what does vladimir putin have planned next? russia and the u.s. trade sanctions over crimea. is this the end of it or just the start? part of the president's domestic plan, get back to talking about the economy and helping women. >> i want to make sure my daughters are getting the same chances as men. >> and when it comes to women, there may be no one more closely watched right now than hillary clinton. the debate over the wait. if she bows out, has the will she or won't she delay hurt democrats who do want to get into the race? good morning, i'm chris jansing. more countries now joining the international hunt for missing malaysia airlines flight 370. after a second day failed produce any sign of two pieces of debris identified by satellite, it's just after 10:00 p.m. there and the search will resume on the morning. on the way to help, china, i

india, japan. china is sending five more ships, helicopters. while they're deploying war ships to what is described as about the most inaccessible spot on the face of the earth. about 1500 miles off the coast of australia in the indian ocean is where this search is focused. they join the p-8 surveillance plane as well as australia and new zealand's p-3 search planes. an australian ship is headed for the search area, too. and two commercial merchant ships are also scouring the waters for any sign of the plane. even as the search evilates, australia's prime minister is trying to manage expectations. >> we have been throwing everything we've got at that area to try to learn more about what this debris might be. now, it could just be a container that's falling off a ship. we just don't know.

>> i want to bring in aviation analyst and retired pilot john cox. also, longtime correspondent robert hager who is back to help with the coverage. good morning to both of you. two days of searching now for the satellite images, the debris, anyway. no sign of it. we have just learned the u.s. has spent $2.5 million so far. more military assets on the way from other countries. what are the chances. bob, it's still floating, and what are the chances we find it? >> this is discouraging that you have five plaebs out there looking today and nobody finds it. >> not just any planes. incredibly highly sophisticated planes. >> absolutely so. then you have a couple days of good weather here, and then there's a storm moving in. you know, all this is a really pessimistic start to this search of the ocean. and i think the prime minister is right there to dial back public expectations because i mean, if we do find any wreckage out there, and it does come from this plane, it's going to take a

while, it looks like -- it's evident after this first day. we're looking at many days process here. >> we're almost into, i guess, 48 hours since they first announced this. and john, tom costello was focusing more now on human spotting instead of radar. why that switch, and how difficult is -- a task is it? you're looking for a bear of binoculars into a wide expanse of desolate ocean. >> i think the idea is they're looking for things, small items that float. seat back cushions, even luggage that may have come out of the overhead. things like that that are going to be very small in signature, are not going to be highly reflective to radar, so as we get a visual search and you start seeing bits and pieces of this debris field, this debris field is out there. there are floating components to this airplane that are out there. it's a matter of us getting the assets in place to visually acquire them and then to start taking that information back and

letting it lead us to the wreckage. and i think -- >> when you say it's out there, do you mean that you believe that what was on those satellite images do indeed represent something from the plane or could it be somewhere else entirely? >> it's possible it could be somewhere else entirely. the images from the satellite are large debris items. i was spore specifically talking about smaller, floating debris, but there is a debris field out there. we have never seen an airplane in the water of this size that did not leave a floating debris field of some size. so therefore, i'm confident it's out there. >> australia's prime minister, tony abbott, had to defend his decision to release these new satellite images. let me play that for you. >> we owe it to the families and the friends and the loved ones of the almost 240 people on flight mh-370 to do everything we can to try to resolve what is as yet an extraordinary riddle. we owe to them to do everything

we can to resolve this and because of the understandable state of anxiety and apprehension that they're in, we also owe it to them to give them information as soon as it's to hand. >> boy, bob, i think these are really tough decisions. you know, you have this need for transparency and the push for information. on the other hand, you still have the families of 239 people who you don't want to give false hope. >> yes, you don't want to give them false hope, but i think the idea is to give them as much information about what you have as possible so they can make their own judgments. i have got to say, i mean, australia is really doing an american-like job because our national transportation safety board has been quite good about laying it out there, what they have, even when it doesn't seem to make sense. the australians now are taking that sort of tack. which is good. >> of course, that hasn't stopped, this search has not stopped, john, the speculation about what might have happened to that plane. for example, malaysian

