills by credit card or automatic bank withdrawal. Most of my service providers don't even send me bills in the mail. So far this year I've written only 3 checks to providers of goods...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Postal Service takes pictures of every piece of mail processed in the United States - 160 billion last year - and keeps them on hand for up to a month. In an interview with The Associated Press, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe said the photos of the exterior of mail pieces are used primarily for the sorting process, but they are available for law enforcement, if requested. The photos have been used "a couple of times" by to trace letters in criminal cases, Donahoe told the AP on Thursday, most recently involving ricin-laced letters sent to President...

Mail delivery to the doorstep may be a thing of the past as lawmakers consider ways to cut costs to save the cash-strapped U.S. Postal Service, which lost $16 billion in 2012. According to CNN Money, the agency is working toward a more "centralized delivery" approach in which residents pick up their mail from a mailbox at the curb or at clusters of mailboxes within their neighborhoods. The practice already is being adopted for new houses and developments, and some House Republicans want it rolled out universally. "A balanced approach to saving the Postal Service means allowing USPS to adapt...

DENVER, CO.  A Colorado federal district court ruled today in favor of a Colorado man and a national gun rights group holding that a U.S. Postal Service regulation barring firearms in its parking lots violates their right to keep and bear arms under the Constitution.  The district court ruled, “openly carrying a firearm outside the home is a liberty protected by the Second Amendment [and the] parking lot adjacent to [Avon’s Post Office Building] is not a sensitive place [such that] an absolute ban on firearms is substantially related to [Defendants’] important public safety objective.”  Tab Bonidy, who is licensed...

House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) is reaching out across the aisle for suggestions on his new discussion draft to revamp the U.S. Postal Service (USPS). Issa released the discussion draft last week, in an attempt to broaden the support for his efforts at postal reform. And in a "Dear Colleague" letter aimed at Democrats, the California Republican says that “while the challenges are great, I strongly believe that the Postal Service is a government institution worth saving.” “While we may not agree on every issue in how to save the Postal Service, I do believe that we all...

This scan of a completely blank signature card is what the USPS offered up as proof that the customer’s package had been delivered. A woman in California recently sold a laptop computer of hers on eBay for $1,300, but it never arrived at the buyer’s house. The seller had paid the U.S. Postal Service for insurance and delivery confirmation on the package, so she should be able to get her money back and see who signed for the package. Not quite. She tells CBS Sacramento’s Kurtis Ming that USPS denied her insurance claim because the package was delivered and signed...

Post office a preview of Obamacare hell to come... (video)

A high-tech computer system that captures images of “every mail piece that is processed” by the United State Postal Service was critical in helping federal agents track the Texas woman arrested today for allegedly sending ricin-tainted letters to President Barack Obama and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. In a U.S. District Court complaint filed today against Shannon Guess Richardson, an FBI agent details how investigators traced the ricin letters back to New Boston, Texas, where the 35-year-old Richardson (seen below) lives with her husband.

"A powerful United States Senator’s husband is standing by, all ready to make millions from a U.S. taxpayer funded enterprise."

The Department of Justice said in a lawsuit filed Tuesday that cyclist Lance Armstrong was "unjustly enriched" while he used steroids to win multiple Tour de France titles. In the formal complaint, the Justice Department said they would seek triple damages against Armstrong, who admitted earlier this year that he doped to win his seven straight titles. The U.S. Postal Service paid some $40 million to appear as the title sponsor of Armstrong's team during six of those seven races. "Defendants were unjustly enriched to the extent of the payments and other benefits they received from the USPS, either directly...

Even parts of government that look like a business never get run with the efficiency of a business. Just look at the post office. They buy commercials and tout their services the way private businesses do. They offer a service that customers want. But a real business can't get away with losing billions every year. (I guess in the era of bailouts, I should say shouldn't get away with it.) The post office lost $16 billion last year, despite having all sorts of advantages that most private businesses don't have. They have a near monopoly on first-class mail delivery. You...

The United States Postal Service said Wednesday that it would delay its plan to cease delivery of first-class mail on Saturdays, rescuing for now a service that it says is costly but that many Americans rely on. The USPS said in a statement that restrictive language in Congress' continuing resolution to fund government operations has forced it to postpone the move until "legislation is passed that provides the Postal Service with the authority to implement a financially appropriate and responsible delivery schedule." The USPS said that while it is disappointed, it will follow the law but will continue to support...

Lazy postal worker burns, buries undelivered mail BELFAIR, WA (KOMO/CNN) - A disgraced mailman is in trouble again after admitting to burying thousands of pieces of mail in his backyard. Postal investigators state mailman Richard Farrell is accused of using a backhoe and burying the undelivered mail in a deep trench. "Just because I was lazy, and I became a not very good employee," said Farrell. "I just wanted to get out of their as soon as possible." According to court documents, in 2010, fellow coworkers discovered Farrell dumping mail in a recycling bin. Those actions prompted investigators to follow...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The financially beleaguered Postal Service suffered a setback in its plan to end Saturday delivery of first-class mail as Congress on Thursday passed legislation requiring six-day delivery. The Postal Service, which lost $16 billion last year, had announced last month its plan to switch to five-day mail service to save $2 billion annually. No law requires the Postal Service to deliver mail six days a week, but Congress has traditionally included a provision in legislation to fund the federal government each year that has prevented the Postal Service from reducing delivery service. The House of Representatives on...

Earlier this week, readers reacted with skepticism after Berkeley City Councilman Gordon Wozniak suggested that taxing email might be one way to raise money for the cash-strapped U.S. Postal Service. … But there’s a history to this idea, however outlandish as it might sound to some. The United Nations Development Program examined such a tax in its 1999 Human Development Report, Globalization With a Human Face, as a way to fund “the global communications revolution.” UNDP calculated that in 1996, such a tax would have raised $70 billion globally. The New York Times took a brief look at the concept...

The Justice Department will notify a federal court Friday that it is joining one of his former racing teammates in suing him for using performance-enhancing drugs during the Tour de France, legal sources told NBC News. The government is signing on to a lawsuit filed two years ago by Floyd Landis, one of Armstrong's former Tour de France teammates who has already admitted cheating. Among its claims: Landis saw Armstrong store and then re-inject his own blood to boost his performance, and Armstrong twice gave Landis banned hormones before races.

It's Saturday, and I went out on the front porch this morning after shoveling out from Nemo and got the mail as usual. There was an advertisement trying to get me to switch homeowner's insurance and a coupon flyer for the local grocery store. That sort of surprise waiting in the mailbox doesn't exactly get me all up in arms over the Post Office's idea to cancel Saturday mail delivery. Up until now, I’ve been assuming that the Post Office is simply an unprofitable enterprise and they may have to put trucks out on the road less often to reduce...

You know that feeling of pleasure you get when you see someone stand up to a bullying, incompetent boss? It’s viscerally satisfying, isn’t it? That’s the way I felt this morning when I heard Postmaster General Patrick Donahue announce that the U.S. Postal Service intended to move forward with a plan to stop Saturday delivery of mail, effective sometime in August. In doing so, Donahue stuck his thumb in the eye of the U.S. Congress, the mail agency’s ultimate boss. Bravo, Mr. Donahue. You may think I have incorrectly identified the incompetent party here. After all, it’s a deeply ingrained...