>> this is al jazeera america coming to you live from new york city. i'm del walters with a look at today's top stories. same-sex marriage is now the law of the land in new jersey. only moments ago we learned that governor chris christie has dropped his legal opposition to the issue. >> i declare joseph and orville to be lawful spouses in the state of new jersey. [ cheering ] >> mayor corey booker doing the honors just after midnight. the first same-sex couples to tie the not at newark's city hallen funerals are being held in baghdad for victims of a deadly suicide-bomb attacks. 55 people were killed when an explosive ripped through a busy

cafe through the compan capitoln under. it was one of six bombings on the day. one of china's biggest cities totally shut down by choking smog. students are being kept home from school and business versus been shuttered just days ago the "world health organization" declared pollution to be a significant cause of cancer. president obama with a speech on the affordable care act. we'll bring you that speech live from the rose garden. "consider this" is next. [ ♪ theme ] >> the u.s. government opened for business

again after a shutdown. dc looks for a path forward. the government is back to work. now what? how does the republican party heel itself, what is next for obamacare, are there winners in the mess? also, what happened to all the claims of transparency in an obama white house. a scathing report from the committee to protect journalists includes a quote from a veteran reporter calling the white house the most closed control-freak administration he's covered. amazon.com is a huge business. why doesn't it turn a huge profit. is its ceo jeff bezos more like steve jobs than his pleasant public personae would suggest. i'm antonio mora, welcome to cr. the government -- "consider this" the government open after a shutdown. the fight over obamacare, is far from over. >> vice president joe biden

delivered morning muffins at the environmental protection agencies thursday. some politicians expressed learnt. >> you'll see a more mainstream conservative party. i don't think we'll have the same brinksmanship on 15 january and februaryth. obamacare. >> i'm not going away. this issue is not going away. i'll use every opportunity on the senate floor to get a vote - up or down vote on the issue. >> president obama seized the opportunity to blame republicans and tea party conservatives for the government shutdown and fizzal crisis. >> some of the same folks pushing for the shutdown claim their actions were needed to get america on the right track to make sure they are strong. probably nothing has done more damage to america's credibility

in the world, our standing with other countries than the speck tackle that we have seen the past several weeks. >> standard & poor's report that the government shutdown cost the economy $24 billion and cut the projected fourth-quarter growth rate from 3% to 2.4%. the pentagon announced civilian furloughs cost the defense department $6 million. the ground hog day approached, budgets must stop. we can't continue to do this to our people. having them live under a cloud of uncertainty. the deal keeps the government open until january, raising the ceiling until february. the house has 23 days in session this year. >> i'm joined by patrick, a policy analyst. they fight for lower taxes, government and freedom. by tom doherty, a strat gift and

advisor to george perform etaci. great to have you with us. i want to start with you. we have a 16-day shutdown and a few days on the edge of default before congress backs away from a cliff. the headlines read losing a lot to get little and john boehner in disarray. wisdom based on polls was that the tea party was the loser. usa rejected that. in the run down of winners and losers ted cruz was among the winners. how do you see this. >> i don't know where the "usa today" gets their informationment the losers are candidates going forward. ted cruz and rand paul expected a lot. they can never win this country. that's the problem. the tea party are interested in

running this right wing agenda that may win in certain parts of the country. it doesn't win in the country at a whole. patrick? >> i couldn't hear my colleague. new yorkers like chuck and peter king have been calling the tea party dead for years, but to say that we shot ourselves in the foot with tactics employed is not true. tea parties have never been about political expedience, it's standing on principal. as time goes on, and the affects of this law, beyond the glitches within the obamacare website, you get down to the economics of the law takes its toll on the american people. >> i think they'll respect the tea party for taking a hardline suffering. >> did the tea party shoot themselves in the foot because, in effect, the polls are blaming the gop

