MARK MY WORD: IT'S TIME FOR TIME OUT FOR THOSE WHINING POLITICIANS

Some days, it's hard to get past the whining.

Our children aren't the only ones whining these days. Many of our nation's politicians have turned whining into an art form this fall. But then that's to be expected. After all, it's an election year.

Today's political ads on television are full of whining about the other guy. Our whole political system seems built on the premise that candidates should be free to whine to the voters.

Of course, we can turn off the TV and tune out politicians. But as parents, we can't tune out our children.

"Stop whining." We constantly deliver that message to our kids.

But the message doesn't seem to be getting through. Maybe it has something to do with selective hearing.

Children have an uncanny ability to hear mom and dad talking about going out for ice cream, but they never seem to hear their own whining.

If other animals did this sort of thing, they would grow up as orphans in the jungle of life. But we're not like all those animals. We endure the whining in the hope that our children will eventually grow out of it and not become politicians.

It isn't easy to win over whining, but we continue to try.

Our oldest daughter, Becca, has a way of asking for things that sounds like whining. I'm sure it's because children her age don't distinguish between whining and cheerful speech. It takes years of parental prodding to get children to permanently dismantle the whining mode.

Bailey whines too, generally about her sister. Becca whines back.

Becca often whines about the fact that Bailey will stand right in front of the TV screen. Admittedly, it is an aggravating thing.

At age 2, Bailey seems to think that she can't watch TV without being practically in the console. I wouldn't be surprised to see her waving to me from inside the TV set one of these days.

At times, our whole house seems to be a whining festival. You just hope none of the whining reaches the outside world.

Thankfully, there are ways to deal with all this whining.

Many dads, including me, turn up the sound on whatever TV program we are watching. As the whining gets louder, we continue to click the volume button on the remote control.

This drives moms crazy. They don't understand how we can continue to sit on the couch and watch the ballgame while the children are whining loudly.

"It take skill to tune out all that whining," I tell Joni as I sit calmly on the sofa, convinced that she'll take charge of the situation.

Joni often tries to reason with the children and explain to them why they shouldn't whine. Of course, that's not easy to do because children have a shorter attention span than do members of Congress.

They quickly forget what it was you were talking to them about. Much of parenting, it seems, involves repetition. You say the same things over and over again like some tiresome political campaign slogan.

Pretty soon, we're whining about the whining.

It's times like that when you have to take a break from all that whining and sing a Barney song, search for Blue's Clues or engage in family hugs.

I'm convinced most children generally don't whine as much in public. They save their worst whining for the comfort of their own home.

As for all those political candidates, they would do well to remember that we've heard enough whining. If it continues, we may just have to put them all in time out.

~Mark Bliss is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.