this was in detroit. he got a brand new car and over $300,000. after james roberts journey a college student set up a go fund me account. >> thanks for watching. "smerconish" starts right now. >> this is cnn breaking news. >> i'm michael smerconish with breaking news. new information on kayla mueller t american aid worker held by isis. after almost two years of keeping her capture secret her family has gone public. u.s. intelligence officials are skeptical and turns out they may have new evidencele on where kayla has been. cnn correspondent is in kayla's home town of prescott arizona. what have you learned? >> reporter: michael, what we know is that there was a rescue attempt, a daring rescue

attempt, and u.s. troops came very close to trying to free kayla mueller as well as other hostages. that attempt happened last july inside syria, u.s. troops attempting the daring escape -- attempt to release these hostages. it failed. the primary hostage we heard about in this failed rescue attempt was james foley. you may remember him. he was a journalist who was later killed by isis. when u.s. troops were there, there was evidence inside those jail cells, some writings scribbled on the walls that is believed to belong to hostages. key to this case are some hair strands that were found and u.s. official tells us they believe those belonged to mueller. why is this important? because last july is when the rescue attempt was, michael. what we know is she was alive as recently as july. michael. >> statement from kayla's

parents, is it directed toward isis? >> reporter: it is a specific address to the captors. they don't directly say isis but clearly that's who they are talking to. whap the public statement says is that the parents who are at this point trying to stay private, you can see the flashing lights over my shoulder they are trying to stay away from speaking directly to the cameras. but this statement is directly to the captors saying look we kept our end of the deal you told us to keep her name out of the global prelsss. they worked with journalists including cnn to keep her name out of the public sphere. we have known that there is a hostage being held who was a woman. the parents say they kept their end of the deal. they want isis to reach out to them directly so they can speak privately. they add michael, that they are hoping their daughter is still alive. >> finally, what do we know if

anything about a white house role facilitateing negotiations or impeding negotiationings. you of course referenced the foley case. >> reporter: certainly. you heard that allegation from foley's mother. she said on our airwaves that she felt that the white house certainly kept her in the dark that they impeded, that she wanted more direct contact, she wanted more of a rescue attempt. we're not hearing any of those specificities from this family. it may be because this family is hoping that their daughter is alive. we're not hearing anything directly from the white house as well but we expect that will be bubbling to the surface in the coming weeks. >> thank you for a great report. now let's turn to phil mudd he spend years at the cia working on counter terrorism and following all of this closely. what do you make of the breaking news there was apparently a rescue attempt made on kayla

mueller? >> reporter: one of the things we got to think about is you're talking about break news from last summer. there has been a lot that's happened since last summer. oublgsly we know what happened to journalists flew the fall and we know what happened over the last week or so when isis killed that jordanian pilot. i think what's happening now six months later is isis is looking at all of the news since that raid last summer and starting to say a week or two ago they made a mistake, now trying to figure out how to hang the dynamic in the public conversation by getting away from all of the news coverage of that pilot and inserting this the woman's name trying to claim the jordanians are responsible for her death. >> you think that this is a propaganda effort to deflect attention from the outcry over the video of the burning of that pilot alive? >> that's correct. there's a couple of dynamics here. the first obviously is the timing which i mentioned. the second is the fact that in the arab world dealing with a female that's a different game.

from isis, the murder of a female hostage would be even more significantly damaging if if you will than murder of the jordanian pilot. so either they are trying to portray themselves as people who were the victim also of a jordanian strike that killed a female or i think there is another outcome i don't want to get into that is i think there is a chance that they might have killed her earlier and that they would use this story, this propaganda story, about an air strike as cover for what they have already done. in other words, they will say she died in an air strike when in fact she died at their hands. >> i know that you and i both pray that that assessment is incorrect. could someone on the ground at that jordanian build, at that syrian building pardon me where they say it was a jordanian bomb that killed kayla mule e could someone discern what kind of a plane, whose plane it was, that dropped such weaponry? >> boy, there are too many coincidences here. i was an analyst for 25 years.

