SANFORD RETURNS!  —  Gov. Mark Sanford is set to return to South Carolina tomorrow.  AP Photo/Mary Ann Chastain  —  South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford will return to the state tomorrow after spending the last five days hiking the Appalachian Trail, according to a statement released by his office this morning.

About Last Night  —  I've been receiving a steady stream of favorable emails from Iranian-Americans regarding my appearance on Larry King last night.  They're delighted that I made it clear that Iran is different from the other countries in the region—better educated, more sophisticated …

Obama calls on HuffPost for Iran question UPDATE  —  In what appeared to be a coordinated exchange, President Obama called on the Huffington Post's Nico Pitney near the start of his press conference and requested a question directly about Iran.  —  “Nico, I know you and all across the Internet …

Why Obama's sudden news conference today?  And what he'll say  —  You don't need to be a basketball-loving president of the United States to know that if you're trying to block opponents' shots in your end, you sure aren't increasing your own totals.  You can't score points on D.

Son's Death Has Iranian Family Asking Why  —  TEHRAN—The family, clad in black, stood at the curb of the road sobbing.  A middle-aged mother slapped her cheeks, letting out piercing wails.  The father, a frail man who worked as a doorman at a clinic in central Tehran, wept quietly with his head bowed.

Mousavi, Celebrated in Iranian Protests, Was the Butcher of Beirut  —  He may yet turn out to be the avatar of Iranian democracy, but three decades ago Mir-Hossein Mousavi was waging a terrorist war on the United States that included bloody attacks on the U.S. embassy and Marine Corps barracks in Beirut.

They Blame America Anyway  —  In an interview broadcast on CBS's The Early Show Monday morning, President Obama was asked about his administration's response to the protests in Iran.  “The last thing that I want to do is to have the United States be a foil for those forces inside Iran …

Iranian leaders will always believe Anglo-Saxons are plotting against them. … - There is nothing at all that any Western country can do to avoid the charge of intervening in Iran's foreign affairs.  The deep belief that everything—especially anything in English—is already and by definition …

Testy  —  An animated and testy President Obama during this presser.  Partly a function, I think, of him pushing back hard on two media/GOP narratives: one, that he's not been strong enough on Iran so that his recent harsher rhetoric amounts to a shift in his position; and, two …

Bolton Slams Obama For Being ‘Timid’ On Iran, Then Admits U.S. Options Limited Because Of Bush's Failures  —  Yesterday on Fox News, Sean Hannity and former U.N. ambassador John Bolton joined the right-wing chorus hitting President Obama's response to the Iranian election crisis.

Iran bans election protest footballers  —  Ali Karimi, Mehdi Mahdavikia and two others are ‘retired’ after sporting green wristbands in World Cup qualifier in Seoul  —  Their gesture attracted worldwide comment and drew the attention of football fans to Iran's political turmoil.

Rubio's curious Tweet  —  Twitter hasn't always been a politician's best friend — see Republican Rep. Pete Hoekstra's comparison of House Republican floor rebellions to the uprising in Iran or Newt Gingrich calling Sonia Sotomayor a “racist.”  —  Florida Senate candidate Marco Rubio …

President Obama Holds Press Conference  —  Opens with Discussion on Health-Care, Iranian Elections and Energy Policy  —  [*] OBAMA: Hello, everybody.  Good afternoon, everybody.  —  Today, I want to start by addressing three issues, and then I'll take your questions.

Iranian authorities scramble to negate Neda Soltan ‘martyrdom’  —  The Iranian authorities have ordered the family of a student shot dead in Tehran to take down mourning posters as they struggle to stop her becoming the rallying point for protests against the presidential election.

Obama's Political Operation To Launch Big Database Of Health Care Stories  —  In a major new effort to throw Obama's campaign apparatus into the push for health care reform, the White House's political operation is set to launch a massive new online data bank of thousands of health care stories …

Clinton toils in the shadows  —  Back last fall, when Barack Obama sprang his surprise about naming former rival Hillary Clinton as his secretary of state, many people assumed she would be the Cabinet's brightest star — a celebrity at large on the world stage, the face of American foreign policy …

Through the Looking Glass With Andrew Sullivan  —  Perhaps the single, common life goal of every intellectual, pseudo-intellectual, and intellectual aspirant, is to be a true Renaissance man — a genius whose force of will and flexible, dominating intellect allows him to master or nearly master …

Top Clerical Council in Iran Rejects Plea to Annul Vote  —  CAIRO — Iran's most powerful oversight council has refused to nullify the contested presidential election just one day after it announced that the number of votes in 50 cities exceeded the number of eligible voters there by three million …

Dennis Ross Expands His Portfolio  —  Remember when the Washington Institute for Near East Policy announced Jan. 7 how happy they were that Dennis B. Ross, a senior official in the pro-Israel think tank, was going to get some kind of uber-job, “designed especially for him,” …