authorities today confirmed there were lithium batteries in the cargo hold, which weren't regarded as dangerous, although they can be prone to overheating and have been known to catch fire. is this the kind of detail that raises any red flags for you? >> in my mind, nothing is off the table. there are some possibilities that a fire could have been onboard, but there's evidence that says probably not. that is the fact that electrically, we know the airplane continues to function. we know that through the acars system. if there were a significant fire, one of the things that they would do is unpower the airplane electrically, and quite likely, that system would have been one of the things that had been unpowered. so the fire likelihood is low. one other bit for you, an airplane that experiences a major fire according to some data released by boeing, has about 17 minutes before

generally they're lost. this airplane flew for something over six hours. so it would make it a statistical outlier, and from what we have seen in the past, put those two together, and the fire possibility, that fire scenario, it begins to be not quite so likely. everything is still on the table, though. >> let's talk about this race against time. because i keep hearing from experts, bob, that we need those black boxes. if we're ever going to find out what really happened, we need them. and give us a little more sense of what we're dealing with right here. >> well, that pinger has got nominally a 30-day cycle, and then it loses power, but they have been known to go another five, ten days or something, and then if you have to search for it without the pinger, you can. >> and black boxes have been found long after -- >> two years later on the air france crash. they can be found. but you know, even if we find the wreckage, then you have to plot very carefully the wreckage

on the surface. very carefully back on how the currents might have taken it and so forth. see if you can find the main body of wreckage, and down there with that would be the so-called black boxes. but then you've got to locate them precisely, so you need sonar, if the pinger is still going. and eventually, you're going to have to have unmanned subs, if they ever do locate them, unmanned subs that go down and cameras show, and when they spot them, they can bring them up. a tedious job. >> one of the things we have to point out is even if they find the debris identified in the satellite images, it would be five, six, seven days later, so they're not going to be sitting underneath, so you still have that issue, although it narrows the field. let me just show you some, i thought, really interesting stuff from morning joe. they had a research scientist on, kathleen dohan, whose expertise is in wind speeds and ocean currents. she said some scenarios showed the debris could be hundreds of

miles awray from the start point, the point where we see the debris on the images. but she concludes it's likely 40 miles east and 20 miles north of the start point. that's what her computer models tell her. and certainly, the people involved in the search are doing this kind of analysis as well. but how difficult, john, does it make it when you have a moving target like this? >> well, the first thing is once we find debris floating debris, then we have a starting point. right now, we do not have a starting point. we're still in the search mode, if you will. once we get a starting point, then the experts can produce these computer models. u.s. coast guard has phenomenal models. the haulographic institute has phenomenal computer models. there's a number of them. they can help hone down the search area for the submerged search for the wreckage that is on the ocean floor. and the whole thing from here is to continue to narrow the search

area down and as we do that, we increase the likelihood of finding it. so it's a series of small steps. >> john cox, bob hager, great to have both of you thank you. checking the news feed this morning, new data from the education department. listen to this. the majority of preschoolers 3 and 4 years old, who are suspended in 2011, were african-american. so right now, attorney general eric holder and the secretary of education, arne duncan, are at a washington, d.c. elementary school to talk about student discipline. the obama administration is taking a closer look at race and equity in schools. also in washington this hour, vice president joe biden speaking to a health care convention. in just over a week, we hit the deadline to get health insurance under the affordable care act, and of course, there's been this major push by the administration to get young people in particular to sign up. chris christie answering questions about the bridgegate scandal thursday for the first time during his recent round of

town halls. he said he couldn't know what every state employee was doing at every moment. >> i found that out in real time on january 8th. the fact is that you have to be able to trust the people that work with you. and if you don't, they have to go. regardless of, if she had lied to me about something, i appr e approved of, shy would have been fired. >> and this is the first full day of michelle obama's trip to beijing. she met with the chinese president and later his wife. >> the relationships between the united states and china couldn't be more important. and having the opportunity to travel here, to listen, to learn, to hear more about the education initiatives here in this country and to cheer my travels with students throughout the united states is a very unique experience, and it's one that i will never forget. >> mrs. obama tried her hand at calligraphy. she wrote the character for eternal, and then she played a

