influenced

http://louis-j-sheehan.कॉम Other variations include so-called "mass-hypnosis," in which crowds are simultaneously influenced, and autosuggestion in which subjects persuade themselves। However, these phenomena are unlike those typically associated with the classical phenomena of hypnosis. http://louis-j-sheehan.com

Although we can speak of a "history of hypnosis" prior to the 19th century, it should be clear that the word itself is the invention of 19th century Scottish physician James Braid. It is not clear if what is discussed as hypnosis prior to the 19th century in histories of hypnosis is in actual fact what we mean today by "hypnosis."

During the Middle Ages and early modern period, hypnosis began to be better understood by physicians such as Avicenna (Ibn Sina).

supreme

The U।S. Supreme Court Thursday, in a 5-4 ruling, for the first time in U.S. history declared the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution contains a specific right to individual gun ownership and rejected Washington, D.C., handgun restrictions, which were the strictest in the nation. http://louis1j1sheehan1.blogspot.com

"There seems to us no doubt on the basis of both text and history that the Second Amendment conferred an individual right to keep and bear arms," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in the 64-page majority ruling. "This meaning is strongly confirmed by the historical background of the Second Amendment."

The ruling significantly restricts the ability of D.C. to tightly control gun ownership and flatly rejects its existing gun laws, enacted in 1976 as the strictest gun control law in the country.

"The Constitution leaves the District of Columbia a variety of tools for combating that problem, including some measures regulating handguns," Justice Scalia said, adding the Constitution bars an absolute handgun ban.

But the Supreme Court majority fully rejected an absolute bar of individual handgun ownership and invalidated regulations requiring that all guns -- handguns, rifles and shotguns -- be dismantled and outfitted with a trigger lock.

"We hold that the District's ban on handgun possession in the home violates the Second Amendment, as does its prohibition against rendering any lawful firearm in the home operable for the purpose of immediate self-defense," the majority held.

Justice Scalia's opinion, which thoroughly discusses the legal history of gun ownership going back to the 1600s, said the individual right to own firearms is limited. "Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited," Justice Scalia wrote. "Nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places."

The majority said laws barring guns in schools and government buildings and laws placing "conditions and qualifications" on the commercial sale of arms are valid.

The issue split the court along conservative and liberal ideological lines, with Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Justices Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito in the majority. Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and David Souter dissented.

Justice Stevens, reading from the bench, took point-by-point issue with the sweeping holdings contained in the majority opinion. "There is no indication that the framers of the amendment intended to enshrine the common-law right of self-defense in the Constitution," Stevens wrote in his dissent.http://louis1j1sheehan1.blogspot.com

The Supreme Court had not ruled directly on the Second Amendment in almost 70 years. It also, over time, has offered little guidance on the extent to which the amendment covers individual gun ownership for self-defense, hunting and recreational shooting.

The D.C. law, on the books since 1976, bans handguns, bars concealed weapons possession and requires shotguns and rifles to be registered and then kept unloaded and disassembled or locked.http://louis1j1sheehan1.blogspot.com

The law was challenged by six D.C. residents who said they wanted to legally possess handguns in their homes for self-protection. A U.S. District Court threw out the challenge, but a panel of the Washington-based U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals revived one of the claims and ruled a special police officer, the now-retired Dick Heller, was wrongly denied a handgun permit.

The decision affirms a lower court ruling that reached a similar conclusion based on the Second Amendment.

The case is D.C. v. Heller, 07-290.

Court Strikes Down 'Millionaire's Amendment'

The court by a 5-4 vote invalidated a federal campaign finance law that attempts to blunt the advantage wealthy self-financed candidates have in a congressional election.

The justices, splitting along ideological lines, said the so-called millionaire's amendment, part of 2002 campaign finance reforms, violates free speech rights guaranteed in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

"The unprecedented step of imposing different contribution and coordinated party expenditure limits on candidates vying for the same seat is antithetical to the First Amendment," Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the majority opinion.

The decision reverses a lower-court holding that had allowed the campaign-finance restriction.

