Last month a congratulatory message from President Obama, left on newly elected openly lesbian Houston Mayor Annise Parker's voicemail, was posted online and linked up all across the Internet. It seemed a bit odd both that the president didn't speak to Parker directly and that the voicemail was all over the place.
On the show on Monday Mayor Parker gave me some background on how the voice mail may have gotten online -- and how the White House wasn't at all happy about it (audio clip below). Parker herself was "a little surprised" that the White House didn't schedule a time for Obama to speak with her. She was doing a CNN interview and the call went to voicemail. The president left a message and never called back.
Annise Parker: I got a curt call from someone in the White House wanting to know how the president's voice mail got up on YouTube. And I said, "I have no earthly idea how it got up on YouTube. It's not something I would know how to do." And he said, "Well, when the president leaves a private communication it should stay private." And I said, "Then he shouldn't have left it on my voicemail[laughing]."
She then explained who had access to the voice mail and how it might have made its way to the world.
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