Nov. 11, 2003 - 20:58 MST

THE WONDERING JEW

Freedom To Do Which ?

Today in the U.S. has been Veteran's Day. In Canada it is called Remembrance Day according to Pauline in her Inertia She says that in Canada Thanksgiving and Remembrance Day used to be celebrated on the same day. She observes that as people are trying to blame the service people who are veterans in their own right, "Perhaps it's time to put the Thanksgiving back into Remembrance Day."

She makes a great point I think. We should be thankful as well as honoring the vets, point in fact, we do not have to give the Nazi salute, carry papers signifying we are who we say we are and being forced to show them to hostile facist goons. If it weren't for service people we probably would be in that very position this present day.

The telemarketers are trying their best to kill the no-call list.

Their argument is that it is unconstitutional because politicians, religious organizations and non-profits can call.

Their aim it seems to me is to be able to blow their smoke in our ears at any time of day or night, regardless of what we the public desire.

From a purely personal point of view I feel that most any call from any of those categories should be blocked too. When I answer the phone and any of those types of people are on the line my usual response is, "I am on the no call list, you should be barred from calling me away from whatever I am doing at the moment. Please put me on a do not call list of your own."

I see in the newspaper that door-to-door sales people might soon be on the doorstep of people's residences as in days of yore. A householder's defense against that type of selling when I was a kid distributing handbills was in most cases seeing the little brass planchet nailed to the doorjamb above or below the doorbell saying, "No Solicitors," perhaps they will come into style again. In most apartment complexes solicitors are forbidden on the premises.

As far as I am concerned the public should be freed from that niggling, nagging, sleeve grabbing selling or being a captive audience in our own homes. It should be illegal all the way around. If I want to buy something, get political information, have need for some religious information I want, or to give to a charitable organization, I definitely do not want to be called on the phone ! I know how to get in touch with any of those groups by phone. If I want to talk to them, I'll call them. They have the right to advertise in the papers, magazines, on TV or radio and to my idea have no business coming into my living room and taking my attention and time to listen to something I don't want to hear anyway.

Constitutional or 'un' what about my right to privacy in my own home ?

And, you know one thing that ticks me off is the inability to reach a live body on the phone in most any business, a menu of button punching does not seem to allow one to talk to a live person and, by golly, none of those darn buttons put me in touch with anyone or get me the information I need. But yet, they have people trying to call to sell services ? Whether it is their employees or a company hired to tele-market it seems that they do not want to talk to anyone who has a legitimate reason to talk to them. Bah !

I wonder at times, we have Freedom To Do Which ? . . . . . . . . . .

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