Have you ever tried to accomplish something, lately, requiring the simple assistance of people who are well paid to provide you with help but who Never Ever answer their phones?  Have you ever spoken with one of these cockroaches who promise to call you back but never ever do?  They can be governmental managers, sub-managers, supervisors, and ordinary front line clerks.  Or they can be corporate customer service folks, their supervisors, and managers.  Its all the same.  All you get is bullshit.  Sound familiar?  It generally takes a huge organization to be fully dysfunctional, such as the Veterans Administration, a major city government, or a major newspaper with national and international distribution.

The new convenient excuse is that 'due to Covid,' these people are 'working from home.'  Once they are home, they realize that No One is supervising them and that their paycheck keeps coming.  So, instead of working they sit around all day in their dirty underwear with their thumb up their ass doing nothing, never ever answering their phone, never checking messages or emails; not ever, not for a whole damn year or more!  What you get is a cheerful female taped voice that says, "Thank you for calling, your call is important to us, please leave your name and phone number and we'll get back to you shortly."  You know very well that what this means is 'GFY, drop dead, you are not worth talking to.'

I tried to call various people at the VA to get the results of an Xray exam, or to the Board of Veterans Appeals find out about my pending disability claim, and to speak with my primary doctor, to ask about prescription medications, and more.  I called during weekday regular business hours.  The result was always the same, "No one is available to speak with you now, try again later."  When I called American Legion Regional Headquarters, who filed my disability claim, the voicemail said, "Due to Covid -We Are Closed." Click.  Apparently, they've been 'closed' for over a year! WTF!

I called the New York City Mayor's office for People with Disabilities with a question about disability services.  The NYC Mayor's office!  This is the top headquarters for a multi billion dollar budget major city.  No one is there to answer the phone!  NO ONE!  Do they return calls?  So far, over a month later, Nothing!  Do they respond to emails? Nothing.  No one is even checking for messages or emails, Not For a Whole Year!  Then I tried my county's Constituent Services line and left a message.  Nothing, no call back!  No one there, ever.  Then I called my local elected city council member.  someone answered, listened to what I was calling about and assured me that someone would call back, and of course no one ever did.

Weeks ago, the major metropolitan newspaper I've been reading for 60 years stopped being delivered to my door.  This happens once in a while, but not for over two weeks.  Every day I called customer service and get a tape recording saying, "Thank you for calling, for a missed paper, press one, for something else press two or three, and to cancel your subscription Press 4.  In other words, "we don't want to talk to you, your call is not important to us and we don't give a shit if you unsubscribe, drop dead."  New York City, where I live, has well over one million apartment buildings and every last one is locked at the front doors.  The newspaper delivery folks have all they keys; each carrier delivers about 3000 papers and has the keys to over 100 buildings.  If the carrier becomes unavailable, does their employer, the distribution company, go get the keys.  Hell No!  They just have some idiot drop the papers on the outside of the locked doors on the sidewalk, which in New York means, "Free Newspaper!" to any passer by.  This is 'Pretend Delivery.'  Every day I call Customer Service and its as if they were just born 5 minutes ago and have no record of previous complaints, and no system to notice that 3000 people in my area are also complaining.  And they cheerfully offer to 'give me credit' as if not getting my paper to read over breakfast doesn't matter.  And of course, they absolutely promise to 'get back to me' about resolving the problem, which they never do.  Their supervisors and managers, ;working from home,' never answer their phone, never check messages, they just keep getting paid by the corporation with its head up its ass.

Here's the thing, the former president taught Americans to Not Give a F**k and to just pretend to work.  He determinedly sabotaged every government function in America.  Remember the highly efficient US Postal Service?  The saboteur he put in charge is still there.  He not only removed new multi million dollar sorting machines, he had them destroyed!  He sold our precious national parks to mining companies.  But his main treason was to teach American workers and managers to not give a damn and just let their work go to hell.

Try calling your elected official.  You'll hear it ring and ring and then nothing.  Or you will get a year old tape saying that due to covid they are closed but leave a message and someone will call you back.  Then, you can die of old age waiting to talk to someone.  The fact is, no one has checked the messages for the past YEAR.

Why the hell should anyone worry about doing their lousy job when every single day across a America a racist white cop shoots and unarmed Black person dead because their life means nothing to them.  Just in the past month racist white cops held a UNFORMED AMERICAN SOLDIER at gunpoint telling him to fear for his life because he was Black and Hispanic and they had hate, not respect, for his life and his service; and elsewhere they shot a little 13 year old Hispanic boy dead while he stood terrified holding his unarmed hands up.  No doubt the hate filled killer cop ejaculated victoriously as the boy fell dead and bleeding at his feet.  Just a few minutes before The Minneapolis Killer Cop was found Guilty of Murder, another unarmed Black American was shot dead by another racist cop.  And with all that, some asshole Customer Service person should bother answering your call?  Please.

The whole problem is Organizational Dysfunction.  It starts with the highly paid techi who fails to properly set up or explain using the office phone and email system from home.  And then, those working from home failed to listen or understand or failed to give a damn.  They conveniently fail to wonder why they are not getting any work related calls, and fail to try to do anything about it, such as checking their messages -for more than a year!  This then extends up the chain of command to their supervisors who conveniently fail to supervise.  And it extends all the way up the chain of command to managers and executives who conveniently make up or receive bullshit quarterly reports that are total fantasy, while they sit comfortably in their country homes too relaxed to actually care about their responsibilities because they know that their Executive Directors are in lala land as well.  Meanwhile, veterans and consumers are screwed because even the person who receives complaints is sitting at home in splendid isolation.

In the case of the failed newspaper delivery, you have a corporation so large that its got its head up its ass.  They have subcontracted everything out to the point that they not only have totally lost control of their own circulation and customer service, but have isolated their executives to the point that they have no clue what's going on.  They wont know that they failed nor how they failed until the day that they sit at a meeting in their $6000 dollar sweat drenched suits to declare bankruptcy.

And then there is the major American Political Party that has transformed into The Political Party of Prejudice with every single elected official emulating the highest ideals of the Nazis. With America being led down the toilet by these traitors, why should anyone bother to actually do their lousy job?