disproportionately for the shut down of the government, for risking default. then you have the issue that the shutdown, the debt ceiling debate sucked up the media oxygen at a time when obamacare, which you opposed, the roll out has been close to a disaster. >> sure, and i think it's a tell-tale sign of things to come elections. >> didn't you guys lose focus by doing this, instead of focussing strongly. >> absolutely not. we wanted to take care of the law and fight the battle, nipping it in the bud before it had the disastrous impacts on the american people. maybe there's more to what the tea party stands for than using economic pain and suffering for political gain. we were sent to washington to fight a battle making sure americans were not subjected to the law. as the law goes on, i believe that we'll see a lot more of the glitches. the website glitches

are cosmetic compared to the economic effects law will have. >> if carl called out the leaders of the movement to fund affordable care act, according to rove he said the tea party republicans acted as if more moderate republicans were the enemy, alienating colleagues insisting they were closest obamacare supporters, and it raised the threat of primary challenges... rove. >> absolutely, and the interesting thing is that why would freedom works - why would the things that they believe. why are they working hard to accomplish one goal - that's elect more democrats. that's all they are going to do. when you look at - when they are going out today, groups like the

tea party people down in mississippi are going after that'd cochrane who has been a solid conservative republican, he's not conservative enough. it's not outrageous. what they are doing is they'll cost, as they have, over the last two cycles, they cost the united states senate seat in five states, nevada, colorado, mississippi, indiana. they are seats we can change public policies and do many things and the cost cutting measures that we agree on. you can't go into a political fight with no way of winning, that's a losing battle. >> patrick, do tom and carl's point, adam brant wrote in an email - here is a quote:

it sure sounds like the tea party is trying to create an internal war in the republican party, and doesn't tom have a point. some of the tea party candidates seats. >> no, i disagree with the assertion. i have to take things that carl rose said, in the wake of the 2012 elections with a grain of salt. looking at the tactics we are employing here, what happened here is that progressives in the country declared war on us and the american people by forking the law down their throat. what conservatives aimed to do was defund the law. when we started tearing apart this law, you know, progress ive republicans like john mccain tried to stand us, instead of standing with us, fighting a united front and holding the

president accountable and bringing him to the negotiating table, they cap ittualated. the republican party had success. they ran campaigns on the affordable care act. if we want to cap ittualate to the middle and run moderate candidates, we are going to lose. >> you won big in districts that are heavily republican. the country has been distributed in districts has favoureded the republicans. the republican party hasn't house. >> we are putting health care cap ittualators like mitt romney at the top of the ticket and john mccain. >> let's talk about john mccain. this is what he had to say. >> we are not going to go through the shutdown again. people have been too traumatised by it. there's too much damage.

>> tom, are you as optimistic as senator john mccain. my party has has learnt a lesson. if the tea party conditions to go down the road, all they'll do is empower the democrats. they'll have to elect democrats. they have lost us five united states senate seats over the last four years. that is a difference in the direction that we need to take this country in, if they are happy about electing democrats they should do what they are doing. to put a guy like thad cochrane on notice, because he had the commonsense to say we can't shut the federal government, we can't put the pull faith and debt of the united states at risk. if that is out of touch, well then, i think freedom works is out of touch. >> patrick, what do you say to senator mccain's optimism about no shut down in january. >> responding to the previous comment, if you look at the results, the centerist big

government republicans lost the house of representatives in 2005 and lost in 2008, lost us the white house why 2008 and again in 2012. the only electoral victories are one where the conservatives and republicans stand on principle and fight no matter what against unpopular laws that the american people don't want. the polls show obamacare is unpopular. to cap ittualate to the departments, i don't view it as a wise political solution. >> in that context, what do you think about what will happen in january or february. is it optimistic that there won't be a shut down? >> we'll offer a plan that continues to fund the government levels that have been agreed to, but, you know, give the american people the favouritism that's been shown to big business and labor on obamacare, and give them a one-year delay of the law preventing the economic harm. the tea party is happy with

