context of all the other sources of financing to cover health care reform. there are sources that the senate's finance committee and house ways and means committee think are more logical and effective as a means to cover the cost of a very important initiative of the president and the u.s. congress. host: heavy been brought to the table on the idea -- how the various food sources come into this discussion? guest: in all but conversations we are having, they say they want to do their part in health care reform. when you talk about thousands of schools all across the country and the importance of doing the right thing for our young people inside schools, which what is what we have heard from parents, so we talk about that with members of congress, and we say we are willing to continue

to help. tell us what we can do. other means to tackle obesity concerns and we are here and çready. host: cross plains, wisconsin. good morning. caller: hi, i'm ray blanchard. in the beverage industry the big elephant in the room is not the sugar or manufactured sugar in the container. it is the container itself and waste created by the industry that is passed on to the consumer to deal with. you should tax the contain are or have it recycled or pay for itself because the industry dumps all their garbage on our door and we have to pick it up and recycle it. so the tax should create a situation where you have a deposit on that vehicle, that container. guest: well, i'm very glad you asked that question. one of the points i would make to all the viewers is that that can, that bottle, is 100%

recyclabl recyclable:we talked about our water efficiency ratios. we have made a big investment in producing packaging and containers that can be recycledç the problem in this country is that we either lack the infrastructure to recycle effectively and that çvaries, some countries lick the ones in washington do an excellent job, others don't. that is something we need to address. then we need to be motivated to recycle. we need to think inside the bin. take the contain are around put it in a recycling bin so something can beç done with it and it can be recycled. one of the things we are looking at as an industry as part of trying to go further to make sure the containers are recycled is how can we help communities develop good programs. each community is different. rural areas where i'm from in iowa are going to have to have a different recycling program than those in a big you are been area and we have many participates an

programs in place where we're trying to help develop good recycling. statistics show curbside recycling is one of the most effective ways to make it easy for all of us to recycle but the community has to be able to pick up those containers and the otherq -- the newspapers, detergent bottles andç other waste and take it somewhere and do something with it. so, we are continuing to look at ways to tackle that. you have the continuous loop and thoseç containersç and whatev else we are using get ecycled. host: austin, texas, david onçç the republican line. caller: good morning. first of all, i think this is a very discriminatory tax because i don't think there is being anything taken into account into lifestyle changes, people being very sed depentary, sitting in t of computers, not getting out.

and if you look at everything that is going on around as an earlier caller said, there is sugar in everything. so, i think we need to get people out exercising and quit the mandatory -- put the mandatory p.e. back in schools. guest: thank you very much for your comment. i think we certainly agree that all calories count. i know the new england journal of medicine had an article saying finance bid the n.i.h. that basically says çthat. if you want to manage your weight and achieve weight loss you have to look at all camp resist and getting -- calories an get enough exercise. it is simple to say but hard to do on a daily basis. talking with those on the hill, it is a discriminatory tax. and if you want to look at some broad based mechanism to attack calorie intake then i guess you haveç to tax all calories. once you try to tax all calories

i don't know who would decide how that works. you would have to tax those of us who exercise. so i'm beipoking a liétme fun h but i'm agreeing with your point that a tax doesn't seem to be the means toç teach us all howo have a healthy lifestyle. it won't work. ã1ójg bethpage, new york, dennis on the democrats line. caller: good morning. i will make it quick since -- if people support single payer they should go to democrats.org change the s to a z. they should tax champagne and caviar and leave the poor alone. and i don't think soda. i drink water or juice. but seriously, why tax the poor to support healthcare. caviar and champagne will do it. thank you. guest: well, you are making the point that it isç a reaggressi tax and your comment is backed up that scored out what a tax

that was just three cents per container would do and it showed that actually 75% of the tax would be paid by those making under $90,000 a year soç it is regressive tax. host: atlanta, georgia. independent line. caller:ç after watching this ly speak today makes me want to get into the lobbying industry. i can see how transparent the arguments are. she is using the word beverages, narrowed the argument to sugar and calories. this is about an empty calorie liquid that is put into theç kids. they should address it with candy bars and attack anything deemed to be a quickç fix and shied away from tobacco. want to talk about ou government taxedç tobacco realizing that it is a product that contaminates our health

system and lastly i would like to say i would like our healthcare policy to also introduce incentives for people to live healthier life styles. i have never gone to a doctor and to be required to pay for insurance because i live a healthy lifestyle. that should be awarded. sidewalks should be built in our communities.çç have a nice day. guest: my final thoughts. i will speak as a mother. i tell my kids absolutely never touch a cigarette.ç i tell them eat and drink in moderation. they have soft drinks as a treat. they have candy bars as a treat and fresh fruits and vegetables and get up and exercise. it is about energy balance and i speak from the heart as a mother, i have two very healthy kids and i'm deeply grateful for that. and we are living a very

>> tomorrow un "washington journal," york one else correspondent peter becker discusses the news of the week, including the health care debate and developments in afghanistan. yuval levin talks about the publication of a new report. norman solomon talks about his book, and an examination of how the obama administration can gain leverage over iran in nuclear negotiations. "washington journal" live at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. this week on "the

communicator's," a look at how members of congress use social media to involve their constituents. we talk with steve israel of new york. >> what is your favorite way of communicating with your constituents? >> in this environment, you have to use the mall. has to be integrated and comprehensive. not everybody follows one venue. in a district as diverse as mine in new york, i communicate through twitter. others communicate through might newsletter. other still want a piece of paper, so we still send frank mail. communication relies on having an employee stock toolbox and using all those tools and an integrated way. >> with the members of congress, using to be an active twitterer.

