Washington, DC accent

How do people in Washington DC talk? What phonological features does this accent have?

I don't know that DC has any particular accent of its own. It's located right about when the southern accent starts petering out, so I imagine it's a lot like neighboring Virginia -- you'll hear both southern tones and generic American spoken there.

↑ I agree. It's one of those odd coincidences in life that I just heard a DC accent, not five minutes ago, on a home improvement program. As Uriel has correctly noted, it's a hybrid accent---half Southern, half GA, with some vowel-raising that's characteristic of the East Coast.

Understandable. When you get to know their language it's easy to understand, some african-americans speak some slang, but nothing to worry.

just wonder why it's written Virginia is for lovers... as I think there aren't lover couples in Virginia? Paris is for lovers yes, but Virginia...

"Virginia is for lovers" is just a slogan to increase tourism there.
It's not really a true statement, but one designed to lure visitors, i.e. "if you're in love, Virginia is a great place to come and visit", you see.

not to be taken literally. I should know, I'm from Virginia, and it ain't nuttin' special ;)

I've got much more information about the slogan : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Is_For_Lovers.
May be it's much more right to say Virginia is for History lovers?

http://www.virginia.org/site/features.asp?FeatureID=140

The majority of the Washington, DC population is African American, and I would guess that a majority of the white residents of the city are transplants or the children of recent transplants. So, usually when a white person says they are from DC that typically means they are from one of the Maryland or Virginia suburbs. There simple isn't any real, concrete DC accent the way there is with other towns, probably for the same reason there isn't much of an Atlanta accent either--both cities are largely populated with people from elsewhere.

Comedian Lewis Black is the only notable caucasian celebrity from the DC area I can think of--specifically from Silver Springs, Maryland. His accent actually sounds fairly mid-Atlantic, close to Philadelphia or Baltimore.

Mary Chapin Carpenter grew up in DC, and her accent is very Virginia/southern sounding

Here's the example of an accent from DC area.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptwsdbQIHic

In the video he also demonstrated some cot-caught merged words, I think this one is useful