The post office has basically been falling apart for years, a victim of falling volumes of first-class and junk mail, as well as Rep. DeFazio's (D-OR) 2006 bill that the post office must pre-fund retirement for at least 75 years of obligations. USPS gets no money from the government, instead relying completely on revenue from mail, of which the prices are regulated by congress. They asked for a bailout from the government, it's tied up in multiple ways, and who knows what's really going on. Apparently someone got the bright idea to say that ballots would be delayed, and all of a sudden everyone punted in their pants. This could all be solved by allowing the post office to go private and raise mailing rates to a point where they actually cover the cost of services, instead of being a hobbled whipping boy for congress. There's a lot more to it than that, basically every two-bit president and congressman has a different opinion about what the post office is and what they do, but at the heart of the matter, it's an obsolete organization that needs to be allowed to modernize or go out of business.