that's all for today. thanks so much for joining me. and until next time, i hope you are learning to be more of a healthy you. we begin with a fox news alert. three americans on the malaysian airlines flight that vanished have been identified. welcome to "america's news headquarters." i'm gregg jarrett. this jet disappeared from radar while flying from malaysia to china with 239 people on board and now the pentagon is deploying the usspicney to help. david piper is streaming live. david. >> reporter: hi, gregg. a huge international search operation is under way to try to find this missing malaysian airlines jet. the vietnamese military saying they spotted two large oil

slicks in the south china sea and it's sending two ships now to investigate. aircraft and ships from several other nations have also been searching the south china sea for the aircraft. but malaysia's transport minister says so far no wreckage has been found. the malaysian airlines 777 went missing yesterday local time on a flight from the malaysian capital to beijing in china. it had 227 passengers and 12 crew. there were 14 different nationalities on the plane including three americans. 150 of the passengers on board were chinese nationals. it's reported that two passengers an italian and austrian on the plane's manifest were not on the flight. they both reportedly had passports stolen in thailand. the authorities say they are looking at all possibilities for the reason for the missing plane, including terrorism. contact was lost with the plane two hours into its flight.

at that time the plane should have been flying close to the vietnamese coast. the plane didn't enter its air space. friends and relatives have been waiting at beijing's airport for news, some have voiced frustration at the lack of information being released by the airline. and now it's more than 24 hours since that plane went missing and it does seem little hope there will be survivors. back to you, gregg. >> david piper, streaming live from bangkok, thailand. thanks very much. to the ukraine. pro russian forces in crimea refusing entry to a team of international monitors. the hungarian representative saying her team was forced back because they had no authorization, allegedly, to enter the area. russia invaded crimea a week ago, insisting it has the right to protect russian interests there. andy kellogg streaming live with the latest. >> reporter: the referendum will

be held a week from tomorrow in crimea and it's not clear whether everyone will be allowed to vote, whether people will be forced to vote, whether people will boycott the vote. what we know this is happening in an environment of increasing militarization in crimea and also that as you mentioned, gregg, observers are not being let in to crimea, both peacekeeper observers and vote observers for the third day in a row a team was stopped from entering the region. shots were fired and earlier in the week we know that a u.n. observer was chased out. he got in but then was surrounded by armed gunmen and basically made to leave. also today, ukrainian border guard plane came under fire. no one was hurt. it was flying around the border. there has been a lot of russian military vehicles moving around crimea today. we see constant demonstrations across this country, pro russian, anti-russian and today

here in kiev there was a demonstration of crimean charters. this is the ethnic group chased out of or forced out of crimea back in the 50s by josef stalin because he wanted to dilute their influence. they started resettling in crimea and they are very opposed to any sort of referendum or possible joining of russia. they say that they feel this group today speaking on independent square concerned about their relatives in crimea they believe that putin is doing this. russia is going in because it feels it's a last desperate chance to do something to hold on to ukraine. in the meantime, things are calm in the capital but we're getting some reports, seeing some pictures posted online and hearing talk of some sort of mobilization of ukrainian forces. they have been very calm in the face of provocation, and everyone is wondering how long that will last and what the next

move might be. government officials here quite tight-lipped about their contingency plan if a week from tomorrow crimea tries to join russia so we'll keep an eye on these movements that we've seen in different parts of ukraine, tanks an vehicles moving around, gregg. >> we'll check back with you. amy live in kiev, thanks. >> suspense building as we await the result of the straw poll. the vote concluding the annual gathering essentially in front of thousands of activists there, the goal of potential 2016 president y5 hopefuls is to show they have the right stuff to win back the white house for republicans. carl cameron live at cpac in maryland. carl. >> reporter: hi, gregg. these are among the nation's most conservative grass roots activis activists. and they are a big

representative sample of the seriously conservative voters who can often decide the first primaries and caucuses ever 2016 in the presidential race. they have been voting for 2 1/2 days in the annual straw poll. last year it won by rand paul, something of a favorite. well received. the balloting ended at 1:30. the votes will be public in the next hour or so. it could be a boost for a number of candidates looking to get a stamp of approval from conservatives. one of the candidates who was particularly tough not just on the obama campaign, ageneral ga, also on the leadership in washington. mitch mcconnell, john boehner, the leader of the house republicans and others, rick santorum, the former pennsylvania senator who briefly won the iowa caucuses. listen to this. >> let's face it.