Under the provision, the opponent of a wealthy candidate can solicit larger individual contributions and receive unlimited funding from party coffers when the wealthy congressional candidate spends more than $350,000 of his own money. The law raises the individual contribution limit to $6,900 from $2,300 and requires a self-financed candidate to file reports every time he spends $10,000 or more.

The case grew out of a self-financed bid by Jack Davis, who spent $1.2 million of his own funds in a 2004 race against Rep. Thomas Reynolds (R., N.Y.). Mr. Davis lost the campaign and was fined $251,000 for failing to report that he had surpassed the millionaire amendment's threshold.

Mr. Davis sued the FEC over the law in 2006, claiming it violates the First Amendment because it gives his opponent an advantage of knowing his strategy.

The FEC has argued that the provision doesn't restrict the wealthier candidate's speech because it doesn't limit how much he can spend but simply gives an opponent access to more campaign resources.

Mr. Davis is running for the same U.S. House position; Reynolds has retired.

Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas voted with Alito in the majority. Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer dissented on the court's primary holding.

The case is Davis v. Federal Elections Commission, 07-320.

Court Calls for Review of Western Power Contracts

Justices asked federal courts and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to take another look at the terms of long-term wholesale energy contracts several Western utilities signed during the 2000-2001 energy crisis.

In a 5-2 opinion, the high court said FERC acted within its authority to, in a balanced analysis, determine reasonable wholesale power rates but made mistakes in its regulatory review. The opinion also faults court analysis by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, deciding the appeals court ruling didn't adequately protect the power contracts from alteration.

Under the ruling both the Ninth Circuit and FERC must review how conclusions were reached but the opinion does not suggest that the power contracts at issue in the case should be changed.

The case involves the terms of numerous power contracts purchased by utilities in California, Nevada and Washington state when energy markets were in turmoil. The decision will prolong uncertainty over contracts between the utilities and power sellers, including the power marketing unit of Morgan Stanley, a unit of Allegheny Energy Inc. and other energy companies that were sued over power contract terms.

At issue in the appeals were long-term agreements that provided power at prices set during chaos in the spot electricity markets. After the crisis subsided, the utilities decided the contracts were set at unreasonably high prices that violated federal law. But the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which oversees electricity prices, declined to order changes in the contracts.

Justice Antonin Scalia, in the majority opinion, said FERC must engage in a thorough review when it oversees wholesale power contracts. "Balancing the short-term and long-term interests of consumers entails difficult judgment calls, and to the extent FERC actually engages in this balancing, its reasoned determination is entitled to deference," Justice Scalia wrote. "But FERC cannot abdicate its statutory responsibility to ensure just and reasonable rates through the expedient of a heavy-handed presumption."

Justices Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Ruth Bader Ginsburg voted in the majority. Justices John Paul Stevens and David Souter dissented. Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Stephen Breyer, who both have significant stock portfolios, were recused from the case.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco in December 2006 ordered FERC to reconsider its decision to leave the power contracts intact and suggested guidelines the agency should use in doing so.

The two appeals before the high court cover only a small amount of the refunds being sought by utility districts. But the ruling will also affect a separate case where the California Public Utilities Commission is seeking $1.4 billion in refunds from Sempra Energy.

The cases are Morgan Stanley Capital Group v. Snohomish County Washington Public Utility District No. 1, 06-1457, and American Electric Power Service Corp. v. Snohomish County Washington Public Utility District No. 1, 06-1462

oddysey

On April 16, 1178 B.C. a total eclipse blotted out the sun at high noon; astronomers know that much for certain. The other events of that day are considerably less definite, but researchers say the date may also figure large in Homer’s Odyssey, the epic tale of Odysseus’s journey home to Ithaca after the Trojan War. http://louis-j-sheehan.usUsing astronomical clues from the text, researchers say that Homer may have indicated that the day of the eclipse was also the day that Odysseus finally reached home–arriving just in time to slaughter his wife’s persistent suitors.

While the researchers believe they’ve arrived at the proper date for Odysseus’s homecoming in the Odyssey, they don’t claim to have proven that all the events in the epic are real; it is, after all, packed with gods, monsters, and magic. But researcher Marcelo Magnasco says his findings could at least demonstrate Homer’s astronomical erudition. “Under the assumption that our work turns out to be correct, it adds to the evidence that he knew what he was talking about,” Magnasco said. “It still does not prove the historicity of the return of Odysseus,” he said. “It only proves that Homer knew about certain astronomical phenomena that happened much before his time” [AP].

