>> tonight, wealth and power in america, the late steve jobs epitomized the ability to change the world from your garage but forget what you think of silicon valley. i'll talk to the authors of a startling new account that separates the man from the myth like never before. the titans of wall street, i'll talk to a politician, who says the bankers really run america. and a student debt strike against an institution that the government deemed too big to

fail. i'm ali velshi, our special coverage of wealth in america starts now. follow the money in america and you'll quickly find yourself on either coast. silicon valley california's hotbed of innovation technology, silicon valley's income is almost double that of the rest of the country. no company embodies the success and wealth of the valley more than apple. the value of apple stock this year topped $700 billion. apple's shares will rise says one analyst to the point where the company will be worth $1 trillion. it's no secret that apple is on

such a roll. chance he are the person next to you is using a iphone. the company has sold half a billion iphones since introducing the phone. most successful electronic product in history. apple'sapple's ceo tim cook. steve jobs could founded apple in 1976, his death from cancer in 2011, during his legendary run jobs was booted from the company, and even a genius, but he also earned a reputation as a breshbrash ego maniac. who didn't tolerate fools or critics. the good bad and ugly of steve jobs was on display in an

authorized autobuying if i was on the shelves soon after steve jobs died. becoming steve jobs quoaks quotes tim cook, that he offered part of his liver to steve jobs but jobs wouldn't hear of it. one current apple executive even tweeting that this portrayal of steve jobs is the first to get it right. i'm joined by the two authors of becoming steve jobs, brent and rick. rick is executive editor of fast company magazine. brent knew steve jobs for 20 years covering him for wall street journal and fortune

magazine. the amount of praise heaped upon you and this book by people who knew steve jobs kind of make you guys a little uncomfortable as journalists. you're supposed to be criticized. >> yes, when we started out apple didn't give us any interviews for two years. they originally just -- shut the door in our faces. >> they are a secretive company anyway. >> this tweet that eddie hugh did is a reflection of that. but is not -- we didn't want to get into a battle over which portrayal is more accurate or anything like that. >> walter isaac don is a historian, he had remarkable access to steve jobs. you wrote in the book, steve developed a reputation as an ego

maniac even in his youngest brashest and most overbearing times, why is that a misunderstanding? >> the primary one that he was bipolar where he was half genius half jerk or you could use stronger words. >> some have. >> as any person, there are many more shades of color in there besides black and white and i saw them over a period of 25 years watching this guy grow up and grow older and mature become a father again become a happily married family man. and he changed. he changed very visibly to me. >> it is rick, steve jobs history is a history we will all have to read generations from now. because we will have to know this man who inarguably changed the world. rick you wrote about tim cook talking about offering some of his liver as a transplant to

steve jobs who was very ill. and he went as far as to figure out that he was actually a match. >> he did. and this was our next to last interview for the book and we just asked a pretty innocuous question to cook and he was off and running and he told the story about how you know steve almost died in 2009, two years before he did finally pass away. and he was in terrible shape. and the executives used to visit him at home. he couldn't get out of bed. and cook went and after one of those visits, he traveled outside the bay area so he wouldn't be recognized. he went through a series of tests to find out if he was a match for steve and he came back and started to offer his liver to steve. and steve sat up in bed and said no way. i'm not putting you at any risk.

cook told us that story because he felt it was a reflection of the fact that steve was not a selfish man. that was cook's way of understanding that moment. >> you know in a moment i'm going to talk to nomi prince about the banks and the destruction she feels they've done but part of it is that we in the media played along with this idea, for a long time. hard to find the crittic the critic to find the banks. but they in the media say you are contributing to the cult of steve. >> that's what they say. >> we want to be on the right side of history and steve jobs if you are a betting man is going to be on the right side of history. >> this is what i think. there were essentially three journalists over the course of steve's time at apple who had very close access to him. brent was one of them. our book reflects the posh portrait

of somebody who had that access. a lot of people who didn't have that access have different points of view of steve. and that's fine. i think if there is a cult of mac, driven primarily by people who love their products, love their iphones andipads paids ipads and over simplify that way want to look at steve as a negative. and there are plenty of things on the negative side that are documented in our book, ranging from steve's participation in the labor conclusion, and his behavior as a young man and the fact that he could continue to be a real jerk to people outside of his closed circle of friends