we have a bunch of leaders in this country who don't believe conservative policies can be the basis of a winning national election, so they put forth candidates that keep apologizing for the principles they say they believe in. then they wonder why they lose. >> reporter: this entire conference featured republicans talking about the need to adhere to conservative principles, and win elections at the same time. the suggestion being that in some way they are exclusive and conservatives reject that. the wrap-up speech in a while, sarah palin of alaska is the keynoter. >> carl cameron, we'll check back with you. thanks very much. and do stay with us. full coverage of cpac, bring you the straw poll results when they are announced. shortly thereafter former alaska governor and gop vice presidential nominee sarah palin will be giving the keynote address. >> well, tax season as you know is in full season now creating a whole lot of frustration for

tens of millions of americans, hundreds of millions, but things may get a lot easier with a tax reform plan that is in the works. plus, the volatile crisis in ukraine taking a dangerous turn, what russia is threatening to do now as the standoff between moscow and the west drags on. make sure to check your clocks tonight before you go to bed. time to spring forward one hour. clocks change at 2:00 a.m. tonight in most states. we're 11 days away from springtime. ♪

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time for a quick check of the headlines. montana flood waters creating treacherous conditions as emergency officials warn people get ready for more flooding as rising temperatures melting the snow in the higher elevations. >> a tampa walmart pulling

steaks off the shelves after selling a steak tainted with lsd to a family of four. all four ending up in the hospital after suffering hallucinations. walmart doesn't know how it ended up in the steak. all meat comes prepackaged. police are investigating a. car loses control going airborne crashing into two homes in wisconsin. no one in either home was injured but the driver was hurt and taken away by ambulance. no word on the cause of that crash. tax season in full swing now and of course you are pulling your hair out and maybe some other things. trying to make sense of all of the confusing jar gone and instructions. but changes could be coming. two republican senators, mike lee of utah, marco rubio of florida plan on introducing a joint reform plan later this year. lee has his out already. few details are in these plans

but they say that the plan would simplify the process, make it pro growth, pro family. john mccormick is here to talk about it. he has been following this story closely. so, john, good to see you first of all. mike lee came out with his first, as we say he's going to then -- it's not the final deal. he will work with rubio. we're going to put up some of the bullet points of lee's plan. it's a good starting point. first of all he proposes two income tax rates. 15% on incomes up to a little more than 87,000, twice that for married couples. 35% above that. he wants to expand, this is important, the $2500 per child tax credit to all parents, and then eliminate special interest loopholes, new mortgage interest deduction would kick in. the question is how would this affect, john, the federal revenue? >> well, initial estimates from

lee and his supporters said that it wouldn't really affect reeve new that much. it would be close to revenue neutral a. new study out this week by the tax policy center, a project of the liberal leaning urban institute, brookings institution said it would reduce by $2.4 trillion over ten years. lee said i accept this now, it's interesting, we're going to go back to the drawing board and try and work on this, incorporate this analysis. they will have different options they want it closer to revenue neutral. they can go for growth, that would grow the economy, also grow federal tax receipts. by encouraging people, encouraging economic activity. they could reduce or limit deductions out there, right now as you mentioned they cap the mortgage interest deduction at 300,000, they get rid of the state and local tax deduction in order to pay for the tax cuts by reducing the rates to 15 and 35% in the two brackets and

expanding the child tax kreld. that's what they are going to stick with no matter what. >> in a way taking a page out of the old reagan tax cuts. if you put more money in people's pockets, because consumers spending drives gdp, you're going to have a healthier economy, businesses will hire more, expand more, and you get more tax revenues that way. right? >> yeah. you need to really, there are different analysis out there and some people think certain plans, they account for growth, another analyst might think this could help growth. the next version might be more pro growth. at the core is the plan to expand the child tax credit to $2500. lee says there is a penalty if you are a parent. you are investing in the next generation. whether you have kids or you don't, you depend on the next generation to pay for social security, 4 medicare. and it cost s hundreds of

thousands to raise a child. an extra $1500 back in taxes isn't going to pay for the kids but it's going to reduce that penalty that is imposed on parents and really targets the funding to the middle class who are struggling with kids. it's so expensive to raise kids. >> quickly is it smart politically to be focusing on the middle class? that will attract more voters for the gop where they are fairly weak. >> i think last time there's too much emphasis on entrepreneurs which are drive our economy, but not enough talk about middle class, middle class tax cuts. that's where republicans are trying to win on this as well as a policy victory. >> always good to talk to you. thanks, john. >> we're following deepening tensions in ukraine as russia extends its hold. u.s. is weighing sanctions. who will win this game t white house or the kremlin?