senator mark orubie. obamacare. >> we have not given up the fight. one thing i want people to understand - they should not feel depressed or discouraged. we'll prevail on this issue. it's a matter of time. >> tom, most republicans and there i think most - both tea partiers and other republicans agree with senator o'rubio, that obamacare is not popular. what do you think will happen. >> it is not popular with me, it's not popular with a republican and many independence around the country, it would have been smarter to the american people to say, "we are not going to shut down the government. we'll put you on notice, we'll go out and talk to every tv radio station around the country. we are not going to default on the american credit. we'll let you no, 1 october,

obamacare will go into effect. we'll check back with you in a year from now. november of 2014, due to the poorly drafted piece of legislation and the bad effects it had, we would have overwhelming elections in the republican column. yet we took away from the mistakes in the first few weeks and made it our problem. decision. >> patrick, the democrat rick party agree with tom. barack obama's former chief of staff told the news that president obama should be grateful for the tea party. >> every time he gets in trouble they come to the rescue. the american people have a concern about spending. they pick obamacare to have the fight over. >> i'll ask you that question. did the tea party mess this up. in fact, becoming the president's best friend? >> the constituents that elected conservative members of congress, the tea party caucus

didn't send the people to washington. they sent them there to fight the law. that's what they did. i agree that the law will continue to become unpopular. it will serve political interests, but the ultimate interest is ensuring american people don't suffer under the consequences. to speak to the dailies point, i don't agree that the conservative members of congress are the president's best friend. republican leadership like mitch mcconnell and john boehner are the president's best friend. when they go into negotiation, they give them everything and ask nothing in return. >> can i ask patrick a question? how many times will the house of representatives voted to repeal and defund obamacare? they have done it at least 40 times. sometimes you have to figure that, you know what, in order to change the law, we need to win the presidency. sometimes winning elections matter. they have had vote after vote. they have failed. wouldn't at some point you say,

"we need to move on from that battle and fight another day it." >> when republican leadership hand picks mitt romney who is a surrender on the issue of health care. then no. if we go through the political progress and find people willing to stand firm and not cap itulate on the health care or economic priorities, we have a chaps of destroying this -- chance of destroying this thing. >> a couple of questions about the big players. how does this leave john boehner. "usa today" and others agree he was the biggest loser. he seems strong in his position as speaker. >> i think this is what happened here, i think - it's not my job to select who is going to be - who should be the new leader of the republican party. the american people will have a vote of no confidence in republican leadership in 2014. >> including the speaker of the house, despite he was allied

with the tea partiers. >> when you look at the as a results of this, the speaker of the house and the leadership in the senate went to the table and demanded, went to the negotiation table and came away with nothing, giving the president everything he wanted. it's not effective government. >> all right. patrick, tom, appreciate you being with us.

>> candidate barack obama might be shocked at the actions of president obama when it comes to the government transparency. during the 2008 campaign, the illinois senator pledged to run a transparent campaign. the white house went already whistleblowers, seized the phone records of the associated press, reviewed emails of a fox news correspondent and could gaol a "new york times" reporter for not revealing a source. a report from the new york committee to protect journalists says it's turning out to be the administration of unprecedented secrecy and attacks on a free press. others say the sources are scared to death to come forward as a result. >> david is a pulitzer prize winning journalist and karen greenburg is the director of the

center of national security. they join us to talk about this. great to have you . >> new york times chief correspondent david sanker wrote tha that: >> every white house press corp, i am sure, complains about whatever administration they are covering. what is different here? >> what is different is the breadth of the report and across the broad journalists in washington saying they have never seen this kind of aggressive push-back against leakers and the reporters they are speaking to. david sanger has sources quoted saying, "do not email me, don't call me, you are radioactive because there's an ongoing investigation." all that is being reviewed. >> bob schieffer said:

