Let's all take a chill pill. I too have registered on the "do not call" list. I applaud you for doing it also, but if you had informed yourself about the law, you would have discovered that it only covers telemarketers that are calling your home interstate. It does not cover Georgia based telemarketers.

In addition, I can't think of a better (and inexpensive) method to timely notify constituents about a town hall meeting. Ain't technology grand?

I would bet that thousands of telephones were called, and only less than 100 people will attend this meeting. How about them beans?

If more of us would be more involved in the actions of our government and elected officials, more might get done.

The woman with the sick baby she’s desperately trying to go to sleep,
… when she has to drop everything to take Westmoreland’s recorded phone call;

The old man with the arthritic knees who finds it painful to walk,
… when he has to painfully walk to the phone to take Westmoreland’s recorded phone call;

The mother in the midst of fixing lunch for her hyper-active and hungry kids,
… when she is pulled to the phone to take Westmoreland’s recorded phone call;

The night-shift worker who’s trying to rest yet expects a phone call from his sick mother,
… when he is awakened by Westmoreland’s recorded phone call;

All these people, and others in countless situations that might be similar, cannot enjoy being awakened or interrupted by a machine programmed to disturb their lives, systematically, ruthlessly, and anonymously too, since the dialing machine is programmed to hide the caller’s name and phone number from the person being called.

The message is simply a recording purporting to be from Rep. Westmoreland. Thus there is no personal effort on his part, in either dialing (handled by the machine) or talking (done by the recording). There is no apology, such as a statement, “I hope I am not catching you at a bad time.” There is no opportunity to reply, unless one makes a note of Westmoreland’s office phone number and then initiates a phone call. By the time the phone call recipient gets to that point in the message, he is generally ready to hang up.

Insensitivity like this cannot go unchallenged. So long as the Fourth Amendment gives us the right to be secure in our homes, patriotic Americans will not stand for Congressmen who sneakily invite themselves into our homes through technology (acquired through special interests’ money). What starts out with one phone call now and then will turn into more and more, and some people will end up not taking phone calls from callers who may turn out to be their own mother because insensitive politicians will have made them wary of all phone calls.

Nice try...but maybe you didn't give all the facts in your little stories.

Could it be that the baby is sick because Mommy has been dragging it around to all the shopping centers to catch the end-of-year sales?

The stubborn old man with the arthritic knees has a portable phone, but does he insist on using the one attached to the wall?

The mother is in the midst of fixing lunch for her hyper-active and hungry kids. Why are they so hungry? Is she running late because she has been on her cell phone all morning and has been ignoring them?

The night-shift worker who’s trying to rest yet expects a phone call from his sick mother -- sick, maybe -- hypochondriac, probably. Could it be that he's relieved it's not her on the phone?

Why are you blaming it on the politicians?

Rude, Intrusive Politicians. Yup, they’re incumbents and they’re typical. How did they get there ? No personal contact because they are ignorant of how to answer even a six word question on public policy. To hell with manners and common decency. The paid political consultants say screw the little guy and go with the big numbers. Take for example Westmoreland and Logsdon. Both got there by being big money, special interest lap dogs that have no clue as to public policy or the desires of the community. They have quite limited education and have not taken any effort to learn the issues. They won’t debate because they can’t. They make thousands of continuous repeat phone calls even to people who politely request that they stop. Why? Because the loss of your handful of votes is meaningless. Lying to a handful of constituents has no downside. When they get their hands on Jack Abramoff casino cash or Group VI development lucre they get the funding to just flood your mail box and your phone with empty prompts with their names. “Hey--- vote for me--- the cardboard cut-out.” In Westmoreland’s case we federal taxpayers pay for his trash. Ask them questions and they won’t answer because they have no idea what you are talking about.