Signed, Sealed, D'oh-livered: Stamp to Feature Simpsons

Decline in regular mail more than offsets gift shipping bump

(NEWSER) - The US Postal Service had a jaw-droppingly ugly holiday quarter, losing $3.3 billion despite a better-than-expected surge in gift shipments, the agency announced today. That's $3 billion worse than its figure for the same period in 2010, the AP reports, and at this rate the agency expects to run out of dough by October. The problem is that traditional mail delivery continues to plummet—it fell 6% in the first fiscal quarter, which ended Dec. 31. More»

Like Barbie, Homer's on the outs in Tehran

(NEWSER) - Maybe the Supreme Leader doesn't giggle at lines like "Homer no function beer well without" and "I felt a surge of power … like God must feel when he’s holding a gun." But whatever the reason, Iranian officials have placed the Homer Simpson doll alongside Barbie on the nation's no-buy list, the AP reports. "We do not want to promote this cartoon by importing the toys," says an official at the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults. More»

WikiLeaks founder appears in 500th episode

(NEWSER) - Homer Simpson shouldn't bother trying to keep any secrets from his new neighbor: Julian Assange. The WikiLeaks founder guest stars as himself in the Simpsons 500th episode, which will air Feb. 19. Assange recorded his part last summer while under house arrest in Britain, executive producer Al Jean tells Entertainment Weekly . More»

But also some heroism ...

(NEWSER) - The Washington Post checks out a watchdog report about the nation's 574,000 mail carriers and finds some doozies:

• A Maryland carrier admitted to burning piles of mail in an abandoned lot and was sentenced to six months in jail.
• A carrier in Cincinnati stole $10,000 in cash and $1,000 in gift cards and pleaded guilty to mail theft.

Half of USPS mail processing centers to shut down this spring

(NEWSER) - Get ready to wait an extra day for the next DVD of The Wire: The mail is going to slow down. As part of its plan to save $3 billion, the cash-challenged US Postal Service will be closing roughly half of its 500 mail processing centers as soon as next March, a move that could bring new meaning to the term "snail mail," the AP reports. The plan will make next-day delivery of first-class mail a thing of the past, and deal a serious blow to things like time-sensitive magazines, mail-order prescription drugs, and Netflix. More»