>> do you agree with that? >> i think it's worse for this administration. karen and i spoke about it earlier. she agreed that there is qualitatively something administration. >> one thing that this administration has is something called the insider threat program, which pretty much is institutionalising tatling. as a cuban american it reminds me what they have in cuba, where neighbours tatle on each other. fourish. >> it does seem like that. we need to know more about the program. i think the general gift with the barack obama administration would say is they are trying to distinguish what a whistleblower is and a leaker and don't want leaks of national security secrets. this is an administration who has had two grand stealing -

stealing of secrets - first with bradley manning and then edward snowden. they are on the defensive and want to make sure that doesn't happen. in a way they overreacted. it's not that they started with a policy of excessive control, but they have grown into it. >> talking about the whistleblowers, the report talks about that saying: again, from a legal standpoint, where do you draw the line. >> well, this is not a legal question, the way the obama administration has drawn it, which is that if you criticise the poll circumstances the nature of their policies, the funding, then you are considered to be a leaker as opposed to a whistleblower. this is contented in the courts. whistleblowers have protection that leakers do not have.

it's an important distinction to make, no one is making it well. >> they have limited it so much. we did ask for comment from the white house. we didn't get anybody who wanted to be interviewed on the show. we weren't able to get a statement from them about this report. as we said, it's gone after the ap records, after james resen and james risen. it's done a lot. as you mentioned david sanger being concerned or his sources concerned about communicating journal. >> in washington. what is amazing is one of the sections of the report is the administration doesn't answer questions, there's a policy of refusing to respond to questions, and there's a real fear amopping people in the administration to say -- among people in the administration to say anything. i received an email of someone i thought of quoting and they said, "are you kidding me, you'll get me fired." there's a fear and it's different from

past administrations. one of the people quoted in the report was ann komp tonne, covering seven administrations and has never seen the level of everything is closed mouth, close to the vest. administration. >> she's been at the white house as long as anybody. she has seen the different - what is interesting is the committee to protect journalists is mostly focused on protecting journalists abroad. something you are familiar with, having been kidnapped and held hostage by the taliban for a long time. what does it say they have dedicated the time to come up with an extensive report and focused administration? >> it's the atmosphere in washington that hasn't happened before. glen downy was the editor of the "the washington post."

the basic art is we are an example, and when this situation exists, it leads to charges of hypocrisy, and a basic example of this is reflected on drone strikes, where we carry out the killings or releasing details about what is happening. clearly actions are not matching ideals. drabs. >> yes. there's many other issues, that's one thing i looked into. it's hard to get information about the drone strikes. the legal rationals, for targetting american citizens. the other side of the equation is national security. it's one thing that the obama administration brings up in defending itself and actions. isn't that the fair. you don't want people leaking concludesified information. >> no, you don't. you want a government to keep its secret. but you have to establish a level of trust between the government and the public. the level of trust was by the bush administration, and the

obama administration has not done enough to re-establish it. until you do that you can't have an equitable conversation about what the standards are. it's basically a state of virtual warfare where they are name calling each other in the name of national security. it's too much of what we have heard before. >> james mccartney defended - jay carney, excuse me defended the administration by giving the example that information leaked out when they talked about going into syria for not going into syria. all of a sudden within a matter of hours we had unbelievably detailed information about how the military action might take place. isn't there a point? >> yes. i think the administration and the white house has a point, but they have to give a little bit on the other side of it. when you are so much in control that things that don't make sense are withheld, then reporters go as far as they can. again, they are in a combative situation.

it's not a cool eejial situation, which is what you want, a col eejial situation. >> people are criticising the press conference saying the white house press corp didn't press the president. interestingly there has been an argument that the press corp hasn't been as tough on the administration as it should be. it's hard, it's a polarised situation. to me the key issue is this is information that's been, you know, released - will it endanger national security is it embarrassing to the white house. one of the other transits talked about is overclassification, huge amount of information, including news stories are declared classified. there's a tendency within the government. people are atrade of retaliation -- afraid of retaliation, a controlling white house. when there's a leak or bad story people are punished. are people making things classified to cover up mistakes that happen that has nothing to do with national security.

