ken feinberg has been the madd man in the middle of all of it. he's out with a new book, who gets what, fair compensation after tragedy and financial upheaval. ken, i want to express my admiration for your willingness to throw yourself into the middle of these contentious disputes. explain what you have done. what is the common theme in each one of these contexts? >> every once in awhile, policymakers whether it is congress, a judge the white house, a decision is made for this particular tragedy no other. let's set up an alternative to go into court. instead of everybody going to court with their claim whoever they maybe want to sue let's set up a voluntary alternative where you can go into a special program if you're eligible, be paid compensation without going to the regular legal system. >> eliot: the benefit to the victims, of course is you're spared the agony, the time and duress of a litigation and you get an individual such as you and you've been, as i said, the man in the middle every one of these very difficult situations to determine the

ken feinberg, thank you. >> thank you very much. >> victor? >> there's some good news. science -- scientists announce a new, aggressive plan to fight cancer. but first, good morning. washington, d.c., a beautiful shot at the capital. the sun is up there. there aren't many people there now, if anyone, because congress is now on break. everyone's going home to campaign. thanks for starting your morning with cnn. i mean you feel me right? yeah. uh, sir... ah... [ male announcer ] layaway's back. earlier than ever. through december 14th. walmart. with less chronic osteoarthritis pain. imagine living your life with less chronic low back pain. imagine you, with less pain. cymbalta can help. cymbalta is fda-approved to manage chronic musculoskeletal pain. one non-narcotic pill a day, every day, can help reduce this pain. tell your doctor right away if your mood worsens, you have unusual changes in mood or behavior or thoughts of suicide. antidepressants can increase these in children, teens, and young adults. cymbalta is not approved for children under 18. people taking maois

ken feinberg, thank you. >> thank you very much. >> victor? >> there's some good news. science -- scientists announce a new, aggressive plan to fight cancer. but first, good morning. washington, d.c., a beautiful shot at the capital. the sun is up there. there aren't many people there now, if anyone, because congress is now on break. everyone's going home to campaign. thanks for starting your morning with cnn. i mean you feel me right? yeah. uh, sir... ah... [ male announcer ] layaway's back. earlier than ever. through december 14th. walmart. with less chronic osteoarthritis pain. imagine living your life with less chronic low back pain. imagine you, with less pain. cymbalta can help. cymbalta is fda-approved to manage chronic musculoskeletal pain. one non-narcotic pill a day, every day, can help reduce this pain. tell your doctor right away if your mood worsens, you have unusual changes in mood or behavior or thoughts of suicide. antidepressants can increase these in children, teens, and young adults. cymbalta is not approved for children under 18. people taking maois

. >> ken feinberg is the go-to guy for thankless jobs, america's arbiter of human suffering. >> why don'tyou open up the purse strings? >> his assignment deciding who should be paid for damages from the gulf oil spill, was one of his toughest yet. they really go after you. >> they do, but it goes with the territory. >> it may be the greatest rescue operation since noah's ark. a billion people watched as 33 chilean miners trapped for 69 days half a mile underground stepped from darkness into light. [cheers and applause] >> if ever there was a story with a happy ending, this was it. [men chanting] but when we visited the miners several months after their rescue, we found many were struggling. for example, alex vega was building a wall around his house, though he couldn't explain why. >> on march 11, 2011, japan was hit by a tsunami that rewrote history. it was triggered by a 9.0 earthquake that helped set off the biggest nuclear emergency since chernobyl. >> this is unprecedented, you know, uncharted territory, that the consequences could be greater than we expect. >> welcome to 60 minutes

i was involved in them the ken feinberg legislation, the mcconnell litigation, and in that case, i was remembering that we discussed among ourselves what would be the maximum amount of time the test the supreme court to dedicate to we single case -- we could ask the supreme court to dedicate to a single case, and we came up with four hours. here is the supreme court, and its own motion, granting six hours of argument time. my own involvement does not run from the beginning. i was brought in at the appellate level. ingesting anecdotes that i will pick up on in a moment, i was actually asked about the case in a media interview before i had any involvement with it. i was and npr show with walter dellinger, who was advancing the dominant view of people in legal academia, that the suit was frivolous, and i had not studied the papers, but i had some basis for understanding the challenge the government faced because in my own time in the solicitor general office i had the opportunity to defend acts of congress against the argument that they exceeded congress' enumerated powers. when i was fir