you stack up two or three coincidences simultaneously and that starts to smell to me. coincidence one, the timing right on the heels of the jordanian pilot. two, which you mentioned, are you kidding me. somebody is looking up and identifying american aircraft versus jordanian aircraft and deciding who dropped the bomb? no way. coincidence three, only one person died in this strike all this to intelligence officer and i don't think it takes an intelligence officer looks to me like isis is trying to come up with some way to dig itself out of the hole that they dug a week ago with the murder of the pilot. >> what is going on behind the scenes? whose job is it on our side to try to figure out. is it the state department the pentagon. some kbi flation on whom are we relying? >> there's an intelligence picture that the cia and others might take months. in the intelligence world

classically you look at two sources. inform mapts and wires. human penetration into an organization like al qaeda and technical information like intercepts of communications. in my experience when we're operating against al qaeda in pakistan for example, verifying someone's death whether it's a hostage's death or whether it's the death of an al qaeda member who might have been killed by a drone strike is very difficult. you've got to depend on the technical side the intercept side for example, for somebody in the organization to make a mistake. somebody to refer to this air strike as a propaganda ploy someone in isis. on the human side you've got to get detainees over the course of months for example who might have been at the site or might have overheard isis commanders talking about what happened to this woman. neither of those stories that is technical intercepts or detainee information or human informant information can be picked up over the course of days or weeks. this could take months to determine what's happened to this woman. >> finally, you herald my

exchange where we both referenced the foley case. do your sources report there is a change in the approach the posture by administration in how they are handling these hostage circumstances? >> i have not heard changes in the posture. you may recollect a few months ago president obama olded a look at how american deals with hostage situations. i don't think that's a situation where the white house and other agencies like the cia, the state department would be talking about paying for hostages. i think in my world in washington that would be viewed as unacceptable. but as more and more people die, i mean i'm not a professional first, i'm a human being, as more people die you've got to say is there some way to engage in a conversation with the terrorist group that potentially brings a human soul back home beyond simply saying we don't talk to terrorists. it's not a pretty situation but there is no pretty outcome. >> i agree. thank you. i've got to take a quick break. a closer look at this question.

as isis spreads evidence of its brutality all over the internet is the media aiding the enme by airing their shocking footage? and, startling new claims that a key u.s. ally may have aided the 9/11 hijackers. i'll speak with a lawyer who heard these from the man called the 20th hijacker. there comes a time in everyone's life when you want more. like a new meticulously engineered german sedan. finely crafted. exactingly precise. desire for such things often outpaces one's means. until now. hey matt, new jetta? yeah. introducing lots of new. the new volkswagen jetta. isn't it time for german engineering? when you ache and haven't slept... you're not you. tylenol® pm relieves pain and helps you fall fast asleep and

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a phony pr stunt, that's what jordan is calling isis claim as there american hostage kayla mueller died in air strikes. the extremist group thrives on propaganda. most recently the brutal murder

of the jordanian pilot burned alive. video of his murder quickly spread across the internet but cnn chose not to air it. meanwhile, fox news has posted the entire 22-minute video on its website, it's viewed more than 7 million times. my question could the posting of the video actually help isis? joining me now is a foreign policy analyst. is fox helping or hurting isis by showing that video on its website? >> isis is contributing to the budget market of isis it's a reckless -- >> fox is. >> fox nuls. it's reckless. they are putting politics above national security. for them they don't understand that by doing that this they are playing with a policy of fear. by doing this isis actually having a large market. isis is doing this designed strategically to have and recruit more jihadists, to

appeal to more around the world. if you see how many foreign fighters. 1,000 foreign fighters going to raqqa, to mosul to fight. so fox news by doing that are helping. >> isn't the contrary argument that fox is showing the horror that people need to see, need to appreciate it almost reminds me of the conversation about "charlie hebdo"."hebdo." there is something for transparency so the world is attuned to how awful these people are. >> i think the world already knows how awful they are. they don't need to see graphically the burning of a man that is alive, 27 years old, the pilot that burned alive. why you need to see that. one thing is to show cartoons of "charlie hebdo" where you see the froft or you see them mocking a religion from one end to another. seert brutality and understand what isis strategy is. isis strategy is actually they are appealing, trying to market

