Otherwise Eligible Votes?

Woke up this morning to the following news story from a Columbus Dispatch news podcast:

“Nearly 23,000 ballots could be discarded in Ohio, a USA TODAY, Columbia Journalism Investigations, and Frontline investigation found.  In this unprecedented election, seemingly minor problems, such as mismatched signatures, inaccurate birth dates, and other paperwork mistakes could disqualify otherwise eligible votes.” – Jonathan Smith, Columbus Headline News Express 10/19/2020 7:15 AM (00:01:03 into the podcast)

The comment seems to be in reference to the article Ohio election winner could turn on absentee votes declared ineligible (dispatch.com) by Darrel Rowland (@darreldrowland) / Twitter.  This article also contains the phrase “otherwise-eligible votes” – but what does that even mean?

Imagine a fairly low-security task such as signing into a website or calling a business on the phone for account information.

You identify yourself, and as part of that they ask you for your birth date, address, or other information to make sure you are really you?

Surely you’ve screwed this up at some point in your life – and rightfully been rejected access to meddle in your own affairs.

But we don’t call these “otherwise eligible logins” – because that’s what we only want eligible logins, not “otherwise eligible”.

Eligible means “Having the right to do or obtain something; satisfying the appropriate conditions.”  When you fail to satisfy the appropriate conditions you are “NOT eligible” not “otherwise eligible” or “differently eligible” or “alternatively eligible”, you’re either eligible; or you’re not.

This is yet another example of newspeak in “news speak” that ultimately amounts to propaganda.

Just like not knowing the correct passwords and challenge questions makes one ineligible to log-in to a computer or interact with an organization by phone, not answering the security questions for voting (a much higher security action) should make one “ineligible to vote” until they answer the questions correctly.

Words mean things, and neither the Dispatch editors nor anyone else get to re-define them to bolster their baseless positions. Editors should know how to use dictionaries and resist the temptation to make up terms (no matter how absurd) to suit their personal or organizational political agenda.

Join me in celebrating “Lysander Spooner Day” on May 14th!

I propose that Americans observe Lysander Spooner Day on May 14th (a Thursday this year).

How?

By refusing any and all un-wanted mail!

I’ll get to the how in a moment, but I think it’d be a fitting tribute because Mr. Spooner thought that the US Postal Service was an unconstitutional monopoly – so he did what any good person would and responded by starting a competing company, the American Letter Mail Company.

The US Government responded to this competition by tying him up in court until he ran out of money and shuttered the company.

Fast forward about 170 years…

I just got done sorting through a pile of unread mail in my home.

It weighed 8.5 lbs (4kg)!

After sorting it into two piles, I found that 86% of the mail was unsolicited junk!

So here’s how to stop it.

The USPS Domestic Mail Manual section 508 part 1.1.3 “Refusal After Delivery” explains that Addressees may control delivery of their mail.

One way to do this is to write Refused near the postage (I’ve used a fat tipped fluorescent pink marker to great effect), then returning it to my mailbox with an indication that there is mail to be picked up.

When the letter carrier arrives, they see the mail piece, read the Refused note, and process it accordingly.

That’s all there is to it – and it takes a lot less of your valuable time and effort to write Refused on a letter (or you can use a Refused stamp) than it does to recycle the mail or throw it away.

Don’t you think that’d be a fitting remembrance for a guy who was bullied by the US Government?  If so, simply share this post with your friends, family, and most importantly – your neighbors!  This protest against Government bullying and junk mail will work best if people participate together.

I propose the hashtag #LysanderSpoonerDay in social media.  Please join me in spreading the word so that Lysander Spooner and the ideas he stood for are remembered across the nation.

All I ask is that you share a link to this page with your friends, and by all means, let me know if you’ll be participating!

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Some of you might be wondering, “What happens if I do this for a while – will I get in trouble? Will my letter carrier get mad at me?” For the answer to those questions, I’ve detailed my experience with refusing United States Postal Service junk mail.

My experience with refusing United States Postal Service junk mail

Earlier today I discovered that I had 8.5 lbs. of mail in my house – none of it really important as evidenced by the fact that I ignore it to no ill effect for long stretches at a time – in this case, several months.

I had been refusing my mail using the process described in the USPS Domestic Mail Manual section 508 part 1.1.3 “Refusal After Delivery”.

But how did I get that much junk if I’m refusing it?  Well, I took a break because we added a new member to our family and I honestly didn’t have time to interact with mail at all – not even enough to refuse it.

