the monument is the world's largest freestanding stone structure. good for everybody in washington. the monument is open. i am david shuster. >> that's the news for this hour. "real money" with ali velshi starts right now >> americans aren't building houses like they used to, and that's a problem for all of us. i'm talking to the man who night know more about this an anyone. also frac-ing in your backyard, literally. i'm kicking off a week long series of what you probably don't know about land rights. and my interview with ron paul, what he says has taken the place of compromise in washington and whether he would run again for president. i'm ali velshi, and this is "real money."

♪ >> this is "real money," you are the most important part of the show. tell me what is on your mind by tweeting me at ali velshi, or hit me up on facebook. america's housing market appears to be cooling off a little bit. existing home sales fell by 6.6% in the first three months of 2014, compared to last year. existing homes, used homes, if you will. at the same time the national association of realtors said home prizes continuing to rise but at a slower pace. home prices are still about 17% below the 2006 peak. but a cooling off in a much smaller slice of the housing market.

newly constructed homes has some people a bit worried. last month there were 635,000 single family housing starts. by comparison there were 1.7 million single family starts a month at the height of the housing boom. but by the depths of the recession, starts fell by 72% to just 353,000. since that low point housing has been slowly recovering. but a healthy economy should have as many as 1.2 million a month. these are new homes. and that's a 50% gap from where we are today. the economic ripple effects are a lot bigger than you might think. new home construction creates a lot of jobs. of the 9 million jobs loss, more than a million were lost in the housing and construction sectors along. that's because home construction has tent calls that reach into

heating, and plumbing, and throw in the big ticket purchases like turn sure and appliances and you get the big picture. now for more on this, we have this report from mary snow. >> reporter: most economists agree that sluggishness in home building is holding back the broader economic recovery. in more normal years like 1990s, home building contributed a quarter of a percentage point to gdp growth. >> in more recent times it really has only been contributing .1 of a percentage point. so we would like to see the housing recovery pick up pace and contribute something like

even a half of a percentage point. >> and each new home built has a positive effect on the economy. adding as much as $111,000 in federal and state taxes. so what is holding housing back? why haven't the jobs materialized. part of the story has to do with tight lending standards. in late 2012 mortgage refinance and originations were on a terror, but since then those rates have nudged up to 4.2%. still historically low, but high enough to put the brakes on mortgage lending which finds itself at a 17-year low. and despite a steady price in home prices, people just aren't putting their houses on the market. >> you have an interest rate on

your mortgage, you are rate locked out, your interest rate is a great 3.5%. so you are disincented to sell. these are the pent up supply dynamics. >> >> reporter: but there is not a great demand for homes either right now. >> first there is still the overhang from the excessive building that happened during the housing boom. second, we have a sluggish economy. it's getting better, but slowly. >> for now many sellers and buyers seem to be sitting it out on the sidelines and waiting for the economy to pick up, a trend which some experts say may take a year or more to materialize, and that's a worrisome thought for an industry that is the cornerstone of the economy. robert schiller is the cofounder of the case schiller

indicis. he is one of three american economists who won the 2013 economics noble prize. bob wrote a book called irrational exuberance among many others. he is also professor of economics at yale university, and joins us from the campus in new haven, connecticut. good thank you being with us. >> hi. nice to be here. >> what is your sense? you are close to the data on this. what is your sense of the current health of the housing market and where it's going? >> well, it's a mixed bag right now. i would guess that home prices will continue to rise but at a slower pace, but let me just say, home prices have pretty much stalled in the last few months but it's typical for this time of year because winter months have normally been slow periods. if you do seasonally adjusted

then home prices are still going un, according to our data as of february, they are going up at a fairly good clip. it looks like it did --? terms of home prices it looked somewhat similar to what it did last year at this time. but i see all of these other indicators that you point out are -- are not looking as good. so i'm thinking probably weaker, but probably not a -- a crash like we saw before. >> what do you make of -- mary snow was just talking about mortgage rates going up. it is historically very, very low, but happens to be higher than it was a year ago. is that enough to slow things down? we're seeing these new applications at multi-year lows. does that make sense to you. >> part of the reason mortgages are low is people don't want .