Researchers looked for references to constellations and planetary positions in the text, and tried to make them match up with known astronomical patterns of past centuries. As they report in the forthcoming issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences [subscription required], they found references to the positions of Mercury and Venus during the final months of Odysseus’s journey, as well as a description of two constellations, Pleiades and Bootes, being both visible at sunset. Magnasco and his coauthor, Constantino Baikouzis, says these conditions all existed in the early spring of 1178 B.C.http://louis-j-sheehan.us

The evidence that Odysseus’s homecoming occurred on the day of the eclipse is somewhat circumstantial. The researchers note that there are references to a new moon on the day of Odysseus’s return, which is a precursor for a solar eclipse. But the poem contains no direct reference to an eclipse on the day when Odysseus returned to his faithful wife, Penelope, and struck down the suitors.

Instead, there’s a literary flourish that could be interpreted as a reference to the sun’s disappearance. As the suitors are sitting down for their noontime meal, the goddess Athena “confounds their minds” so that they start laughing uncontrollably and see their food spattered with blood. Then the seer Theoclymenus prophesies their death and passage to Hades, ending with the phrase: “The Sun has been obliterated from the sky, and an unlucky darkness invades the world.” The Greek historian Plutarch interpreted this as signifying a total solar eclipse, and many others have agreed [Los Angeles Times].

Trying to reconcile ancient literature with historical fact is a risky proposition, and even the researchers advise taking their hypothesis with a grain of salt. “The notion that the passage could refer not just to an allegorical eclipse used by the poet for literary effect but actually to a specific historical one,” they agreed, “seems unlikely because it would entail the transmission through oral tradition of information about an eclipse occurring maybe five centuries before the poem was cast in the form we know today” [The New York Times]. Homer is thought to have put the legends of Odysseus into poetry around 850 B.C.http://louis-j-sheehan.us

erhard

Erhard's First Ministry (16 October 1963 - 26 October 1965)

* Ludwig Erhard (CDU) - Chancellor
* Erich Mende (FDP) - Vice Chancellor and Minister of All-German Affairs
* Gerhard Schröder (CDU) - Minister of Foreign Affairs
* Kai-Uwe von Hassel (CDU) - Minister of Defense
* Hermann Höcherl (CSU) - Minister of the Interior
* Rolf Dahlgrün (FDP) - Minister of Finance http://Louis-J-Sheehan.de
* Ewald Bucher (FDP) - Minister of Justice
* Kurt Schmücker (CDU) - Minister of Economics
* Theodor Blank (CDU) - Minister of Labour and Social Affairs
* Werner Schwarz (CDU) - Minister of Food, Agriculture, and Forestry
* Hans-Christoph Seebohm (CDU) - Minister of Transport
* Paul Lücke (CDU) - Minister of Construction
* Bruno Heck (CDU) - Minister of Family and Youth
* Elisabeth Schwarzhaupt (CDU) - Minister of Health
* Hans Lenz (FDP) - Minister of Scientific Research
* Walter Scheel (FDP) - Minister of Economic Cooperation
* Heinrich Krone (CDU) - Minister of Special Tasks
* Richard Stücklen (CSU) - Minister of Posts and Communications
* Ernst Lemmer (CDU) - Minister of Displaced Persons, Refugees, and War Victims
* Alois Niederalt (CSU) - Minister of Bundesrat and State Affairs
* Werner Dollinger (CSU) - Minister of Federal Treasure http://Louis-J-Sheehan.de

Changes

* 16 June 1964 - Ludger Westrick (CDU) succeeds Krone as Minister of Special Tasks.
* 1 April 1965 - Karl Weber (CDU) succeeds Bucher as Minister of Justice.