little ping-pong as well. coming up, president obama makes a pitch to women. >> when michelle and i had our girls, we gave everything we had to try to balance raising a family and chasing careers, but i'll be honest with you. it was harder for her than it was for me. >> it's a good midterm issue, but it is also setting up hillary clinton in 2016? but first, the latest on russia and crukraine has presidt putin officially makes crimea his. but i am so stuffed up, i can't rest. [ male announcer ] nyquil cold and flu liquid gels don't unstuff your nose. they don't? alka seltzer plus night fights your worst cold symptoms, plus has a decongestant. [ inhales deeply ] oh. what a relief it is. [is really what makes it slike two deals in one.he $1,000 fuel reward card salesperson #2: actually, getting a great car with 42 highway miles per gallon makes it like two deals in one. salesperson #1: point is there's never been a better time to buy a jetta tdi clean diesel. avo: during the first ever volkswagen tdi clean diesel event get a great deal on a jetta tdi.

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or, get 24-months interest-free financing. - a new tv... - a laptop... - a game console! female announcer: sleep train's big gift event is ending soon. ♪ sleep train ♪ ♪ your ticket to a better night's sleep ♪ breaking news right now. not only has the u.s. p-8 plane just landed in australia, ending the search for the day, there will be no search with the p-8 tomorrow. joining me on the phone is commander william marx, spo

spokesman for the fleet in the philippines. good to talk to youering commander. thanks very much for joining us. tell us first about the decision not to send the p-8 tomorrow. >> well, it's actually a fairly routine standard operating process. it's plan maintenance. we watch the fatigue levels of our pilots and our air crew very carefully. along with the planes. so you can't keep a human being up for 24 hours, continuously. you can't operate an aircraft continuously. and that's not just the u.s. navy. that's pretty much universal around the world in all military, so we do watch these levels very carefully. and the most important thing for us is to make sure the people and aircraft are both operating in a safe manner. >> so what should we expect? >> tomorrow will be a no-fly day for the p-8.

however, i should let you know, the p-3 will be flying the mission tomorrow. >> what is the typical sort of turnaround? is it one day off and then so many days on? is there kind of a standard operating procedure, commander? >> every situation is different. this mission is certainly unique. it's really unprecedented. i don't think we have seen anything the scope of this before. we actually have quite a few of these planes. they are based or i should say deployed out of oakinawokinawa,. they fly missions all the way north, north of japan, and all the way south through the east china sea, the south china sea, and down towards australia. so these planes, we watch the maintenance and the air crew hours very carefully. and this is just along those same lines. very planned, very much routine maintenance for us. >> let's talk about the actual search as it is, whether it's

for the p-8 or the p-3. what is the actual size of the search area we're working with right now, and how are decisions being made or who is making the decisions about where to position these craft? >> the u.s. navy and seven fleet, we're in a supporting role to the australians here in this southern sector. so they are the lead effort. i can tell you we operate our planes very similarly. they're a very close ally. one thing you have to look at for these flights is the tremendous length and distance out in the search area. so, you know, a typical flight will be about nine hours. and three hours is just to get out there. then they'll have about another three hours on station time, and then three hours back. so quite a long distance out there in the range of 1400, 1500 nautical miles. so it's a very collaborative

effort. very closely coordinated with our close ally, australia. and to be honest, this has been since day one, if you look at how we started in the gulf of thailand, the effort led by malaysia with eight or nine countries and then expanded to the indian ocean. now at 25 or 26 countries. so just a tremendous international effort here. you have to be pretty proud of it. >> william, thank you so much for your time. >> sure thing. thank you. this morning, russian president vladimir putin made it official, signing a law that absorbs cry m crimea into russi and the pentagon has concern that thousands of troops have been moved to the eastern and southern borders with ukraine. one senior u.s. official says while there's no indication the troops are planning to enter the country, they're on a ha hair-trigger close enough to enter the country without warning. joining me now, jim miklaszewski.

