Plume and expect there to be no harm whatsoever to the home life. From the judges perspective, she has to look out for people that werent able to pop in negotiations. Were talking about as many as 20,000 plaintiffs. We were the first generation, probably in the history of the world that really had the opportunity to do what we wanted to do. Three years after a deadly tsunami in japan, 71 u. S. Sailors who took part in relief efforts are suing the operators of the power plant. House and Senate Lawmakers want to find out exactly how much radiation u. S. Servicemen were exposed to. The sailors say expose tour radiation during their service led to frightening illnesses, including hemorrhages and cancer. What i went through has 100 changed my life forever. Military personal necessarily were located near the fukushima power plant. He was assigned to investigate radiation levels in the air and on military aircraft going in and out of affected areas. Background radiation in the air was 300 times higher than a normal day. He and his team were exposed to these levels and now three years later, hes feeling what he thinks are the effects of radiation exposure. My bodys falling apart. When flexed, my right arm is smaller than my left. I have 50 to 60 of the power i used to have out of the right side of my body. Steve simmons from maryland said his life will never be the same. He among others say they drank contaminated desalinated sea water. They cooked with it, cooked with it, bathed in it. He said the effects are did he about him tating. I ended up dropping between 2025 pounds unexpectedly. My left arm started swelling. I have severe night threats and the lift kept going. He is forced to use a wheelchair as he continues to lose power in his legs and arms. Signals between his brains and bladder are failing. He uses a cath at her every four hours. His kids are afraid of whats happening to their father. Our oldest, its been the longest time since the only thing she could think about is dads going to die. Navy personnel exposed to radiation banded together in a lawsuit against the folk yo electric Power Company which operates the fukushima power plant. They lied. I dont understand how you can place a ship the size of a carrier into a nuclear plume for over five hours, suck up contaminants into the water system of the ship and expect no harm whatsoever to the human life. Rewarding the possible effects of exposure, a Defense Department spokesperson wrote i optically believe if they had Accurate Information in a timely manner, things would have been done differently. He says the lawsuit isnt about the money. What im looking for in the suit is a medical fund, put aside someplace for all people, make sure weretain care of down the road. Joining us now from san diego is michael seaborn, former u. S. Sailor who was a radiation decontamination officer and dealt with personnel who had flown into the area after the tsunami. First as we just heard in the story, youve been through a lot. How are you doing . Well, physically, i have my issues, but im ok. Im ok. Day by day, im doing good, thank you. The lawsuit initially was dismissed last year but the suit being retiled. The number of sailors suing is growing, more than 70 now. They say the company that owns the fukushima power plant new there were Dangerous Levels of radiation in the area but said nothing and let navy ships and planes go into that area. Thats correct. Its almost we take Operational Risk measurements when were deciding what were going to do. The level of assistance that we can give to the japanese people, our first reaction was to go help. Were not going to put ourselves in undo harms way to be able to go assist. So, we took what they said, what tepco and the highups in the military, coming up with a plan that is safe to get for the relief efforts that we could provide based on what we were being told. It turns out what we were being told was false. You were doing your work at an american air base quite a distance from fukushima. You were dealing, checking airplanes as they came back and helicopters coming back from the area and found incredibly high numbers doing that. Thats correct. We started off our base had completely evacuated all of the aircraft had gone to guam, the family members evacuated. We were told that we may never come back to that base again. We were told to put our names and Contact Information into our windows of our houses and to the dashboards of our cars, because it may be too dangerous to ever come back to. We went up and we did relief efforts from a much safer area. After it gets very cold up there and because of the snow, because the mountains, we couldnt get over the mountain to say continue the relief efforts. We went back to continue relief efforts on basically a 24 hours notice that if anything got worse that we would be evacuating out of there and we would never return. As you were going through these airplanes, you were going through them without suits and at some time found levels four times higher than the level required to wear a suit. Thats correct. We actually after the operation had started to die down, we still had aircraft