you don't want secrets coming out that will endanger the lives of american military, people, others. >> what about the barack obama administration defense that they have given freedom of information act requests, and responded to other administrations that president obama has given more interviews than george bush and bill clinton both did combined within the first term. clearly it doesn't seem to make much of a difference. >> no, it does make a difference. you have to make is a distinction between quality and quantity. quantity of materials given out. quality matters. we don't have, referring to the pred tore i don't know targeted killings a program. we don't have a redacted version of the alarqi memo. there's a long way to go in covering the base and giving what people are asking for, much of which is legitimate.

people are not asking for state secrets, nuclear secrets or names. >> we have a viewer question. >> a viewer wrote in - leakers used to be known by another name - journalists. >> leakers as journalists - the line is blurred. anyone can post whatever they want online. wikileaks was an interesting case where cables came out. i'm a journalist, i'm bias, i credit news organizations that they went through the documents, redacted names, africans were providing information. wikileaks released them all publicly without redacting the names. we have a responsibility as journalists to vet our information, to listen to the government to have a conversation about a story, if there's a legitimate case for holding the information, we should do that. whether you come down and

information is released. >> this is a good question, you don't know. i think that they deserve protection as whistleblowers or as journalists. that both should have protection. the lines are blurred now and again. it's important that people not doing. >> david, karen, good to have thanks.

this." >> julian assange has been called a menace to society and a national security threat. some say he's a fearless whistleblower. the cofounder of wikileaks is the focus of a new film "the fifth estate." what does he have to show for it? joining us is benjamin wells whose essay on julian assange is featured in the magazine's issue.

your essay - he's a cartoon, a megalow maniac, an irresistable hollywood subject and a historical figure. let's start with the end of that the crucial historical figure. why do you see him as this? >> i'm glad you started with that. that's the big point. before julian assange i think most americans had a big sense that their military and the intelligence agencies that served them did things behind the shroud of secrecy, whose nature they would never know. what julian assange did with the assistance of bradley manning, publy sissing that bradley, now chelsea manning supplied, was to show what was happening behind the shrouded secrecy. and in case after case in iraq, where, you know, the american military was not saying how many military death it was causing,

in afghanistan where the military was basically lying about attacks on schools, for instance, you know, dead civilians that it was murdering. in the case of american intelligence contractors supplying their technologies to foreign dictator ships. what julian assange showed was what was happening was alarming. that is in subtle but important ways changing the way americans see the national security state and the problem of secrecy. that is incredibly important. while lifting the shroud, exposing abuse, didn't he also create serious problems and possibly the deaths of some people. yes, i think the deaths allegation is something that has not been proven. there's certainly a wait and see

callousness to how julian assange behaved and an ideological strictness put ahead of a code. what we are talking about is the problem of redactions. in the massive documents they were the names of many, many people who supplied, you know, the american military and intelligence agencies with intelligence - people who are collaborators with people in afghanistan and iraq. there was a lot of legitimate fear that those people would be put at risk once they are - their involvement was exposed to the world as part of document dumps that julian assange helped to produce. he was prevailed upon many times to redact those names to block out the names so they could not be viewed by people with harm. in some cases he did that. only after an extraordinary amount of pressure and many other cases he did. so, yeah, there's certainly a strong case to be made there.

>> moving to other parts of the subtitle, you called him a cartoon and megalow maniac - do you think that's what led to people abandoning him. he's off on his own now. >> it's incredible to see how isolated he's become. if you read the history of wikileaks, it's a history now. you know, basically what you see is four years of his own allies abandoning him. he cycles through separate generations of allies and assistance, and people at the core of wikileaks. right now wikileaks - part of this is a product of julian assange's legal difficulties. now wikileaks is a much-diminished organization. what they did between 2008 and 2011 - the frequency and deep exact of the leaks published -

to see what happened since, there has been a dramatic deminishment of the role. >> he got back into the public consciousness with edward snowden's leaks. you say in the piece that you ask why 480,000 people have edward snowden's security clearance and more than a million has chelsea manning's - why haven't there been other leaks? isn't that a good thing? where do you draw the line? >> i don't think so. look, it seems to me that if you are talking about genuinely morally alarming things that the american military, american intelligence community is doing, it's surprising that more people did not sort of speak up. did not do the things that edward edward snowden and again... >> is that where you draw the line, that is has to be calling attention to very alarming things, as opposed to some