the secretary of defense had an hour-long conversation with his russian counterpart yesterday, demanding an explanation for the russian troop build-up. what can you tell us? >> in that call, secretary hagel pressed the defense minister for russia, on just what are those troops doing there. now, that defense minister assured, according to u.s. officials here, assured this defense secretary that these troops are only conducting an exercise and that russia has no intention of invading ukraine. but i can tell you there are many people in this building who don't necessarily buy that explanation. and there's probably the highest level of concern about the possibility of a pending military operation than i have ever seen in this building in recent times. and one of the reasons is for an exercise, they've got more than 20,000 forces, including ground forces, tanks, artillery, and attack helicopters, just a few

kilometers across the ukrainian border inside russia. and as you mentioned, chris, they could easily mount an invasion in the blink of an eye. and there would be no way that the u.s. could have any kind of meaningful advance warning. even if there is an invasion into ukraine. and nobody is predicting that it will happen. but even if there is, there's little that the u.s. can do about it. there certainly wouldn't be a u.s. military response, so then it would end up being the ratcheting up of whatever sanctions, whatever diplomatic measures the u.s. can take. and along that line, the only u.s. military ship that was in the black sea anywhere near crimea left the black sea this morning. the guided missile destroyer, which has rejoined the george h.w. carrier battle group in the mediterranean, chris. >> jim, thank you so much for joining us. i wanted to bring in washington editor at large for the atlantic, steve clemens, and

diplomatic correspondent from the washington post, ann gearrin. thanks to both of you for joining us. look, mick has been there a very long time at the pentagon, when he says, steve, that this is the highest level of concern he has seen and obviously, that there's a lot of skepticism, that these are just exercises, what do you think is going on here? >> we haven't seen vladimir putin even flinch or blink despite all of the phone calls with president obama, despite all of the imposition of sanctions on people close to vladimir putin, at every step in the process, putin has basically activated the pugnacious nationalist part of the russian population and basically celebrated the annexation of crimea, and he's basically said he's concerned about instability in eastern and southern ukraine, which also translates into code that they may rush in with troops to do something. i think jim miklaszewski's concerns and those in the pentagon are right on target. there's not much we can do to stop this rolling train that

vladimir putin has put into play. >> yet the president is trying, and those sanctions that we talked about target 16 senior russian government officials, the heads of state enterprises, a lot of them with long ties to putin. let's start with why that, why now. >> well, chris, the u.s. slapped sanctions on two different groups of people yesterday. a political inner circle around putin, his chief of staff and some of his other top advisers and three businessmen who were longtime friends of putins who have gotten enormously rich off government contracts since he's been in power. also, this state bank, essentially the kremlin's own bank. putin had a joking reference to that today. he basically said, oh, don't worry. i'm going to keep my salary and everything will be fine. he also sent a couple of potentially conciliatory signals to the west, saying he sees no reason to have sanctions on additional u.s. officials beyond

the list of congressmen, senators, and white house staff who were named yesterday. but, as mick said and as steve reiterated, there are troops poised that could move at any moment at the second that putin essentially orders it. and the u.s. would be powerless to do anything about it. >> so what happens next? we put up the list and we can show it again. putin wasted no time firing back. he essentially seems to be laughing in the face of the u.s., and he puts his own sanctions list out there. john boehner, harry reid, john mccain aren't going to be traveling to russia. what's the next step here? >> i think right now we see a tit for tat escalation. the moment we began sanctioning individuals around putin, and a bank around putin, we need to realize that may be a strategy. it seems to me it's something that makes people angry, but it doesn't necessarily affect the behavior of a government. it's a government doing these things, and i think there are

some russian analysts who don't take the west seriously for the way they responded. they say you're basically picking at flies, playing with a couple of oligarchs. this is great power behavior we see unrolling in the sense that russia is essentially reasserting what it believes to be a security zone. it has been angry at the united states from when kosovo was recognized. has felt humiliated at various points, and putin has been courting this confrontation with the west to sort of look like the ronald reagan of russia. to look like this is morning in moscow. we're ascendant and the west can't dictate to us what we'll do. russia has been playing a game with us with snowden, with syria, with other kinds of confrontations and the united states is dealing with each small issue unto themselves. we're going to sanction these individuals and think we're going to knock back russia's strategic game. what we're going to do if we're not going to have a silly escalation is move to something much more strategic and look at