to these jihadists around the world so they can have them and recute them and can show them how exciting and what they are doing and the extreme brutality. so if you understand that this is their strategy why you are actually helping them and give them a platform. >> maybe i'm naive. i would like to think -- by the way i watched. i wish i could unwax. i wish i had not watched but i did watch thinking i needed to understand the to be able to conduct a program like this. i would hate to think there are people on the globe who would watch the culmination of that video and say that's something i want to be associated with. >> of course there's people around world doing these things and actually getting excited by these things. if you think of all the jihadists that are traveling from europe from chechnya from the middle east to help isis in their cause. what are they excited by? what are they intrigued by. this is al qaeda, isis is al qaeda on steroids. this is what excite them. >> if the isis claim a jordanian

air strike has killed the u.s. hostage, kayla mueller, if that's propaganda isn't that evidence of what i'm saying that even isis now realizes that they overplayed their demented hand by videotaping the way in which they killed that pilot and even isis doesn't want people now to see it because they are losing ground? >> this is one way of seeing it. this is what i look at. i look at the datas, how many foreign fighters are going on monthly basis to help isis. how many watch this video. >> 7 million plus on fox alone. >> if the you -- on fox alone. there's at least as much worldwide watching that video, if one percent of these people are sympathetic to isis or somebody that is sitting in europe and feel marginalized or feel excluded from society, and he has a borderline identity crisis and this is appealing to him, then what did we do? we actually help pushing isis

agenda. we need to stop this propaganda. imagine if nazis are putting propaganda -- this is how they started the whole hate crime against jews in europe. >> in 99.99% reject it that fraction that remains is enough to keep isis moving? i get the argument. it will recruit that individual. i want to switch gears slightly. you have said previously what's needed is recognition in the muslim world that this is not a united states battle against isis do we finally have a champion in the king of jordan? is he now the individual from within the muslim community prepared to be the face of the opposition to isis? >> i think that champion is civil society that throws up and said enough. this is not done in our name, not in the name of our religion. this is not who we are. we will fight till the end. i think now they are owning this battle. they are owning this the war and it's exciting to see millions of people in the streets of jordan

saying look not only you are killing our religion and the credibility of our faith, but you are killing our own people over and over. and i think the burning of that human being alive, just -- i think triggered in the jordanians one idea that isis not fighting you know their claim that they are fighting foreign fighters or fighting the saudis or fighting eventually the americans, but they are fighting every muslim that doesn't agree with their ideology. >> was the video a tipping point? has the tide finally turned now that people who needed to awaken will because they have seen that? >> i think the people in the middle east have been awakened for a while. they have been fighting this. but now they are galvanized and they needed to be. but let's be clear about it michael. we can win this militarily but if we don't defeat the ideology of isis it will keep coming back.

killing bin laden had nothing to do with the trajectory of the war on terror balls we didn't kill the ideology. we need a game changer. >> thank you as always. after a break i have terrific stories including a mystery about 9/11 from behind the bars in the most secure prison in the united states. the man known as the 20th hijackerhijack er hijacker is making a shocking allegation about a u.s. ally. an exclusive with the tofrnlt and brian williams the face of nbc news remains in controversy, did he lie? and will he keep his job? then bruce jenner, won gold now appears that the former athlete and tv personality is becoming a woman. i'll talk to someone who has gone through the transsexual transformation in just a moment. the real question that needs to be asked is "what is it that we can do that is impactful?" what the cloud enables

