The destination of political mailers

[ZLoth]

Since it is election season, that means that political mailers are being dropped off at your doorstep or received in the mail. Where do you "file" those mailers?

Thank goodness my city has a recycling program....

[1995hoo]

Unlike the rest of the mail, they often get thrown in the recycling on the way into the house without being looked at (beyond discerning that they're political garbage).

[Max Rockatansky]

Made for decent kindling for a camp fire one time. 

[kphoger]

○   In a large plastic bowl, to hand out to trick-or-treaters

[1995hoo]

○   In a large plastic bowl, to hand out to trick-or-treaters

Heh. If I knew any of the neighborhood kids well enough to tell who they are and which ones live in houses with political flags out front, I'd make sure to give them the mailers for candidates or causes I know their parents wouldn't like (e.g., Democrat mailers for the guy up the block with a flag bearing Trump's name, MAGA-themed mailers for the kid whose parents have one of those rainbow-colored "In this house, we believe" list of liberal slogans in their front yard). That way I could offend everyone.

[gonealookin]

USPS doesn't deliver to my residence; I have to go to the local post office to pick up my mail.

In the post office, they considerately have placed large bins for recycling.  So those mailers usually travel about 10 feet from my PO box to the bin.

[CtrlAltDel]

USPS doesn't deliver to my residence; I have to go to the local post office to pick up my mail.

That would annoy me. I'm annoyed I have to cross the street to get the mail.

[Mapmikey]

I actually got some intended use out of one - a write in candidate for a school board election that had someone running unopposed on the ballot. Wasn't impressed with the ballot candidate so I got a second opinion I would not have otherwise seen. 

What I wish is that since I early voted, there was a way to stop receiving these mailers.

[GaryV]

I figure any mailers (or any advertising) for a candidate I wouldn't support is just money wasted by them.

[gonealookin]

USPS doesn't deliver to my residence; I have to go to the local post office to pick up my mail.

That would annoy me. I'm annoyed I have to cross the street to get the mail.

A couple of issues come up.

1.  The Patriot Act (post 9/11) requires that financial institutions have a residence address rather than a PO box for initial communication.  I recently applied for a new credit card and even after some communication back and forth was rejected over this specific issue.

2.  Somebody will send a package to my residence address via USPS.  USPS returns it because "that address is not in our system".  A reason I do a lot of business with Amazon is that they handle this issue well when I place an order.  If an item can't be sent to a PO box for some reason, they say so at the time I'm placing the order, and give me the option to send it to the Amazon Locker down at Whole Foods.

After all the years of dealing with those problems, I've mostly figured out ways around it but a couple times a year something comes up, like with the credit card.

The reason USPS doesn't do residential delivery is that a lot of the homes here are second/vacation homes, often unoccupied for weeks or months at a time, and the residential mail boxes would be overflowing with mail, mostly junk, if they sent the truck out every day.

The PO box at the local post office is free because of all of this; I have to show them something like my gas or electric bill that has both the service address and the PO box once a year to certify my residency.

[NWI_Irish96]

Each election season, I take one mailer for a candidate that is not of my chosen party, draw in a head wound, and tape it to the front door. I don't get anybody knocking at my door.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Two things:
1. Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!
2. I keep them until Election Day, to help me decide who to vote for, and then trash.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

○   In a large plastic bowl, to hand out to trick-or-treaters

Heh. If I knew any of the neighborhood kids well enough to tell who they are and which ones live in houses with political flags out front, I'd make sure to give them the mailers for candidates or causes I know their parents wouldn't like (e.g., Democrat mailers for the guy up the block with a flag bearing Trump's name, MAGA-themed mailers for the kid whose parents have one of those rainbow-colored "In this house, we believe" list of liberal slogans in their front yard). That way I could offend everyone.

Talk about the ultimate Halloween scare

[vdeane]

Two things:
1. Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!
2. I keep them until Election Day, to help me decide who to vote for, and then trash.

While tangentially related to politics, I don't see anyone actually discussing politics (candidates, issues, etc.) here.  Just the mailers.

Incidentally, you'd need a pretty big file to deal with the amount of mailers I've gotten over the local state senate race.  I've been getting 1-2 pieces of mail on it per day for the past couple weeks or so.  And that's just one little state senate race.  I can only imagine how much people in tossup federal races are getting.

