I promise you no educated Shia Muslim ever asks any of the Ahlul Bayt (including the holy prophet himself) --peace be upon them-- in place of asking Allah, even I can claim that the same is true also about the uneducated Shia Muslims, however, there might always exist some exceptions that are not aware that what they believe contains Shirk. But after making such a claim, the way that we will answer your question is already classified as Childish in your view. Although your question has been updated to become more respectful but let me answer your original question in which you first claimed saying "Ya Ali Madad" and "Ya Doctor Madad" are shirk since they are assigning such attributes of Allah like being The All Hearing and The All Knowing to others, then you claimed that the only allowed Wasillah toward Allah in Qur'aan is committing good deeds and following sunnah and naufil of prophet peace be upon him! But why aren't they childish? Let me explain it to some extent:
(1) You certainly know that the martyrs are called شهداء in Arabic, which means indeed witnesses and a witness is an observer, and all the Imams of Shia (and indeed all the 14 infallibles) are known to be martyred, so not strange if they be given the ability to observe us with the permission of Allah (and maybe with some limitations defined for them), without being reputed as the All-knowing, the All-Hearing and All-Seeing, as is God. However, let me make strong my argument here using some Ahadeeth that interpret some verses of Qur'aan:
مد بن يعقوب: عن الحسين بن محمد، عن معلى بن محمد، عن الحسن بن علي
الوشاء، عن أحمد بن عائذ، عن عمر بن أذينة، عن بريد العجلي، قال: سألت
أبا عبد الله (عليه السلام) عن قول الله عز و جل: وَ كَذلِكَ
جَعَلْناكُمْ أُمَّةً وَسَطاً لِتَكُونُوا شُهَداءَ عَلَى النَّاسِ.
فقال: «نحن الأمة الوسطى، و نحن شهداء الله على خلقه، و حججه في أرضه».
Imam Sadiq --peace be upon him-- was asked about the verse [2:143] of
Qur'aan that reads "Thus, have We made of you an Ummat justly
balanced, that ye might be witnesses over the nations, and the
Messenger a witness over yourselves ..." and Imam answered: "we are
the Ummat justly balanced, and we are the witnesses of Allah onto His
creatures, and His reasons in His Earth" [البرهان في تفسير القرآن،
ج1، ص: 342,343]
in another Hadith from the same book تفسیر البرهان Imam Sadiq --peace be upon him-- clarified further what being a witness of Allah implies and he said: "نحن الشهداء على الناس بما عندنا من الحلال و الحرام، و بما ضيعوا منه" which means "we are the witnesses onto the people on what is with us from Halaal and Haraam, and on what that they destroy from it". And in yet another Hadeeth he further explained what is meant by "balanced" in this verse, that Ahlul Bayt are those to whom will return those who exaggerated about them (calling them God for example, like there were some and might still exist some) or put less than required effort in helping them: "إلينا يرجع الغالي، و بنا يلحق المقصر". All these in overall shows by "Ummat justly balanced" Allah implies "criteria for measuring our deeds and intentions" (میزان)! The following is also a Hadeeth from the same book البرهان فی تفسیر القرآن after the above Ahadeeth:
عن أبي عمرو الزبيري، عن أبي عبد الله (عليه السلام)، قال: «قال الله
تعالى: وَ كَذلِكَ جَعَلْناكُمْ أُمَّةً وَسَطاً لِتَكُونُوا شُهَداءَ
عَلَى النَّاسِ وَ يَكُونَ الرَّسُولُ عَلَيْكُمْ شَهِيداً فإن ظننت أن
الله عنى بهذه الآية جميع أهل القبلة من الموحدين، أفترى أن من لا تجوز
شهادته في الدنيا على صاع من تمر، يطلب الله شهادته يوم القيامة و يقبلها
منه بحضرة جميع الأمم الماضية؟ كلا، لم يعن الله مثل هذا من خلقه، يعني
الامة التي وجبت لها دعوة إبراهيم (عليه السلام): كُنْتُمْ خَيْرَ
أُمَّةٍ أُخْرِجَتْ لِلنَّاسِ و هم الأمة الوسطى، و هم خير أمة أخرجت
للناس».
that clarifies further the verse, but as does not directly answer your question I avoid to translate it and only for record I left its Arabic version here.
Also you can check for yourself about the following verse how that it backs the previous interpretation:
فَكَيْفَ إِذَا جِئْنَا مِن كُلِّ أُمَّةٍ بِشَهِيدٍ وَجِئْنَا بِكَ
عَلَىٰ هَـٰؤُلَاءِ شَهِيدًا
How then if We brought from each people a witness, and We brought thee
as a witness against these people! [4:41]
and also see [16:89] and [22:78] in this regard.
