The Senate met in an unusual Saturday session to vote on two tax proposals doomed to fail from the start.

Bottled water could get a few cents more expensive in Florida under a proposed surcharge to pay for environmental cleanup work.

Campaigning for governor, Rick Scott wasnt particularly courteous when talking about President Barack Obama, whose policies he slammed on the campaign trail. But somehow the incoming governor was surprised this week to be left waiting for a courtesy call from Obama that never came: a heads-up about a ban on new drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.

The pieces seem to be falling into place for Senate President Mike Haridopolos to make a run for U.S. Senate in 2012.

The Senate and House spent much of this week behind closed doors discussing the tax deductions that will expire in a few weeks. These Bush tax cuts that became law in 2001 and 2003 number in the 60s.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced Friday that the unemployment rate rose to 9.8 percent for November, an increase from Octobers 9.6 percent figure -- and congressional Republicans have opened fire on the Obama team.

While international affairs has not been one of the chief hallmarks of either his presidential bid in 2008 or the efforts he has been making to run for the Republican presidential nomination again in 2012, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney took aim at one of President Barack Obamas major foreign initiatives.

Two weeks after legislators passed a law enabling more stringent legislative oversight of the rulemaking process of state agencies, the new law is already having the effect of delaying some new regulations.

The Florida Commission on Ethics settled its case against Senate President Mike Haridopolos on Friday.