DAILY CHUCKLE 8-270

"Let's all be careful out there!"

SEPTEMBER 25TH

Today is Thursday, Sept. 25, the 269th day of 2008.
There are 97 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

• On Sept. 25, 1789, the first United States Congress adopted 12 amendments to the Constitution and sent them to the states for ratification. (Ten of the amendments became the Bill of Rights.)

On this date:

• In 1493, Christopher Columbus set sail from Cadiz, Spain, with a flotilla of 17 ships on his second voyage to the Western Hemisphere.
• In 1513, Spanish explorer Vasco Nunez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama and sighted the Pacific Ocean.
• In 1690, one of the earliest American newspapers, Publick Occurrences, published its first — and last — edition in Boston.
• In 1775, American Revolutionary War hero Ethan Allen was captured by the British as he led an attack on Montreal.
• In 1890, Wilford Woodruff, president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, issued a Manifesto formally renouncing the practice of polygamy.
• In 1919, President Wilson collapsed after a speech in Pueblo, Colo., during a national speaking tour in support of the Treaty of Versailles.
• In 1956, the first trans-Atlantic telephone cable went into service.
• In 1957, nine black students who'd been forced to withdraw from Central High School in Little Rock, Ark., because of unruly white crowds were escorted to class by members of the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division.
• In 1978, 144 people were killed when a Pacific Southwest Airlines Boeing 727 and a private plane collided over San Diego.
• In 1981, Sandra Day O'Connor was sworn in as the first female justice on the Supreme Court.

Ten years ago:

• Hurricane Georges raked the Florida Keys with sheets of rain and 105 mph winds, but spared Florida the kind of devastation seen across the Caribbean.
• Mark McGwire hit his 66th home run, just 45 minutes after Sammy Sosa hit his 66th homer of the season.

Five years ago:

• France reported a staggering death toll of 14,802 from the summer heat wave.
• An Islamic court in Nigeria overturned the conviction of an illiterate mother sentenced to be stoned to death for having sex out of wedlock.
• Aquila al-Hashimi of the Iraqi Governing Council died five days after being shot by assailants.
• Fifteen people died in a nursing home fire in Nashville, Tenn.
• Author, journalist and editor George Plimpton died in New York at age 76.
• Nobel-winning economist Franco Modigliani died in Cambridge, Mass., at age 85.

One year ago:

• Warren Jeffs, the leader of a polygamous Mormon splinter group, was convicted in St. George, Utah, of being an accomplice to rape for performing a wedding between a 19-year-old man and a 14-year-old girl. (Jeffs was later sentenced to two consecutive terms of five years to life in prison.)
• Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, addressing the United Nations, announced "the nuclear issue of Iran is now closed," and indicated Tehran would disregard Security Council resolutions imposed by what he called "arrogant powers."
• Japan's lower house of parliament elected Yasuo Fukuda prime minister.

Today's Birthdays:

• Broadcast journalist Barbara Walters is 79.
• Folk singer Ian Tyson is 75.
• Rhythm-and-blues singer Joe Russell is 69.
• Defense Secretary Robert Gates is 65.
• Actor Robert Walden is 65.
• Actor-producer Michael Douglas is 64.
• Model Cheryl Tiegs is 61.
• Actress Mimi Kennedy is 59.
• Actor-director Anson Williams is 59.
• Actor Mark Hamill is 57.
• Polka bandleader Jimmy Sturr is 57.
• Actor Colin Friels is 56.
• Actor Michael Madsen is 50.
• Actress Heather Locklear is 47.
• Actress Aida Turturro is 46.
• Actor Tate Donovan is 45.
• Basketball player Scottie Pippen is 43.
• Actor Jason Flemyng is 42.
• Actor Will Smith is 40.
• Actor Hal Sparks is 39.
• Actress Catherine Zeta-Jones is 39.
• Rock musician Mike Luce (Drowning Pool) is 37.
• Actress Bridgette Wilson-Sampras is 35.
• Actor Chris Owen is 28.
• Rapper T. I. is 28.
• Actor Lee Norris is 27.
• Singer Diana Ortiz (Dream) is 23.
• Actress Emmy Clarke ("Monk") is 17.