Also I invite you to think about the permission Shia Muslims take before entering any of the houses that belongs to the holy prophet --peace be upon him and his household-- and his family as is ordered to us in Qur'aan: " يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا لَا تَدْخُلُوا بُيُوتَ النَّبِيِّ إِلَّا أَن يُؤْذَنَ لَكُمْ ..." that means "O ye who believe! Enter not the Prophet's houses,- until leave is given you ...", [33:53], and the content of this permission asking is not the invention of the Shia Muslims:
اَللّهُمَّ اِنّى وَقَفْتُ عَلى بابٍ مِنْ اَبْوابِ بُيُوتِ نَبِيِّكَ،
صَلَواتُكَ عَلَيْهِ وَ الِهِ، وَقَدْ مَنَعْتَ النَّاسَ اَنْ
يَدْخُلوُا اِلاَّ بِاِذْنِهِ، فَقُلْتَ يا اَيُّهَا الَّذينَ امَنُوا لا
تَدْخُلُوا بُيُوتَ النَّبِّىِ اِلاَّ اَنْ يُؤْذَنَ لَكُمْ، اَللّهُمَّ
اِنّى اَعْتَقِدُ حُرْمَةَ صاحِبِ هذَا الْمَشْهَدِ الشَّريفِ فى
غَيْبَتِهِ، كَما اَعْتَقِدُها فى حَضْرَتِهِ، وَاَعْلَمُ اَنَّ
رَسُولَكَ وَخُلَفآئَكَ عَلَيْهِمُ السَّلامُ اَحْيآءٌ عِنْدَكَ
يُرْزَقُونَ، يَرَوْنَ مَقامى وَيَسْمَعُونَ كَلامى، وَيَرُدُّونَ
سَلامى، وَاَ نِّكَ حَجَبْتَ عَنْ سَمْعى كَلامَهُمْ، وَفَتَحْتَ
بابَ فَهْمى بِلَذيذِ مُناجاتِهِمْ، وَاِنّى اَسْتَاذِنُكَ يا رَبِّ
اوَّلاً، وَاَسْتَاْذِنُ رَسُولَكَ، صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَ الِهِ
ثانِياً، وَاَسْتَاْذِنُ خَليفَتَكَ الْأِمامَ الْمَفْروُضَ عَلَىَّ
طاعَتُهُ فُلانَ بْنَ فُلانٍ وَالْمَلائِكَةَ الْمُوَكَّلينَ بِهذِهِ
الْبُقْعَةِ الْمُبارَكَةِ ثالِثاً، ءَاَدْخُلُ يا رَسُولَ اللَّهِ،
ءَاَدْخُلُ يا حُجَّةَ اللَّهِ ءَاَدْخُلُ يا مَلآئِكَةَ اللَّهِ
الْمُقَرَّبينَ الْمُقيمينَ فى هذَا الْمَشْهَدِ، فَاْذَنْ لى يا
مَوْلاىَ فى الدُّخُولِ، اَفْضَلَ ما اَذِنْتَ لِأَحَدٍ مِنْ
اَوْلِيآئِكَ، فَاِنْ لَمْ اَكُنْ اَهْلاً لِذلِكَ، فَاَنْتَ اَهْلٌ
لِذلِكَ
O Allah I am verily standing at a door from the doors of the houses of
your prophet, your peace be upon him and his household, and you have
forbidden for the people to enter unless they are given permission, as
you said "O ye who believe! Enter not the Prophet's houses,- until
leave is given you". O Allah I believe in the esteem of the owner of
this honorable monument during his absence as I believe in it during
his presence. And I know that your apostle and your Caliphs peace be
upon them are alive finding their sustenance in the presence of you,
they observe my position and hear my voice and answer back my
greeting, and verily you have covered their voice from my ears and
opened to my mind the joy of whispering with them, so I first ask for
your permission O Lord, and ask for the second permission from your
apostle peace be upon him and his household, and ask for the third
permission from your Caliph obeying whom is obligatory, so-and-so the
son of so-and-so, and from the angels who are the advocates of this
shrine. May I enter O apostle of Allah? May I enter O reason of Allah?
May I enter O the nearest-to-Allah angels who are residents of this
shrine? So permit me O my master to enter the best of permissions that
you give to any of your closest friend, if I am not among such great
men you are such great [to nominate me for such a grace].