[edit] Erhard's Second Ministry (26 October 1965 - 1 December 1966)

* Ludwig Erhard (CDU) - Chancellor
* Erich Mende (FDP) - Vice Chancellor and Minister of All-German Affairs
* Gerhard Schröder (CDU) - Minister of Foreign Affairs
* Kai-Uwe von Hassel (CDU) - Minister of Defense
* Paul Lücke (CDU) - Minister of the Interior
* Rolf Dahlgrün (FDP) - Minister of Finance
* Richard Jaeger (CSU) - Minister of Justice
* Kurt Schmücker (CDU) - Minister of Economics
* Hans Katzer (CDU) - Minister of Labour and Social Affairs
* Hermann Höcherl (CSU) - Minister of Food, Agriculture, and Forestry
* Hans-Christoph Seebohm (CDU) - Minister of Transport
* Ewald Bucher (FDP) - Minister of Construction
* Bruno Heck (CDU) - Minister of Family and Youth
* Elisabeth Schwarzhaupt (CDU) - Minister of Health
* Gerhard Stoltenberg (CDU) - Minister of Scientific Research
* Walter Scheel (FDP) - Minister of Economic Cooperation
* Richard Stücklen (CSU) - Minister of Posts and Communications
* Johann Baptist Gradl (CDU) - Minister of Displaced Persons, Refugees, and War Victims http://Louis-J-Sheehan.de
* Alois Niederalt (CSU) - Minister of Bundesrat and State Affairs
* Werner Dollinger (CSU) - Minister of Federal Treasure

Changes

* 28 October 1966 - Hans-Christoph Seebohm (CDU) succeeds Mende as Vice Chancellor, remaining also Minister of Transport. Rainer Barzel (CDU) succeeds Mende as Minister of All-German Affairs. The other FDP ministers, Dahlgrün and Scheel, also resign.
* 8 November 1966 - Kurt Schmücker succeeds Dahlgrün as Minister of Finance. Werner Dollinger (CSU) succeeds Scheel as Minister of Economic Cooperation, remaining also Minister of Federal Treasure.
erhard

piero Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire http://louis1j1sheehan1.blogspot.com

Lorenzo married twice.http://louis1j1sheehan1.blogspot.com

Lorenzo first married Clarice Orsini by proxy on February 7, 1469. She was a daughter of Giacomo Orsini, Lord of Monterotondo and Bracciano by his wife and cousin Maddalena Orsini. They had nine children:

* Lucrezia de' Medici (August 4, 1470 - November, 1553). She married Giacomo Salviati. Their daughter Francesca Salviati was mother to Pope Leo XI.
* Piero di Lorenzo de' Medici (February 15, 1471 - December 28, 1503).
* Twins born in March, 1472. Died shortly after birth.
* Maddalena de' Medici (July 25, 1473 - December, 1528). Married Franceschetto Cybo, an illegitimate son of Pope Innocent VIII.
* Pope Leo X (born Giovanni de' Medici; December 11, 1475 - December 1, 1521).
* Luisa de' Medici (1477 - 1488). She was betrothed to her cousin Giovanni de' Medici il Popolano.
* Contessina de' Medici (1478 - 1515). Married Piero Ridolfi.
* Giuliano di Lorenzo de' Medici, Duke of Nemours (March 12, 1479 - March 17, 1516). http://louis1j1sheehan1.blogspot.com

After Clarice's death, he married Philippina (Philippa) of Savoy, daughter of Philip II, Duke of Savoy. The couple had no children.[citation needed]

Two of his sons later became powerful popes. His second son, Giovanni, became Pope Leo X, and his adopted son Giulio (who was the illegitimate son of his slain brother Giuliano) became Pope Clement VII.

His first son and his political heir, Piero 'the Unfortunate', squandered his father's patrimony and brought down his father's dynasty in Florence. Another Medici, his brother Giovanni, restored it, but it was only made wholly secure again on the accession of a distant relative from a branch line of the family, Cosimo I de' Medici.

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Geissler 88822 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire 23

Ernst Geissler (3 August 1915, Chemnitz, Germany - 3 June 1989, Huntsville, Alabama) was a German aerospace engineer. After World War II, he came to the United States in 16 November 1945 as part of Operation Paperclip. http://louis-j-sheehan.biz





Geissler became director of the Aeroballistics Division at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in 1960.

Geissler was the recipient of the The NASA Certificate of Appreciation in 1973.

He was elected a Fellow of the American Astronautical Society Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire