Various politicians are rushing to condemn John McCain's unsolicited robocalls about Barack Obama's "relationship" with William Ayers. I would like to take this opportunity to condemn all unsolicited robocalls about anything. This includes the ones that want to tip me to great pay-per-view events on DirecTV and the ones that invite me to try out a free membership at my local Family Fitness Center. We're not getting political-type calls here in California but if I do, I will condemn them, no matter who they're from or what they're about.
I actually question whether they're effective in any way. They seem to me like a great way to piss people off, interrupting their lives or dinners or other, more important calls to listen to some unwanted sales pitch. There also seems to be a high potential of robocalls reaching the wrong person…someone in the home who couldn't buy the product if they wanted to.
I suppose the companies that set up such things have statistics that prove robocalls are of some value in moving a product or public opinion, however illogical that seems to me. Nevertheless, even if they make sense for the sponsor, I think they're a slimy, annoying way to do business and I think less of any enterprise that employs them.
Obviously, they should be outlawed and the people who do them should be sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole and, more important, no access to a telephone. Failing that, they should be required to include their home phone numbers in any robocalls so we can ring them up at our leisure and tell them exactly what he think of such tactics. 4 AM sounds like as good a time as any to me.