>> i use several approaches. there are my correspondents who use twitter as a hand grenade and will toss it to me. i enjoy engaging them. there are some that it does not make sense to engage, because anything i say will not have any resonance with them. i have one correspondent named zack. we have some pretty fierce intellectual debates. i think that is very important, because although i may disagree with him, i have a sense of where he is coming from. i also like to do behind the scenes things. i am on the house appropriations committee, and we were in a marathon mark of one day, and i took pictures of the markup and twisted them, saying this is what it looks like to be on the appropriations committee -- i tweeted them. texted to get in trouble for

taking pictures in the markup? >> my fellow members of congress have no problem getting their pictures taken. >> how common is it for members of congress now to treat? are you one of the first? >> i think i am one of the early users of twitter. i believe i am probably one of the most frequent and sustain users of twitter. the problem is that technology has changed so quickly. for 200 years, most members of congress communicated with their constituents in newspapers and in town hall meetings and franked mail. in the past eight or nine years, that has changed incredibly. i remember coming to congress in 2001 as a freshman congressman. i was told that you had to use toque -- local television stations and town hall meetings.

two years later i was told that frank mail was not working anymore, so you had to do e-mail newsletters. then i was told you had to have a youtube presence and then a facebook presence, and now a twitter presence. but the time i have figured it out, it is passe. the challenge is keeping up and diversifying, making sure you are not using just one but using them all. there is always a challenge. the rules of the house sometimes can be antiquated and can make certain assumptions based on technologies that have already gone out of business. >> you have 1500 followers on twitter. 500,000 people in your district.

how many on your e newsletter? >> i do not know how many are subscribers to our newsletter, but we may bear -- we work very hard to make sure is available to them. every communication i have with my constituents, whether responding to a piece of mail with another piece of mail, or doing something on my internet site, we always ask people to subscribe to my e newsletter, and the responses coming pretty well. we never did for other technologies. two weeks ago i decided to have a telephone town hall meeting, and we used our e newsletter subscriber list to identify people who might be interested in participating in that telephone town hall meeting. the end result of that multifaceted strategy is that we had over 5000 people calling in to this town hall meeting on health care. i represent a district that is

very fast pace. people do not always want to hear from their congressman. to get 5000 constituents on one phone call was a very big deal. >> let's walk through some of the technology you have here on the desk. what do user iphone for? >> this little thing has become my most effective tool at communicating with my constituents. just this morning tweeted, and and i do it routinely during the day. this morning i shared one of the concerns i have had with some of my colleagues who are engaging in rhetorical excess on the health reform bill. one of them said that the health care bill will put seniors in a position of being put to death by their government. i tweeted that. i am not making a judgment or

defending it, i just want people to hear what is being said. i have already received some responses. this is instant feedback for me. i do not have to wait to check the phone logs are the mail logs. i can just see how many people have responded to my tweets. it is taking along to load. >> you can be anywhere and send a tweet. >> absolutely. and other members of congress are tweaking. congressman tim ryan from ohio. last sunday at a the speech to the fighting 69th. i want people not to read my speech, but to join me in honoring the members of the fighting 69th.

opposed to the photograph of the troops from the stage. people can access what i am doing, and i can hear from them at frequent points during the day. >> congressman, is this your personal iphone or is it issued by the house? >> this is my personal iphone. you mentioned the rules of the house. one of my frustrations is that the rules have not kept up with the technology. we have not figured out how to make sure that the increase did that for house e-mail's is secure -- that the in corrected data is secure on the iphone. -- the encrypted data is secure on the iphone. >> my friend tweed me, at least give us time to debate the issue before jamming it through,

talking about health care. last night he said the government prevent competition in health care market. you get a wide view of opinions, but you get them instantly. >> had ever chatted with that in person, or just via tweets? >> the just via tweets. i am not sure where zak lives. when you are tweeting, there is no way of knowing, but it is not immediately understood or apparent that some of your fellow tweeters live in the district. i still enjoy the engagement. >> you also have on your official website a video blog.