to refinance. in late 2012 the news was all about all-time record low mortgage rates, and i think that gave a boost to the housing market. it got people thinking, hey, don't want noise the all-time low. there's only one day mortgage rates can go, and that's up. so it created a surge in demand, and that created a sense of optimism in the housing market, which is still showing up in the data. but now that mortgage rates are no longer at record lows, i think that this market will -- a good chance it will falter -- i mean grow at a much slower pace. >> mary's story was talking about how many more jobs would be created in the economy if we were to get up to where we were at the height of home buying and selling. but one might say that is an unreasonable expectation. what is the right amount of home

selling? we're up about 13% already. how much should they go up? is this a healthy -- as much as it may be slowing down, is this healthy where we are right now? >> yeah, well, back in 2006 or so, residential investment was something like 6% of gdp, which was really high. i don't think we want to get back to that. so now there's a question of how much should we be doing on housing? there's many other things in life besides housing. america is a country that is very fixated on housing, and maybe we have gone a little bit too far. there is another issue that maybe young people are not as focused on housing as they have been in the past. we live in kind of an electronic internet age. you can live in a nice little apartment in a city and it seems to work well as a lifestyle for a lot of people. so it may be that the american fission accusation on having a big house and a big yard is fading a little bit.

>> we're also urbanizing, and then there's this issue after the recession, so many financial planners have been saying rent if you have to. given the fact that we take big, big mortgages in america, you are not paying off a lot of capital toward your house initially anyways. >> yeah, this might be a pretty reasonable time to rent. home prices are probably going up modestly. you know, no big deal. you are not missing out on a once in a lifetime opportunity. and it's easier to rent. you don't have to worry -- houses brings lots of worries and expenses. people don't factor that in when they buy a house. >> robert schiller is a professor of economics among many other titles at university. >> one when family is having a crisis, pretty soon the whole

neighborhood is involved that's what is happening in ukraine. and we'll take a look at impact on farmers and ranchers in north dakota. >> does it make you concerned when you see all of these oil and gas frac-ing around here? >> it makes us very nervous. >> keep it right here.

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>> pro-russian separatists in eastern ukraine are celebrating their victory in sunday's succession vote. but poland is saying not so fast. they say the vote in eastern ukraine is illegal, and warned russia that it is risking stiffer sanctions. the eu today did expand its current sanctions to two crimean companies and 13 individuals.

even russia stopped short of validating the vote. urging ukrainian officials to begin negotiates with the separatist leaders. the separatists have seized government building in about a dozen cities and town. the new sanctions are nothing more than symbolic, but what is on the horizon over the next few weeks will paint a clearer picture of russian's reputation. lauren joins us now from austin, texas. this is the same sort of story we have heard. russia does or incites something that europe doesn't like, but the sanctions never seem to match the bark. >> that's very true. today's sanctions out of the eu were fairly week and won't effect russia at all. it is just going to ban 13 more

individuals from traveling into europe, and it also puts sanctions on two crimean-based companies that were taken over by russian authorities once the annexation was complete. so fairly toothless sanctions this time around. what was interesting was coming out of the eu foreign minister's meeting, there were quite a few that said they are not interested in any real economic sanctions on russia. for example, austrian's foreign was one of the men who came out against any further economic sanctions that would actually harm russia, because he said it would harm his country too much. >> and this is where this gets interesting. poland is coming out very strongly in favor of sanctions, why has poland got such an interest in this? >> poland has always been the leader of the anti-russian sentiment inside of europe. they all understand russia and

russian aggression more than say the western european countries. also polish firms don't have a big stake in russia, and their economy is more robust, so they are the natural leader for this sentiment. >> there is an investor conference that vladimir putin has invited a number of western companies to attend. a number of companies have rejected the invitation. visa, coca-cola, many companies that are saying we're going to stay on the sidelines for now. >> it's incredibly important in showing where investors heads are concerning russia. whether they see them as a potential partner or if they see the current relations too poor. so it will be the real litmus test on where investor sentiment