that were radiated. We would decontaminate and measure the outside skin of the aircraft, which is what we were taught and instructed to do by the written instruction that is came down from the higherups, but had aircraft that had flown back, stopped performing missions. The levels were down. We thought they were safe, and then all of a sudden, because of preventive maintenance, we pulled a radiator out and everything that comes off the aircraft has to be scabbed for radiation exposure. I scan this and its reading over 20,000ccpm like what you said was four times highlier than the level we should be wearing not only suit and gloves, but a respirator, as well and this has gone growing and just seating itself inside the aircraft, we werent instructed or know to take out internal components of the aircraft when trying to measure radiation. We were just doing the outside air frame, so, yeah, that was a scary moment right there. Many people suing were on the uss Ronald Reagan sent to the area to help, and part of the issue there claims that the problem was they went right into a radiation plume and the water, they desalinate the water on the airplane. They take the water out of the sea. Thats the water they use to bathe in and brush their teeth and that this obviously made them terribly sick. So, why not sue the navy . Why just sue the Tokyo Company . Well, for first off, theres a lot of guys on the suit that are still in the military, and you cant sue the navy. You cant do that. We sign paperwork arched contracts when we up for service that you cant do that. But at the same time, i think the navyive did the best they could. Obviously the skipper of an Aircraft Carrier with 6800 people and 8800 aircraft is not going to steam right into a plume of radiation. If he knows whats safe and whats not and if he has the correct information, then they wouldnt have been as close as they were. Right. So, we were there to help, and like i said in the beginning, we can make our calculated risk decisions and figure out how safe we can get, how close we can get while not putting our guys in danger and if the dangers are higher than were told, then, you know, i think the navy did the best they could with what information that we had. Its just the information we had wasnt 100 correct. I hate to be a devils advocate, but if there were thousands of people on the reagan, why so few people coming forward now and suing . Why didnt more people get sick . In fact the World Health Organization says that residents who were evacuated were exposed to so little aidation that headlight impacts are likely to be below detectable levels. What do you say to that . Honestly, that sounds ridiculous to me. Those individuals who were evacuated havent gone home. Theres a reason for that. If these levels are safe 100 , why did tepco agree to pay each individual that lived in that area 50,000yen to compensate them . As opposed to the members of the reagan, why so little, in the military, youre understood, expected to do your job and a lot of these guys that are still in the youvey, they dont want to come forward, because they fear backlash. Theres guys if youre not having, you know, medical issues at the moment, then im sure they think nothings wrong. Now youve got 20, 30, 40 people on the uss reagan that are in their 20s and early 30s that have come down with some form of cancer. One or two you could call a coincidence, but 20, 30, 40 in their 20s the navy dont believe the claims, a Spokesman Says worst case exposure is less than 25 of the annual radiation exposure to a member of the u. S. Public from Natural Sources of background radiation, suc such s the sun, rocks and soil. Are you upset that the navy yea hasnt taken your side . To that point, i was there, so im measuring the background radiation. If the normal is normally between nine to 15ccpm and im measuring three to 500 in the air,en some some of these numbers are skewed. Honestly with the navy not taking our side, i will say i understand it. Its a very political issue. The navy and the japanese need each other. We need them to be analyzed with us. I was in japan for 17 years, i was there for a long time. I saw the crimes that happened against the japanese people, i saw the murders, the rapes, the assaults, at a certain point, we were completely on lockdown where we couldnt be outside the base past 8 00 p. M. Because there was a occur fee in place because of crimes committed by service members. In okinawa, the Prime Minister questioned whether or not the navy should be able to operate out of there, so for us to go help them, and then for a few of us to sue the electric Power Company for what happened, i completely understand the u. S. Navy taking this political side to be able to keep on the good spirits of the japanese government, so i dont blame them whatsoever. Thats the stance they have to take, so its understood with me. Michael, i hope you get well, and also hope that for all the other sailors, they will have to see what comes of this congressionally mandated investigation. Thank you very much for joining us. Thank you very much. Well be back with more. The beyond is undoubtedly the