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Today is Friday, December 13, the 348th day of 2024. There are 18 days left in the year.
Today in history:
On December 13, 2003, Saddam Hussein was captured by American forces while hiding in a hole under a farm in Adwar, Iraq, near his hometown of Tikrit.
Also on this date:
In 1862, Union forces under Major General Ambrose Burnside launched futile attacks on entrenched Confederate soldiers during the Battle of Fredericksburg in the Civil War; the badly defeated northern forces withdrew two days later.
In 1937, during the Second Sino-Japanese War, Japanese soldiers murdered an estimated 200,000 to 300,000 civilians, war prisoners and soldiers in the Chinese city of Nanjing.
In 1996, the UN Security Council elected Ghana’s Kofi Annan as the world organization’s seventh Secretary General.
In 2000, Republican George W. Bush claimed the presidency a day after the U.S. Supreme Court halted further recounts of disputed ballots in Florida; Democrat Al Gore conceded and called for national unity.
In 2001, the Pentagon publicly released a captured videotape of Osama bin Laden, in which the al-Qaeda leader said the death and destruction wrought by the September 11 attacks exceeded his “most optimistic” expectations.
In 2007, Major League Baseball’s Mitchell Report was released, identifying 85 names to varying degrees in connection with the alleged use of performance-enhancing drugs.
In 2014, thousands of protesters marched in New York, Washington and other US cities to draw attention to the killings of unarmed black men by white police officers.
In 2019, the House Judiciary Committee approved two articles of impeachment accusing President Donald Trump of abuse of power in his dealings with Ukraine and obstruction of Congress in the investigation that followed.
In 2022, President Joe Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act which provides federal recognition and protection for same-sex and interracial marriages, saying that “the law, and the love it defends, strikes a blow against hate in all its forms.”
Today’s Birthdays:
- Actor-comedian Dick Van Dyke is 99.
- Music/film producer Lou Adler is 91.
- Singer-TV presenter John Davidson is 83.
- Baseball Hall of Famer Ferguson Jenkins is 82.
- Rock musician Jeff ‘Skunk’ Baxter is 76.
- Rock musician Ted Nugent is 76.
- Country singer-musician Randy Owen (Alabama) is 75.
- Actor Wendie Malick is 74.
- U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack is 74.
- Former Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke is 71.
- Country musician John Anderson is 70.
- Actor Steve Buscemi (boo-SEH’-mee) is 67.
- Singer-actor Morris Day is 67.
- Football Hall of Famer Richard Dent is 64.
- Actor-comedian Jamie Foxx is 57.
- Actor-reality TV star NeNe Leakes is 57.
- Hockey Hall of Famer Sergei Fedorov is 55.
- Rock singer-musician Tom Delonge (Blink-182) is 49.
- Rock singer Amy Lee (Evanescence) is 43.
- Singer-songwriter Taylor Swift is 35.
- Actor Maisy Stella is 21.