is in the west. you have six u.s. firms that have come out and said they are rejecting russia's reputation to join the forum, however, there are quite a few u.s. firms that will be in attendance. bowing, caterpillar, goldman sachs are set to attend. and the europeans -- there are no european firms that have yet to decline the invitation. there will be very large european contingents there with putin, firms from france, germany, uk, all across the board, so the europeans have not at all taken the u.s. nod to start rejecting russia as far as a potential investment. >> we're further away from the worst of our recession than europe is, and they might be feeling a little bit more delicate about the whole thing. are there concerns that europe

at least those countries that have a financial relationship with russia could go in to recession? >> it's a possibility. there are three things we're going to be looking for. the first thing is the st. petersburg economic forum. can they maintain their investor friendliness? thus far all signs point to yes. especially because the sanctions themselves are not stark enough to actually deter these investors. the second thing is what is going to happen in the lead up to the may 25th elections in ukraine. if anything does happen as far as russia attempting to intervene, then of course europe is going to have to react, and that is going to change investors minds. and the third thing to watch as far as russia, ukraine, and europe, is the energy talks that are taking place. russia came out with a very

stark threat today saying they will cut off the natural gas if ukraine does not hand over the $3.5 billion in debt that they owe to gazprom. that's not an empty threat. so if it gets shut off, yes, it is summertime, but that can really effect european countries. >> june 3rd is the deadline for that. lauren thank you so much. all right. it's are $10 billion decision that could make or break her career, more on yahoo boss. plus not in my backyard. that's what a lot of people say about frac-ing. >> they make you an offer. if you don't want to take the offer, you can take them to court, but you are not going to stop them from coming in. >> coming up the little known truth and drilling and land

rights as i kick off a week long look at frac-ing in america. people of our time. rosie perez >> i had to fight back, or else my ass was gonna get kicked... >> a tough childhood... >> there was a crying, there was a lot of laughter... >> finding her voice >> i was not a ham, i was ham & cheese... >> and turning it around... >> you don't have to let your circumstance dictate who you are as a person >> talk to al jazeera only on al jazeera america

♪ >> last week i told you a lot about the largest e-commerce site in china. yahoo stands to make a killing off of alley bah bah when it goes public. it has the foresight to buy a big stake in the site for just a

billion dollars. it has now been whittled down to a little more more than fifth of the company today. based on current estimates, yahoo's stake could make it much more. the internet company peaked at the height of the tech bubble in 2000, since then it has been struggling to stay profitable and figure out its identity. nobody knows quite what is next for yahoo after it sells much of its steak. and the ceo isn't giving any hints. the latest cover of fortune magazine calls its her moment of truth. we have the woman who wrote that article. you have been on this for a long time, and you have had the

necessary scepticism of the great financial journalist that you are. but you haven't come out disliking marissa mayer? >> absolutely not. yahoo is a legacy business. 19 years old. it's old. almost no one could save this legacy business. marissa has done a pretty good job. two years in, a lot has gone right at yahoo, and i could content there is probably nobody else who could do as good of job as she has done, but i'm not bullish on yahoo!. >> this is interesting. why not? what is your hesitation? >> yahoo! has done product right. >> yeah. >> marissa has done product right. she has hired tons of people in. she got there, there was like maybe one mobile engineer, and

now they have 500 people working on mobile. what she has not done so well is fix the advertising. and this is an advertising business. >> right. and one in which it has become highly come mod tiezed. >> right. >> the value of a webpage has only gone down in value. >> there's the rub. so she has to not only fix what is broken, but she has to inevent something new. think about the hypergrowth companies you know. you have google, it has search ads. facebook, has the new advertising. and she comes in request this thing called native advertising, ali everybody is doing that to. >> right. and tell me what noisive advertising is. >> it's basically just good stuff on the web. traditional advertising on the web has looked different.