and his close colleagues at work. i think that we're in the middle of a process of trying to figure out who steve jobs was. and it will take a long time for history to render its verdict. >> sure. >> this is just part of it. there are going to be opposing views. >> reporter: . >> brent do you know tim cook as well? >> sure. >> i'm sure somebody would like to be described as someone other than tim cook. >> a master of taming, after apple's challenge was after the ipod exploaded it was to improve versions of these things with great regularity in huge numbers. apple had not done that before, they had produced personal computers by the thousands per month. now they were making millions of

devices per month now they're making millions per week. >> right. >> this is an enormous logistical challenge. tim cook designed the system, negotiated the deals with the distributors and there are ten million of them -- >> we heard the stories when the glass isn't right and this doesn't fit and the issues about the workers in china you guys have contributed to the history of tim cook and of steve jobs. the evolution of a vij visionary leader. from the legends of silicon valley to the titans of wall street. the income gap is wider than ever. i'm going to talk to the woman who says blame the banks is she

right? you're going to hear her story in just two minutes. minutes.

judge the bailout of the nation's banks one of the most polarizing events in recent history, critics blasted the move calling it welfare for the wealthy. it was a necessary evil to save the economy some say to save the economy. whatever side you feel yourself on one fact was indisputable. the gap is wider than ever. nomi prince is a former wall street bank he, the result of u.s. banks manipulating for their advantage she's the author of several books including all the president's bankers, the hidden alliance,

now out in paper back, nomi good to have you back on the show. at some point we have to accept the fact that there are people with too much money and people with not enough and the bank distributes that money from the rich gives them some interest and lets the less rich buy a car buy a house get an education. the way you write you talk about the banks as most of the evil or the reason for inequalities. >> they leverage the money trillions and trillions of dollars and they have more today than before the financial crisis of 2008 and they leverage that money, they use it as chips on the table to bet on debt, to bet on derivatives and in areas that people can't understand or pronounce and it's because of that risk that we're not talking about just borrowing money and going back and forth. we're talking about an upside

down pyramid of risk. big six banks in the united states a couple in germany they own the political ties, they control the deposits disproportionately the top 30 banks in the world control nearly all the wealth in the world and government relationships, it's knot just a transfer of money but of experience and influence. at the end of that risk when it goes wrong it is such a problem to everybody else. >> president obama will tell you and everybody else and he said it a lot in his campaigns that he's not in bed with the banks. you say that the relationship between the big banks and the white house is as strong today as it was 100 years ago. >> and we still have that i don't want to even call it a revolving door. i want to say it's two doors

into washington. obama was put into husband position because of the former secretary robert reuben, a corporate political power type organizer, he basically got a lot of goldman sachs support one of the big six banks one of his top corporate contributors in his early campaign, the actual results of the years that he's been in office is that these big banks are bigger. the man in power at the top of these banks for the most part, are still in head of these banks, jamie dimon and they continue to be influential from that risk standpoint.

they have aggregated more deposits they have therefore put other banks out of business at the smaller local level. they care more about what's going on in the foundation of economy, with individual banks and so forth.part of that inequality is because of the power inequality. it has only gotten worse the overall power of the banks has increased. >> you write in your book about october 1907, october 1929, october 2008, all instances in which the president of the united states goes to banks because the economy or something, the market, is going wrong and asking them to do something. >> right. >> and you're saying that the similarities remain, that the president in the worst of times does have to talk to the -- you know consult with the nation's bankers and often equities tract concessions from them. >> not only are they having the midnight meetings, but they're the ones that the treasury

secretary need to be sustained first in order for anything ohappen afterwards. >> do you disagree with that? do you think we could have done something differently in 2008, could big banks been allowed to fail and would we be around having this conversation if they did? >> we be having a very differentk, from the top down, which has happened, the federal reserve, has the largest hedge fund in the world right now subsidizing these banks if we had gone in and subsidized the mortgages, the bottom up the things that were lining the toxic assets that we came to know of that infiltrated the system that went from the bank balance sheet to be sold in little towns in norway, if that had happened in a foundational level instead of the top down maybe another bank would have failed but the result wouldn't have been larger more powerful banks that had been sustained by banks and subsidies -- >> do you knew tim geithner knew

enough hank paulson knew enough at that time for that -- in other words it was a panicky time 2007 and so was 1929 by the way. >> theodore roosevelt asked them to fix it with treasury money. it was bigger in 2008. the main constituents was the banking system and the argument was that without the banking system to be saved in this manner everyone would come to their atm machines and couldn't get money out. the reality was the contracts with aig could have been preserved with far less government money than was ultimately spent because it wasn't this $700 billion bailout, it is a multitrillion dollar policy that is still going on. if we really firkd it it would not have still been going on and it wouldn't have been so global.

