Do to no one what you yourself dislike.

—Tobit 4:15

Recognize that your neighbor feels as you do, and keep in mind your own dislikes.

—Sirach 31:15

Christians should follow the positive, more expansive formulation of Jesus of Nazareth, and "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you," to use the common paraphrase of the injunction in Matthew 7.12 and Luke 6.31; but I'm not a Christian and will stick with the teaching of Hillel and the Apocrypha and the double-negative formulation that that which I dislike when done to me, I shouldn't inflict on others.

            This is becoming a problem for me as the 2012 political season wears on. And on.

            I want to support good Democrats for office, and that means contributing money and, more so, doing volunteer work. But some of my money will be going for RoboCalls and human telephone operatives, and much of the volunteer work I might do would be to make such calls.

            And I really, really, really dislike all "cold calls" from robots, strangers — or even friends and neighbors — who want me to buy something or support some candidate or cause. So for me, making such calls certainly, and to some extent even paying for such calls, is unethical.

            This is a dilemma.

            I swore "to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States," and this minimally includes the basic duties of citizenship; and I was raised in a tradition of strict civic responsibility, where the duties of citizenship emphatically include active involvement in politics.

            So I guess some of my neighbors (in a very broad sense) will be seeing me walking their precincts and bothering them with a personal low-tech touch.

            But I'll feel ambiguously guilty if I make calls or if I fail to make calls.

            How's this?

            Let's push for a Constitutional Amendment overturning the US Supreme Court's Citizens United decision and requiring Congress to drain most of the money out of politics and to limit active campaigns to the sort of twelve-week political seasons that serve most of the rest of Earth's republic. And while we're at it, let's require one-step, Happy-Eighteenth-Birthday! registration for Selective Service, application for a full-adult drivers license — and registration to vote, with electronic modernization of voting procedures to make it very easy to vote and very difficult to commit voter fraud.

            And after that, people: START PAYING ATTENTION!

            There's no reason US politics should require insistent and intrusive advertising, and (horrible phrase) "constant contact" in multiple media to give Americans enough information to vote intelligently.

            We citizens need to pay attention, and to insist that politicians talk to us as if we were all adults.

            "If elected, what will you do for us and the country (or smaller relevant political unit) — what are you likely to do to us?" Then we need journalists who'll check what the politicians say against their records.

            And that way I won't have to annoy you and sin against my integrity by interrupting your dinner with a pitch for some pol. Or at least not very often.