you get the banner across the top. >> and generally speaking you are ignoring it. >> for the most part. although maybe every once in a while you notice, gosh those shoes keep coming up. so native advertising doesn't look any different. let's see you read an article about a great hotel in cancun. are you going to care who wrote that article? in the old days maybe you would, but in the new days of native advertising, maybe you won't even notice. because once you pick up the mobile phone, you have about one second before you put it down again. >> right. >> so you have to get hooked right away. >> i did a lot of business on yahoo. it's where i learned what an internet portal is. but what is yahoo! supposed to be? a news site? your entry point to the

internet? what is the future of yahoo!. >> marissa will say yahoo! is your daily habits. nobody knows what that means. yahoo! is supposed to be something people come to all the time. think about the last time you deliberately went to yahoo!. not so often. the advertisers who pay to place ads in front of us, yahoo! doesn't stand to do very well. >> interesting conundrum. i think it's worth a read, the cover story on fortune. jesse thank you. >> thank you. you could end up with an oil well on your front lawn and you wouldn't be able to do a thing to stop it. >> oil and gas rights has leaded them to a company, they can come

and put an oil well, a site for toxic waste, chemical storage, even build a road right on your property without your permission. >> coming up i kick off a week long series on frac-ing in america, and what you don't know about property rights and why you better read the fine print. plus i'm talking to ron paul, and why he says you can say good-bye to the u.s. dollar as the world's reserve currency. all of that and much more coming up. keep it right here. #

>> today we are launching a week long look at the controversial oil and gas drilling technique known as frac-ing.

the more technical name is hydraulic fracturing. here is a basic look at hot it works. wells are drilled in an l-shaped intershale rock. an explosive charge creates holes in the rock and a combination of water, chemicals and sand is injected into the yell at high-pressure. the trapped oil and gas is sent back to the surface, mission accomplished. on the flip side, environmentalists have called attention to side effects like earthquakes and contaminated water among other problems. today i want to talk money. you might assume you own the land where frac-ing takes place. the people who own the land where frac-ing takes place are enjoying a financial windfall.

but that's not the case for many hand owners who don't also own the mineral rights to your property. and unless you own those rights you might find an oil rig on your front yard whether you like it or not. >> reporter: richard works as a ranchers and farmer in north dakota. but even though he has title to this land, he doesn't own all of it. instead richard like most people in north dakota only has rights to the surface. most of what lies beneath was soldiers ago to a prior owner. that means richard has little say over what happens beneath his ranch, which just so happens to sit atop of the bakken, can an estimated $118 billion dollars worth of oil. but richard is just one of thousands of these so-called split estimate owners. where the surface is owned by one party and the minerals are

owned by the other. >> many people when they go to buy a house don't realize that they might not be owning the oil and gas resources beneath the property they are buying. >> reporter: and it can happen more often than you might think. in pennsylvania roughly 40% of oil wells are located on split esta estates. >> even recently in florida of all places, some of the developers in these subdivisions are holding on to the mineral rights. >> reporter: and by law mineral owners trump the right of surface owners. >> that has been designed to encourage oil and gas exploration. >> reporter: whoever owns the oil and gas rights has leased them to a company.

they can put an oil well. a site for toxic waste, even build a road right on your property without your permission. >> reporter: then one day in 2010 it happened. >> we heard from the mail carrier that there was a letter saying they were coming in to drill in section 11. >> reporter: after acquiring mineral rights, a texas-based oil company moved in and began frac-ing. richard expected it, but at first he thought he could prevent it. >> they make you an offer if you don't want to take it, you can take them to court, but you are not going to stop them from coming in. >> reporter: despite his protests, this well continues to extract tens of thousands of barrels of oil every year from atop richard's land. natural gas is also burned off here, and while it's not clear

if this so-called flaring affects air quality, so much of it goes on here, that these fires are visible from space. >> they have been burning next to the house for two years, and we don't know what the effects of the fumes are. >> reporter: the couple has complained about intermitt act health problems. >> burning eyes and sore throat and headaches. >> those individual landowners have made -- made choices out there their family history either to sell their minerals in order to save their farm or to possibly sell or keep their minimals when they sold their land. >> reporter: but home buyers should also take note. >> it's critically important to ask do i get the mineral rights

