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Nearly 70 percent of Americans say they are concerned about illegal immigration, and more than half think the government should do more to prevent illegal immigrants from coming into the country. But there are experts on both sides of the political divide who say cracking down may not be a solution -- for both practical and economic reasons. While both President Bush and Sen. John Kerry support versions of guest worker programs, the public isn't convinced. NPR's Marcus Rosenbaum reports.

Paul Nitze, a leading U.S. statesman of the Cold War era, has died at 97. A wealthy, scholarly member of the Eastern establishment who served Republican and Democratic administrations, Nitze held numerous government posts over 40 years. He became a central architect of U.S. nuclear deterrence policies. NPR's Michele Kelemen reports.

Bernardo Bertolucci's The Dreamers has been given an NC-17 rating for its explicit sexual content. Bertolucci says he preferred to get that rating rather than cut scenes from the movie. But most filmmakers would rather trim than have their films limited by theatres who won't run NC-17 movies, and newspapers that won't run NC-17 ads. NPR's Kim Masters reports.

NPR's Michele Kelemen reports Secretary of State Colin Powell is putting a bit of distance between his pre-war views on the alleged weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and the growing evidence that there were none. A year ago in a speech at the United Nations, Powell insisted that known facts proved the Iraqi threat of WMD. Today he admits that if knew then what he knows today he might not have been so ready to go to war.

In the third and final story in our series profiling California's Inland Empire, NPR's Scott Horsley reports that this sprawling region east of Los Angeles and north of San Diego has one of the fastest-growing economies in the nation. Affordable housing has drawn commuters from the coast, who in turn attracted small businesses. Then good highways and railroads turned the Inland Empire into a major distribution center. Now the question is whether it can climb the economic ladder by attracting high-paying jobs.

Last month, NASA shocked the astronomy world by canceling a repair mission to the Hubble Space Telescope. That decision all but sealed the observatory's fate to a slow death in orbit. But as NPR's Richard Harris reports, astronomers aren't giving up yet.

The Bush administration makes its first detailed security offer to North Korea, as negotiations resume on that country's development of nuclear weapons. Under the plan, North Korea would receive aid if it agrees to dismantle its program. The United States would also provide assurances that it won't invade the North or overthrow President Kim Jong Il. NPR's Vicky O'Hara reports.

The Senate Indian Affairs Committee grilled a lobbyist, who, with his business partner, collected millions of dollars in fees from tribes operating casinos. Jack Abramoff, who has close ties to House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination as senators read back e-mails where Abramoff made insulting and racist remarks about Native Americans. NPR's John Ydstie reports.

New images of Saturn's outer moon, Phoebe, reveal a complex and puzzling chunk of ice and rock. The Cassini space probe snapped the images on its way to a four-year rendezvous with Saturn. NPR's Richard Harris reports.

The government has set new recommendatins for cholesterol levels, lowering the threshold for getting treatment. The idea is to save lives by using drugs more aggressively to lower patients' LDL cholesterol levels. NPR's Joanne Silberner reports.