Iran said on Monday it is considering plans to build two new uranium enrichment plants concealed inside mountains to avert air strikes, drawing condemnation from the United States.

The announcement from Iran's atomic chief Ali Akbar Salehi came soon after top US General David Petraeus warned that Washington would now pursue a "pressure track" against Iran to thwart its galloping nuclear programme.

"Inshallah (God willing), in the next Iranian year (starting in March) as ordered by the president we may start the construction of two new enrichment sites," Salehi told ISNA news agency.

Last November, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced Iran would build 10 new uranium enrichment plants, after Tehran was strongly rebuked by world powers for building a second enrichment plant near the Shiite holy city of Qom.

Salehi said the enrichment capacities of the new sites would be similar to the existing facility in the central city of Natanz, where a defiant Tehran is refining uranium

A modest job-creation bill advanced in the U.S. Senate on Monday as the chamber's newest Republican bucked his party and sided with Democrats on a $15 billion package of tax cuts and highway spending.

Republican Scott Brown joined four other Republicans, 55 Democrats and two independents to overcome a procedural hurdle that sets up a final vote later this week.

Brown was widely hailed as a conservative hero after his surprise victory in Massachusetts last month gave Republicans enough seats to block most Democratic legislation.
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Some conservative hero, right?

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was dismissive of the Tea Party movement in a “This Week” exclusive interview with Terry Moran. "The Tea Party is not going to go anywhere,” Schwarzenegger told Moran. “I think the Tea Party is all about just an expression of anger and dissatisfaction.”
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The Tea Party movement is too splintered and disorganized to be an effective national force. However, it may affect some isolated small state GOP primary elections – like Nevada's Senate race.

Study claimed in 2009 that sea levels would rise by up to 82cm by the end of century – but the report's author now says true estimate is still unknown
Scientists have been forced to withdraw a study on projected sea level rise due to global warming after finding mistakes that undermined the findings.

The study, published in 2009 in Nature Geoscience, one of the top journals in its field, confirmed the conclusions of the 2007 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It used data over the last 22,000 years to predict that sea level would rise by between 7cm and 82cm by the end of the century.
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The science needs to be reviewed by an independent panel of climate experts – an open series of cenferences

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee blasted the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Saturday as outdated, nearly corrupt and unrepresentative of the conservative movement.

Huckabee, a 2008 Republican presidential contender and potential 2012 candidate who had spoken at the conference for years, said the reason he blew it off this year was that the meeting has become dominated by libertarian activists.

“CPAC has becoming increasingly more libertarian and less Republican over the last years, one of the reasons I didn’t go this year,” Huckabee said in an interview with Fox News, where he is a paid analyst and has his own show.
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And, it is held in the middle of winter in D.C. Ugh!

The death knell for CPAC and the ACU?

Israel’s Air Force on Sunday introduced a fleet of huge pilotless planes that can remain in the air for a full day and fly as far as the Persian Gulf, putting Iran within their range.

The new aircraft, called the Heron TP, has a wingspan of 86 feet, making it the size of a Boeing 737 jetliner and the largest unmanned aircraft in Israel’s military.

The commander of Israel’s Air Force, Maj. Gen. Ido Nehushtan, said the aircraft “has the potential to be able to conduct new missions down the line as they become relevant.”

Israel’s military refused to disclose the size of the new fleet or whether it was designed for use against Iran.
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Designed for use against Iran is the best bet

Ha ha! 50 votes in 60 days! Good one. Remember when they were going to have it done before they took their summer break?

It’s Reid via The Hill, on how they are going to get that health care thing through in two months, using procedural tactics to push it through with a simple majority, bypassing the usual 60-vote filibuster barrier:

“I’ve had many conversations this week with the president, his chief of staff, and Speaker Pelosi,” Reid said during an appearance Friday evening on “Face to Face with Jon Ralston” in Nevada. “And we’re really trying to move forward on this.”
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And, the Dems will self-destruct if they use budget reconciliation – go ahead my friends.

WINNERS

The Tea Party Movement: Virtually every speaker paid homage to a movement that remains loosely defined, praising fiscal restraint and a renewed energy among activists protesting the Obama admin's policies. The media had fun interviewing the guy in the tri-cornered hat and "Don't Tread On Me" flag, but GOP leaders are doing their best to incorporate, and kowtow to, the movement. Anyone who can show they lead a local Tea Party group is leaving CPAC with an enormous sense of power, and the GOP is all too happy oblige.

Ex-MA Gov. Mitt Romney: He didn't win the CPAC straw poll, but Romney came in second place to a contender no one believes is serious about running in WH'12 — Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX). Romney gave a well-regarded speech that fired up the crowd more than most of his potential '12 rivals, and his showing, 3 times more than ex-AK Gov. Sarah Palin (R), demonstrates he still has a following among the influential group of activists.
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Tim Pawlenty did not make a splash

The New York Times noted in observing Buckley's passing: "Mr. Buckley's greatest achievement was making conservatism — not just electoral Republicanism, but conservatism as a system of ideas — respectable in liberal postwar America. He mobilized the young enthusiasts who helped nominate Mr. Goldwater in 1964 and saw his dreams fulfilled when Mr. Reagan and the Bushes captured the Oval Office." (Emphasis added.)

As one of the leading organs of the Eastern Liberal Establishment, the Times unquestionably played a key role in granting Buckley the keys to the kingdom of "respectability" (whatever that means in contemporary society) by which he might possess the power to admit (or deny) an entire political spectrum passage through the pearly gates guarded by alumni of Ivy League universities and members of the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations.
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Read it all and understand why the nuts/extremists from the JBS should be shunned from the conservative movement

The annual Conservative Political Action Conference is a great event attended by just about everybody who is anybody in the conservative movement. It also attracts a lot of college students who aspire to make a contribution to the movement.

ABC's Jonathan Karl reports that this year's CPAC event was co-sponsored, unbelievably to me, by the John Birch Society. Karl quotes some of Buckley's characteristically vibrant denunciations of the JBS. "Two years after Buckley's death," Karl observes, "the John Birch Society is no longer banished; it is listed as one of about 100 co-sponsors of the 2010 CPAC."

Karl reasonably asks: "Why is the Birch Society a co-sponsor?"

"They're a conservative organization," according to Lisa Depasquale, the CPAC Director for the American Conservative Union, which runs CPAC. "Beyond that," she told Karl, "I have no comment."

Additional comment is required, and if Depasquale will not provide it, I will. This is a disgrace.
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Disgraceful indeed