Also for the sake of brevity I only refer you to a Hadeeth that says wherever an whenever that you named the holiness Khidhr peace be upon him greet with him as he will be present there. And this is not strange at all if you know anything about طی الأرض and its different levels. And also I refer you to a famous story in which an non-Muslim ascetic (somewhat a Sufi) came to Imam Sadiq --peace be upon him-- and Imam asked from him about what he has hidden in his hand, the atheist waited for a second and answered I saw everywhere on the ground and the only thing that was not in its place was so-and-so, then Imam opened his hand and he found that same thing in his hand. So to say if something seems strange to you it will not be very reasonable to deny it and call it "tales of the ancients" or "Childish"!
(2) About your second Childish issue let me tell you one thing. Entering the territory of thinking-about-the-religious-concepts with a mathematics background I once decided to talk only precisely, precise in the sense of mathematics, stating any and every assumptions that I have in top of my mind behind any of the statement that I am going to express, in order for the ambiguity in my conversations to vanish completely! But it was rather impossible. I tried and was thinking that it is the only way to remain far from implicit errors usual in thinking and expression of the thought. Then I noticed the Ahadeeth of the Ahlul Bayt --peace be upon them all-- and noted that they have chosen to talk very ordinary, by only choosing the right word for each concept. It can at the same time pass a concept precisely if its hearer is knowledgeable enough and encrypt some points for those who are not to understand the massage completely! So I decided to change my way and talk like them, to choose the words with caution and avoid playing with words. Now we reach to your question when you put forward such statements as "Ya Ali Madad" (O Ali assist me). It was indeed "O Ali that you are too close to your Lord and have credit in His view, spend from your credit for the sake of us who have nothing but sins and miseries". You can find this expanded version in the very famous Dau of Tawassul. For example, look into the following extract of this Dua:
اَللَّهُمَّ إِنِّي اسْالُكَ وَاتَوَجَّهُ إِلَيْكَ بِنَبِيِّكَ نَبِيِّ
ٱلرَّحْمَةِ مُحَمَّدٍ صَلَّىٰ ٱللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَآلِهِ يَا ابَا
ٱلْقَاسِمِ يَا رَسُولَ ٱللَّهِ يَا إِمَامَ ٱلرَّحْمَةِ يَا سَيِّدَنَا
وَمَوْلاَنَا إِنَّا تَوَجَّهْنَا وَٱسْتَشْفَعْنَا وَتَوَسَّلْنَا بِكَ
إِلَىٰ ٱللَّهِ وَقَدَّمْنَاكَ بَيْنَ يَدَيْ حَاجَاتِنَا يَا وَجِيهاً
عِنْدَ ٱللَّهِ إِشْفَعْ لَنَا عِنْدَ ٱللَّهِ
O Allah, I beseech Thee, and turn towards Thee, through Thy Prophet,
the Prophet of Mercy, Muhammad, may Allah Bless him and his Progeny,
and grant them peace. O Abul-Qasim, O Messenger of Allah O guide of
mercy, O intercessor of the community, O our chief, O our master, We
turn towards thee, seek thy intercession and advocacy before Allah, we
put before you our open need; O intimate of Allah, Stand by us when
Allah sits in judgment over us. [see here for the complete content of the Dua]
As you can see we do not identify Ahlul Bayt --peace be upon them-- as beings beside Allah but created by Allah along the line of His creativity that we belong to the same line as well, but they are verily in a closer position from Him than we are. Asking such person for such requests is not Shirk of course as you can find similar requests narrated by Allah in Qur'aan and is encouraged:
وَإِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ تَعَالَوْا يَسْتَغْفِرْ لَكُمْ رَسُولُ اللَّـهِ
لَوَّوْا رُءُوسَهُمْ وَرَأَيْتَهُمْ يَصُدُّونَ وَهُم مُّسْتَكْبِرُونَ
And when it is said to them, "Come, the Messenger of Allah will pray
for your forgiveness", they turn aside their heads, and thou wouldst
see them turning away their faces in arrogance. [63:5]
قَالُوا يَا أَبَانَا اسْتَغْفِرْ لَنَا ذُنُوبَنَا إِنَّا كُنَّا
خَاطِئِينَ / قَالَ سَوْفَ أَسْتَغْفِرُ لَكُمْ رَبِّي ۖ إِنَّهُ هُوَ
الْغَفُورُ الرَّحِيمُ
They said: "O our father! ask for us forgiveness for our sins, for we
were truly at fault." / He said: "Soon will I ask my Lord for
forgiveness for you: for he is indeed Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful."
