WASHINGTON (AP)—Oprah Winfrey has come a long way since her childhood years in a Mississippi shack and in public housing with a poster of The Beatles on her bedroom wall. Sunday, she was honored with Paul McCartney, one of the Beatles she so loved.

Stars from Hollywood, Nashville and Broadway gathered in the nation's capital to salute Winfrey, McCartney and three others—country singer Merle Haggard, Broadway composer Jerry Herman and dancer Bill T. Jones—with the Kennedy Center Honors. The president and first lady Michelle Obama sat with the honorees and former Secretary of State Colin Powell.

ENTERTAINMENT ROYALTY—Recipients of the 2010 Kennedy Center Honors, Oprah Winfrey, and Paul McCartney, sing the National Anthem at the Kennedy Center in Washington, Sunday, Dec. 5. Others are Stedman Graham, back left, and Trade Representative Ron Kirk, back right. (APPhoto/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

by Mesfin Fekadu

(AP)--Alicia Keys and Lady Gaga take charity work seriously, and they’re going offline to prove it.

Gaga, Justin Timberlake, Usher and other celebrities have joined a new campaign called Digital Life Sacrifice on behalf of Keys’ charity, Keep a Child Alive. The entertainers plan to sign off of social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter on Wednesday, which is World AIDS Day. The participants will sign back on when the charity raises $1 million.

DIGITAL DEATH—Alicia Keys performs on stage May 9 at the Festhalle in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. (AP Photo/Mario Vedder, file)

“It’s really important and super-cool to use mediums that we naturally are on,” Keys said in a phone interview from New York last week.

by Anne Flaherty

WASHINGTON (AP)—When a majority of troops told the Pentagon this summer they didn’t care if gays were allowed to serve openly in the military, it was in sharp contrast to the time when America’s fighting forces voiced bitter opposition to accepting racial minorities and women in the services.

HISTORY LESSON—Thomas J. Woods, 78, holds his graduation photo from the Marine Corps in 1951 in his home in Fayetteville, Ga. The stories of Woods and other Black vets who served among the military’s first desegregated units during the Korean War offer an iconic history lesson amid the debate over whether gays should be allowed to serve openly in uniform. (AP Photo/David Goldman)

The survey, due out Nov. 30, is expected to find pockets of resistance among combat troops to ending the ban on gays. But some 70 percent of respondents were expected to say that lifting the ban would have a positive or mixed effect, or none at all, according to officials familiar with the findings.

For the week of Dec. 3-9

December 3

1847—Frederick Douglas and Martin R. Delaney establish “The North Star” and it goes on to become a major anti-slavery newspaper.

THOMAS HEARNS

1922—Ralph Gardner is born in Cleveland, Ohio. He was a pioneer chemist whose research into plastics led to the development of so-called hard plastics and aided product developments in the petrochemical and pharmaceutical industries.

1982—Thomas “The Hit Man” Hearns defeats Wilfredo Benitez for the WBC Junior Middleweight boxing title. Hearns becomes the first person to win boxing titles in five different weight classes.