FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
President Barack Obama is throwing the U.S. Postal Service a lifeline. But maybe he shouldn't.
It's all part of the president's larger plan to cut $3 trillion from deficits over the next 10 years.
First, the president would allow the postal service to raid $7 billion from an overfunded pension account to avoid financial collapse.
The agency is facing a serious cash crunch and is expected to hit its $15 billion borrowing limit in a couple of weeks.
That is why Obama also wants to give the postal service more time to make a $5.5 billion payment to a health care retiree fund that's due at the end of this month.
The White House plan would allow the Postal Service to end Saturday mail delivery and raise the price of a first-class stamp another 2 cents to 46 cents.
Obama is against letting the Postal Service void union contracts to lay off 120,000 postal workers. The Postal Service itself proposed layoffs in its own cost-cutting plan.
Republicans are slamming the White House plan - especially the part about using $7 billion from its extra contributions to the pension plan. They say instead of fundamental reform, this plan uses "accounting gimmicks."
The Postmaster General has acknowledged that the agency faces a "new reality." He's looking to cut $3 billion a year by closing hundreds of processing facilities, cutting equipment in half and slowing mail delivery.
With the use of e-mail and other electronic communication, it's clear the Postal Service has become a dinosaur: There are 43 billion fewer pieces of mail sent now than four years ago.
Yet our government is intent on throwing more taxpayer dollars down the drain.
Here’s my question to you: What should happen to the U.S. Postal Service?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Christian in Houston, Texas:
Jack, Clearly the U.S. Postal Service needs a major overhaul. I am not against partially privatizing some of their operations, while maintaining their public monopoly on mail carrying. They keep raising their prices, but the service is poor and outdated, and now they are virtually bankrupt.
Bud in Jacksonville, Florida:
Democratic answer: Subsidize it some more. Republican answer: Streamline it to fit its current and projected revenues. Libertarian answer: Privatize it. Everyone will choose an answer according to their politics, inevitably. I choose the Republican answer.
Micah on Facebook:
Privatize, sell it off in chunks, different companies for different regions. Allow the private sector to correct the government’s mistakes.
Susan:
By all means, keep the postal service; it is needed and useful. But they should do away with Saturday deliveries and shorten the business hours.
Chris:
Cut retirement benefits, close post offices, cut delivery from 6 days to 4 days, and cut express mail or overnight mail. That's it.
Mark:
Privatize it now! FedEx and UPS run better than this government-run mess. Cut Saturday mail, end junk mail, massive layoffs...problem solved.
Noel in New Mexico:
Cut mail deliveries to three times a week. That would mean three less trips to the garbage can every week to dump my junk mail.