Today in History

Today is Friday, May 3, the 123rd day of 2013. There are 242 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On May 3, 1973, Chicago's 110-story Sears Tower (now the Willis Tower) was topped out after two years of construction, becoming the world's tallest building for the next 25 years.

On this date:

In 1791, Poland adopted a national constitution.

In 1802, Washington, D.C., was incorporated as a city.

In 1913, Clorox had its beginnings as five entrepreneurs agreed to set up a liquid bleach factory in Oakland, Calif. Author-playwright William Inge was born in Independence, Kan.

In 1916, Irish nationalist Padraic Pearse and two others were executed by the British for their roles in the Easter Rising.

In 1933, Nellie T. Ross became the first female director of the U.S. Mint.

In 1943, Pulitzer Prizes were awarded to Thornton Wilder for his play "The Skin of Our Teeth" and Upton Sinclair for "Dragon's Teeth."

In 1948, the Supreme Court ruled that covenants prohibiting the sale of real estate to blacks or members of other racial groups were legally unenforceable.

In 1952, the Kentucky Derby was televised nationally for the first time on CBS; the winner was Hill Gail.

In 1960, the Harvey Schmidt-Tom Jones musical "The Fantasticks" began a nearly 42-year run at New York's Sullivan Street Playhouse.

In 1971, the National Public Radio program "All Things Considered" made its debut.

In 1979, Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher was chosen to become Britain's first female prime minister as the Tories ousted the incumbent Labor government in parliamentary elections.

In 1986, in NASA's first post-Challenger launch, an unmanned Delta rocket lost power in its main engine shortly after liftoff, forcing safety officers to destroy it by remote control.

Ten years ago: President George W. Bush told a news conference in Crawford, Texas, it was a matter of when — not if — weapons of mass destruction would be found in Iraq. Pope John Paul II urged hundreds of thousands of young people outside Madrid to be "artisans of peace." New Hampshire awoke to find its granite symbol of independence and stubbornness, the "Old Man of the Mountain," had collapsed into rubble. "Funny Cide" rolled to victory in the Kentucky Derby. Model and actress Suzy Parker died in Montecito, Calif.

Five years ago: Barack Obama defeated Hillary Rodham Clinton by seven votes in the Guam Democratic presidential caucuses, meaning the candidates split the pledged delegate votes. Big Brown won the Kentucky Derby by 4 3/4 lengths. (Filly Eight Belles finished second and then broke both front ankles; she was euthanized on the track.)

One year ago: U.S. officials published online a selection of letters from Osama bin Laden's last hideaway; the documents portrayed a network that was weak, inept and under siege — and its leader seemingly near wit's end about the passing of his global jihad's glory days.

Today's Birthdays: Folk singer Pete Seeger is 94. Actress Ann B. Davis is 87. Actor Alex Cord is 80. Singer Frankie Valli is 79. Sports announcer Greg Gumbel is 67. Pop singer Mary Hopkin is 63. Singer Christopher Cross is 62. Country musician Cactus Moser (Highway 101) is 56. Rock musician David Ball (Soft Cell) is 54. Country singer Shane Minor is 45. Actor Bobby Cannavale (ka-nuh-VAL'-ee) is 43. Music and film producer-actor Damon Dash is 42. Country musician John Hopkins (Zac Brown Band) is 42. Country-rock musician John Neff (Drive-By Truckers) is 42. Country singer Brad Martin is 40. Actress Christina Hendricks (TV: "Mad Men") is 38. Actor Dule (doo-LAY') Hill is 38. Country singer Eric Church is 36. Dancer Cheryl Burke (TV: "Dancing with the Stars") is 29. Soul singer Michael Kiwanuka is 26. Actress Jill Berard is 23.

Thought for Today: "Nobody is bored when he is trying to make something that is beautiful, or to discover something that is true." — William Inge (1913-1973).

(Above Advance for Use Friday, May 3)

Copyright 2013, The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

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Rand Paul's Twisted History Blames GOP Race Problem on Depression-Era Gifts

As promised, Rand Paul offered a lesson on the secret history of the Republican Party and black people in a speech to students at Howard University, a historically-black college, on Wednesday. Paul's version of history was not all that different than the one offered last month at CPAC's "Trump the Race Card" panel, a history that goes something like this: Republicans believed in emancipation and abolition and were radically not racist in the 19th century and… let's just skip over the last half of the 20th century. Paul said that Republicans saw a significant drop in support from black people from the 1960s on, not because of the party's calculation that it could win elections by appealing to the prejudices of racist Southerners, but because Democrats offered a bunch of handouts during the Great Depression. Paul said:

I think what happened during the Great Depression was that African Americans understood that Republicans championed citizenship and voting rights but they became impatient for economic emancipation.

African Americans languished below white Americans in every measure of economic success and the Depression was especially harsh for those at the lowest rung of poverty.

The Democrats promised equalizing outcomes through unlimited federal assistance while Republicans offered something that seemed less tangible-the promise of equalizing opportunity through free markets.

Rand Paul's explanation for how Republicans lost the support of black voters sounds a lot like Mitt Romney's explanation for why he lost the 2012 election — that Obama won because he offered "Paul did not mention that the New Deal is why white people voted for Democrats, too. (At left, the electoral college maps for the presidential elections in 1932, 1936, and 1940.) And Dwight Eisenhower got 39 percent of black voters' support in 1956. That means there's another explanation.

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Paul only got to it when asked by a student whether he was from the Republican Party of Abraham Lincoln or "post-1968 Republican party — Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan." Paul disagreed that there was any difference between the Lincoln party and the Reagan one. "People perceive those as being completely different parties," Paul said. He explained:

"The argument that I'm trying to make is that we haven't changed. We don't talk about it... There are some of us who haven't changed, who are part of that party that you liked, who truly believe that Reagan was still part of that. Who don't see an abrupt difference."

There is a difference! Ronald Reagan kicked off his 1980 general election campaign near Philadelphia, Mississippi, a place that is solely famous for being the site of there civil rights murders. Reagan invented "welfare queens." In the 1990s, Newt Gingrich said he would crack down on crime by building emergency prisons and advertising longer sentences on "MTV and rap radio." Rand Paul's father Ron Paul made millions of dollars selling newsletters that warned of a looming "race war." This is not disputed history. Republican National Committee chair Ken Mehlman apologized for the Southern Strategy in 2005.

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It is great that Paul wants to reach out to new voters. It is fantastic that the GOP wants to compete for black voters. These are obviously good things. But voters deserve a little bit of honesty about very recent history. Paul seemed surprised when Howard students were better versed in black GOP history than he was. Paul tried to explain that the first black senator was a Republican — but stumbled when he was "blanking on his name." The crowd shouted that it was Edward Brooke. Paul tried another fact. "If I would have said, 'Who do you think the founders of the NAACP were? Do you think they were Republicans or Democrats?' Would everybody in here have known they were all Republicans?" "Yes!" the crowd shouted. "Alright, alright," Paul admitted, "you know more than I know."

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