this post was submitted on 05 Mar 2025
298 points (98.4% liked)

News

25665 readers
4901 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] cabillaud@lemmy.world 1 points 16 minutes ago

Step 1: Privatize and sell it for peanuts to fellow billionaires Step 2: Watch it crumble Step 3: Buy it back for a fortune to the very same people you sold it

[–] thisphuckinguy@lemmy.world 15 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Someone punch him in the face, please

[–] coaxil@lemm.ee 3 points 1 hour ago

I think a much smaller object with much much greater velocity it's referable.

[–] SuperCub@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 hour ago

It's time to strike some fear in Elon's heart. He's fucking around, he's going to find out.

[–] Wispy2891@lemmy.world 9 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

In my country since the government privatized a part of postal service, the quality of service heavily declined to the point that now is almost guaranteed that they will "lose" your letter if you send it in a place that will cost too much to deliver

[–] sibachian@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 hour ago

this is almost what has been happening in my country.

[–] DegenerationIP@lemmy.world 2 points 1 hour ago

Don't do that. Grrmany did. Did not end so Well.

[–] rageagainstmachines@lemmy.world 8 points 3 hours ago

Privatize deez nutz, bitch

[–] MyOpinion@lemm.ee 12 points 4 hours ago

This has been a fever dream of Republicans for my entire life. Looks like they just may get it this time.

[–] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 6 points 3 hours ago

This is exactly the shit that will give permanent erections to the cons.

And people should not call this shit "Trumpism" - this is who the Republicans are and what the Republican project has always been. They HATE the idea of a functioning society for all. Next up, we're going to hear how education should be handed over to the Devos family. You know, for "choice".

[–] slinkyjelly@lemm.ee 18 points 5 hours ago (1 children)
[–] wanderwisley@lemm.ee 7 points 3 hours ago

Definitely, I live in a very rural area of the country I think it might be one of the most rural places in the lower 48 states. And we heavily depend on the postal service to get things that we simply don’t have here. This will totally cripple my town and 99% of the people here will blame it on woke.

[–] SolidShake@lemmy.world 6 points 4 hours ago

try it. no one will use it then.

[–] WhatSay@slrpnk.net 32 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

You know who wants to replace the postal service? Amazon. They have delivery vehicles, lockers, and so on. They have been building towards it for years. I'm sure an attack on the postal service would leave Amazon on top, and I bet it's a plan in the works.

As for Amtrak, maybe musk wants to swallow it up with his boring company.

[–] jj4211@lemmy.world 20 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Actually they don't, they want to replace fedex and UPS.

No one wants the business of daily letter service.

[–] Zron@lemmy.world 26 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

What people who want to gut the postal service don’t understand is that it’s a fucking service.

The USPS does last mile delivery for all courier agencies. FedEx and UPS won’t pay a driver to deliver your dildo out to your cabin in bumfuck Nebraska, but the USPS will, along with your tax documents, bank statements, and anything else you need.

If you get rid of USPS, you’re cutting anyone who isn’t in a major city off from not only packages, but critical documents.

[–] vithigar@lemmy.ca 14 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago) (1 children)

It is insane to me when people complain about the failure of a public service to turn a profit as if that's some kind of bad or unexpected outcome.

Services cost money to operate for the benefit of those using them. That is literally the point.

[–] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 1 points 3 hours ago

Yes, the Republican con has been to compare government to a household budget and/or corporations, and it's just so very stupid.

[–] NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world 2 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

nah, they'd then require someone else who takes on the private company to do it, give them 10 billion dollars to ensure the infrastructure remains and the service is provided, and then they would still refuse to do it but somehow use all the money anyway.

[–] PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee 1 points 4 hours ago

I had to ups a document recently certified delivery but the company i was doing business with refuses to receive usps mail. It cost me $50 to send a fucking letter. I was so pissed.

[–] NatakuNox@lemmy.world 11 points 6 hours ago (4 children)

The post office would take an act of congress.

[–] treadful@lemmy.zip 1 points 16 minutes ago

And a constitutional amendment.

[–] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 9 points 3 hours ago

Whole lotta shit happening right now that should take an act of congress. Seems to make no difference.

[–] T00l_shed@lemmy.world 15 points 6 hours ago

Nah, not anymore, just an XO and the little fascists will make it happen.

[–] PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee 2 points 4 hours ago

Both would, actually. They are independent quasi governmental corpirations.