other - really, these are massive document dumps as you said with names of people that helped the united states and other things that warrant what you are describing. is that where you draw the line. i think that's a fair place to start. i mean, these are complex issues. it seems to me that there is a basic moral imperative, that somebody who looks at secret documents and sees that their government is doing things that are objectionable, are not being told to the public. there's a basic moral obligation that they have to do something with that information, to not simply sit at their computer and note it and move on. when you read the chat logs where chelsea manning is confronting some of this stuff, trying to make sense of it, it's very moving. there's a genuine feeling that

something terrible is going on. you know, that she is seen - you know, she has seen crimes committed, and not been - and the public not informed. do you know what, i think that is something that we ought to cheer. i mean, that is a kind of morally important thing to have people within the national security apparatus do. >> let's get back to julian assange and his presence situation. he's holed up at the ecuadorian embass ni in the u.k., london, where he's hoping to get asylum in ecuador or somewhere else. let's listen to him talking about the prospect of leaving his life. >> well, i would leave this embassy. you know, it's a bit of a prison in some way, but i have good people here. but where would i go to? you know. i would end up in the outside world where you are, but what is happening to the outside world?

the west is becoming a place where the best and the brightest who keep the government - hold the government to account are ending up in asylum or exile in other countries. we have seen it before with dictatorships in latin america, with the soounion and it's -- soviet union and it's time it stopped >> he faces criminal charges in sweden if he leaves the embassy without safe passage to somewhere else. there are arguments whether the united states might want to arrest him. he certainly sounds fairly paranoid, doesn't he? >> absolutely. one way to read wikileaks, and it's the way i read the wick story, is that -- wikileaks story, is that julian assange's difference and peculiar yarty enables wikileaks to become what it was, but also has sort of sab tarnaled himself and the organization. i mean, these sexual assault

charges in sweden are not charges - allegations, are something that i think he could have handled much better. you know, he accused western intelligence agencies of being complist in making up the charges against him, when the charges against him are incredible. there is an element of paranoia that runs through julian assange's public statements, not just recently, but earlier on. i think that has done a lot to undermine his cause, which i think is a worthy one, and to alienate a lot of people, and have been friends to him and future. >> you call him an irresistable hollywood subject. "the fifth estate" comes out friday. it's getting mixed reviews. it sounds like the julian assange we know. certainly very dramatic. let's see a clip. >> this is the biggest leak of classified information in

history. >> the guardian, "new york times" standing alongside you. >> he's not a journalist. security. >> lives are at stake. >> what about the lives of civilians in the conflicts.. >> if they had someone like you the berlin wall would have come down years before. >> very dramatic. hollywood playing it big there. >> yes. >> julian assange is not happy about the movement. he called it cowardly. what did you think? >> i thought it showed him in a decent light. it certainly emphasised some of his par noia, and some of his selfishness. those are hard things for a movie to avoid. there are accounts of people who left wikileaks because of exactly the problems with julian assange personally. on the plus side, it made a strong case that he had sort of changed the world. and

that, you know, the kind of revelations that he - that he managed to put forth shifted towards the united states and global power. one thing that we can see in the reaction to edward snowden is that there is now, i think, a little more of a receptive audience for the idea that american secrecy is a problematic force in the world than there was five or six years ago when we had the first round of less well-documented, but the first round of suggestions that the nsa was spying on citizens. >> we have been monitoring social media. what have you found? >> antonio, we looked at the wikileaks twitter feed. this is what we found. the seed was riddled with criticism of the movie. julian assange released talking points outlining everything wrong with it. he has a rival people titled

"media stand: wikileaks rogue movie out in time to challenge the fifth estate." why does he hate it so much? >> because it portrays him as a maniac. to him that has come to matter more than being seen as a visionary. there's a way in which his personal brand and his defense of his brand began to interfere with his political brand in defense of his politics. you watch his relationship with english intellectual society, and there was a time in 2010 and 2011 when he was a hero of a lot of liberal english society. that support has altogether disappeared, because he is difficult to deal with. and so, you know, you see both those sides in the movie. >> where do you think he'll be five years from now? >> it's hard to imagine. you know, i can't imagine that

this state lasts for much longer, but in another way it's hard to see what state would want to take him on and take on all the baggage. maybe he's in limbo five years from now. >> all right. great to have you here. really fascinating topic. >> appreciate your time.

