Telemarketers should be prohibited from blocking telephone caller ID systems' access to the telemarketer's company name and telephone number. It is totally unfair that the consumer should be left totally helpless in the face of an intruder who knows where the consumer lives and the telephone number at which he/she can be reached, yet the consumer is denied the means to identify who and where the intruder is, for what company the intruder works and with whom the consumer can file a complaint for abuse, disrespect, intrusion, etc. It is the summum of irresponsibility for the government to deny the consumer the means to "retaliate" in this fashion.

So "the TSR requires telemarketers to make specific disclosures [...] and prohibits calls to consumers who have asked not to be called again" (Washington Post, 3/1/2000). Big deal. How does the consumer prove the telemarketer did not comply with the TSR? And who is this telemarketer in the first place, whom does he represent, from where is he calling...?

Albert LeQuang