what we're going to do with russia on a global level, and that's what we're not doing. >> when you look at the possible motivation, you know he wants respect. he wants respect for himself, mostly, he wants respect for russia. you look at the big picture, ann, and i'm going to go back, for example, to the olympic games. i thought when i was there, i got there, i could sense a lot of skepticism among the russian people about this huge expenditure of money, and then by the end of the games, when they had been successful, there seemed to be this growing sense of nationalism. does he have the support of his own people? is there a sense within russia that vladimir putin is doing the right thing? >> there is. broadly speaking. he has many critics. even within the very limited strata in which critics are allowed to operate in russia. and there would be as many skeptics who don't voice themselves quite as publicly. >> and who can't be heard in

state-controlled media? >> exactly. they can be heard outside of russia. they can be heard in other ways. certainly as in the case of pussy riot, they make themselves heard, but the underlying sense is yes, there is this long-standing grievance. the west is trying to push us around. ever since the fall of the soviet union, we have been on the back foot. this will show to some extent we're not on the back foot. there's a reason he ordered fireworks today in moscow and crimea. this is a celebration. >> ann and steve, to be continued. thank you both for being with us. have a good weekend. >> thank you. >> thank you. coming up, we're going to go live to perth, australia, we'll check on the search for flight 370. later, as we wait for her big 2016 decision, is hillary keeping other democrats out of the race or protecting them? that debate next. when jake and i first set out on our own, we ate anything. but in time you realize the better you eat,

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we still don't know if those two fuzzy satellite images are pieces of the missing plane, but either way, it does seem like a few major countries are going all in to search that area for malaysia airlines flight 370. just today, china announced it's sending three warships to the coast of australia, japan, and india, and also sending resources, new zealand -- the resources from new zealand, australia, and the u.s. are already there. joining me now, nbc's tom costello. what's the latest? >> the latest, they still have spotted nothing out there, of course, and now it's, what, 10:30 at night in that region. of course, all assets are back down on the ground. and they will again pick up the search tomorrow. but in a little bit of a limited fashion in that they won't have that american p-8, the most advanced sub hunter which was in the skies today in that renalen. tomorrow, saturday, will be down for maintenance, scheduled maintenance there in perth, australia. we had five planes in total searching the area today. three p-3s from australia and

new zealand. also a p-8 from the u.s., and c-130, and you also mentioned the chinese and the international contingent. two chinese aircraft expected on saturday. two japanese aircraft also expected on saturday. the whole point here is that this is the best lead they've got, but they don't have any concrete evidence that in fact there is debris there. what they have are these two grainy satellite images taken now five days ago. five days ago, which purported to show something that could be big enough to be from that plane. but you know, there are also experts who say even pieces that big, if they're metal, and if they have been in the ocean for a considerable period of time, and if they have started to take on water, in other words, a wing, they could sink. they may not still be there. so they may really be looking for such tiny minuscule pieces in a vast ocean, one of the biggest oceans, of course, on the planet. and in one of the most remote locations.

so we are at this point standing down as we watch to see when the australians will pick the search back up again. and also, we should say, norwegian ship that was in the immediate vicinity as soon as the word went out that there may be wreckage there, this norwegian cargo ship immediately diverted, started looking, it has spotted nothing either. >> tom costello, thank you. let's go to perth, australia. that's where nbc chief global correspondent bill neely is following the latest developments. to what tom was saying, what is the level of confidence there, that they're putting all these vast resources into this one area, and as you well known, there's been some criticism about that focus and about whether sort of there was an oversense of hope given to this satellite imagery? >> well, it is very difficult, isn't it? the malaysian government has been absolutely slammed and hammered for giving too little information. tony abbott, the australian

