for 25 September 1998. Updated every WEEKDAY.

Going Postal

Heya,

Your mention of the Fat
Elvis/Skinny Elvis poll in
9/14/98's Suck got me to
chucklin'. You implied that
the vote was rigged in favor
of Skinny Elvis, but I have
evidence to the contrary. A
friend of mine once told me
that our local newspaper, The
Oregonian, ran its own Fat
Elvis/Skinny Elvis poll, one
of those deals where you call
1-800-QUA-LUDE to vote for
Fat Elvis or 1-800-NOT-APIG
to vote for Skinny Elvis. At
this time my friend was into
using his modem and terminal
software to rig polls such as
this - he would tell his
computer to auto-redial a
certain phone number over and
over again, which would slant
the vote in his favor. Well,
my friend set his terminal
software to redial the number
for Fat Elvis, then left the
house to go to work ... and
at the end of the polling
period, Fat Elvis beat out
Skinny Elvis 80 percent to 20
percent.

Anyway, if the USPS ever
extends their polling to the
telephone or the Web, now we
all know what to do.

Sincerely,

Michael Lambrigh
<basehead@europa.com>

Perhaps it's a measure of my
own gut, but I'm starting to
think fat Elvis really wasn't
that fat. In any case, this
mystical imp is holding out
for the Real Winners Don't
Use Drugs - They Abuse Drugs
stamp series, so all the
rock 'n' roll greats can get
into the act.

Mr. M

Ke aloha no from Maui!

I can tell you live on a
coast but not which one. How?
Because you are not worried
about the prospect of
free-for-all mail
competition. If you lived in
any of the hundreds of small
interior American towns that
benefited from airline
deregulation by losing all
their air service, you would
think differently.

I realize you are just
parroting the party line of
Milton Friedman, but
Friedman, despite his Nobel
Prize, still doesn't know
anything about how to value
services. In particular, he,
and you assign zero value to
the network. Actually, most
of the value of a postal
system is in its network.

It is true that it costs much
less than 32 cents to move a
letter between New York and
San Francisco, but we are
talking about a national, not
a local, service. It costs
much more than 32 cents to
send a letter from New York
to Point Barrow.

You personally may not care.
Perhaps you never will want
to send a letter to Point
Barrow. But if you do, it
will cost thousands of
dollars. Assuming that
somebody (not necessarily
you) will sometimes have to
send something to Point
Barrow changes the accounting
- the 32-cent (or even
64-cent) stamp becomes good
value for the money.

Every other nation in the
world recognizes the value of
the network by charging more
than the USPS does for
postage, without a lot of
rabble-rousing. You might
want to ask yourself, why is
that?

Harry Eagar
<heagar@aloha.net>

Aloha and book 'em Dano,

The dimension I live in is
not coastal; indeed, it's
surrounded by a sea of
landedness. What's more, it's
a frigging small town so
small it can't even support a
Starbucks or a McDonald's
with a big play-slide area.
And maybe I do want to send a
letter to Pt. Barrow. Indeed,
maybe I want to squeeze
miniature economist Milton
Friedman into a box and mail
him to that godforsaken
tundra town. And if I did,
and if I cared when he showed
up, I'd send him UPS or
FedEx. You're right that US
mail is priced the same,
regardless of destination.
That subsidy might be good
for you in Hawaii, but you've
already got cheap macadamia
nuts. Why shouldn't you pay
more for mail?

Mr. M

Great column today! Keep up
the great work. If you have
the chance to respond, where
did you find the Fitzgerald
quote?

Brock SF Weekly

As Churchill said to Stalin
at Yalta, "You sir are one of
the two great minds in this
conversation." (Roosevelt was
taking a leak and Alger Hiss
was nowhere to be found.)

Check out The Great Gatsby,
early on, when Nick Carraway
- a truly hateful character -
is describing the "failed"
mansion that Gatsby resides
in. It may well be a misquote
but if it is, the point
nevertheless holds up.

All power to Meyer Wolfsheim!

Mr. M

Your in-depth research of the
USPS is sadly flawed: Its
existence is not perpetuated
by a perceived monopoly on
first-class mail (as if
anyone fucking sends letters
anymore, duh!) but rather by
volumes and seas and oceans
of junk mail (USPS calls it
"bulk business mail") which
flows in vomitous torrents
and floods ad nauseam and
will continue to do so
throughout the existence of
time itself.

Yah think Phil's Mattress
Outlet or Loans 4 U are gonna
quit spewing their shit out
just cuz it's obnoxious and
annoys people? Fingerhut and
Harriet Carter and ARRP 'bout
to change their evil ways?
UPS gonna snatch that action
right up for $0.08 cents per?
Add the recent and growing
surge of parcel-post revenue
via Internet shop-at-home
outfits, a national average
of 90-plus percent public
approval ratings, and what
must be an extremely
irritating passage in the
Constitution itself
guaranteeing a
government-provided postal
system, and you think its
days are numbered? Yah really
think FedEx is gonna go down
that 15-mile dirt road to get
Mrs. Really Old Lady's liver
pills to her? I could go on
for sooo long....

But maybe you are right;
radio certainly did kill the
book/periodical/newspaper
industry, then television
came along and whacked radio
right into oblivion. And now
with the Internet, Ted Turner
is selling paper roses on the
sidewalk and Rupert Murdoch
will work for food.

Then again, perhaps you
missed the target and hit the
waitress square in the ass
with a house dart. No more
comp draw beers for you.

;)b
<huey@1starnet.com>

Yes to all the above, except
the parts I disagree with.
First-class letter volume
remains large and profitable;
video did kill the radio star
(or at least the Buggles);
and last time I checked, UPS
and FedEx were willing to
drive to people's houses not
only to deliver packages but
to pick them up.

