Politics : Big Sky AstroBlog

Jan

23

Heh. Someone caught George tidying up before a visit from Chinese President Hu Jintao - perhaps to keep his mind off this evening’s oral presentation on the state of the union (in a word: “disgruntled”):

“I knew he was coming, but I didn’t realize he was coming todayâ€”just look at this place,” said a visibly flustered Bush, as he and his Secret Service detail hurriedly picked up trash along Interstate 66 near Arlington, VA. “We got the area around the [National] Mall spotless, but now it just makes the rest of the city look worse. There are homeless people cluttering up our streetsâ€”and not just here, but in Denver and San Francisco, too.”

“It’s humiliating how much we let this place go,” Bush added.

Isn’t it just?

So what will be Bush’s tone during this evening’s address - chastened? chagrined? conciliatory? Will charges leveled at VP Dick “Darth” Cheney by the prosecution in today’s installment of the “Scooter” Libby trial - that Cheney was behind the Valerie Plame leak (surprise!) possibly have chastened the beleaguered “President”? Don’t bet on it; the Moon is in feisty Aries, coming off a square to Mars earlier in the day….

January 23, 2007 | Comments Off

Jan

17

There are many interesting things about Barack Obama, but my interest in him is personal: We are nearly birthday twins, born just 26 hours apart. Both of us were born with a Leo Sun in the 9th house and a Gemini Moon in the 7th house. We’re both writers; both lost our fathers in car accidents (I at age 9, he at age 21); and both currently have transiting Saturn and progressed Venus hovering around natal Uranus.

The conclusion I have drawn from these corollaries is obvious: Today, friends, I declare my candidacy for President of the United States.

PSYCH! Nah, I don’t want the job. Give it to the guy with Mars in the 11th house (team player), Scorpio ascendant (politically astute), and rock-star Leo Midheaven. With my Sag ascendant and Virgo midheaven, and Mars in the 10th, I’d rather be free to do my own thing. But I wish my near-celestial twin well in his bid for White House, and shall watch his journey with interest - despite the uncomfortable feeling that I’m simply not ready to be the same age as the President of the United States.

Obama appears to be meeting with rather more success in his career at the moment than I am, having been propelled into the spotlight by his dazzling oratory skills. My oratory skills, on the other hand, just earned a rejection of my application to speak at UAC, the big astrology conference being held next year in Denver. Ah well, me and about a hundred other people, and it’s not as though I have an illustrious resume after all. Still, at midlife - when one’s birthday mates are, after all, bidding on positions such as Leader of the Free World - one feels a little dejected to realize the upper echelon of one’s own profession may prove forever elusive. Who knows… perhaps Barack feels the same way, some days.
Sag-like, though, I insist on viewing this turn of events as a blessing in disguise; tomorrow’s New Moon falls very close to my natal Jupiter. When a door closes, sometimes a window opens - although sometimes a bird flies in through that window and poops on your desk.

Keep a screen on your window, Mr. Obama.

January 17, 2007 | 8 Comments

Jan

11

This Saturday (2:00 am PST / 5:00 am EST), Mars and Pluto collide in their last conjunction before Pluto leaves Sagittarius. When irresistible force (Mars) meets the cold, dark collective heart of darkness (Pluto), the result is almost always the ultimate defeat of Mars’ shadow side of reckless, self-destructive temper and violence. But in the process, Mars often takes an awful lot of people down with him.

Let us attempt to learn from the mistakes of those who refuse to learn from their own. Whether you’re leader of the free world or just some poor sap who has to share the freeway with your fellow motorists, a little caution is in order over the next few days. Here are 13 things to Avoid as Mars and Pluto meet in one final, ideology-driven, Sagittarius deathmatch:

Picking fights.
Making bad situations worse.
Involving others in your unresolved, personal psychological complexes and grudges.
Gambling with the wellbeing of the many in order to further the interests of the few.
Demanding sacrifices of others that you do not require of yourself.
Ignoring the laws of man, nature, and the universe.
Disregarding the voices of common sense.
Assuming that a willingness to use violence and aggression makes one strong.
Believing that might makes right.
Imposing your ideology on others through the use of force.
Defending the bad choices of others out of a misguided sense of loyalty.
Repeating failed strategies and expecting a different outcome.
Letting your violence turn you into the very thing you were fighting against.

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January 11, 2007 | 1 Comment

Dec

27

jerry The 1970s were an ugly decade, and it’s only the fact that I came of age then that I hold any nostalgia for it. For instance, I’m stunned today to find myself shedding a tear over the death of former President Gerald Ford.

My mother disliked Richard Nixon even as she carried me in her womb, and by the early 70s the loathing of Nixon had become an article of faith in our household. Yet I remember crying the day we watched Nixon make his last, pathetic walk to that helicopter; and although at the time I thought Ford a giant sell-out for pardoning Nixon, I sort of saw his point, and I never disliked Ford. How could you? After Nixon’s sweaty, malevolent Capricorn-gone-wrong show, it felt really good and reassuring to hear Cancerian Jerry Ford pronounce, “Our long national nightmare is over.” (Well, it sort of seemed true at the time.) It was sweet to watch him bump his head on things, and even though he was a gifted athlete (Sagittarius Moon) his reputation as a klutz took hold - thanks, Chevy Chase! - and was actually sort of endearing. And his wife! Betty was - is - fantastic, the embodiment of Ford’s candid, inspiring Sag Moon id.

He’ll be remembered as a guy who fell down a lot, but also as the accidental president who made a single difficult, graceful gesture that essentially ruined his political career. In the op eds I’ve read today, many have commented on his misguided attempt to impeach Justice Douglas - hey, Ford was no saint - and of course the political risk of the Nixon pardon; but hardly anyone has come out and said, “He shouldn’t have issued the pardon.”

My own reaction upon reading the news last night was, “Awwww!”, quickly followed by the vestigial remnants of my mom’s vendetta: “That pardon was a mistake.” But today, having read and thought about it as an adult who has lived through at least 26 years of a politics almost entirely devoid of grace, I’m grateful to Jerry. If only because he thought it was the right and healing thing to do, I think he did the right thing, Mom. Give him a warm welcome when you see him.

December 27, 2006 | 1 Comment

keep looking »

Sign of Leo

Moon sextiles Mercury at
4:20 pm on Jul.5, 2008

Moon opposes Neptune at
5:22 pm on Jul.5, 2008

Moon trines Pluto at
3:05 am on Jul.6, 2008

Moon goes void of course at
3:05 am on Jul.6, 2008

Moon enters Virgo at
4:04 am on Jul.6, 2008

Moon conjuncts Mars at
9:19 am on Jul.6, 2008