prime minister, is now under pressure because it's being seen that perhaps he raised expectations a little too high by identifying those pieces, those two images on satellite. but today, he was almost ratcheting back on that, trying to lower expectations. saying, look, there are a lot of containers in the ocean in that area. containers that have fallen off ships and that is true. he was saying also, this is just about the most inaccessible spot on earth, and again, that is true. one australian aviation expert saying you couldn't pick a more difficult location to conduct a search like this. the swell, the sea swell is high, the waves can reach 100 feet. the current is strong. the winds can be strong. indeed, the search crews yesterday were describing really difficult weather conditions. a little bit more better today with crews able to see six miles or so. but tony abbott definitely on the defensive, but saying we're throwing everything at it, and

we will do as much as we can because the families demand that of us. >> bill noly, thank you so much for that update. now to my must-read today. it's in honor of march madness. i'm going to give a shout out to the members of my team who go to syracuse because they had a good day yesterday. what i must-read, the history of the buffalo chicken wing. for example, they have been around for less than 20 years. calvin trillen's marvelously entertaining story is my must-read. it's on our facebook page. check it out. mayo? corn dogs? you are so outta here! aah! [ female announcer ] the complete balanced nutrition of great-tasting ensure. 24 vitamins and minerals, antioxidants, and 9 grams of protein. [ bottle ] ensure®. nutrition in charge™. [ male announcer ] the rhythm of life. [ whistle blowing ] where do you hear that beat? campbell's healthy request soup lets you hear it in your heart. [ basketball bouncing ] heart healthy. [ m'm... ] great taste. [ tapping ] sounds good. campbell's healthy request. m'm! m'm! good.®

so many people asking this question this morning. how is a teenager able to breach what is supposed to be one of the most secure sites in america? happened early sunday morning. 16-year-old justin was able to make his way to the top of the new world trade center. despite all the security cameras around 4:00 a.m., he sneaks through a one-foot-wide hole in the construction fence. then he scales a scaffold to the

sixth floor, rides an elevator to the 88th, and then he walks up the staircase to the 104th floor and got by a security guard. the port authority describes him as inattentive. yeah. then he climbs a ladder to the antenna. why do all this? a man who has known him since sixth grade said he's an aden ln junky. >> i was walking in from lunch and i saw him hanging out of the third floor window by one hand, waving at everyone. >> he now faces a misdemeanor charge of criminal tres pass that could send him to jail for 90 days. the guard on duty on the 103rd floor, well, he's looking for a new job. by the way, if you are wondering, yes, that building isn't open yet. >> first day, first friday, anyway, of march madness. forbes is taking a look at the most valuable college basketball teams. here they are, number five, the

indiana hoosiers worth just shy of $25.5 million. north carolina's tar heels have dropped to number four. the kentucky wildcats value has surged in recent years. now leveling off at number three. the kansas jayhawks, runners up at $33 million, and the louisville cardinals are number one for the third straight year, worth $39.5 million. that bad? i dropped 2 balls, mom. eye on the ball! that's all it is. eye on the ball. that's a good tip. i'll try it. by the way, bill... this is delicious! so many grilled tastes and textures. and all the nutrition i need. go on. no really. top notch. (laughing) there it is - there ya go. new american grill from kibbles 'n bits... go together like... food 'n family.

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president obama working to shore up his party's popularity among women voters. he's been outlining key steps to boost economic opportunities. >> this is a family agenda, but it starts with making sure every woman is getting a fair shot. it's time for a woman's economic agenda that grows our economy for everybody. now, that begins with making sure women receive equal pay for equal work. >> meantime, a politico article

is raising the question of whether hillary clinton is giving democrats a fair shot in 2016. critics say she's freezing the democratic presidential field as she waits to decide whether to run. but supporters say it's just the opposite. quote, the former first lady is shielding other prospective democratic contenders from months of attacks and scrutiny they would probably face without her in the picture. joining me snow, washington bureau sheaf for the sun times, lynn sweet, and politics editor shira center. good morning, ladies. >> good morning. >> let's start with the president's focus on women and you don't have to look far to figure out why he's doing it. so the latest nbc/wall street journal poll shows republicans have a one-point lead on a congressional generic ballot, but trailing among women, lynn, by 11 points. that's the same margin they lost women voters in the 2012 presidential race. what does president obama think he can do to help democrats with women in 2016? 2014, sorry. >> i think what he's trying to