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the controversy swirling around brian williams continues to grow. he's now the subject of an internal investigation into exactly what happened in iraq on that day in 2003 when he says his chopper came under small arms fire and struck by a grenade. williams admitting he got the facts wrong. now there are more conflicting accounts from the pilots involved. did he lie or did hills memory

simply fail him? should he keep his job? joining me is frank cesno, now director of the school of media and public affairs at george washington university. frank, is an internal network investigation the appropriate response from nbc? >> i don't think so. i don't think what nbc is ever going to do is resolved this situation and molify it's outspoken critics with an internal investigations. there are questions well these people are on nbc's payroll. how can they be impartial. most of these serious investigations when they are done like this involve people from the outside looking in with full access to rome. so the question is what is nbc trying to investigate, how deep are they going to dig and will they satisfy their harshest critics. >> can he be punished where the pilots can't agree. i went to bed after watching a jake tapper report one of the

pilots said i flew him and we did draw fire admittedly not rpg fire. that may get williams ahead of the curve. the following morning there was another individual who said i was the pilot, and this story bears no resemblance to the truth. so if the fog of war is such that the pilots don't know what occurred how can we hold brian williams accountable? >> that's a good point. i think brian stealther talked to somebody who said he was apy lot. brian has an interesting piece walking through being transparent about what he was told. fascinating piece, i was reading the science behind brian williams memory flub with a northwestern university professor who did research into that part of our brain that remembers these things. he makes a very compelling case for how these things can get mixed up. so i think it's very important in this sort of cable driven world that we're all in where everybody wants to jump to instant conclusions and run to the twitter verse and say what they want to say and there are

some really nasty stuff out there right now. to acknowledge that memory does fog, that these things can happen and it may be that this is in fact the explanation. zblp the problem, though michael, is the job that brian is in like the job i had, the job that you have is in dealing with fact and being really careful. and in not getting it wrong and then not dissembleing to try to explain what went wrong. that's where your credibility comes into question. that it is the damage both he and nbc news have to confront right now. >> do you think that i'm right in saying that in the end this is not a ratings calculus. it occurs i bet the numbers are high and will be next week because they are rubberneckers. people want to tune in and see how is he going to perform under adversity. or does it come down to ratings in the end? >> i'd love to say oh, michael, you're wonderful and you're so right and ratings don't water and the bottom line never matters but some people say wait

a minute brian williams is too big to fail. that's not true. people could have said dan rather was. twa was too big to fail. i don't think we know what's going to happen. ratings do matter. brian williams is in a commanding position they recovered lost ground he talks to 9 million people a night or so. that is a very important thing for nbc news. but you lose control sometimes in these situations you don't know where the facts are going to lead you. you know you and i talked about the internal investigation that nbc's got. guess what we're wrong, it's an external ves garks it's an everybody investigation, it's happening. brian williams has said is being scrutinized by somebody. >> the flood gates are now open and of course they are now reports questioning whether he got it straight in katrina relative to what he saw in the french quarter. let me ask this question. so what then is the appropriate response am from a competitor? i'm from a political world more than anything.

i'm very well familiar with opposition research. is it appropriate for abc? is it appropriate for cbs right now to doggedly pursue all brian williams reporting or does that cross an ethical line? >> i think it crosses an ethical line if the purpose is outflank the competition. that's going to be unseemly and will backfire. if the however they want to pursue the story as ves gayetative as stars and stripes started it following up on some bloggers the news media should be reported as harshly and with as much discipline as any institution. maybe more so because we're the ones you're the ones in the media who are purveyors of information so you better be credible and you better stand as accountable as any other institution your reporting on and holding accountable. at that level, yes. this is fair game. if brian williams was making it up or lying, that is a story and that is the part of the

accountability the transparency of an open society. >> you know my reaction to this has been the same as something i said about tillman and i said recently about chris kyle "american sniper." why weren't the facts of the real underlying story good enough? the guy put himself in harm's way. he was in iraq. you would think that would be a sufficient story to repeat. frank, thank you. appreciate you being here. >> after a break, a look inside what it's like to undergo the change from man to woman. zoe tur, the first transgender television news reporter joins me. 13 years after 9/11 a would-be hijacker ups the ante to release confidential documents that suggest a saudi role in september 11. my exclusive interview with the lawyer who took his testimony is coming up.

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bruce jenner is an american icon who led a public life jenner graced the from of the wheaties box after taking gold in the '76 olympics and now the cover story of "people" magazine. he is also a reality television star on the popular show keeping up with the kardashians, it's reported that jenner is in p process of gender transition that is becoming a woman. my next guest also leads a public life as a special correspondent for inside edition. she might soon have something else in common with jenner. you might not know the name.

