House Republicans Insist the Post Office Keep Expensive Saturday Service

Hope you hadn't made any plans for August 3, because they just got cancelled: You'll be sitting by your mailbox, waiting for your mail, just like every other Saturday. And you can thank Congress — the House on Wednesday afternoon voted to override the postal service's plan to axe weekend deliveries starting that day. The Times Ron Nixon reports:

Faced with billions of dollars in losses, Postal Service officials said last month that beginning in August the service would stop delivering mail on Saturdays, though it would continue to deliver packages on a six-day schedule. The agency said cutting Saturday delivery would save about $2 billion a year.

Politicians didn't like that move, apparently, even though a healthy majority of Americans did. With House passage of the "continuing resolution" — a bill that serves to kick the budget ball a few months down the road — the measure now heads to the Senate and, if passed there, would then need to be signed by the president.

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That it passed the Republican-dominated House by a healthy margin suggests that Saturday service will survive 2013 — but it doesn't explain why it passed. We have a government agency imploring Congress — quite literally! — to let it save money by curtailing service, and the House GOP rejecting the idea. In nearly any other context, that would be inexplicable. But: save the mail!

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Nonetheless, good news for those who depend on various catalogs, fundraising appeals, bills, and — once or twice a year — cards from loved ones to get by. You need only continue to suffer through Sundays, at least until 2014.