greatest military power in the world but has it forgotten how to win wars . According to a provocative article for more, im joined by professor of International Relations at Boston University and author of many books. Great to have you with us. In the article, you say the u. S. Military is second to none with it comes to skills and gadgets, but struggles to finish the job. Where did this start . Well, i think that the problem has many aspects, but i think the most important and probably the most difficult for americans to reckon with is that military power is an inappropriate instrument to deal with the conditions that exist in places like afghanistan and iraq. We came out of the cold war, United States came out of the cold war having convinced itself that military power was sort of an all purpose tool. I think in many respects, Operation Desert Storm back in 1991 seemed to affirm that conclusion. All of our experience since, whether youre talking somalia or the post 9 11 wars tell as different story. Were using the wrong tool to solve the problem. Lets talk about afghanistan. Should we have not gone in after 9 11 . No, i think we needed to in the sense that if you recall, the george w. Bush administration demanded after 9 11 that the taliban cough up osama bin laden, dismantle alqaeda training camps. The taliban then governing afghanistan refused to do so. I do think it was necessary for us to demonstrate that any nation harboring, providing sanctuary to terrorists who are in tent on attacking us needed to be taught a lesson. They need to make clear to the world that that was unacceptable. What doesnt follow is that we needed to stay in afghanistan for now well over a decade, trying to create a stable political order. That has turned out to be a task that we cant handle. President obama spoke out about the war in afghanistan a week ago. Id like to play part of what he said and get your reaction. I do think its important for americans to recognize that we still have young men and women in harms way object along with Coalition Partners who are continue to go make sacrifices and we need to say this job all the way through . The question is what would seeing the job through mean there in afghanistan . What would winning that war mean in afghanistan . There are reports this week that the u. S. Plans to draw down close to zero troops in afghanistan by the end of the president s term. Of course the president is i think in a sense understandably vague about what finishing the job is. There have been many did he ever anything elses over time. My sense that is at this point, the Obama Administration would be satisfied with being able to extricate all or most of u. S. Forces and not have the karzai regime clams at least not until obama has left office and that frankly, that may be the most practical definition of success. What we need to remind ourselves is how the difference between that definition of success and the definition that is were touted back in the immediate wake of 9 11, recall that the invasion of afghanistan was touted, named Operation Enduring freedom. It was this expectation that somehow, we were going to bestow freedom on the people of afghanistan. That was an absurd expectation andens it hasnt come to fruition. You dont have an issue with the fact that we went in to get alqaeda, but its just that we went too far in defining what we thought winning the war would be. Absolutely. We went too far and then articulating a global war on terrorism. Its that formulation, that framing of engaging in a global war on terrorism that then leads, creates some kind of a rationale for going from afghanistan to iraq. The invasion of iraq, there was no justification for that. Another mismanaged war from which we are still trying to recover. Were seeing how things are falling apart there. Then there was the intervention in the former yugoslavia. I think thats the closest case you can get to post cold war intervention that is did seem to produce unbalanced positive political outcome, albeit there, the occupation of kosovo for example by u. S. And allied forces ended up taking a much longer time. So then and let me emphasize, my argument is not that there are never cases where military power has utility. There are cases. I think that the problem with policy makers in the United States over the past couple of decades is that they have tended to think that all problems can have a political solution. Excuse me. A military solution. We went into libya and helped overthrow gaddafi. Thats a disaster, still a mess there. In yemen gone in in a limited day without intervention. The question that comes to mind is is the problem intervening in countries where there are very substantial parts of the population, mostly Muslim Country that is really just hate the United States. I dont think id phrase it that way. I think id phrase it that there is a problem with expecting that u. S. Intervention, fortune intervention in societies that are in the process of an immensely complicated transition, a transition to modernity, trying to reconcile religious traditions with the 21st century. To imagine that a bunch of american soldiers can facilitate that transition in a relatively short period of time is a delusion. My own sense is that the people themselves, whether were talking about libyans or iraqis or afghans or egyptians, that the people themselves are going to have to figure out how to make that transition, and outsiders for the most part are going to find themselves irto the process. A lot of thought provoking information. Appreciate you joining us today. Thank you very much. Americas decline has been a big political talking point for years, but do we have it all wrong . Political magazine looks at the issue in a new arlen titled americans, top worrying and learn to love decline, why 2014 will be our best year yet. Charles kenny wrote the piece and joins us. Hes a senior fellow at the center for Global Development and author of a book. Good to have you with us. Theres real data saying that america is not the dominating force it once was. Saying china will overtake us but you say thats a sign that the rest of the world is coming up. Absolutely, so just last year, for example, china became the largest trading nation in the world overtaking the United States. Thats just sort the first of many firsts to come, if you will. Thats not bad news for the United States. Its not because the United States hasnt even growing exports in recent years. Its done quite on that weather. Its that chinas been growing very, very fast. Indias been growing fast and brazil. The rest of the world is getting richer, fewer poor people, more educated People Living longer lives and producing good that is we want to buy and producing demands for goods we want to sell. Its good all around. People say there are benefits to being dominant and its not a question of the rest of the world camping up to us, but that we are voluntarily contracting, that we are actually doing things that are making us not move forward as quickly as stay as strong. Im sitting here in washington, d. C. I can harold argue that congress and the president couldnt be doing a built of a better job. I accept there are some roles for the United States doing things wrong in this area. I think it could be engaging much more proactively globally. It could be pushing trade and investment and migration more and that would strengthen the u. S. Economy. Having said that. Most of the story really is a story of other places not doing things wrong and starting to do things right. I mean take china. Only, you know, a few decades ago, it was killing off millions of its own population. Thats not a good way to grow as well as being a disgusting human rights event. Now its doing things better, not great, but better. The same is true of india. Were seeing huge reforms in indias economy and getting their macro situation a little better, so the story of the growing rest is the bigger part of a story rather than us doing things wrong. Its also returning to the default position in Human History that countries that have larger populations end up being more dominant economically. Again, the critics of the position that you take say well that it is a choice that we have chosen not to go after all our natural resources, going offshore drilling, drilling in the arctic, that weve pulled back and are letting our countries check up to us and were losing our primes in space. So the last 100 years or so, the United States economy on average has grown around 2 , its done worse than that recently. China and india growing at seven or 8 . The United States never gross that fast. Its a rich country at the edge of technology. It doesnt have the opportunities to catch up growth. Using the technology innings substitution that is weaver developed to grow faster like india, china and brazil is not simply a priority of whats happening here. Its a story of whats going on in the rest of the world. You think that there will be positives and in fact the title talks about 2014 being the best year yet. Absolutely. So, a richer, healthier, more secure world is a huge opportunity for the United States, not least over the recent past one of the few bright spots in the u. S. Economy has been growing exports. Now 3 5 of exports go to the developing world. A richer china or india in vent new stuff. They make money from patents and royalties, but we benefit, we benefit from those new technologies. Richer india and china, africa produce more innovators, many of whom come total United States. A big part of silicone valley is attracting those to Technology Officers driving the potential of silicone valley. There are huge jump sides for the rest of the world Getting Better off. We have a social media question for you. Tony b. Wrote to us saying he basically says given your articles conventional wisdom, do you find you are largely alone in your view . Its not a hugely popular view, reflecting the sort of washington attitude if one sides up, the others down. Thats a really dumb way to think about its national relations. International relations is largely about positive sums, partnership, meaning both sides are better off. Thats true in trade, investment and migration. Its true if we can come to peace agreements globally, areas line serbia. If we can Work Together with russia and china to create peace. Thats much better than sitting in our armed camps buying more and more weapons. Do you see danger if the United States pulls back and is not the dominant force, the super power in the world. We have been the super power, if we pull back, someone else will fill the vacuum . I want america to engage more. The sad thing is how few americans go out and study or live elsewhere for a while or to retire or get health care. If more americans traveled more and went overseas, that would be a great thing. I do think the role for the u. S. As the Global Military leader, youre going to continue for a while and its an Important Role that plays an Important Role in Peace Keeping efforts worldwide. The u. S. Military provides 0. 