20 years ago people tuned in to a broadcast of a police chasing a white ford on a highway carrying one o.j. simpson. the chals was caught on camera by a news chopper flown by bob tur known as chopper bob. bob tur is now zoe tur for inside edition. the first transgender tv news reporter. zoe, thank you for being here. what's the hardest part of going through the transition? is it physical or emotional? >> it's loss of male privilege. so it's environmental. followed by the brain changes, the emotional changes, and the things that you lose when you do transition including family friends, jobs money. >> i know that the family aspect of this was a particular struggle for you as you recently detailed to los angeles magazine. >> yeah. it was extraordinary. i have two children i have a daughter that's on nbc news a

son in medical school. it was a shock to them. it took them a while to come around. it's taken my daughter almost two years. she's finally you know dealing with this and we're back on good terms. my son a little sooner. but it's a big shock to your friends, family and to the people that knew you publicly. i transitioned publicly. i was famous before i transitioned. a lot of people followed me and it was surprising to a lot of people. >> is there a tend answer for transgenders to do heimer masculine things? i'm thinking of you flying helicopters, i'm thinking of bruce jenner and his exploits in the olympics i'm thinking of the seal chris in the beck or the media focuses on those cases? >> no i think we tend to be left-handed. we tend to be well educated. our iq points about 20 points higher than the national average. and we tend to do things that are considered hyper masculine.

there is a number of us that are helicopter pilots pilots airline pilots. i know six other helicopter pilots that are transgender. i know a bunch of airline pilots in the nsa, spies, military people. so we're everywhere. it's not what you think like we're hair drelsers or anything. though we aspire to hair dressing. but the reality is that we do these masculine jobs or what are considered masculine jobs. >> so do you look at this as a good thing that potentially this is what's occurring now with bruce jenner in other words, from your perspective and that of others who have been through the process who va transitioned. you say finally there will be more public acceptance because he is a beloved figure? >> well her coming out is a very good thing. bruce jenner is an amazing athlete but the way she's doing it is terrible for the community. >> how so? >> it's horrible. balls it looks like it's part of

the kardashian train wreck. you know painted with the kardashian brush so people are very suspicious is this real. also you know the tension is building up. is bruce really doing it not doing it. and maybe from reality show selling a reality show product, it's a good thing. but it's terrible for our community balls it makes us look stupid and bruce jenner by losing the narrative and not controlling her narrative and coming out and speaking about it allows us to speculate, allows the tabloid press to speculate and jenner has become a national joke. >> zoe, you reference other helicopter pilots that you're familiar with who have similarly transitioned. i thought this was wild. everybody knows where they were while we were watching your film footage of the white ford bronco chals. what i didn't realize is that you had competition, there was another helicopter in the sky, you were racing one another to

get there. arguably the other helicopter beat you there. what is it that america needs to know about the other pilot? >> that was dirk bally. we get in this fight all the time. it's kind of a good natured fight. we didn't like each other. we were fierce competitors. then i discovered the day the story broke that i was transitioning, it was covered widely by the press. somebody a friend of mine called and said you need to call up dirk. i said why. dirk is you know -- i hate dirk. she said no. he is now daniela. she transitioned 24 months ago. and i went you got to be kidding. first again. >> thank you. appreciate your perspective. >> thank you so much. >> coming up the so called 20th hijacker claims the saudi royal family supported al qaeda before the 9/11 terror attacks.

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planning of neng. former intel chair bob graham was one who read the pages the secret pages and he told me this. >> they primarily deal with who financed 9/11 and they point a strong finger at saudi arabia. >> the saudis deny this the obama administration has thus far refused to release that information, despite the pleas of 9/11 victim family members. last week we learned that in connection with a lawsuit in which insurance companies are seeking to hold saudi arabia financially responsible for 9/11 zacarias moussaoui gave sworn testimony he said it was his job to prepare an electronic data base tracking donations from members of the saudi royal family to bin laden. the lawyer to whom moussaoui gave that testimony is shawn carter and he is joining me now. the saudis as you know they say he stone cold kraltzy and not even the 9/11 commission bought into this.