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the crisis in ukraine is reaching a fever pitch now. russia trying to tighten its hold on crimea. high stakes game of chicken going on between washington and moscow. russia is threatening to suspend an arms inspection deal if the u.s. imposes sanctions. today president obama work the phones, calling on european

leaders for their support. but he's on a golf course right now. judy miller is an investigative reporter, good to see you. >> nice to see you. >> predictable that putin would start threatening the nuke inspections, right? >> right. this is ratcheting up. this is escalating. each side is escalating up its threats. this was going to happen. i think the president is prepared for it. >> our threats are sanctions, visas and financial sanctions. but look, the united states imposing sanctions is really meaningless, isn't it, because russia's big partners are european nations that do so much trade. i mean, europe gets roughly 30% of its natural gas from russia and europe makes huge profits by selling a myriad of stuff to russia. so if you're a european nation, you don't want to damage economically your biggest trading partner. >> that's the problem, gregg. that's why the president's been on the phone with our european

allies all day. he's on the phone with two different kinds of people. european allies trying to say look, you've got to do something about this because we are, as you point out, our trade with russia is 1% of gdp for the e.u., it's 30%. so that's really a big difference. but the second group that he's got to concentrate on are the nato members, those former satellite states that are close to russia. they're feeling very nervous about american -- they want american and european assurances that we will be there for them. so the president is spending a lot of telephone time. >> 20 years ago in the hungry budapest accords, we promised we would be there for ukraine if they gave up their nuclear weapons. we promised, in writing, to protect their territorial integrity and we're not doing it, are we? >> we didn't do it and we didn't

do it when george bush was president and the russians went in to georgia and sawed off two provinces. this is just a very tough nut for the americans to crack because the russians have history, proximity, geography on their side. so it's very difficult. >> one wonders when the president is on the phone to european and other leaders whether he has much credibility. surely they know that his approval rating is the lowest of his presidency and he's got all kinds of domestic problems here at home. and at the same time, they may be miffed that he drew a red line and backed off of it. >> well, yes, but i don't sense that putin made his calculation -- >> based on that? >> based on syria. i really don't. >> really? >> he would have done this no matter who was president, i believe, because the ukraine and crimea, home of the black sea fleet is just so important to russia.

when he sensed his guy in kiev was falling, he was going to move. it took everyone by surprise, including apparently the c.i.a. >> let's talk about putin's motivations here. someone said, he wants to recreate the old soviet empire. as communist as he is a analyst. >> exactly. >> the way to improve russia's power in the world is to improve their territory. >> exactly. remember, ukraine is historically linked to russia, 46 million people and they have a strong connection, especially in one part of the country that we've been focusing on. so this is really, really turf. the crimea may be only 2 million people, but 60% of those 2 million are ethnically russian. >> we were talking a moment ago about how much europe really relies on russia for its natural gas, roughly 30%. some have been suggesting that the united states should lift its defacto ban, sell the energy

to russia's neighbors undercutting putin. but want that make putin undercut the price? >> that's pretty much what he would do, one assumes. if we do x, he does y. but the way, we couldn't do this fast enough in this crisis to make a difference. we may want to do it anyway. it may be sound policy. but i don't think that it would be good in this situation. >> there was a meeting in dublin today, what's going on? >> they heard from the ukrainian opposition. they heard the woman with the braid, one of the leading opponents say this is not just about us. this is about your credibility. you can not let the russians hold a referendum under that in the crimea. she said your credibility is on the line. she was very, very powerful. and two other opposition leaders also spoke pretty much the same

message. >> did ukraine get hit with a computer virus? >> yes. it did. according to the financial times, there was something called the snake that began to make its way through the ukrainian government and official sites at the beginning of last year. >> who is behind it? >> well, of course, russia would never say it's us, we did it. and when the united states has participated in that against the iranians -- >> they've shut down tv in the region. >> par fort course. >> judy miller, good to see you as always. >> nice to see you. >> that's going to do it for us. stay with fox news. continuing coverage of cpac and the straw vote coming out inn just acu moment.

hello, i'm andrea terrentino. it's 5:00 o'clock in new york, city and this is of is "the fiv. a lot of americans are fed up with our government. they want to feel great about our country again.co today rick perry gave them atoda voice and some encouragement with this firey speech at cpac. >> get out of the health care business! get out of the education business! stop hammering industry!amme let the sleeping giant ofg american enterprise create prosperity again! my fellow conservatives, the future of this nation is upon you! it belongs to