03 of the Peace Keeping. Most come from developing countries. Theres a huge role for partnership. Appreciate you joining us. A group led by one of the nations best known education reformers has a new report that ranks state School Systems not on academic performingance but whether theyre moving forward with policies to boost down the road. Not one state earned an a from district of columbia. According to the state policy report card, the nations overall performance was dismal. Taken as a whole, the adjustment scored d plus with a 1. 40g. P. A. On the three policy areas, the group tested elevating the teaching profession got a c minus, empowering parents a d minus and spending wisely on Public Schools and governing well a d plus. For more, im joined by michelle recent, c. E. O. And founder of students first. A d plus is barely a passing grade in most schools, failing in others. Is there any good news in your regard. There is. This is our Second Annual report and actually, we saw some progress from last year, and not only had the g. P. A. Of the nation as a whole go up, but also we saw a far less states who are actually in the failing grade, so thats good news. We also saw a lot of states make Good Movement on the first pillar of elevating the teaching profession, making sure they are putting evaluation and teach, inc. Systems in place. What did your evaluation do to make its way to the top of the charts . You take a state like tennessee, which did extraordinarily well. It broke into the top 10 this year. They have done a tremendous amount of work on elevating the teaching profession making sure that they were doing layoffs by quality instead of seniority, implementing a new teacher evaluation system, by insuring that schools have the ability to choose the teacher that is they wanted to hire instead of having the District Force teachers on to the schools. By making those changes at the state legislature level, it really earned the state a higher grade, and you can see the corresponding increases in student achievement levels, as well, tennessee was the nations top grower on the National Assessment called the nape. Whats really interesting about that top 10 is just how varied they are, financially, politically, geographically. Different states and their policies can make a real difference. Its important that they make a difference. If we look at american teenagers and their academic performance compared to other countries, in a Major International study found that americans were 17t 17th out of 34, in reading, 21 in science, 26 in math. What do we do to catch these guys, because obviously theyre going to try to stay ahead of us if they can. I think this years results, the International Test results were sobering, because not only did we drop rankings in every one of those categories, but some of the country that is leap frogged ahead of us were countries like astonia and the Slovak Republic. If the u. S. Had fallen behind the Slovak Republic for gold medals, it would be considered unacceptable, yet come 26th in the globe in math and people really arent batting an eye. Its really, i think ought to be a wake up call for this nation to say weve got to fix our Public Education system. The laws and policies in place are not serving children well, not allowing our educator to say put in place the kinds of practices that they need to, and so its up to, you know, our government, our state legislator to say take the mantel here, have some conditioning and put some of these policies in place. It makes you wonder what our priorities are, but what do you see as the Biggest Barriers Going Forward . I think that change is difficult and anytime you want to really shake up a system, you know, implementing new teacher evaluation systems, introducing choice and competition into the school marketplace, youre going to get pushback by the status quo and the bureaucracy. Thats a big impediment. At the same time, we have to know as a country that, you know, when we have less than 50 of our force in eighth graders at lower proficiency, thats a call to do something wildly different. You support the common core curriculum, already in place in 45 states and d. C. Those standards, while supported by many have been criticized from both sides of the political spectrum. To read a couple of quotes to you your response. Id say that both of those quotes are actually wildly