>> into today's dat adive takes a trip to the best destinations the 26 annual readers awards came out. 1.6 million were passed. paris, new york and london were nowhere to be found among the top 10. charleston karolina took fifth, the best u.s. city for the third straight year. a town in spain tied for fifth. it's one of three spanish cities in the top 25, along with barcelona and seville. sales burg austria, fourth.

moet zart's home town scribed as transporting you in time. budda pest - a classic master piece with grand architecture and easy to get around, tied with italy, forrens, it placed in the top 10 with sienna and nine th and rome at eighth. >> the top city was in mexico. the old city center pull of well-preserved buildings in the 17th and 18th senturies. readers loved the lack of street lights and billboards. so much more modern tiles. more travel categories. the lodge at calorie cliffs in museum is the top lodge. on 6,000 acres. beautiful views of the potion. rooms go for $420 a night per person, all the way to $7300. of course, you have to fly to most destinations.

the top u.s. airline virgin america beating jett blue, hawaii airlines and south-west. singapore airlines topped emmer haed. >> despite issues crews lines had, readers gave several lines high marks. disney cruise lines scored the highest and crystal cruises topped the mid size ship lines. >> so many places to go. so little time.

on inside story, we bring

>> chances are you have a bunch of stuff in your house bought on amazon. the online superstore sells everything - books, toys, high heel shoes and dog food. as amazon has taken over the online marketplace it has left massive companies, including circuit city, barnes&nobel and borders in its wake. a new book "the everything store: jeff bezos and the age of amma zone" tracks the rise and company of its founder. brad stone is the author and a writer at bloomberg's business week. a fascinating book.

i saw a quote comparing jeff bezos to henry fords, saying jeff bezos transformed sales of everything in the way ford changed manufacturing in general. is that fair. >> absolutely, steve jobs the other natural comparison. it's not just online shopping. jeff bezos changed the way we read with the kindle and the amazon cloud services business. they are changing the way companies, particularly in silicon valley run their businesses on amazon servers. as you said, he has done so much. he started with the books, took it to toys and other things out there. he's getting into the supermarket. online - you can buy your stuff and get it delivered to your house. but he also - part of his focus has really been from a corporate standpoint on the consumer, focussing on consumer profits. how did he make that work. the company rarely has turned a

significant profit. >> the interesting thing about the amma zone story it hasn't worked. at the beginning... >> it's getting bigger. >> during the.com boom investors loved the land rush and expansion. for five or six years amazon was pumelled. no one believed. jeff bezos are in seattle believing that ecommerce could work and customer focus was worth while, stuck it out. people now believe in him and the company so much they tolerate some losses. >> is it an important model for other people, the focus on consumer loyalty, and growth, rather than the quick quarterly profit. >> i think amma second gets away with it because people believe in the founder and the vision. let's be clear. customer loyalty - the customer focus is one thing. they are brutal.

they take out competitors. they behave ruthlessly, drive prices down to the consternation of manufacturers. we saw it with walmart, and we see what happens - manufacturers go overseas. great for the customers, but mcrae economic effects need to be considered. >> he has been tough in negotiations, and really it's an company. we have a social media question. >> thank you. viewer wants to know, "based on research, what is it like to work for jeff bezos on a day-to-day basis? ". >> great question. probably very similar to how it is working for bill gaits during microsoft or steve jobs at apple. it's top. he's demanding excellence and punishing people. >> that was something i was surprised by. i met him years ago. could not have been a nicer guy. he has the famous silly laugh.

you know, that's the personae that he's always portrayed is when he's on jay leno or on the rare occasions he does interviews. nut. >> you have to be. it's why amazon is the success that it is today. he is not willing to tolerate meady okay rity. a lot of employees go to amazon and last less than two years. it's a tough place to work. you are not always meeting with the ceo. he created a culture of adversarial friction. >> compared to most other companies of its size, it has quicker employee turn over than others. it's a frugal business the way - he gives them some perks, you can bring your dog to work. employees have to pay for parking, and the desks are made out of almost recycled materials, and not fancy ones.