>> if we agree with you or not agree with you, it is still a great read. nomi prince is a fellow at demos, the hidden alliances that drive american power. coming up, the college students who say they're stuck with worthless degrees and tons of debt from a failed school. >> do you think that you should have to pay back those loans? >> no, i don't think i should have to. >> get this: the government stepped in with a bailout not just for the students but for school. coming up in two minutes.

two -- too big to fail institutions. i'm not talking about subprime mortgages. i'm talking about student loans. they're the only type of consumer debt that cannot be discharged through bankruptcy. you default on your student loan repayments and can you look forward to poor credit, gar nished wages and more. but that's not fbs fright nij a group of student borrowers. they were defrauded. the first ever student debt strike. patricia sabga has the report. >> i felt exuberant. i was exalted. i felt happy. >> an associate degree from everest college in california. part of the for-profit education giant core cohinthian.

not the career everest promised her. . >> they promised us that we would have a job in the field we studied in no more than six months. they said we would be getting paid above minimum wage. >> but horn said her everest degree commanded so little respect she couldn't get her foot in the door or transfer her credits to other college. >> i tried to go to fullerton and they said we don't accept credits from everest. >> she had nothing but $28,000 in student loan debt. >> do you think you should pay back those student loan debt? >> no, i don't feel i should

have to. >> so she and other students are on debt strike. refusing to pay back their federal student loans and demand that the leader the department of education cancel them. >> we didn't we were charged too much. >> charges filed by california, massachusetts, wisconsin and the consumer finance protection bureau accusing corinthian, of other unlawful practices. the evidence was compelling enough to underwrite state and federal lawsuits but not enough to convince the department of education to shut down the institution or cancel student loans of students like nah natasha.

>> only have the for profit announce it would have to declare bankruptcy. but the u.s. department of education didn't let corinthian go under. instead. the department of education kept the funding taps open and brokered the sale of 56 corinthian campuses to a student debt loan collection agency. liberty warren urged the department of education to cancel federal student loans. >> why continue to fund them? >> ann larson with the debt clefn, an offshoot of the debt collective. >> the department of education has been a partner in crime with corinthian. they have funded and supported

it and done everything they can to make the top officials in the company that investors don't suffer any consequences. >> reporter: the department of education declined our request for an interview to discuss their handling of corinthian. the spokesman gave us a quote saying we have been concerned which is why we have taken a series of actions in recent months to protect students from being misled and holding corinthian accountable. >> i don't think the department of education doesn't want to set a precedent of mass student loan cancellation. once they get what they deserved other students who have better than scammed and defrauded will want the same thing. >> as for defaulting on student loans, natasha fully understands the consequences of it. >> i'm not a frayed.

you can take my taxes you can start gar nirk my wages. you're not going to be breaking me. >> a thought she hopes will be echoed by other student debtors. >> i know we have something and we can make the department of education sweat. >> we asked corinthian to weigh in on the allegations. in a statement the corinthian statement told us, quote recent criticism wrongly disparaged the career assistance we offer our graduates and mischaracterize the purpose of the genesis lending program. completing their educational programs with minimal disruption. unfortunately precipitous unwarranted actions by state and federal reergts regulators make it more

difficult for employees. patricia sabga joins me. you mentioned federal loans what about private loans? >> those would be the genesis loans. those 56 campuses, not all but those 56, the consumer protection agency managed to rang billion half a million dollars for those students who did get the private student loans. 90% of corinthian's loans didn't come from private loans they came from taxpayer backed loans. >> the department of education somehow cancelling these federal loans do they have the legal authority to do that? >> the debt strikers think they do. that's why on tuesday they are taking defense to repayment letters to the department of education. they claim because they were defrauded by corinthian, the department of education does have the authority to cancel these loans but these are untested legal waters.

>> thank you we'll continue to follow. that's our show for today i'm ali velshi, thank you for joining us. joining us. federal corruption charges. >> i'm angry and ready to fight. >> senator robert menendez is indicted and accused of taking bribes for political favors. he's vowing to fight but giving up an influential backlash on capitol hill arkansas is the latest state to confront a measure critics call antigay. the governor there is calling for changes before he agrees to sign it.