with this. because if you have the mineral rights you have control, and you can sit down and negotiate what you want and get paid, and also negotiate to make sure the rig is not set up in your backyard. >> reporter: industry advocates stress that the companies should work with people when setting up sites. >> when they lease their minerals to a developer, then the developer has certain rights to exact those minerals. >> reporter: petro hunt paid richard and brenda a one time fee of $18,700 for the access road. that's according to bank statements and documents that the couple say they received from the company. petro hunt did not respondent to multiple requests for comment. but today richard and brenda say

they sef an annual payment of $1,250. so this is a free flowing natural spring that has been on your ranch for generations. does it make you concerned when you see all of these oil and gas wells all around this region? >> it makes us very happen. we have to have water for these cattle. they have to drink every day. >> reporter: as oil companies ratchet up plans, landowners with no mineral rights often have little recourse, and those who try to buy back minerals are often stymied. >> this particular well, there were 300 mineral owners. >> reporter: nearly two-thirds of the mineral owners live out of state or even out of the country. most of the people who own access to oil and gas in north dakota don't live in north

dakota. and are far removed from the way it effects local residents, the region's wildlife and the environment. >> they are getting a check and not having their roads tore up or putting up with the dust or the drilling rigs right next to your house. >> reporter: and while the energy boom brings new jobs and development to these towns, it has also brought hardship to those unable to cash in on that new-found prosperity. >> so this idea is called split esta estates. and joining me now to dig deeper is christine. an oklahoma native and a profess of law at the university of north dakota. thank you for joining us. >> glad to be here. >> let's talk about this. you said the u.s. is one of the few countries in the world that does the split estate thing. how do other countries deal with

this? >> actually the united states is one of the few states who has private mineral rights at all. the majority of the rest of the world has -- the minerals are owned by the individual governments. they are not owned privately. canada, australia, united states, are the rare exception to where we even have private mineral rights. and then on top of that, those rights can be split. the mineral interest is what we call the dominant estate. and that's why you can't prevent someone from drilling on your property. texas, oklahoma, colorado, pennsylvania, all of the states have split interests. >> are there any states where the surface rights are the dominant interest, so you can say hold on, we have to negotiate this or do something else? >> they wouldn't be the dominant

states. there are a few states that have what is referred to as the unified system, where they are not split. but any time they are split, the dominant estate is the minerals. and that really is only a logical way to get the minerals out of the ground. if your idea is you will produce the minerals, you can't have surface owners saying, no you can't drill on my land. i -- a lot of issued are beyond the surface issues. issues because of the frac-ing and the dust, those are nuisance issues, could be handled separately. they cannot prevent the well but they are entitled to be compensated. >> and how effective is that? people who get on the new have health issues, and provide documentation that they have tried to get these things

settled and there tends to be a lot of denial. is that always the case? >> it is a struggle. in oklahoma i had a suit one time where we had a large nuance case. the gas being produced had hydrogen sulfide in it. and they had a dairy farm. that suit went on for many, many years, and we eventually got a jury trial out of it. but it is a very contentious issue. as far as drilling the actual well, those are covered under statute, and there's a process where they have to try to make settlement, and if they can't reach a settlement for the use of actual land, to actually put the drill pad on, then the land owner can take them to court. if it's a split estate. if it's not a split estate then you are going to negotiate that

when you are negotiating your lease. >> is it a given when i buy property that i would know it is a split estate? >> not always. it is not always apparent. you sometimes have to dig around. and sometimes whenever someone sells it, they think they own more than they do. what you want to do is make sure you get a warranty deed that says you say what you own is warrantied. but it's not uncommon, in oklahoma where we have even smaller -- the beginning patents were smaller, so we have even more fragments -- it's even more fractionalized than in north dakota. so it's not uncommon for multiple owners to own the rights under the surface. >> thank you so much for joining us. >> you are welcome. >> and tomorrow i'll introduce you to a pair of shale-ionaeres.