inaccurate. On the first one, the fact that the person would say that National Standards have shown no progress is absolutely incorrect. Most states are just Getting Started in terms of implementing the standards, but two states that have been on the front edge, which are the jurisdiction of washington, d. C. And tennessee have actually shown the greatest gains in student achievement levels over the last two years. I think we are seeing progress in this area. I think that generally, people have a lot of complaints about the common core, but the bottom line is that we do have to have a set of rig rouse National Standards that are internationally bench marked, because the bottom line is that the children growing up in America Today are not going to be competing for jobs internationally, theyre completing against india, china and japan. We have to make sure they have the skills to compete in the international marketplace. We have a question, do you believe Public Education is a public as ooh set and does privatization threaten that . You know, i think that education is absolutely a public right and it is a responsibility of the government to provide an excellent education for all children. I think there is this really odd sort of divisive argument going on right now where when you want to provide choice to families, people see that as a move to privatize Public Education. I dont think thats the case at all. Public education means you are providing an education to the public, and in that vain, we have to make sure every family has high quality options. This is america. We should not be in a situation where any family feels like their kids are trapped in a Failing School without any choices. The most important thing we can do as a country is to make sure the next generation is welleducated. There are lots of ways to make sure that happens. We have excellent Public Schools in this country, excellent charter schools, excellent private schools, why not give children and family those options, high quality option to say choose from. You address a lot of these issues in your book. Its great to have you on the show. Thank you for join us tonight. Well be back with more of all this week, trades near the speed of light. If youre not trading at those speeds, youre toast billions of dollars at stake, is our economy insecurity now at the mercy of these machines . Humans arent able to receive information in that timeframe. Were looking at the risks, rewards, and dangers of High Frequency trading there are no rules or regulations all this week on the new expanded real money with ali velshi helping you balance your finances and your li. Now an hour, starting at 7 eastern 4 pacific only on Al Jazeera America the world is our fault, according to author who writes about baby boomers adding we are the generation that has an excuse for everything, one of our greatest contributions to modern life, but the world is still our fault. So while most generations think theyre special, he skewers his own generation in his book. It is great to have p. J. With us tonight. Good to see you. Good to see you. Very funny book, are we really that bad . Weve always been characterized as self absorbed, but you say we go well beyond that. We do, we are terribly several absorbed but are we bad . No, i think were a very easy going, very tolerant generation, not rigged at all. Its hard to imagine us as nazis or communists, except to play communists, pretend communist it is. We dont have a lot of discipline. This is a generation that never grew up, but all the bad things in the world have been done by grown ups. You say that the world, while you joke about the world being our fault, you say the reality is the word is a better place thanks to baby boomers. I think so. You can put the take overof the baby boom, obviously we dont run the world from the time were born. We take over the world about the time animal house is released. Weve had an effect it keeps the public amused and thats a very important thing within the truth of the matter is that if you compare a thing, you know, compared to world war ii, world war i, korean war, compared to vietnam, once the baby boom gets in charge, things calm down very considerably, because, you know, were just too lays and self involved to go do anything. Fewer american of died in wars. Many, many fewer. Every death is horrible, but, you know, the sheer numbers have gone way down. You say were spoiled brats but say were one of the most altruistic generations ever. Weaver been very innovative, all this tech stuff thats around. We older baby boomers may not know how to use it, but we did in vent it. You do a little dividing amongst the boomers. Its such a huge generation. It goes from 46 to 64. Its cher to my sell obama. You divide us into seen years, juniors, sophomores and freshman. Im a senior. In your class, you had hillary clinton, democratic. Bill. Bill, a democratic. George w. Bush, also cheech and chong. How can you generalize about this generation. The very first part of the generation, we were like right out there on the bow wave of this voyage of exploration that the baby boomers have been on ever since, but