[Max Rockatansky]

Two things:
1. Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!
2. I keep them until Election Day, to help me decide who to vote for, and then trash.

Tell us about who your favorite and most hated political figures are.  Inquiring minds want to know, omit no detail.

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Two things:
1. Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!
2. I keep them until Election Day, to help me decide who to vote for, and then trash.

While tangentially related to politics, I don't see anyone actually discussing politics (candidates, issues, etc.) here.  Just the mailers.

Incidentally, you'd need a pretty big file to deal with the amount of mailers I've gotten over the local state senate race.  I've been getting 1-2 pieces of mail on it per day for the past couple weeks or so.  And that's just one little state senate race.  I can only imagine how much people in tossup federal races are getting.

For the Illinois Gubernatorial race I got a bunch for one, one for the other

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Two things:
1. Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!
2. I keep them until Election Day, to help me decide who to vote for, and then trash.

Tell us about who your favorite and most hated political figures are.  Inquiring minds want to know, omit no detail.

I'm not stupid, I know the forum rule

[I-57/Route 66 Fan]

Since it is election season, that means that political mailers are being dropped off at your doorstep or received in the mail. Where do you "file" those mailers?

Thank goodness my city has a recycling program....

If we were talking about political ad business cards, those make good bookmarks.

[Max Rockatansky]

Two things:
1. Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!
2. I keep them until Election Day, to help me decide who to vote for, and then trash.

Tell us about who your favorite and most hated political figures are.  Inquiring minds want to know, omit no detail.

I'm not stupid, I know the forum rule

I find some irony though that you won't break this rule but you're totally cool with low quality spam posts.

[Scott5114]

Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!

So long as nobody mentions specific candidates, parties, or issues, it's fine.

Each election season, I take one mailer for a candidate that is not of my chosen party, draw in a head wound, and tape it to the front door. I don't get anybody knocking at my door.

One of my favorite things about Las Vegas culture is that any candidate who is unwise enough to include their face on campaign signage will have it be mercilessly vandalized in the silliest possible manner—added moustache, giant googly eyes, Groucho Marx glasses, missing teeth, etc.

One prominent state candidate (who I won't name, in keeping with the above) ignited a minor scandal a month or so back for yelling at a Las Vegas cop to get out of a red-light ticket. His words to the cop were then added to his massive billboard overlooking CC-215. And a moustache added for good measure. Apparently the candidate was mad enough about this he pressed Las Vegas police into dusting for prints, but as far as I know nobody has been arrested for it.

○   In a large plastic bowl, to hand out to trick-or-treaters

This isn't the worst possible answer thread...

[formulanone]

The same place the legions of credit card offers go, into the shredder. It's quite satisfying; ultimately both safe and childish.

Though, I'll save a few bits of dark card stock as sun visor extensions.

[ZLoth]

The same place the legions of credit card offers go, into the shredder. It's quite satisfying; ultimately both safe and childish.

FWIW... You can opt out of the credit card offers at https://www.optoutprescreen.com/ . I still wouldn't waste the electricity to shred the political mailers.

And next Monday, around high noon, my mother and I will take advantage of the early voting that begins that day. After that, all those mailers would be completely ineffective.

[Scott5114]

There's also the fact that shredding paper greatly shortens the wood pulp fibers, which makes it less recyclable. Sending something to recycling directly without shredding is greatly preferable from an environmental standpoint. (Shredded paper at least biodegrades well, but that process usually releases carbon.)

[ObsidianTheFox]

Two things:
1. Oh yes, a classic rule-breaking politics thread on this forum!
2. I keep them until Election Day, to help me decide who to vote for, and then trash.

While tangentially related to politics, I don't see anyone actually discussing politics (candidates, issues, etc.) here.  Just the mailers.

Incidentally, you'd need a pretty big file to deal with the amount of mailers I've gotten over the local state senate race.  I've been getting 1-2 pieces of mail on it per day for the past couple weeks or so.  And that's just one little state senate race.  I can only imagine how much people in tossup federal races are getting.

The two big races over here are filling up ~50% of the commercials on TV and at least 75% of what I've been seeing on YouTube the past couple months.

[kphoger]

Each election season, I take one mailer for a candidate that is not of my chosen party, draw in a head wound, and tape it to the front door. I don't get anybody knocking at my door.

I stopped voting along party lines a couple of elections ago, so I'd have to put up multiple mailers like that.  Still a cool idea, though.