do in 2014, and by extension then, 2016, is to do things that appeal particularly to independent women, suburban women, swing voters, shore up that support, keep them energized. keep them in play in a sense. now, none of this women's agenda that i think the white house in a sense is repackaging is new. my goodness, as we know and shira knows, the first bill he signed when he came to office was the lilly ledbetter fair pay act. >> but the problem obviously is shira, when you look at the numbers that show some skepticism about democrats, then women become even more important. and in 2012, 53% of voters were women. the republican response has been, isn't it that the real war on women is being waged by democrats because the economy isn't doing well? which seems to be what the president is responding to. >> right, so what i think is fascinating, really, about the last couple cycles and what

democrats have done to appeal to female voters is the shift to economic issues, right? the president also mentioned the same things, equal pay and the state of the union as well. this has bieen something he talked about in the 2012 race, too. we shifted from abortion issues to economic issues. that's part of the argument, which is? trusting because it's been curious to see how republicans respond to this, right? the past, they have been able to respond to the abortion, they have a party platform issue, but the economics issue mixes that up for them. >> you can't have a conversation about women voters without mentioning hillary clinton. maggie looks at whether clinton has frozen the democratic field by taking all the attention away from other potential 2016 candidates or whether she's acting as a human shield, essentially protecting other contenders from months of scrutiny and attacks because she's the focus. lynn, what do you think? >> well, i think both are true. it's not as if hillary clinton made a calculated choice to do

this, to either be a shield or an arrow on this one. so the reality is in campaigns, people have to put themselves out there. and if a cuomo or an o'malley, new york, and the maryland governors or whoever is out there thinks they want to be the stand-by candidate, it is really up to them to create the situation, the environment. and the reality is, yeah, hillary clinton is out there taking most of the attention. that's what campaigns and strategy is about. >> if she decides not to run, that's valuable time that's been lost by the other folks to line up staff, to line up donors. >> exactly. i don't buy the supporters' argument that she's shielding the rest of the field because what she's also doing is freezing up the money race as well. all of the democratic donors are sitting on the sidelines waiting for her to maim a decision, and a lot of the alternative candidates, whoever they might be, would prefer to be raising money and talking to those very same donors so they can set up their own race.

i'll also note that hillary clinton, if she doesn't run, the field is completely wide open. the bench after her is, i would say, in many ways relatively weak in terms of someone who could found a national campaign quickly and effectively in an organized manner. >> except maybe joe biden, maybe. >> thank you, ladies. have a great weekend. >> thank you. >> thank you. it's getting close to tax crunch time. 26 days until you need to file your tax return. need some motivation? how about this? the irs just announced that nearly $760 million in unclaimed refunds may be due to more than 900,000 people who didn't file their last return in 2010. but uncle sam will get to keep it if the 2010 return isn't filed by this year's tax deadline. here to talk taxes is cnbc personal finance correspondent sharon epperson. great to have you here. >> great to be here. >> the moral of the story is file your tax returns. >> don't leave the money on your

table. you have three years to file an amended return. if you find things and say, wait, i could have saved on this last year, think about filing an amended return, but do it within three years. >> let's talk about this year's return, because there are ways to save money. depends on where you are in your life. let's startnewlyweds. >> a lot has changed in your life. one thing is you're going to have to do your taxes two ways to figure out the best option. there are two options. married filing jointly or married filing separately. this is particularly important for newlyweds who are same-sex couples because this is the first time they can file their taxes this way under the irs rule. a lot of single people also take the standard deduction, which may not be what you want to do if you're a married couple. think about itemizing. >> let's talk about panchts. some of those rules have changed about the kinds of breaks you get if you have kids. >> right off the back, you get $3,900 personal exemption for your child, but you may also