how do you do that, and where do you do that? >> do you want to see it? >> short. . sure. >> i do not want mike website to be static. the whole point is to be up to date and timely. i like to speak directly to my constituents. >> and this is the official house website? >> this is the official house website. >> i want you to -- i want to invite you to call a special dedicated online i have set up. it is very important to me that i understand your concerns, that i hear your questions, and that i am aware of your opinions. i invite you to call and let me know what you think congress and the president should do about

health care. i want to share some statistics with you. this gives you a sense of trying to use those integrated strategies. i am using the telephone, which is a more conventional instrument of communications with a website, where people will call and give us a base of those who are concerned about health care. i will be able to engage them in back-and-forth communication. we are trying to have a multidisciplinary communication strategy. mexican technology be used to take that? >> -- what kind of technology do you use to take that? >> this is a high technology flip cam. it helped generate tremendous support for legislation that i

introduced. it would move elections from tuesday to weekends. one out of four people who do not vote say they did not vote because tuesday is just too inconvenient for them. they have jobs in kids, so i am trying to move it to begin voting. when i talk about that in the district or around country, people understand it. i took this down to the capitol building one day when there were lots of tourists downtown and i did my own little documentary. i ask if anyone knew why we voted on tuesday. >> i am going to do an interview with you on the spur of the moment. what do you think we have election day on tuesdays in america? >> i guess because once upon a time all the taverns were closed on tuesday. >> the people would forget to go to the polls on monday. >> maybe if easter falls late on

monday? >> the majority of the holidays or observed on monday, so we vote on tuesday. >> as a result of that, we had over 12,000 hits on the internet. that has generated a lot of curiosity and co-sponsors for my bill. we use that as another communications tool with legislative strategic intent. >> you were also recently in afghanistan and brought the flipped him with you. >> i bring this almost everywhere i go -- brought the flip cam with you. >> in the old days -- we are now in a clicker society. i need ways of communicating with my constituents that have impact. they want something fast and immediate. when i visit troops in

afghanistan and iraq, i do not just write a report, i write a documentary. i was in new orleans and mississippi after katrina. >> there were no animals and no sounds. >> 35,000 homes all had water in them. >> we have pockets of recovery, and then you have something like this. >> this is the lower ninth. this is the levy that failed. water came over this levy, swept down on this area, and completely washed homes of their foundations, so there is all this green's base here. this was not green space. this was blocks and blocks of homes, now open space. >> i did my own documentary and

took my flip camera around and interview people. it got a tremendous response. people cannot understand the devastation of katrina without seeing that. >> is this house issue, or is this personal? >> this is house issue. right on your front page is your video below, and on the right side you have twitter, youtube, and facebook. if you can click on the youtube side, i want to show here where it says you are now leaving the house of representatives. we hope your visit was informative and enjoyable. what does that message come up? >> youtube is not an official site of the house of represented. there are a whole series of fire walls that are built into our messaging. this is my house site, which is an official site of the u.s. congress, sanctioned and approved by the congress. if you want to go to something

that is not official, whether it is twitter, youtube, or facebook, you literally have to leave the house official site. >> when you do and go to the youtube site -- >> this is mike official youtube channel -- my official youtube channel. there is a whole series of speeches and other lbos i have been able to do. c-span is my favorite kind. i wanted to understand where might district was on middle- class economic issues, so instead of taking a poll, i took my flip camera out and went to a shopping center in new york and asked people what their priorities are.

>> i am talking to people about what their biggest economic challenges are. [unintelligible] what is the biggest economic issue you have right now? >> gas prices. going to work in coming back. >> de have any idea how much extra it is causing you in gas prices recently? >> about $20 a week. >> what is you would you focus on more than any others? >> gas prices. >> are you going to high school? >> how often do you do this? >> it really depends on the

impact of an issue. i intend to do this when i am back in my district this august on the health care reform bill. i did it last august when the economy was really on everybody's minds. it reached a crescendo last august. i do depending on the impact of an issue. adjusted at town hall and, most new yorkers eyes would glaze over. >> can you put anything you want on your youtube channel? >> on my youtube channel, yes. on my official house website, no. it has to be official. cannot be partisan or political. >> could you put campaign video under you to page? >> most of my colleagues have their own separate and distinct

facebook and youtube campaign pages, as dubai. i am not allowed to show you that on this computer. -- as an do i. >> if you would take is to your official facebook page. >> once again, we have to leave the house of representatives. >> it did that take quite a while, to be able to link up? is that rule change? >> it took about five seconds, which is about four seconds to long. this is my facebook page. >> is this a personal -- a personal facebook page or a government based the page? >> this is an official facebook page. you get some good feedback. i want at public option, so i urge you to vote yes.

>> in looking at your comments, i did note that there were some criticisms on here, and is had a conversation you are having. >> my district is the quintessential moderate district. whenever i communicate with my district, i will get a diversity of opinion that. most of my district is between the far left and far right. you have to be prepared for that kind of diverse opinion, and i think i have a responsibility to flesh it out. i do not want to hear from just one side or the other side. that is why i feel so passionate about having all these different conduits. the best way i can hear that diverse range of opinions is by creating a diverse range of communications options. >> are you doing prior to congress? >> i was a local elected

official in the town of huntington, new york, and i had a small business. >> are you a techno file? >> yes. my dad had a ham radio in the attic. he was always the first one out to buy the new gadget, and that is part of my dna. >> you have over your another gizmo. what is that? >> this is another effective way of communicating with my district. it is a teleconferencing technology. when we have groups of constituents in my office and i want to communicate with them and do it visually, they can come to the office. i have another unit back in the d.o., and and i can talk to them in real time rather than just on a conference call. we have two separate staffs that are part of one team, and sometimes it makes more sense in terms of cohesion to have the