But I did use this approach before for several months and here’s what happened.

At first, the mail simply disappeared.  This happened for a few weeks.  Then, one day when I wasn’t home, the letter carrier asked my wife a strange question.

Does your husband live here anymore?

My wife suspected something fishy and said that yes, of course I still lived here, and asked him what led to his question.

He said:

Oh, well, we’ve been getting a lot of mail addressed to him that is refused… so we’re going to assume that he doesn’t live here anymore and hold all of his mail.

Seriously? Threats?!? They didn’t like what I was doing so they were going to hold my mail hostage and make me go to their post office to beg for it – no doubt with a complimentary tongue lashing?

My wife responded that the mail man would need to discuss that with me first.

It took me a few days to catch my letter carrier to discuss it with him.

I asked him what the issue was and he explained that my refusal was causing a lot of confusion and frustration at the local post office.

Specifically, he was concerned that it was his sworn duty to deliver every piece of mail with proper postage to my house.

I explained that I did not in any way wish to interfere with anyone’s attempts to do so – only that, as documented in the Domestic Mail Manual, I would be exercising my authority to refuse any mail allowed by the policy.

He said that this left them in a bit of a pickle.

According to him, anything mailed first class would be sent back to the sender – at the sender’s expense (which is an easy way to use market forces to encourage organizations to stop sending junk mail – who wants to pay for useless junk mail?).

That was a hassle for them – but at least they knew what to do with it.

The problem was “bulk mail” that is delivered to everyone in an area as a service of the Postal Service.  Apparently they don’t have a process for returning it – and my junk mail was piling up in the post office.  Worse yet, they have strict policies against destroying or disposing of mail.

His proposal was that I continue to accept delivery of mail as before – and continue expending time and energy processing it as garbage or recycling.

I expressed that I was simply trying to simplify my life, and that while I planned to deal with any requested mail, the junk mail was tantamount to someone stopping by each day and littering in my living room.

I explained that I was unsympathetic to the concern that the perpetrators of this littering would now have to shoulder 100% of the burden for the trouble they’ve caused me and countless other Americans for years.

Since I have nothing against my letter carriers or US Postal Service employees personally, I notified him that I opted out of “bulk mail” and that as a result he would no longer have to shoulder my mail both to my home, and back to the post office after I had refused it.

Unfortunately, he was unwilling to accept my proposal, once again admonishing me that he was bound by sacred trust to deliver every fake foreign lottery winning notice some fraudster felt like sending.

I also explained that, perhaps he could obtain some relief by asking the USPS to amend the Domestic Mail Manual (DMM) or other policies to address his concerns.  It was a real shame that people reading and following the instructions in the DMM were causing so many internal issues – but those were issues between the USPS and it’s employees, and as a customer there was little I could do about them.

Disappointed, he smiled and said that his supervisor would be paying me a visit and I responded by sharing my schedule so she could catch me on a weekday when I was home.

Unfortunately, I have yet to discuss the matter with a supervisor as none have ever attempted to contact me.

So, there you have it… refusing mail in compliance with DMM guidelines may result in threats and attempts to coerce you to stop, but so far I have not explored the limits of adhering to this approach in the long run, so my apologies if it results in less favorable outcomes in your particular case.

Walking Chicken

You’ve probably seen it before. You’re walking along in a store or down a sidewalk when, for whatever reason, someone decides to play “chicken” with you.

Note: This article assumes that it’s generally proper to walk on the same side of an aisle or walkway as you might drive your car on the street. In other words, this approach is to be used where polite convention has somehow failed.

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It’s not that they don’t see you, maybe they think because they’re with two friends walking three-abreast down the sidewalk that you should yield to them. Maybe it’s some kind of guilty passive-aggressive pleasure. Maybe they’re trying to assert dominance over you.

In any case, my Dad taught me a little trick that has served me well over the years in dealing with this rather common rude behavior in a polite way – and you ALWAYS win the game of “chicken” to boot!

The key is that no person (or animal) will walk into a stationary object. So if you’re approaching a group of people on a crowded sidewalk and their body language is saying “get out of my way”, gradually slowing down and stopping requires *them* to decide how to get past you.

The vast majority of the time, simply slowing down and giving the situation more time to work out results in the person ducking in behind their friends or otherwise changing course to avoid you.  Stopping takes the fun out of a game of “chicken”.

Interestingly, this also works in cars if you’re on a narrow street with parking on each side. Stopping, leaving room for the other driver to maneuver, and letting them sort it out works wonders.