Hello, this is RoboCall, asking you to read this column

Even if Election Day didn't fall on Groundhog Day, the Illinois primary campaigns have a familiar, repetitive vibe to voters. The political process is relentless.

We remember some of these candidates from before, or at least we've seen and heard their political commercials for weeks and weeks now. Our mailboxes are filled with their political pamphlets. As we near the end of this primary campaign season, some voters are as weathered and weary as those political yard signs stuck in the mud and the snow.

But there is no escape, not even at home.

"Politicians are so arrogant and egotistic they think they have a God-given right to call you whenever they want," says Shaun Dakin, CEO and founder of the National Political Do Not Contact Registry, a nonpartisan, not-for-profit group out to curb unwanted political "robocalls."

A Federal Trade Commission rule that went into effect Sept. 1 prohibits unwanted prerecorded commercial telemarketing calls to all consumers. But no matter what you think of politicians, they "are not telemarketers," explains Mitchell J. Katz, a public affairs specialist with the FTC. Politicians are not affected by the new robocall crackdown, no matter how much voters complain.

"We do get that, too, especially around election time, and we have to explain to them that those calls are exempt," Katz says. "They don't like it, but it's a free-speech issue."

Robocalls are more than a First Amendment right, they are democracy in action, an essential arrow in the quiver of the little guy, argues Angela McMillen, executive director of the American Association of Political Consultants.

"Automated calls level the playing field," McMillen says. "There is so much money in politics, especially for incumbents, the challengers have very few options to get their messages out to the voters."

Only the well-healed candidates can afford TV commercials. It might cost a candidate 50 cents to get a brochure in the hands of a voter. But a recorded phone call can deliver the message for a few pennies, McMillen says. Ban political robocalls and "you are disenfranchising a group of people who don't have the ability to compete with entrenched incumbents."

A handful of states, including our neighbor Indiana, have banned recording political calls. But even robocall opponent Dakin concedes that free speech is a valid argument.

"I'm not saying we need to ban robocalls," Dakin says. "We're just saying, 'Give the voter a chance to opt out.' When it comes to political robocalls, they are the antithesis of any civil discourse. They are phone spam and voters hate them."

While an unethical, poorly timed or misleading recorded call might put the pain in campaign, not all voters hate robocalls, counters McMillen. She tells of one case where an underdog candidate used robocalls to successfully draw voters to a campaign appearance.

Robocalls even have won Pollie Awards, the Oscars of political advertising.

"The calls do work, especially for 'get out the vote,'" McMillen says.

While Dakin urges Illinois voters to register their phone numbers at http://stoppoliticalcalls.org, he notes, "There's no guarantee that anything will happen."

"We reached out to a couple of governor candidates and to be frank, they ignored us," Dakin says of the effort in Illinois. "They (candidates) all hate robocalls. They are just unwilling to tie one hand behind their back. 'If our opponent uses robocalls, we want the ability to respond.' There is no arms reduction, so to speak."

But a truce is in the offing.

"It's over the day after election," says the FTC's Katz. "Those calls go to zero."

At least until the buildup to the Nov. 2 general election.