some lucky land owners have made millions by leasing out their mineral rights. it's part of a renaissance that has brought thousands of new jobs and development across the country. you hear it all the time, washington can't agree on anything? whatever happened to compromise. >> there's a lot of compromise going on. you give me my stuff, you give me my stuff for tobacco, i'll give it to you for milk, and those kind of things. >> that conversation and more coming up.

ray suarez hosts inside story weekdays at 5 eastern only on al jazeera america >> before there was rand paul, there was ron paul, rand's dad and a libertarian folk hero. the former was a doctor, and while the son is a senator who may run for president in 2016, the father is not fading into the background. ron paul remains an outspoken libertarian who makes his own opinions known loud and clear. you can find those opinions on ronpaulchannel.com. some of the content is free, and some requires a prescription

that costs $9.95 a month. i sat down with him and asked if he could accept some views. in other words can ron paul build with the middle ground. >> the middle ground is building coalitions -- >> which doesn't happen anymore. >> well, there's a lot of compromise like you give me my stuff for tobacco, and i'll give you your stuff for milk. so i want to build a coalition. dennis and i are good friends, but we don't agree on health care. so we don't dwell on health care, and we talk about the positive. ralph nader and i just had a long visit the other day, and we talked about the things we agree with. and on economics take for

instance the difference between corporatism, and free market. so we both despise corporatism, the big corporations running the show, so we pick the things that we can agree on, so i think that is the way to work, because you are right. i mean how many people are you going to get to agree on every single thing. when it comes to [ inaudible ] i'm a little bit firmer on that. but i was watching an interview the other night of milton friedman, and they said what was your opinion of the federal reserve? and he says we shouldn't have one. and i thought that's pretty good. but, no, if you move in the right direction, you should accept it. let's say we have a fed and we're not going to get rid of it. and we can stop them from being a price fixer and fixing the price of money. >> are you encouraged by this

fed and the ben bernanke giving press conferences? does that make you feel better? >> not a whole lot. i guess i have become too cynical about, you know, having straight-forward answers, because they do have an an genda, but they thought tooth and nail of audit of the federal reserve, which the people are now demanding -- >> what would that show? what do you believe an audit of the federal reserve, other than people tend to become more transparent -- >> every single transaction and negotiation going on with other central banks. why does belgium have

$320 billion worth of treasury bills. it is not a wealthy country. and the whole purpose for the world right now is to perpetuate the illusion that the dollar is here forever, and it will never be knocked down, because everybody has an interest in it. it's a reserve currency, so it's just not going to -- those who hold dollars and those who don't like the dollars still want to use it. and the people who challenge the dollar get into trouble. right now russia is threatening to do that, and iraq did that, and libya, so that is -- >> and do you think there's any likelihood of that happening? of the dollar not being the reserve currency of the world in the foreseeable future? >> i don't think there is a chance that that won't happen. it will be eliminated because it always happens. the only one that has

lasted -- the only currency that has lasted for a long time has been the gold currency, and it is not called a reserve currency, so in a true free market you don't need a reserve currency, you don't have to have one single currency. >> do you have any interest in bitcoin? >> yeah, philosophically. libertarians love it. >> yeah. >> and my name was attached to it frequently because i spoke so much about -- you know, competing currencies. and you talked about, you know, what would you tolerate? well, the system that we have allow competition, and talked about competing currencies, and bitcoin all of a sudden could this be a competing currency. i don't think it is really money per se, but it is something that substitutes in the transfer of funds. so far the government hasn't

cracked down other than saying they are going to tax it. but can you imagine how they are going to tax these transactions. but if it's competing and serves a function. it should be legal. it shouldn't be taxed. >> will you do presidential politics again? >> i don't think so. i think people have had enough of me on there on the debate. but i cannot foresee not dealing with the issues, which is what is really important to me. >> will rand paul follow your footsteps into presidential politics. >> he seems to have shown an interest. >> do you talk to him a lot about it? >> no, not too much. you know, he -- he stays pretty busy. and we have large -- a lot of activities in texas with my activities and he does too, you know, he had three kids. i know he talked to his mother yesterday on mother's day. >> oh, good. >> and he was home for mother's day and helped share

