Post Office scandal – nothing succeeds like failure

A “cruel and incompetent” administration guilty of “institutional obstinacy” is the conclusion about the UK Post Office fiasco which saw almost 3000 employees and hundreds of postmasters mistakenly blamed for losses and bankrupted, sacked or jailed. In reality the financial discrepancies were due to a faulty IT system. To date £58 million has been paid out in compensation for false prosecutions with the judge remarking that the evidence he heard from the Post Office side were akin to ‘flat earth’ assertions.

  The CEO at the time Paula Vennells, who pushed for prosecutions over the alleged shortfalls, has since been awarded a CBE, resigned form the Post Office and been appointed chairperson of a healthcare trust and a non-executive board member of the Cabinet Office. She is also an Anglican priest.

    And she has a chart and a half!

  Born 21 February 1959, she has a Pisces Sun opposition Pluto square Jupiter in Sagittarius opposition Mars in Gemini – that’s Boris on steroids.  Sun Pluto = controlling, not good at backing down and admitting mistakes. Mars Pluto = uber-determined, ruthless. Mars Jupiter = opportunistic.  Jupiter Pluto = pushily confident. All in Mutable signs – scattergun, a whirlwind in a storm.

  Her Mars in Gemini is further highlighted/afflicted by being on the focal point of a Yod to Saturn sextile Neptune – has problems modulating anger and assertiveness, too much or too little leading to self-defeating behaviour. Bil Tierney remarks: “A mismanaged yod with Mars as an apex planet, can result in fateful consequences of a crucial nature due to rash or disruptive actions on the individual’s part.”

  Her future happily enough looks panicked, undermined and a swamp for several years ahead.

  It’s not often I feel sympathy for militant, paranoid anti-government arguments. But in this case I’ll make an exception. There were suicides and some have died before this got sorted. And it shouldn’t just be Vennells that takes the rap. All the decision makers inside the Post Office should be named and shamed.

But really – rising from failure to failure. Shades of Dido Harding, another Boris luvvie.

Kenzo Takada – nature on the catwalk

Kenzo Takada, the Japanese-French fashion designer who founded a global brand of perfumes, skincare products, and clothes, has died of a covid-related illness aged 81. His use of flamboyant, bright, often clashing colours and flower prints, were flaunted with theatrical delivery in his shows.

  He was born 27 February 1939 in Japan but came to France in his twenties and remained there throughout his long and successful career.

  He was a Sun, Jupiter, Mercury in creative Pisces with a Gemini Moon. His Mercury Jupiter were opposition Neptune square and adventurous Mars in Sagittarius – he was well-designed for a life of publicity and attention and not short of courage when it came to making his mark.  He had an Earth Grand Trine which is good for business and connected him to the material, earthy real. “Nature is very important to me,” he said. “Part of me is an ecologist.”  His creative Uranus in Taurus trine Neptune was also trine Venus in Capricorn with his Venus square Saturn which would add to his talent for design. His Venus was in an intense and passionate opposition to Pluto.

  His creative, get-it-together 5th harmonic had a Half Grand Sextile so oozing with ability. His tinged-with-genius 13H was also well aspected; as was his global superstar 22H; and leaving-a-legacy-for-history 17H.

Germany – heading for seismic changes + Bavaria

The reunification of Germany in 1990 after the fall of the Berlin wall is celebrated every year on 3 October.  The promise of the time by Chancellor Helmut Kohl was to transform East Germany, a drab Soviet Union client state, home to 16 million people, into a ‘blooming landscape.’ With a further declaration to allay anxiety that a united Germany would become too powerful – “Germany will not go it alone, there will be no unilateral nationalism and no ‘restless Reich.” The first promise hasn’t quite materialised since the east still lags economically behind the west.

  Looking back over Germany’s tumultuous 20th Century history, with two World Wars, a divided and then reunified country, what is noticeable is one of the key trigger points of the Germany country chart’s is the 8th house Pluto in Taurus. When the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 tr Pluto in Scorpio conjunct the Sun was opposition the Germany Pluto with the Solar Arc Neptune square the Pluto.

   In the years running into World War 11 as Hitler’s power rose tr Uranus was conjunct the Germany 8th house Pluto; through the war years tr Saturn moved through the Germany 8th crossing over the Pluto creating blockages and setbacks. World War 1 had other factors at play although the transiting Uranus Jupiter midpoint in the grandstanding 5th house was exactly square the Pluto. So it is a highly sensitive point for Germany.

  The other key directional indicator is the Germany Midheaven at 9 Cancer which was highlighted for both World Wars. Tr Pluto conjunct the MC for the start of WW1; Solar Arc Jupiter square the MC for WW11. And the other end of the Midheaven on the IC was spotlighted for the 1990 Reunification with the triple conjunction of Uranus, Neptune, Saturn in Capricorn moving across the base of the Germany chart.

   The relevance of all of this for present day Germany is that tr Uranus will return to its 1938/39 position at 17 degrees Taurus to conjunct the Germany 8th house Pluto from June 2022 onwards. Life never repeats exactly but it will stir an archaic energy in the German psyche – as well in this instance as cause economic disruptions given the state of global trade, since the 8th house rules international finances as well as deeper transformations.

   The triple conjunction of Saturn, Pluto, Jupiter has been moving through the Germany 4th house causing domestic unrest and pressure for change; with a hopes-dashed tr Neptune square Jupiter now till late January 2021, which may be partly covid-related.

