AND NOW FOR THE GROWN-UP WORLD – AT 9:21 A.M. ET:  Just thought you'd like to be kept up to date on land-use plans in Iran:

TEHRAN, Iran – Iran said Monday it has decided where to build 10 new uranium enrichment sites inside protected mountain strongholds and will start construction on the first in March, defying international efforts to curb its nuclear program.

Enriching uranium creates fuel for nuclear power plants but can also, if taken to higher levels, produce the material for weapons and Iran's growing capacity in this process is at the center of its dispute with the international community.

The U.N. Security Council has already passed four sets of sanctions against Iran to try and force it to stop enriching uranium.

Last year, Iran flouted international concerns by claiming it would build 10 new enrichment plants and Monday's announcement revealed that the sites had been chosen and would be inside mountains, without revealing any other details.

"Construction of a new uranium enrichment site will begin by the end of the (Iranian) year (March) or early next year," Vice President Ali Akbar Salehi said. "The new enrichment facilities will be built inside mountains."

COMMENT:  Iran is moving toward the bomb, and that will dwarf all other issues.  While some economic reports suggest that the new round of sanctions is being felt in Tehran, there has been no indication that they have given the mullahs any second thoughts about pursuing their nuclear dreams. 

We learned in the last few days that Russia will begin loading uranium fuel rods into the Iranian plant at Bushehr on August 21st.  Once the fuel is in, an attack on the plant becomes extremely problematical because radioactive material will be spewed into the air.  America's former ambassador to the UN, the great John Bolton, says, "Iran will achieve something that no other opponent of Israel, no other enemy of the United States in the Middle East really has and that is a functioning nuclear reactor."

One more famous victory for the reach out-and-go-touchy-feely foreign policy of the Obama administration.

August 17, 2010