After a while, I became familiar with the pattern of telemarketing calls, and I've devised my own way of dealing with them without governmental help:
1. At dinnertime, I don't answer the telephone, but let the answering machine screen all calls. The receiver is within reach if it's someone I want to talk to.
2. If I answer the phone and there's no response, I hang up, since it's 99% likely that it's the "call-ahead" software that dials the next number in anticipation of the caller's concluding his current call.
3. In the event they actually begin their spiel I just say No and hang up.
That pretty much takes care of my issues with telemarketers. No one should feel badly about being rude to these people. In the first place, hanging up saves them time to call someone else. In the case of high-pressure callers, I say "Hold, please", punch the hold button, hang up the phone, and go back to whatever I was doing when they called.
Sales calls are the bane of existence for stay-at-home moms. I can easily get 10 a day. It really disrupts my relationships with my children when I'm constantly running to answer the phone, which always rings when I'm trying to nurse the baby, read the preschooler a book, help my 2nd grader with my homework--and then getting back to the child afterwards and reconnecting with him is harder.
The best thing about sales calls is all the running around to answer the phone has kept me slim. Really.
My husband and I both signed up for the do-not-call list the very first day, unbeknownest to each other.
I was so disappointed to learn that a judge has stopped it. All summer I've been looking forward to Oct. 1.