[–] match@pawb.social 180 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

fuck no, nationalize spacex and starlink

[–] ivanafterall@lemmy.world 56 points 10 hours ago (4 children)

Makes a whole lot more sense, honestly.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] Bathilda_Bagshot@lemmy.world 17 points 7 hours ago

They want to eliminate or control the Postal Service so that they can eliminate mail-in voting. Their added bonus is padding the pockets of fellow millionaires and billionaires.

[–] Itdidnttrickledown@lemmy.world 13 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

As long as they pay out the full pension to all the employee's. After every postal employee's pension is fully funded.

[–] T00l_shed@lemmy.world 10 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

Lol, you know they wouldn't

[–] Itdidnttrickledown@lemmy.world 1 points 3 hours ago

Of course not. Its been the dream of these scumbags for decades to get their hooks in to all that pension money and screw over the postal workers. They forget the term going postal exist for a reason.

[–] sifr@retrolemmy.com 7 points 6 hours ago

AmTrak is a hill I am willing to die for on.

[–] captainWhatsHisName@lemm.ee 137 points 11 hours ago (5 children)

No.

Not everything should be privatized so some asshole oligarch can have another toy.

[–] takeda@lemm.ee 59 points 11 hours ago (6 children)

Exactly, we have UPS, FedEx, DHL and bunch of others.

Leave USPS the fuck alone.

load more comments (6 replies)
[–] Davin@lemmy.world 19 points 9 hours ago

Everything that has been privatized, has ended up costing us more for shittier service. This will not be different.

[–] Nougat@fedia.io 51 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

I'd bet he wants to take over Amtrak so he can replace it with that stupid Las Vegas car tunnel.

[–] ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world 3 points 2 hours ago

Or replace it with nothing, because "railways and mass transit are obsolete" (translation: "they're hurting my car sales").

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] OhStopYellingAtMe@lemmy.world 59 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago) (4 children)

The usps is a government SERVICE. These parasites look at that and say “but nobody profits from that” and somehow they just can’t let that happen.

load more comments (4 replies)
[–] DigitalDruid@lemmy.sdf.org 9 points 8 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago) (3 children)

my personal conspiracy theory is that Amtrak exists solely to make train travel look bad, driving up private car sales.

I had a long career in ecommerce and the amtrak website has been annoying to book train rides on for the entirety of its existence. It would be trivial to improve it in any number of ways but it's got (and maintains) the design patterns of a captive audience portal like ssa.gov instead of doing anything that removes barriers to purchase.

While it's possible they have just had the same not very good at their job person for the entirety of the sites history (decades now) i very much doubt it. The company's site today gives the same feel as when it started; they really don't care if you buy a ticket or not and they aren't really going to do much to help you do it.

[–] MajorasMaskForever@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago

The conspiracy theory isn't that the automotive industry makes them look bad, it's the rail owners.

Real: Amtrak doesn't own any rails, they lease them and legally are supposed to have right of way on tracks unless the owner/operators of the rail currently have their own train that's too big for the bypasses.

Conspiracy: Rail owners make Amtrak experience so painful that it drives down usage so Amtrak runs fewer and fewer trains, so they can be less of a nuisance to them or outright get rid of the service line and they get to completely ignore Amtrak

[–] PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee 2 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

You aren’t wrong, BUT Amtrak does a decent job maintaining their trains and service despite the odds.

Amtrak recently received a huge infusion of funding under biden so of course trump wants to kill it.

[–] DigitalDruid@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 3 hours ago

i do like the trains! The Coast Starlight is amazing and the view from the observation car is just heaven.

The Empire Builder is another good train although the scenery on that route can't compare with the west coast.

[–] CmdrShepard42@lemm.ee 4 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

I can get on board with this theory. They're also insanely slow and nearly as expensive as air travel. I understand some of this is due to the rail network and who owns it, but it still seems like Amtrak hasn't improved one bit since the 1950s.

[–] MutilationWave@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 4 hours ago

I used them once to get from Tampa to Miami. It was fine. We got there over an hour late. I wouldn't really want to take a longer trip.

[–] AntY@lemmy.world 43 points 11 hours ago (3 children)

I remember seeing an interview with Margaret Thatcher where she said that rail could never be successfully privatized. Just as a reminder of how extreme Musk’s ideas are.

load more comments (3 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›