Lessons from Life

White House disables e-tip box
By MIKE ALLEN | 8/17/09 12:43 PM EDT.
POLITICO 44

Following a furor over how the data would be used, the White House has shut down an electronic tip box — flag@whitehouse.gov — that was set up to receive information on “fishy” claims about President Barack Obama’s health plan.

E-mails to that address now bounce back with the message: “The e-mail address you just sent a message to is no longer in service. We are now accepting your feedback about health insurance reform via http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck.”

The “flag” service was introduced Aug. 4, with a White House blog post saying: “There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.”

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said at a briefing shortly after the service launched: “We're not collecting names from those e-mails. … All we're asking people to do is if they're confused about what health care reform is going to mean to them, we're happy to help clear that up for you. Nobody is keeping anybody's names.”

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, wrote a letter to Obama raising privacy concerns about what the senator called an “Obama monitoring program.”

“I can only imagine the level of justifiable outrage had your predecessor asked Americans to forward e-mails critical of his policies to the White House,” Cornyn wrote. “So I urge you to cease this program immediately.”

In a later statement, Cornyn said: “Of course the White House is collecting names. … It is inevitable. Anyone with access to the flag@whitehouse.gov account has access to the names and email addresses that are collected in that account. … How are they purging names and e-mail addresses from this account to protect privacy?”

White House will change e-mail rules
By MIKE ALLEN | 8/16/09 8:48 PM EDT.
POLITICO 44

The White House said Sunday night that it will change its e-mail sign-up procedures after some recipients of a health-care e-mail complained that they had not asked to receive updates.

“We are implementing measures to make subscribing to e-mails clearer, including preventing advocacy organizations from signing people up to our lists without their permission when they deliver petition signatures and other messages on individual’s behalf,” spokesman Nick Shapiro said in a statement Sunday night.

After a few such recipients appeared on Fox News, White House officials determined that advocacy groups on the right or left could have sent in the names without the person knowing it.

For instance, a group might have sent WhiteHouse.gov a comment from each person who had signed an online petition, and the White House would have captured the e-mail address.

FoxNews.com reported: “FOX News has offered the White House examples of what hundreds of people say were unsolicited e-mails.”

Shapiro said in the statement: “The White House e-mail list is made up of e-mail addresses obtained solely through the White House website. The White House doesn't purchase, upload or merge from any other list. … [A]ll e-mails come from the White House website as we have no interest in emailing anyone who does not want to receive an email.

“If an individual received the e-mail because someone else or a group signed them up or forwarded the e-mail, we hope they were not too inconvenienced. Further, we suggest that they unsubscribe from the list by clicking the link at the bottom of the e-mail or tell whomever forwarded it to them not to forward such information anymore.”

The complaints concerned a 1,500-word e-mail sent Thursday in the name of White House senior adviser David Axelrod, including “8 common myths about health insurance reform.” The e-mail mimicked the style of chain e-mails attacking President Barack Obama’s health-reform plan. The subject line: “Something worth forwarding.”

The White House had sent other e-mails to the list without complaint.

Fox News’ Major Garrett had a lengthy exchange about the matter with White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs at the televised briefing on Thursday.

Garrett said: “[F]olks have emailed me … [who] would like to know how they get an e-mail from the White House when they have never asked for one.”

Gibbs replied: “I'd have to look and see.”

Later, when Gibbs was asked whether public opinion would influence the administration’s Afghanistan policy, he quipped: “We're e-mailing Major's list.”