>> yeah. there are two problems with the arguments on that point. the first is the 9/11 commission did not exonerate saudi arabia our filing included not only blew sawy's testimony but affidavits from two members of the 9/11 commission emphatically denying that the commission exonerated the saudis and urging there was further evidence that did need to be explored. with regard to the saudis comment that moussaoui is a deranged criminal the fact is that is what makes him knowledgeable witness. when the department of justice prosecutes a mob boss they don't call the parish priest as the star witness. they call someone else in the mob, a deranged criminal as it were and they ask the jury to believe that person precisely because only someone from within a covert criminal enterprise can truly provide inside information about what it does. now, in moussaoui aels case the fact of the matter is our claim against saudi arabia doesn't rise and fall on moussaoui's testimony. it's part of a bigger mosaic of

evidence that documents strong ties between saudi government actors and hijackers in the united states and the filing this week included 4,000 pages of evidence in support of our claims. it wasn't just moussaoui's testimony. >> you went behind bars of the most secure federal prison in the united states i want to put up on the screen an oath that moussaoui offered as you were about to take his testimony. he says that may allah curse the liar. frgs i say until the end of this testimony will be true. may allah curse the liar. did you find him credible? >> i did as well as the other lawyers and investigators who were out with us. we actually brought some subject matter experts, counterterrorism experts with us so we would be able to gut check what he was saying throughout the testimony. he provided incredibly detailed testimony about al qaeda's operations during that period the structure and who was responsible for certain

activities the nature of al qaeda's facilities at that time and everything he said when he was providing this detailed directly responsive testimony checked out. so we do think that what he said was credible. i also saw this week in the last day or so that congressman steven lynch and walter jones both of whom are pressing for a resolution to release the 28 pages have commented that they saw things in moussaoui's testimony that reflected and mirrored by the 28 pages. >> why won't the whis release the 28 pages? the president has on two occasions told family members that he is supportive of the release. why won't the white house release that information? >> well we never received an explanation of that and the affidavits that we submitted this week including from former secretary of the navy who served on the 9/11 commission said that there is nothing in the pages that would in any way implicate or compromise national security.

so you know there doesn't seem to be a real justification for with holding them on national security grounds. at the end of the day what we think this reflects the interest in moussaoui's testimony, in seeing the 28 pages released is this overwhelming sense among the american people that we still haven't gotten a full and transparent accounting of saudi arabia's role in the emergence of al qaeda and the events of september 11. that's what we really need. we don't simply need the 28 pages, we need all of the evidence available to assess whether or not the saudis had something to do with that. >> what is that the you think went on here? is it that the saudis -- why would the saudis want there to be a strike against the united states? do you believe that at its core what took place here is that the saudis were buying themselves peace by paying off the wahabi clerics and turning a blind eye to what might take place outside of saudi arabia am or do you believe that the saudi royal family wanted there to be a strike against the united

states? >> i think there are many reasons to conclude that members of the royal family would have derived political and even personal benefits contributing to bin laden during that period one of which the reason you note that it would bought certain protection within the kingdom. it would have apeetzed demands of the wahabi clergy who exercise tremendous influence and were increasingly flexing their muscles during that period and making demands of the saudi royal family to get in line with their agenda. the saudi royal family has also demonstrated willingness to use islamist jihadist fighter as proxies in conflict zones where they want to. we saw that in syria. so it's reasonable to expect that al qaeda would have been viewed as a reasonable proxy during this period in the late 90s for conflicts in bosnia kosovo and elsewhere. there are all of these reasons. within the saudi royal family

there certainly thousands of princes and some are more closely aligned with the wahabi clerics than others. as to the individual motivations of particular princes i can't say. >> i don't know what the real facts are. think think we are owed the release of those 28 pages. i want to read the testimony of president bush president clinton and vice president cheney. i think we have a right to all of the facts. thank you, shawn carter. surprises from an investigation into obamacare. like my potassium and phytosterols which may help lower cholesterol. new ensure active heart health supports your heart and body so you stay active and strong. ensure, take life in.