>> we think of amazon as a technology company. it is. it's more its retail side. walmart or sam walton's autobiography, the frugality is baked into wall mart. >> jake, a reader, went and plucked dna from a lot of different things, that's a trade he took from walmart. >> you mentioned steve jobs. that is clear in the book - there's a bunch of parallels - personal and two. >> not only creating a great technology franchise, but to what you are referring to on the personal side, famously steve jobs was adopted. part of this explored jeff bezos's earlier history and found to, my surprise, that not only did he have a biological father who was not in his life, but that this person had a remarkable history, was in the

unicycle troop as a teenager when jeff was born. i traced the father down, he was running a bike shop outside phoenix and didn't know his son had become a billionaire and ran a world-wide known company. >> you did amazing leg work to find him. you must have been completely shocked when you figured out that he didn't know who jeff bezos was. the question is - does this matter? why is this important to the amazon story? i think that jeff bezos is a unique, driven individual, like jobs or, you know, frankly president obama or bill clinton, and you wonder does the absence or the disappearance of the biological father - >> he had a great adoptive father. >> somewhere in the stew of this individual that would have had an impact. >> the biological father wrote him and he wrote back. do you know whether he has interest in meeting his biological dad?

>> i don't know. i would assume, you know - let's go back to the steve jobs story, at the end of his life he didn't have an interest in meeting his biological father. he said he had a great father, and wasn't interested in making the connection. i don't know what the story here will be. outcome. >> as we said he revolutionised the way we buy all sorts of things, he bought the "the washington post," do you think he revolutionise print media. >> it needs help. >> it needs help. >> he has a better chance than anyone. number one, of course, he has the resources. he paid $250 million. his net worth is a relative drop in the bucket. he has a long-term orientation and a willingness to try new things, and experiment gracefully, sunset, the old businesses, the new ones. if i'm a reporter at the "the washington post," i feel good,

instead of living in the age of decline. we'll start trying new things and experimenting, and you have an owner that's willing to stay in it for the long term. >> talking about new businesses, you mentioned that he spoke in a valla dictry speech in high school in miami about his interest in space, and now he has a rocket company. >> he spends a day a week origin. >> how do you run these businesses. you are talking about a rocket company and selling shoes. >> it's a thing he does well, which is disperses time across the businesses. they describe it in the book as a series of chest boards, all of them oriented in a way that he can play every game in the most efficient way possible. with a lot of amma zone customers, that's what he does. >> he's described as being bright his whole life. you interviewed him. the last time you interviewed him was when you mentioned that you would write a book about him

and amma zone. he wasn't that trilled. >> i saw him two weeks ago when he introduced - was lunching the new kindle fire tablet. look, like every retail ceo, he doesn't want to share his perspective. that's the competitive edge. he saw the inevitability. amma zone changes the way we live in the account written. he was rooting for the book. >> even though he was not interviewed for the book, he certainly allowed - he opened a lot of doors. we wish you the best of luck. we hope it's a best seller on amazon, and jeff bezos will talk to you in the future after he reads it. >> the book again is, "the everything store - jeff bezos and the age of amazon." the show may be over. the conversation continues on the website, aljazeera.com,

>> welcome toage america. i'm del walters. these are the stories we're following for you. just moments from now president obama will address the affordable healthcare changes. and one of the most restrictive abortion laws anywhere in the country. and governor christie as same sex marriages go forward any way. >> it has been nearly four weeks since a keyar