Congresswoman hangs up on Obama

Not everyone is convinced by Barack Obama, it seems. The other day Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican congresswoman, received a call from the President-elect congratulating her on her re-election, but after listening to him rattle away for about a minute she cut him off, saying: "I'm sorry, but I think this is a joke."

No doubt Ros-Lehtinen was thinking of the mockery heaped on the Republican presidential candidate Sarah Palin after she chatted amiably to a Canadian radio station prankster posing as President Nicolas Sarkozy.

However, a little later, Obama's Chief of Staff-designate, Rahm Emanuel, called her back to try and reassure her that the caller was in fact Obama. "Ileana, I cannot believe that you hung up on the President-elect," he said. Her response? She thought he was a hoaxer, too, and hung up again.

Finally Howard Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee who knows Ros-Lehtinen, intervened. Still suspicious, she asked that he recount a story "only both of them would know". He duly obliged, and when Obama called again she picked up the phone.

Said the congresswoman: "I thought it was one of the radio stations in South Florida playing an incredible, elaborate, terrific prank on me. They got Fidel Castro to go along. They've gotten Hugo Chavez and others to fall for their tricks. I said, 'Oh, no, I won't be punked’."  ·