Rural America is not the problem

Editor:

The new rural surcharge by the USPS implemented in July is not only rural discrimination and a violation of its universal mandate to deliver for America, but it is to bite the hands that feed America, that source the natural resources that power our homes and businesses. Yet, U.S. Postmaster General Steiner has decided that rural America is a drain on its operations and must therefore be penalized and be made to pay more. That’s what rural America gets for feeding the cities that are benefitting from his restructuring that smacks rural America across the face because he thinks the postal service, which was always intended as a public entity, should be a

business, a business that apparently intends to stick it to rural America, that refuses to recognize the very lands and people on whom we are all dependent, the lands those trucks must cross as they meander from big city to big city.

Steiner and his cadre of scrooges pontificate and wag their authoritative fingers like characters from Oliver Twist as rural America dares to expect to be treated with the same deference that he prioritizes for his urban beneficiaries, deference guaranteed by the USPS universal mandate to deliver for America. Rural America should never have to beg for the equity promised by the mandate as in “Sir, may I have some more — please?”

Blaming fuel costs as an excuse for charging us more when we have tracking data of packages going from south Texas to western Colorado via New Jersey — by ground — is to deny the recurring realities of inefficiency after inefficiency followed by excuse after excuse. Maybe if they weren’t trucking out three-ounce packages willy nilly around the country for 10 days, they wouldn’t need to use so much fuel.

Rural America is not the problem.

Krystyn Hartman

Graduate student, Western Colorado University