In a very special segment, Don Goldberg flew down to Houston, Texas to visit a Focus Washington favorite, Mike Loya of Vitol, one of the leading physical oil traders in the world. In part one of this two part series, we discuss the ever pressing issue of gas prices. As the dog days of summer dwindle, hear what Vitol is doing to keep the price at the pump down for everyday consumers. For more information, visit http://vitol.com/

By Chuck Conconi

“I believe it is better to be looked over than it is to be overlooked.”

– One of the many enduring quotes from self-made celebrity star Mae West, the subject of a Studio Theatre production of Dirty Blonde. That phrase probably defined West, who achieved a star-stature difficult to understand by contemporary standards.

The buxom, zaftig Mae West was no beauty and not really much of an actor who self-created herself in a career that ranged from the age of vaudeville to the movies of the 30s – “I’m No Angel” and “She Done Him Wrong” — and she was still projecting her sexy, outrageous illusions almost up until her death at 87 in 1980. Unfortunately, by then she became a caricature of herself, propped up in tight, glittery gowns and wrapped in feathered boas.

Produced in Signature’s intimate Arc Theatre space, West, is portrayed brilliantly by Emily Skinner. You begin to understand, in Skinner’s deft portrayal, how this course-talking Brooklyn gal talked her way into celebrity stardom simply by bluntly talking dirty in ways no woman then would have ever dared to talk. She constantly tested the censors and her audience loved her for it.

No other woman said such things as: “Sex is emotion in motion.” “I’ve been in more laps than a napkin.” “Between two evils, I always pick the one I never tried before.” “A hard man is good to find.”

Skinner is so good and is supported by the dynamic performances of co-stars J. Fred Shiffman and Hugh Nees, that it is easy to overlook some of the flaws of the play that is a play within a play. One part relates the West story, while the other has Skinner doubling as a young, sometimes actress who develops what seems to be an impossible relationship with Nees, portraying a film archivist. Both meet a West’s crypt in a Brooklyn cemetery and both are obsessed with the dead star. Nees is so smitten that there is a question of his masculinity because he dresses up like West, spangled gowns and boas. And, he once actually met the real Mae West, one of the highlights of his mundane life.

There is something of the criticism of the Julie & Julia movie about Dirty Blonde that would have worked better being one thing or the other. That is, however, just a quibble. Skinner, Shiffman, and Nees are so good that any theatre fan would pay to watch them knit granny a sweater. And like Mae West, Dirty Blonde is not a production to overlook.

I recently spoke to Washingtonian magazine President and Publisher Cathy Merrill Williams about what the future might hold for the print media and how outlets such as hers are currently evolving with the times.

I sat down last week with Colleen Hernandez, the President and CEO of the Homeownership Preservation Foundation (HPF), a non-profit organization whose mission is to sustain homeownership and reduce foreclosure. She spoke to me about the current mortgage crisis and the resources and options available to homeowners who may be at risk of losing their homes to foreclosure.

David Weinberg, general counsel of PRBA–The Rechargeable Battery Association, discusses the unexpected downside to recycling, e-waste and sustainability initiatives. You can view the video or read the transcript below:

TRANSCRIPT:

Chuck Conconi: My guest today is David Weinberg, who is the general counsel of PRBA-The Rechargeable Battery Association. He’s been here before and it’s great to see you again, David. Thanks for coming.

David Weinberg: My pleasure, Chuck.

Chuck Conconi: This is a complicated issue on batteries and you’ve been working on recycling issues for more than 20 years. Explain a little bit what’s going on.

David Weinberg: Sure. I have been working with all segments of the battery industry for 25 years or so. Both the automotive battery people, who have a very successful recycling program based on state legislation that we’ve taken the lead in getting adopted around the country, and the rechargeable batteries for things like consumer products, which the rechargeable battery association represents. It put together a free-for- the-public, free-for-retailers recycling program 15 years ago. And to do that, had to get regulations and legislation changed to make it possible, but it has been very successful with that program for the last 15 years.

Chuck Conconi: We all have more batteries for products, phones, and what have you. But there is a growing list of proposed recycling, e-waste, and product stewardship regulations. It involves several Canadian provinces and the United States. What’s going on?

David Weinberg: What’s going is an expansion of a concept that began 15 years ago and is now expanding into many other products. It began 15 years ago and rechargeable batteries were the poster child, seeking to have the manufacturers and suppliers of those batteries responsible for them at their end of life. That led the rechargeable battery industry, through what is called PRBA-The Rechargeable Battery Association, to develop a national program to recycle those batteries. It set up not a not-for-profit company called RBRC, that runs something called Call to Recycle, and it has collected 50 million batteries in the years since.

More recently, there has been attention to things like waste TVs, waste computers and various other waste products and efforts to impose legislative obligations on the suppliers of those products both here in the United States and in Canada and to have them do something similar to what the rechargeable battery industry did voluntarily 15 years ago.

And the challenge to the rechargeable battery industry, frankly, is to not be collateral damage as people try to implement those other programs and to have people recognize we’ve got a successful program. Keep it in place. Do what you decide needs to be done as to these other products, but don’t disrupt the successful rechargeable battery program.

Chuck Conconi: But what’s the problem for the rechargeable battery industry?

David Weinberg: The big problem is that most of the activity that is going on now is on a state-by-state basis, or province by province in Canada. And even the most well meaning people, if they develop 50 different state programs and a dozen different Canadian programs, are going to make it impossible to lead a national program like RBRC operates. They will have different reporting periods. They will have different obligations to file updates. They will have different approval requirements.