also are very closely tethered to our parents, to the greatest generation. We sort of ended up keel hauled, dragged under the boat. If we turn up soggy and confused at the end. Theres a good reason for it . Right. Then you get the next generation. Those are the tech guys. They were worst hippies than we were. Not necessarily bill gates, but definitely steep jobs. Steve jobs, not bill gates, he pretty much belonged to the math club in high school. Steve jobs off wandering around, looking for phone apps before they were in vented, barefoot in india. They come back and find some shoes and theyve never found the neck ties. Then you kind of, you know, i got to tell you i have to complain about my group, im one of the sophomores. You talked about us being m. B. A. s and site the author of the preppy handbook, an old friend of mine as representatives of the generation you. Guys were looking at us guys and thinking well, this worse in general, but it may not work specifically when the bong sets fire to the bean bag chair. Maybe i better finish college. One of my favorite he quotes of the book is maybe how the sophomores looked at the juniors and seniors and said that baby boomers believed passion pour living should replace working for one. Which is why im not retired and playing golf the way i should be. We totally were the first generation, probably in the history of the world that really had the opportunity to do what we wanted to do, truly do what we wanted to do. We were by world historical standards very rich. The war was over, the depression over. The hope and optimism of the 50s and early 60s just cant be overstated. We decided to take into face value, we were going to go for it, do what we wanted to do. Of course that stuff turned out to be pretty stupid. You write that we were happy, that kids and the baby boomers were happy. How did we end up turning into helicopter parents . I thought about that myself. I was puzzled for a while. We are. I know we are at my house. Its because were the generation that never grew up, so we know whats on their little minds. Like the greatest generation of parents, they didnt know what kids are thinking, kids today, who gets them. We know what theyre thinking. We know youre thinking about pot, beer and sex. So that makes us more careful. Way more careful. Of course i have to blame the kids a little bit. It takes two. We would have shot that helicopter down, the baby boomers. They let us hover. The other thing that you write about is that you dont like the name of the generation. It does sound silly. You want to be generation x, y. Or millennial. Millennials, the lost generation was cool. The greatest generation works, too. Greatest generation is not bad. Why not baby boomers. Its just an explode in infant, sounds like. Who wants to be called that all their life. I want to ask you about a couple of things in the news these days. Chris christie, what do you think is going to happen . I think its a slow newsweek is what i think it was. It was, we were talking about this before we went on camera. The story just goes on and on and on and like of course here in new york, youre like George Washington bridge traffic jam, oh, my gosh. Every day. What are they thinking in ohio. The news tonight is there are traffic jams in new jersey. It will be interesting to see how its playing. It shows, i think, the interesting part of the story is somebody is really scared of Chris Christie in 2016 and looking for scandal. If they think bridge traffic jams have legion that are going to last until 2016, thief got another think coming. One final one given that were talking about baby boomers and you mentioned pot, the legalization of pot, what do you think is going to happen and how big a deal is it . Its going to increase use. Part of the costs of pot were its illegality. Even if you dont physically lower the cost, youre taking danger out of it. Basically, i think its around, so pervasive in our culture that were not going to get that gene knee back in the bottle. This might be a part of the drug war we should surrender. The baby boom, how it got that way and it wasnt my fault and ill never do it again. Great to have you. Thank you. Well be right back. We are turning to developments on a story about con cues in the nfl and their terrible consequences. A federal judge on tuesday denied initial approval of the landmark settlement between the nfl and many former players over claims of brain injuries, saying the money is insufficient to cover the scope of the problem. The judge ruled that even if only 10 of retired nfl Football Players eventually receive a qualifying diagnosis, it is difficult to see how the Monetary Award Fund would have the Funds Available over its life span to pay all claimants at the significant award levels. Joining me now is leonard marshall, former pro bowl defensive lineman. He won the superbowl twice, diagnosed with chronic traumatic enreceive lop thee. Great to have you here. The judge wants more financial details from both sides. Do you think a better deal is going to be worked out and what was your reaction to what happened today. Well, first of all, i think that a