Now that we’re two weeks into 2010 and the Obama administration’s end of 2009 deadline for progress with Iran is quickly disappearing in the rear view mirror, one would expect that the administration would be moving towards the “crippling sanctions” that Secretary of State Clinton threatened Iran with for most of 2009.

Instead, there are reports that the administration is still flirting with a possible deal to transfer some of Iran’s low enriched uranium out of the country.  As Laura Rozen at Politico notes, this comes as the vaunted P5+1 group of countries supposedly working together to resolve the Iranian nuclear crisis is increasingly becoming a group of five rather than six.  She writes that the Chinese may not be able to attend a meeting planned for Saturday in New York.  It’s worth noting that the Chinese also bailed on a planned P5+1 meeting in December.