TODAY IN HISTORY
Today is Thursday, There are 23 days left in the year.
8. Today’s highlight: On this date: Dec.
On Dec. 8, 1941, the United States entered World War II as Congress declared war against Imperial Japan, a day after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
In 1765, Eli Whitney, inventor of the cotton gin, was born in Westborough, Massachusetts.
In 1886, the American Federation of Labor was founded in Columbus, Ohio.
In 1980, rock star and former Beatle John Lennon was shot to death outside his New York City apartment building by Mark David Chapman.
In 1987, President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev signed a treaty at the White House calling for destruction of intermediate-range nuclear missiles.
In 1991, AIDS patient Kimberly Bergalis, who had contracted the disease from her dentist, died in Fort Pierce, Florida, at age 23.
In 2001, the U.S. Capitol was reopened to tourists after a two-month security shutdown.
In 2008, in a startling about-face, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed told the Guantanamo war crimes tribunal he would confess to master- minding the Sept. 11 attacks; four other men also aban- doned their defenses.
In 2011, the 161-day NBA lockout ended when owners and players ratified the new collective bargaining agreement.
In 2014, the U.S. and NATO ceremonially ended their combat mission in Afghanistan, 13 years after the Sept. 11 terror attacks sparked their invasion of the country to topple the Taliban-led government.
In 2016, John Glenn, whose 1962 flight as the first U.S. astronaut to orbit the Earth made him an all-American hero and propelled him to a long career in the U.S. Senate, died in Columbus, Ohio, at age 95.
In 2020, the Supreme Court rejected Republicans’ last-gasp bid to reverse Pennsylvania’s certification of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory in the electoral battleground; the court refused to call into question the certification process in the state.
Ten years ago: Police charged Dallas Cowboys defensive lineman Josh Brent with intoxication manslaughter after he flipped his car in a pre-dawn accident that killed teammate Jerry Brown. (Brent was convicted in Jan. 2014 and sentenced to 180 days in jail; he was reinstated by the NFL in Sept. 2014.)
Five years ago: Japanese pitching and hitting star Shohei Ohtani announced that he would sign with the Los Angeles Angels.
One year ago: President Joe Biden signed an executive order to make the federal government carbon-neutral by 2050, aiming for a 65% reduction in planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and an all-electric fleet of car and trucks five years later. The number of Americans fully vaccinated against COVID-19 reached 200 million. Nearly 17 years after being sentenced to die, Scott Peterson was resentenced in California to life without parole for the Christmas Eve killing of his pregnant wife, Laci, in 2002. (The state Supreme Court found that Peterson’s jury was improperly screened for bias against the death penalty.)