[12:97,98]
Our Wasilah toward Allah is our deeds and intentions, right, but these also can include our relation with the Ahlul Bayt as well, and our inclination toward them is very fundamentally asked for by the holy prophet --peace be upon him-- as the cost of his prophet-hood. The holy prophet --peace be upon him and his household-- is himself a Wasilah in this regard if you may note and his household are Wasilah too. Let me reach this point from using your own comment when you said: Ya Ali Madad is analogous to saying Jesus is our savior! I have touched this issue elsewhere but let me remark it again here in short. The Christian AFAIK claim that Salvation is through the Christ peace be upon him, and we say Salvation is through Ahlul Bayt peace be upon them, this is true. However, there is a fundamental difference between how we address this and how that they address such a salvation. Our difference lays in the point that the Christian identify Jesus --peace be upon him-- as the forgiver (if I have understood right) while we identify only Allah as the Forgiver, the God who has no alike, no son, and no competitor, and consider Ahlul Bayt as Wasilah toward His mercy and rescue. In that answer I used an analogy sometimes used by the Shia scholars to address the salvation issue in Shia Islam, the bus analogy, but now let me use the original analogy that was put forward by the holy prophet himself, peace be upon him and his household: The rescue ship (سفینة النجاة) analogy!
مَثَلُ أهلِ بَیتی کَمَثَلِ سَفینَهِ نوحٍ مَن رَکِبَها فَقَد نَجی وَ
مَن تَخَلَّفَ عَنها فَقَد هَلَکَی
My household is alike the arc of Noah, whoever that got in it has been
survived, and whoever that avoided it has been demolished. [عیون
الاخبار ج 1 ص211]
Dunya is like a stormy ocean, full of Fitnah that can simply make any of us (when left alone with our own deeds) fail or loose our hope and consequently be drowned and smothered. Ahlul Bayt in this ocean are like the arc of Noah --peace be upon them all--, they have survived (based on their own deeds and intentions) and now are trying to rescue the others, and Allah has ordered us to stick to them to be survived ("وَاعْتَصِمُوا بِحَبْلِ اللَّـهِ جَمِيعًا وَلَا تَفَرَّقُوا ..." which means "And hold fast, all together, by the rope which Allah [stretches out for you], and be not divided among yourselves ...", [3:103]). This is the salvation that is meant by the Shia scholars. And the rope in that verse is made of "ties of affection" (مودة) and love (محبة). If I REALLY like someone I will naturally try to get closer to him by obeying him and pleasing him. This is what Awliya do to get closer to Allah:
قُلْ إِن كُنتُمْ تُحِبُّونَ اللَّـهَ فَاتَّبِعُونِي يُحْبِبْكُمُ
اللَّـهُ وَيَغْفِرْ لَكُمْ ذُنُوبَكُمْ ۗ وَاللَّـهُ غَفُورٌ رَّحِيمٌ
Say: "If ye do love Allah, Follow me: Allah will love you and
forgive you your sins: For Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful."
[3:31]
So love ("liking" is perhaps a better word for that indeed) can be a motor for obeying and it is this love (the honest love) that is requested from all Muslims by the holy prophet about his household:
... قُل لَّا أَسْأَلُكُمْ عَلَيْهِ أَجْرًا إِلَّا الْمَوَدَّةَ فِي
الْقُرْبَىٰ ...
... Say: "No reward do I ask of you for this except the love of those
near of kin." ... [42:23]
قُلْ مَا سَأَلْتُكُم مِّنْ أَجْرٍ فَهُوَ لَكُمْ ۖ إِنْ أَجْرِيَ إِلَّا
عَلَى اللَّـهِ ۖ وَهُوَ عَلَىٰ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ شَهِيدٌ
Say: Whatever reward I have asked of you, that is only for yourselves;
my reward is only with Allah, and He is a witness of all things.
[34:47]
which also clearly states such a cost is not for the benefit of Allah or His prophet or even his household, but only for our own benefit and that's being saved as has been already declared. Although books can be written (and has been written) around this issue let me end my answer by these Ahadeeth:
Imam Ali --peace be upon him-- said: "من احبنا فلیعمل بعملنا و لیتجلبب
الورع" which implies: "whoever that likes us so should behave like us
and put on the cloth of piety"
Imam Ali --peace be upon him-- said: "من احب الله احب النبی و من احب
النبی احبنا و من احبنا احب شیعتنا" that means "whoever that likes
Allah also likes the prophet, and whoever that likes the prophet also
likes us, and whoever that likes us also likes our followers"
reference: this link.