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ramic,. welcome back to the program. a lot of campaign promises were fulfilled this week when the newly elected house republicans got their first chance to vote to repeal obama care. this was now the 67th time the house voted to repeal all or part of the affordable care act. president obama is still pledging to veto any attempt to roll back his signature legislation. more than 7 million americans are enrolled in private insurance through obama care while tens of millions of americans still don't have health insurance. one prominent journalist who has done a year-long investigation of obama care says the law focuses too much on who pays not enough on how much they pay. . joining me is steven bril. his book "america's bitter pill money politics back room deals and the fight to fix our broken

health care system" i should point out already a "new york times" best seller. congratulations. >> thank you. >> you wrote the longest ever cover story for "time" magazine about health care and then you had an aortic aneurysm so you had a front row view. what did you learn from your own experience that you didn't already know some. >> i knew intellectually health care was a difficult political issue because people really care about their health more than they care about health care policy. i learned that in spades emotionally when i had my own situation and when i learned is that there's no such thing as a health care marketplace as we know the marketplace, which is you go into a store, you're a consumer you have information about what you want to buy, you can comparison shop you can decide you don't want to buy it you can ask questions, you can look at consumer reports and see what the quality ratings are, none of that happens in the health care marketplace. >> you pointed out after your discharge you opened 36

different envelopes which all contained your billing. what i thought when i read that part of the book is we don't care what it costs, all we want to know is are we covered? in fact in part of the book you said there's no such thing as a runaway cost when it's a loved one getting treatment. >> that's exactly right. when i opened those envelopes, 36 of them which tells you something about the efficiency of the system. >> right. >> the third one said amount billed zero. amount you owe, $154. as it happened i had an interview scheduled a few weeks later on this part of the book with the ceo of united health care my insurance company, then at the end i reached into my pocket and took out that explanation of benefits and said i'm wondering if you can help me with this. i'm having trouble understanding it. amount billed zero amount i owe $154. what does that mean? he looked down at it he looked down at it for a while, his pr guy was getting very nervous and looked up and said i could sit here all day and couldn't decode

that for you. i have no idea what it means and i don't know why they sent it to you. i said well, aren't you they? >> i think for those who are hoping that the affordable care act, obama care is going to solve this my takeaway from "america's bitter pill" the affordable care act is about who pays but not how much they pay and that has yet to be reigned in. >> exactly right. it's a good thing. the good news is many more people, millions of people now have access to health care in this country and it was a national disgrace that they didn't. that's good news. the bad news is they're going to -- we're going to be paying for it as taxpayers because we're subsidizing their insurance and the prices haven't changed, the irrationality of the system hasn't changed, nothing has been done it just means that the bill for taxpayers is going to be added on to everything we've been paying for before. >> a final point. you don't just condemn or criticize that which we have. you offer solutions. at the end of the book steve

bril based out on your knowledge and studying this issue. give me one example. >> we have to stop being the only country in the world that does nothing to control the price of prescription drugs. that's one obvious example. we have to rein in the profits of so-called non-profit hospitals which all across the country are typically the most profitable biggest businesses in any community with the most highly compensated executives in their community. >> and they all seem to be expanding. >> they're all expanding and they're all non-profits which means -- >> non-profit. >> they don't pay taxes. >> right. steven congratulations on a best seller "america's bitter pill" is a great book. >> thank you. >> we'll be right back. the world is filled with air. but for people with copd sometimes breathing air can be difficult. if you have copd, ask your doctor about once-daily anoro ellipta. it helps people with copd breathe better for a full 24hours. anoro ellipta is the first fda-approved product containing two long-acting bronchodilators in one inhaler.

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thanks so much for joining me. don't forget follow me on twitter if you can spell sper smerconish. we'll see you next week. can peace be reached in ukraine? world leaders are meeting in munich but there are some doubts that diplomacy can save the situation. >> coalition aircraft hitting isis hard this morning, going after new targets in northern iraq. also in syria. plus the family of kayla mueller, they're not giving up hope that