Tomorrow is Super Tuesday, which means eight states are having their presidential primary elections all on the same day. And every day for the past week, I've been getting telephone calls from both the Republican and Democratic parties asking for my support for various candidates. But these are not the solicitation telephone calls of the past. Back in the day, volunteers from the various candidates' committees used to personally call local residents who were registered voters of that particular candidate's party, hoping to count on their support. But with the advent of the modern telemarketer and that pesky invention of theirs, the autodialer, now candidates can bombard entire states with their own pre-recorded messages. I get at least three telephone calls a day. Just today Hillary Clinton, Mitt Romney, and Mitt Romney's wife have all called me to ask for my support. Yesterday Barack Obama called me. I've yet to hear from Ron Paul, but as no one seems to know who he is, maybe he hasn't bothered with telephoning anyone.
I can't wait until this election is over. Being bombarded with television advertisements as early as last fall was bad enough. Now they're monopolizing my telephone. When I was in college and was about to register for my first election, a friend advised me not to put down my telephone number on my voter registration application. He said it wasn't a requirement, that they only used it for the aforementioned committee volunteers to cold-call voters. Now with autodialers, that point is moot. But at least I can fight back with counter-telemarketer technology: Caller ID. Any time I get a call from "Private Caller," I can be sure it's another pre-recorded election message. Then I let it go to voice mail. And they do leave voice mail.
I'm not the only one who is sick of the campaigning, and how it started off way too early and got too intense too fast. A recent episode of The Simpsons totally took the piss out of this year's election campaign with its "Ralph Wiggum for President" episode. And like Hillary and Barack and Mitt, Ralph has his own presidential election campaign website: http://www.wiggumforprez08.com. So pick a winner. Vote Wiggum in '08!
2 comments:
Horray - you're back!
Yes, those calls would drive me mad too - it's not as if as pre-recorded message is going to sway your judgment. I would have thought that the head to head TV debates are the only things that could really sway public opinion.
I'm not going to bother voting in the next election. Both parties are offering me subtle variations on the same set of policies, so what's the point?
And after all of my complaining, I didn't even get a chance to vote yesterday! I worked a 10-1/2 hour day yesterday and was too tired when I got out of work to take the bus to the voting center (as it's not conveniently located to where I live). So I didn't get to exercise my constitutional right to have a say in who runs for president.
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