that with his three boys. >> a kiss hasn't generated this much buzz since 1945, and i am talking about the espn video of michael sam kissing his boyfriend after being drafted by the st. louis rams. sam is the first openly gay player in pro football. already there is controversy. the dolphins fined don jones and suspended him and tweeting, omg, and horrible after the photo. but his jersey is the second-best seller among the rookies thus far. michael eaves is here with me now. good to see you. >> always, ali. >> is jersey sales an indicator of anything? >> it's an amazing accomplishment. johnny manzel was a super star.

michael sams was a good player, but not a household name. now he is a household name because of his announcement that he was gay. >> is it a political statement when people wear a michael sams jersey. are they saying we're not subscribing to the homophobia. >> it's also an indication of the buying power of the gay community. when jason collins announced he was gay, his jersey was number 2 behind only lebron james. some estimate they have a lot of buying power. >> and they even direct that buying power. but is there a bigger way for the nfl to profit from michael sam? >> any time you have a high profile player coming into the

league, there will be ways to maximize exposure. he plays for think st. louis rams. there was always that build-in fan base, and now you bring in the gay come community attending his games. any time he plays on the road, there will be a large gay contingency to come out and watch him. >> let's talk about these tweets, and not to diminish anybody who sends something hurtful. >> the league can't control the views and actions of every player, but they can punish them. the league has been very strong in support of michael sam and other minorities, saying we have no tolerance for this behavior. >> this brings us to the donald sterling case, because one

wonders how war we should go down this road of trying to control people's views and whether we're pushing things back into the closet, whereas in the case of guys tweeting about michael sam or the case of sterling and what he said. fact is whatever sterling said about black people, he employs a lot of them. are we silencing something we should be discussing. >> professional sports teams and leagues operate differently than other companies. donald sterling went into a partnership agreement with other teams when he purchased the team. if the league believes is not living up to his obligations, they believe they have the right to oust him. the players don't believe that either. they have -- collective

bargaining agreement with the league. big stars like lebron james say he is not welcome in the league. so you could see the entire player associate boycott next season and not play. >> thank you so much. all right. the head of the international monetary fund knows when she is not welcome. she backed out of giving the commencement speech at a college next sunday after a petition signed by nearly 500 people asked to uninvite here. la guard who has been a guest on this show, said she dropped out to avoid being a distraction at the graduate. she is not the only one to decline an invitation this month. condoleezza rice resourced course on a planned speech at

rutgers in new jersey over protests on her role in the iraq war. when we come back, the man who played a key role in keeping the economy from crumbling into a full-blown depression. keep it here.

♪ not a week goes by on this show without some reference to the financial crisis of 2008. six years later, america is still recovering from what proved to be the worst recession since the great depression. one of the foot soldiers on the front line, timothy geithner has come out with a new book called "stress test." it outlines the incredibly difficult position he found himself. he was there when lehman brothers collapsed. he writes in the book that the

government was pow powerless to prevent a catastrophic default. the panic that ensued froze credit markets around the world. he says it was like fighting world war iii with general washington's army. and the $700 billion bailout brought him in to conflict with the bailout's watch dog, who insisted that wall treat fat cats take a haircut. he says quote, he assumes our motives were self-evidently sinister as if we helped banks for profit. he disputes that. others have also taken issue with some of geithner's account. glenn hubbard was a financial advisor to mitt romney.

hubbard says geidner was a liar. but he was there on the front lines during some of the most difficult times this country has faced. that's our show. i'm ali velshi. thanks for joining us. ♪ good evening, everyone. this is al jazeera america. i'm john siegenthaler in new york. ransom, nigeria reacts to chilling video. boko haram says it will trade the kidnapped girls for militants in prison. declaring independence, a formal request to join russia from another troubled corner of ukraine. at risk a second u.s. case of the lethal middle eastern virus. unstoppable, the most alarming warning yet about