New Haven, CT Will Issue Identification Cards to Illegal Immigrants

Now some fresh pickings from the Political Grapevine:

Haven for Illegals?

The city of New Haven, Connecticut will issue legal identification cards to illegal immigrants. Monday the Board of Aldermen approved the program — believed to be the first of its kind in the nation. The ID cards would give illegals access to city services and permit them to open bank accounts. City officials say that will allow the area's 15,000 illegals to avoid carrying cash around and becoming robbery victims.

Mayor John DeStefano told a TV station — "The city's not trying to set its own foreign policy here. What's happening is we're dealing with a failing national immigration policy."

Global Warming Comments

NASA Administrator Michael Griffin is apologizing for comments he made last week that global warming may not be a problem that requires human intervention — but he's not saying he was wrong.

Griffin was soundly ripped by many scientists who believe human activity causes climate change and that it is very dangerous. Griffin said earlier this week in a closed-door meeting at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena that he was sorry for airing his personal views —"Unfortunately, this is an issue which has become far more political than technical and it would have been well for me to have stayed out of it."

Griffin said it is NASA's job to provide scientific evidence about global warming — and leave the decisions about what to do with it up to policymakers.

No Tiananmen References

It is against the law in China for the media to make any reference to the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown on pro-democracy protesters — which left hundreds or even thousands dead.

Many young people in China have no knowledge of it at all. And so when a young clerk responsible for the classified section in a southwestern Chinese newspaper received an ad referring to the anniversary, she allowed it to be printed.

The ad in the Chengdu Evening News on Monday night, the anniversary of the massacre, read — "Paying tribute to the strong-willed mothers of June 4 victims."

Another Chinese paper reports the woman had never heard of the crackdown — and when she called the man who purchased the ad and questioned him — he said it referred to a mining disaster.

Switch Off Lights

Al Gore's idea to have everyone watching his upcoming Live Earth concerts switch off their lights at the same time has been vetoed by the people who run Britain's electrical grid.

They say that if all those people turned the lights back on around the same time, it could cause a power surge that might overload circuits and endanger hospital patients on life support machines.

Gore has also dropped the idea of making live appearances at concerts in the U.S. and England because of criticism over the gas-guzzling jet flight that would be necessary.

—FOX News Channel's Martin Hill contributed to this report.