Mr. M

Oh, wow, what an exciting use
of space. Suck rips apart the
United States Postal Service.
For a second I thought I was
reading the editorial section
of a high school newspaper.
What the hell do you have to
complain about. Postage in
the US is less than any
country in Europe. As for
undelivered mail, try mailing
a package from Russia or some
South American nation. I
don't think it'll be the USPS
that steals, loses, or
destroys your package. Maybe
next week you can brighten
our day with an exciting
article about those dreadful
lines at the DMV.

Sincerely,

Andrew Morton
<amorton@propoint.com>

Since we aim to please, those
of us who believe that high
school comprises the best
years of our lives are
heartened by your response.
Indeed, things in good ol'
Amerika are, on average,
better than they are in the
typical Third World country
(or, certainly, than the
typical Fourth World planet,
such as New Apokolips).
Indeed, your critique of Suck
pulls up short: What, you
might ask, do any of us
outside Russia or the former
South America have to
complain about? As for higher
postal rates in Europe,
someone's got to pay for all
that good bread. While your
query about a DMV
exposé is interesting,
we must pass on such a
sensitive topic at the
present time; one
Constitutional crisis is
enough.

Mr. M

Hello:

Due to your related
experience, I thought you
could help me out.

I am looking for a scientist
who will be responsible for
directing and overseeing
animal studies (mainly mouse)
to study the role of stem
endothelial cells in new
angiogenic beds, for example
angiogenic beds in limb and
cardiac ischemia. Future
studies will also include
gene therapy animal models.

The candidate should have
hands-on experience in
implementing, carrying out,
and analyzing ischemic /
angiogenic animal models.
Experience in histological
analysis of ... (blah blah
blah).

If you know anyone that might
be interested contact:

Sandy Stern
<sis@candseek.com>

May I suggest Postmaster
General Henderson for the
job? He seems somewhat
uncomfortable in his current
position and I'm confident he
would bring the same ability
to hire Karl Malden as he has
in his current position.

Mr. Mxyzptlk

Going Postal

But I LIKE the postal
service. And who the hell is
going to want to deliver
small envelopes containing
one or two sheets of paper
for 32 cents? It's a volume
business, baby. Carve it up
and make a big old mess.

<jyoull@wcnet.org>

I'm not a baby and I haven't
come a long way. Since when
is a big old mess not
preferable to a machine-gun
totin' monopoly? Read your
Schumpeter, bay-bee.

Mr. M

I was expecting to open up
Suck today to find the first
article available about
Clinton with a sense of
humor. But you did me one
better, you had an article
making fun of the postmaster
general. Salud.

P.S. Oh, I didn't read the
postmaster article, but I'm
sure it's quite captivating.

<Bgzw18d@aol.com>

If I may speak for the
corporate paymasters behind
the operation of Suck, the
philosophy here is, Why
disappoint today's customer
when there's always a
tomorrow?

Mr. M

Suck,

And now a reference to Mr.
Mxyzptlk, my FAVORITE old
Superman character?

Oh gawd, you girls are TOO
MUCH!

Wow.

Best,

Bill Gubbins
<gubbins@usit.net>

Muto, The Purple Parasite,
and Matter-Eater Lad all say
"Hi," though MEL says that
minus the buck you owe him,
you still owe him a buck.

Mr. M

Nice article; hope you can
manage to contribute more
than once every two years,
but the commentary rings true
again. Nice someone has the
gumption to present it ...
something that keeps me
coming back to Suck (and
Reason, for that matter).

Yours,

Brad Miller
<miller@mcc.com>

As The Stranglers so
eloquently put it 50 or 60
years ago, there are "no more
heroes anymore ... no more
Shakespeare-os." Into this
hero-less world I stride
ready to take the bold,
seemingly indefensible
position that the post office
is ripe for ridicule and,
even more controversially,
that Karl Malden isn't worth
his expense money. I wear
this crown lightly, if at
all.

Mr. M

Awesome stuff; really made my
morning! I could not have
said it (or thought it) any
better myself. You've got my
vote.

Mark Gran

<mgran@amada.com>

If it's wrong of me to want
to be a stamp and have people
lick me, then I'm guilty but
still legally acceptable.

Mr. M

I don't work for the post
office, nor do I want to, but
talk about kicking the
handicapped. Let me ask you
one thing: Is there any
company on this planet
prepared to take a letter
from me in Los Angeles and
deliver it to my Grandma, who
lives down a dirt road miles
from anywhere, for 32 cents?
I fail to see how this is a
bad deal. And everybody
whines and bleats whenever
the PO asks for a penny
increase - a damn penny! -
when they are blowing
hundreds of dollars on the
Home Shopping Channel or
buying Hand Knitted Toilet
Roll Covers or even (shock)
buying $2000 PCs they don't
really use.

The USPS ain't perfect, and
I'm sure it could be a lot
better (to see how, examine
the British postal service,
arguably the best in the
universe), but show me an
alternative (overnight
urban-to-urban is just cherry
picking, it doesn't count)
and I'll buy in to your
screed.

Craig Zerouni
<craig@sgrail.com>

It'll be a great day when the
Pentagon drops bombs on the
handicapped and schools have
to hold bake sales to buy
books. Some alternatives:
email, faxes, telephone
calls. If the effin PS is so
great, then why does it need
a first-class letter
monopoly? Wouldn't it
vanquish all possible foes
via superior service? Why
can't utility meter-readers
simply leave bills in
people's mailboxes and pick
up the same when they come
back to read the meter and
bang the missus (like they
used to until the '20s when
the PS went to court to
prevent the bill-paying part
at least)?

Btw, those pennies add up;
despite inflation, 100 of
them still equals a dollar
(US).

Mr. M