qualify for a child tax credit. that's up to $1,000 for kids 16 and under. that if you're working and you need someone to take care of your child, daycare, at-home care, summer day camp if your child is 12 or younger, you might qualify for the dependent care credit, and a lot of parents sending their kids to college are like, what can i get? i'm paying so much in tuition. you want to look at the american opportunity credit. that will give you credit for $2500. that's something you can have for the first four years of liege and there's also the lifetime learning credit, a tuition and fees credit. you can only take one per student. >> a lot of people postponing retirement because of their finances. one of the things you want to look at in that whole big package is tax breaks when you retire. >> definitely look at tax breaks and one of the biggest ones off the bat is the fact you can still contribute until april 15th to a traditional ira. a lot of folks may not realize they still have time to do that. for those who are 50 and over,

that's $6500 you can put into this ira. you can also put about $5500 for everyone else. the other thing to think about is ira rollovers because you may have money in the ira fund and you may want to take it out tax-free in retirement. you will have to pay taxes up front on the money, but you can take it out after 59 1/2 tax free. the roth ira rolling over from a traditional to a roth irs is something some people want to consider. and there's another break for seniors that is really only for them this year, if you're 65 or older in terms of medical expense deductions. you need to have 7.5% of your gross income, the threshold you have to reach to claim that deduction. for everyone else, it's 10%, the threshold is much higher. so seniors need to realize they can still take advantage of the lower threshold in terms of claiming the deduction for their medical expenses, which is as health care costs rise, very important to be able to do. >> great advice, sharon. thank you for coming in. >> my pleasure.

>> our tweet of the day marks twitter's eighth birthday. they created a feature that lets you easily look up your first tweet. here's my. i may be the most technophobic anchor, but i'm excited to be joining twitter. we looked up vladimir putin's tweet. congratulations to u.s. president-elect barack obama. how things have changed. ♪ [ girl ] my mom, she makes underwater fans that are powered by the moon. ♪ she can print amazing things, right from her computer. [ whirring ] [ train whistle blows ] she makes trains that are friends with trees.

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to politics now where president obama told talk show host ellen degeneres his job is nothing like the show "house of cards." >> if you followed me most of my day is sitting in a room listening to a bunch of folks in gray suits talking about a whole bunch of stuff that wouldn't make very good television. >> no. well that's what i do, and we make great television. right?

>> i have to tell you, though, ellen, there is not much dancing in the situation room. >> no? >> as a general rule. >> however, there is dancing going on in one congressional office. check out john lewis showing off his moves to pharrell's song "happy." ♪ >> you wish you had those moves. that wraps up this hour of "jansing & co." i'm chris jansing. "news nation" with tamron hall is up next with the crime stoppers chief who ate his tip. . a backyard invasion. homeowner takes matters into his own hands. ♪ ortho weed b gon max. with the one-touch, continuous spray wand... kills weeds without harming innocent lawns. guaranteed. weeds killed. lawn restored. justice served. weed b gon max with the one-touch wand.

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new bounty. the no-quit picker-upper. [ mom ] why use more, when you can use less. how was prugh.ce? that bad? i dropped 2 balls, mom. eye on the ball! that's all it is. eye on the ball. that's a good tip. i'll try it. by the way, bill... this is delicious! so many grilled tastes and textures. and all the nutrition i need. go on. no really. top notch. (laughing) there it is - there ya go. new american grill from kibbles 'n bits... go together like... food 'n family. good morning, everyone. i'm tamron hall and this is "news nation." we begin with the latest on the search for malaysia air flight 370. the aerial search for two pieces of possible debris spotted by satellite has been called off for the night. it's now just after 11:00 p.m.

in the search area in the southern indian ocean. so far, one norwegian cargo ship is still in that area searching. and here's australian prime minister tony abbott earlier today. >> we have been throwing everything we've got at that area to try to learn more about what this debris might be. it's about the most inaccessible spot you could imagine on the face of the earth. but if there is anything down there, we will find it. we owe it to the families of those people to do no less. >> and speaking of the families and what's being seen as a very insensitive move, we're learning chinese family members of the missing passengers and crew, they have been forced to change hotel rooms in kuala lumpur because of the formula one racing circuit in town. nbc's tom costello has been following this for us. let's start with why the search was called off for the night. was this due to