better deal needs to be struck between the players and the nfl. Its one thing to have an award, and a significant award, but its also Something Else to have a significant award that will take care of a major class of this population. Theres a number of different guys and families that have endured enough as a result of the irresponsibilities of the nfl shown over the life span of careers and theres families like the webster family, the long family from the steelers, the other families that have suffered and continue to suffer. I think based upon what you just read, it speaks volumes. If you take the guys and say of the 450, how many of them have c. T. E. , e. L. S. , how many have dementia and you awarded a claim, you wouldnt have enough money to pay them out based on the structures here, plus the attorneys have come back and said they want 112 million of the settlement. It was announced and said they didnt want a piece that have money. 112 million is going to the lawyers. If you brought up the how much money goes to each player, and it really will vary tremendously depending on what happened to the players. People who have a. L. S. Could get as much as 5 million, dementia 3 million. Colder players with very Serious Problems could only get 25,000. Right. What do you think about the way the moneys being distributed . Its too unfair, unclassified. Ill look at me and my two friends. Ill look at tony dorsett, mark and myself. Here we are guys, living specimens that have this issue. This job related illness from playing contact tackle football in the nfl. We didnt have it before we joined the nfl. You cant state or make that claim, because if you knew that, why did you make the purchase when we came out of college . Rightfully so, we went through physicals, got diagnosed whether we had problems or not and were all high round draft picks, dorsett a one, delanano a one, me being a high two and duper a one. Now that all the evidence is out, a player that does have c. T. Now and qualified port money that to take a portion of moneyless the entire piece of the pie as he deserves. I say you take the money, put into it a fund, let the player live off the interest. As his case weakens or gets better, you now make a decision on whether or not to take back some of the money, or outright award the money, but dont punish the players and say you need to be dead in order to receive this money. We need to cut your brain open and really see that you have a. L. S. , dementia or you fully have c. T. E. And we dont accept the study that you did at ucla or wherever else you did it. Until we do that, we dont want to award the money. Youll see players saying i might as well just go ahead and kill myself if im going to get the money for myself and my family, let my family live it out. Its unfair. The stories are heartbreaking, not only the suicides, but dorsett has told his story, you know, its awful to hear him talking about whats going on with him and jim mcmahon, many big stars that have suffered. How are you doing . Better, im not doing great, im doing better. The good thing about myself is i have support. I have a bunch of good doctors around me, good advices around me. I have a great lady in my life, so im doing well in trying to adjust to having c. T. E. And then coping with it. Some people have again been critical of this deal from the beginning, because they felt that there wasnt enough money. You are talking about them putting this money into a fund and figuring out the interest as it goes along as opposed to giving these awards. What do you say to the critics . What do you say . Is it enough . Is it enough money given that this deals with former place, not current or future players. Lets say for example you have classifications. You had 10 with c. T. E. , 10 with a. L. S. And 10 with dementia. 30 have 800, 600 million to 800 million. If you made the award of 4 million to a player, all that moneys gone. What happens to the other 70 of those players, the general population . What happens to them. Of that general population, how many of them were fully diagnosed . How many of them fully went to the doctors and made claim to help figure out whats going on with them. The number i think is more like 4 billion, just for argument sake, but who am i . This is just the beginning. Glad youre well, hope they figure out something to take care of the guys who need taking care of and how to figure out that this doesnt happen in the future. Its great to meet you and great to have you on the show. The show may be over but conversation continues on our website or on our facebook or google plus pages. You can find us on twitter. Results of analyses were skewed in favor of the prosecution the fbi cant force the states to look at those cases the truth will set you free yeah. Dont kid yourself the system has failed me welcome to Al Jazeera America. Im stephanie sy. Here are the stories that were following for you. Boston beefs up security to protect thousands running in this years marathon. And jo Vice President biden arrives in ukraine. And the president vows to punish those responsible
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