Let me give you an example. When we first started the rechargeable battery recycling program, the concern was with nickel cadmium batteries. Those were being used in cell phones and computers and so forth. Now a different kind of battery is reused with those products, something called lithium ion. The RBRC program adjusted itself and expanded to include these other kinds of batteries. The RBRC had to adjust its fee-setting program that assessed the fees against the manufacturers from. Those things happened, and happened quite efficiently and effectively.

If we had had to go to 50 different states to get approval of a change in schedule or an approval of a change in a program, it would have been an administrative nightmare. Those states wouldn’t have intended that—they would have been acting in good faith—but they just inadvertently . . .

Chuck Conconi: So what is going to happen?

David Weinberg: That’s what we are concerned about and we are finding ourselves after 15 years—having fought this battle 15 years ago and shifted to dealing with other issues – dealing with safety issues, dealing with electric vehicle issues, and so forth, we are finding ourselves back dealing with recycling issues. It’s kind of the price of our good intentions…

Chuck Conconi: The unintended consequences of good intentions.

David Weinberg: Exactly. We have to go back now and protect ourselves.

Chuck Conconi: The rechargeable battery industry has intervened successfully in several states in devising sustainability, which means – you said – recycling plans?

David Weinberg: What we have done, what we have found in most places, where we have explained the situation to the legislators, they get it very quickly. They realize they did not mean to disrupt this program.

But it’s an effort to do that. It takes time and it takes resources, and that means money. And for trade associations that means they have to make sure their members understand the nature of the challenge they are facing. And this is a very important challenge.

Chuck Conconi: One quick question before we close. Where do you think it is going for the industry?

David Weinberg: I think we will be able to continue to operate the RBRC program. I think it’s going to be successful, but I think it will be a continuing challenge to address at both the state and, ultimately, the federal level, making sure that the good intentions of the policy people don’t disrupt a very fine program and a very successful program.

Chuck Conconi: David Weinberg, thank you so much for being here. I’m Chuck Conconi, and this has been Focus Washington.

The word legendary, like the words hero and friend, has become meaningless in senseless overuse. But the word fit in stories reporting the death of “legendary” newsman Walter Cronkite. He was one of the last trusted newsmen. He was, however, a voice from a less frenetic journalistic time. It is true that there was less competition for readership and viewership, but the level of journalistic ethics and credibility, while never perfect, was significantly higher then than it is now. 

Cronkite, who died at 92, was a veteran of ink on paper journalism and even though he became famous as the anchor of the CBS Evening News, he never lost his belief in print journalism. When he was at the height of his career, he once observed that it troubled him that people felt they were properly informed if they watched his evening newscast. He pointed out that if the entire newscast was set in type, it would barely fill one page of a daily newspaper. He understood he was presenting headlines, but to be intelligently informed required much more.

During the Cronkite years — and his career ranged from World War II to the Vietnam War, to the assassination of President Kennedy, the Civil Rights movement and the first man on the moon — there wasn’t the cacophony of information that now exists. The insatiable maw of cable television did not exist, and most importantly, the Internet did not exist.

It is a cliché to say that at this time in history there is more information available at the stroke of a commuter key than was ever dreamed of only 10 years ago. But with all of that potential knowledge, are we actually better informed? More importantly, do we take advantage of it?

I contend the answer to both questions is no. Much of it is only headline news. It was once predicted that television would destroy newspapers. It didn’t. Afternoon newspapers died, but morning newspapers grew and thrived. Now, it is argued, the Internet is pounding a stake into the heart of print journalism. I would argue that it is premature to announce that the newspaper beast is dead.

 There is a complicated love/hate relationship, between the press and public relations. Because of that, I think there is a rush to say that twitter, tweet, IPods, Facebook, or whatever is coming will finally show the newspapers and magazines that they are archaic, passé. Maybe that will happen. The Internet is a vastly faster source of information.

When Washingtonian publisher Cathy Merrill spoke at Qorvis Communications recently about her magazine, she pointed out that readers go to the on-line pages because the printed magazine exists. She said the same is true for papers like the New York Times and the Washington Post. She doesn’t see print succumbing to the Internet.

A newspaper or print magazine – and many publications, especially the news magazines, will fail over the next few years – is still where journalistic credibility exists. At newspapers there is a vital filtering system of editors who are responsible for factual content, journalistic integrity, and depth of reporting. We look back on Walter Cronkite’s distinguished career as an example of trustworthiness with his admonition, “get it first, but get it right.” 

He believed carefully presented facts were more important than opinion. That isn’t true on the opinion-dominated, dizzy, noisy array of Internet web sites from Drudge to Slate to the Daily Beast, to whatever new sites that will be established tomorrow. Until Cronkite’s admonition about getting it right is more the rule than the exception, for now I’ll keep getting my information from sources I trust – print on paper newspapers and magazines.

We sat down with Lady Judge, one of the most respected experts on energy. We spoke about various forms of energy, specifically nuclear energy and coal.

I was lucky enough to sit down with Paul Starobin before he leaves Washington for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. As a contributor to the National Journal and contributing editor of the Atlantic Monthly, Paul has lived and breathed American politics for decades. His new book, After America, deals with the constantly evolving place of the United States in the global realm and how their seat at the table is changing.

Recently, I had the chance to sit down with Chet Nagle, author of the new novel “Iran Covenant.” The book is largely based on the possibility of a nuclear arms race in Iran and how Israel and the United States would react. Nagle draws upon his own extensive experience as a CIA agent - giving him a unique perspective on the matter.

Today, I spoke with Adam Goldberg, a partner at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, LLP. He also served in the White House as Special Associate Counsel to the President from 1996 to 1999, providing advice on crisis communications and political strategy for the campaign finance, Monica Lewinsky, technology-transfer, and other investigations. He joined us in the studio to talk about the field of crisis communication, an area in which Mr. Goldberg has become one of Washington’s top experts.