The almanac

Today is Sunday, Nov. 13, the 317th day of 2011 with 48 to follow.

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mercury, Neptune, Uranus, Jupiter and Venus. Evening stars are Saturn and Mars.

Those born on this date are under the sign of Scorpio. They include St. Augustine of Hippo, a theologian, in 354; King Edward III of England in 1312; Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson in 1850; U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis in 1856; Negro League legendary player and manager Buck O'Neil in 1911; actor Richard Mulligan in 1932; TV producer/director Garry Marshall in 1934 (age 76); actors Dack Rambo in 1941, Joe Mantegna in 1947 (age 64), Whoopi Goldberg in 1955 (age 56), Tracy Scoggins in 1953 (age 58) and Chris Noth in 1954 (age 57); television talk-show host Jimmy Kimmel in 1967 (age 44); and actor Gerard Butler in 1969 (age 42).

On this date in history:

In 1927, the Holland Tunnel was opened under the Hudson River, linking New York City and New Jersey.

In 1933, the first recorded "sit-down" strike in the United States was staged by workers at the Hormel Packing Company in Austin, Minn.

In 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a case from Montgomery, Ala., that segregation on interstate buses was unconstitutional.

In 1967, Carl Stokes became the first black U.S. mayor when he was elected in Cleveland.

In 1974, Yasser Arafat told the U.N. General Assembly that the goal of the Palestine Liberation Organization was to establish an independent state of Palestine.

In 1982, the Vietnam War Memorial was dedicated in Washington.

In 1985, a volcano erupted in Colombia, killing 25,000 people. It was the third-deadliest volcano disaster in history.

In 1992, a group of Peruvian military officers tried unsuccessfully to assassinate President Alberto Fujimori and overthrow the government.

In 1993, Pakistan's Foreign Minister Farooq Leghari was chosen president.

In 1997, Iraq expelled the U.S. members of the U.N. team that had been sent to verify Iraq's compliance with U.N. directives.

In 2001, U.S. President George W. Bush and Russian leader Vladimir Putin agreed to reduce stockpiles of nuclear weapons by about two-thirds.

In 2004, one day after Yasser Arafat's burial, Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei called for the continuation of peace talks with Israel.

Also in 2004, an Iraqi national security adviser said up to 1,000 insurgents were killed in the six-day battle for Fallujah.

In 2006, as many as 150 people were kidnapped from Iraq's Ministry of Higher Education in Baghdad by about 80 gunmen in security services uniforms.

Also in 2006, nearly two dozen people were killed and thousands more displaced in flooding in northern Kenya.

In 2008, Sudanese President Omar Hassan Bashir ordered a cease-fire with rebels in war-torn Darfur and said he would move to disarm pro-government militias. Up to 300,000 black African inhabitants of Darfur had died since 2003 in what officials called an ethnic cleansing campaign.

In 2009, the self-proclaimed organizer of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Khalid Sheik Mohammed, will stand trial in New York, the U.S. Defense Department announced, with the death penalty likely to be sought.

Also in 2009, U.S. President Barack Obama, in Tokyo on his first Asian trip as president, and Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama recommitted to reduce their countries' carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2010.

In 2010, the military government of Myanmar, formerly Burma, released pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest to cheering crowds. The leader of the National League for Democracy had spent 15 of the past 21 years confined to her home.

A thought for the day: U.S. Army Gen. Douglas MacArthur said, "In war there is no substitute for victory."