Thought for Today:

"History is too serious to be left to historians."
Iain Macleod, British politician (1913-1970).

"Let's all be careful out there!"

DAILY CHUCKLE 8-269

"Let's all be careful out there!"

SEPTEMBER 24TH

Today is Wednesday, Sept. 24, the 268th day of 2008.
There are 98 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

• On Sept. 24, 1789, Congress passed a Judiciary Act which provided for an Attorney General and a Supreme Court.

On this date:

• In 1869, thousands of businessmen were ruined in a Wall Street panic known as "Black Friday" after financiers Jay Gould and James Fisk attempted to corner the gold market.
• In 1929, Lt. James H. Doolittle guided a Consolidated NY-2 Biplane over Mitchel Field in New York in the first all-instrument flight.
• In 1955, President Eisenhower suffered a heart attack while on vacation in Denver.
• In 1958, "The Donna Reed Show" premiered on ABC-TV.
• In 1960, the USS Enterprise, the first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, was launched at Newport News, Va.
• In 1963, the U.S. Senate ratified a treaty with Britain and the Soviet Union limiting nuclear testing.
• In 1968, the TV news magazine "60 Minutes" premiered on CBS; the undercover police drama "The Mod Squad" premiered on ABC.
• In 1976, Patricia Hearst was sentenced to seven years in prison for her part in a 1974 bank robbery in San Francisco carried out by the Symbionese Liberation Army. (She was released after 22 months after receiving clemency from President Carter.)
• In 1988, Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson won the men's 100-meter dash at the Seoul Summer Olympics — but he was disqualified three days later for using anabolic steroids.
• In 1988, members of the eastern Massachusetts Episcopal diocese elected Barbara C. Harris the first female bishop in the church's history.

Ten years ago:

• Hurricane Georges was charging toward the Florida Keys, after killing hundreds of people in the Caribbean.
• The government began releasing the new, harder-to-counterfeit $20 bill.

Five years ago:

• After four turbulent months, three special legislative sessions and two Democratic walkouts, both houses of the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature adopted redistricting plans favoring the GOP.
• The top candidates vying to replace California Gov. Gray Davis joined in a lively debate.

One year ago:

• Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad questioned the official version of the Sept. 11 attacks and defended the right to cast doubt on the Holocaust in a tense appearance at Columbia University in New York.
• United Auto Workers walked off the job at GM plants in the first nationwide strike during auto contract negotiations since 1976; a tentative pact ended the walkout two days later.
• Two kidnapped Italian intelligence operatives were rescued in a NATO-led combat operation in western Afghanistan, two days after they went missing.
• As many as 100,000 anti-government protesters led by Buddhist monks marched in Yangon, Myanmar.

Today's Birthdays:

• Actor-singer Herb Jeffries is 97.
• Actress Sheila MacRae is 84.
• Rhythm-and-blues singer Sonny Turner (The Platters) is 69.
• Singer Barbara Allbut (The Angels) is 68.
• Singer Phyllis "Jiggs" Allbut (The Angels) is 66.
• Singer Gerry Marsden (Gerry and the Pacemakers) is 66.
• Actor Gordon Clapp is 60.
• Former U.S. Rep. Joseph Kennedy II, D-Mass., is 56.
• Actor Kevin Sorbo is 50.
• Rhythm-and-blues singer Cedric Dent (Take 6) is 46.
• Actress-writer Nia Vardalos is 46.
• Country musician Marty Mitchell is 39.
• Actress Megan Ward is 39.
• Singer-musician Marty Cintron (No Mercy) is 37.
• Contemporary Christian musician Juan DeVevo (Casting Crowns) is 33.
• Actor Kyle Sullivan is 20.

Thought for Today:

"The easiest way to get a reputation is go outside the fold, shout around for a few years as a violent atheist or a dangerous radical, and then crawl back to the shelter."
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)

"Let's all be careful out there!"