Up to my ears and fed up with politics

I like covering politics. I like writing about politics.

But at this stage of the game, I've had it.

I've become over-saturated with campaign flyers in my mailbox, attack ads on my television, and campaign banners ads on every single web page I visit.

I know I'm not alone.

Good friends recently posted a Facebook notice:

"If you call us and we ignore you, don't be offended. We're just assuming you're a) a politician, b) a political survey of some sort or c) a telemarketer. Your chances will be better after next Tuesday."

Politicians are a desperate lot. They are desperate for you and me to like them. That desperation grows during the course of an election year, then crescendos in the last few days before voting day.

Tuesday is voting day and the crescendo is deafening. You can't hear the issues for the noise about character right now.

The desperation they show for you to like them is often characterized by efforts for you to dislike the other candidate.

I shouldn't be -- I've been around politics long enough -- but I'm surprised just how vile campaigns can get. And I'm not limiting that comment to one party or another. Democrats, Republicans, Tea Partyers, Tea Baggers, Coffee Filters ... they're all guilt of being politically vile at this point in an election.

And it's made worse, frankly, by the U.S. Supreme Court decision of late last year that says anyone with a wheelbarrow full of money can spend as much as they wish on anonymous attack ads.

It's one thing to be attacked by your opponent. It's quite another to be attacked by some of these organizations about whom you know nothing because they don't have to file anything about themselves with anyone.

Revere America. Crossroads. Commission on Hope, Growth and Opportunity.

Who are these people? You don't know who is standing in the shadows, who the wizards are behind the curtains of these organizations.

It'll end on Wednesday. It'll be safe to go to the mailbox again, turn on the TV again, cruise the web again.

But it'll be shortlived.

The 2012 race for president will crank up soon enough.

You think it was bad this time around? You ain't seen nothing yet. Wait until you see, hear and read the vitriol coming in the next round.

Turn down the noise

No, health care reform is not the most pressing issue facing the U.S. Congress.

Neither is propping up the economy, or terrorism or global warming.

It's the ads on TV that are too loud.

You heard me correctly, and I didn't have to say it that loudly by PUTTING IT IN CAPITAL LETTERS!

I'm really tired of TV ads yelling at me.

As I advance through my middle years I admit that I don't hear as well as I used to. But I don't need the extra volume of a television ad that's trying to sell me a car, a high cholesterol medication or an adult diaper.

It's seems everyone is shouting like Billy Mays, God rest his loud-mouthed soul.

The issue has been around for a while, but -- maybe it's just me -- but the problem seems more pronounced now that we've gone digital. Analog was loud and annoying; digital seems more piercingly loud and annoying, it seems to me.

Congress is finally addressing this issue of national importance.

In mid-December the House on a voice vote passed a measure that requires the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to enforce federal regulations requiring that television advertisements not be excessively noisy.

The measure was written by Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., after discovering it was a long-standing common complaint with the FCC.

Commercials would have to be aired at the same volume level as the programs they accompany.

Eshoo calls her legislation the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act -- CALM, for short. Gotta love it.

While I'm safe and sound at home -- cocooned somewhat from terrorism, health care woes and global warming -- I don't want to be assaulted by another means.

You can get your point across without screaming.