  Tr Pluto will start to oppose the Germany 10th house Uranus from late January 2021 onwards for two years for a forced change of direction. That again echoes the 1930s when tr Pluto in Cancer was conjunct the Uranus in 1934/35 just after Hitler was named Chancellor in 1933. With the key difference that this time tr Pluto is not moving through the power-hungry 10th but bringing domestic and internal challenges in the 4th. There is also upcoming a devastating Solar Arc Pluto opposition the Germany 7th house Neptune in 2023, suggesting differences with a neighbour.  

  Whatever the outcome it is a time of seismic change for Germany. Relations with the EU will be exceptionally confused through 2021/22 with tr Pluto conjunct the composite Neptune and highly uncertain in 2022 with tr Neptune square the composite Saturn.  Relations with France, in days gone by the power-couple drivers of the EU, are bumpy and muddled this year into next spring; with the gulf widening precipitately in 2023/2024 as tr Uranus opposes the composite Sun and tr Pluto is in a high-risk, aggravated square to the composite Mars.

  Germany’s relations with the other starter EU nations:

Italy – aggravated in 2020/21 and in a state of significant upheaval from mid 2021 onwards for three years.

Netherlands – disappointed and undermined in 2021; undergoing a radical shift in relations along with increasing pressure from 2021 to 2024.

Belgium – again 2023 to 2025 look to be the nadir years.

Luxembourg – much the same, undermined through 2021/22 and turned upside down thereafter.

All options are open but it will be into the melting pot, for sure.

  The Germany/UK relationship chart isn’t that informative though 2022/23 will be discouraging and 2025 looks high-tension, unsettled and a turnaround in relations.

Add On: On the prospect of Bavaria splitting from Federal Germany – historical charts are always iffy but there appears to have been a significant moment on 16 September 1180 JC when the Wittelsbach dynasty that survived till 1918 took over as rulers. It gives a Libra Sun square Pluto in Cancer which clashes mightily with the Germany 1871 Saturn Sun opposition North Node Midheaven square Mars in Libra. Not much love lost there.

The Bavaria chart, if sound, is under exceptionally heavy pressure in 2021/22 with tr Pluto opposition the Saturn for a discouraging slog; and then in rebellious mood come 2023/24 with tr Pluto square the Uranus.  The relationship chart with Germany 1871 again has the same separating influences come 2023/24 as some of the other relationship charts.

Boris – portrait of a paradox

Revelations about Boris Johnson’s childhood and messy romantic life in Tom Bower’s biography “Boris Johnson: The Gambler” have filled in a graphic background to what was already known or suspected. And it helps flesh out and give a context to his birth chart.

   His father Stanley – a Sun Mars in Leo square Uranus – was not only an emotionally distant and mainly never-there father and a serial womaniser, he was also violent towards his first wife. She claims he broke her nose in an altercation, which he said she deserved. She ultimately ended up in a mental hospital with depression for eight months. Boris was sent off to preparatory school aged ten and then Eton, compounding his unhappiness and sense of alienation. When his father was home, he instilled a dog-eat-dog, cut-throat desire to win arguments at any cost in his children, setting them up in competition with each other.

  Stanley Johnson, 18 August 1940, has an incredibly fixed as well as angry and competitive chart with Saturn Jupiter and Uranus in Taurus and Pluto Mercury in Leo as well as his Sun Mars – nothing will budge him. Boris is the polar opposite with his jitterbug four Gemini planets, Uranus Pluto in Virgo and Saturn in Pisces.

  Evidently the only stable parenting figure in Boris’s early childhood was a grandfather which explains his two 8th house planets.

  What I hadn’t really concentrated on before now since it is out-of-sign is Boris’s Grand Trine of Scorpio Moon trine Saturn trine Node, Venus Sun in Gemini, formed into a Kite by Saturn opposition Uranus. Moon Saturn is depressive (as is Saturn opposition Pluto), an indication of a less than warm and nurturing childhood. Moon trine Venus hints paradoxically at an affectionate connection to women figures in his life. Bower comments again and again that “only a woman could ever be his confidante.” And yet as Jennifer Arcuri, one of his recent mistresses, also comments he had a blind spot inherited from Stanley: ‘An inability to take women seriously.’ His intensely emotional and highly sexual Scorpio Moon is tied into his chart in a highly complex and contradictory web, trine Saturn and trine Sun Venus, as well as sextile Uranus and tied into his Neptune and Jupiter by more minor aspects.

  He comes across as exceptionally lonely with no real friends, only a conveyor belt of passing romantic affairs. His second wife for 25 years Marina was the one mainstay of his life, who kept him grounded, through endless affairs and wayward pregnancies. The affair with Carrie Symonds, according to those close, would have fizzled out had Marina not decided that she’d had enough and much to his horror filed for divorce. Jennifer Arcuri (admittedly hardly a detached observer) commented of Carrie: ‘Boris got caught by a flirtatious minx. She’s controlling him.’

 Boris’s attitude to men/father figures is all wrapped up in his Saturn opposition Uranus Pluto square Mars. Mars Saturn reflects cruelty and anger; Mars Pluto ruthlessness and black rage; Mars Uranus is explosive.

  His relationship chart with his father has a volatile, high-wire, needs-space Mars conjunct Uranus in a can-be-fanatical square to Neptune; with a power-struggling for the upper hand Jupiter square Pluto; and a chilly Saturn square Mercury, Venus.

  The tensions in the wider Johnson family, laid bare in Bower’s book, make clear how Boris’s grown up children from his marriage expressed their contempt for his behaviour when the divorce happened, siding with their mother.

  Two minor points. One is that Rachel, Boris’s sister evidently refuses to condemn her father. Born 3 September 1965, she has a prominent Sagittarius Moon probably square Saturn opposition Pluto, Uranus Sun in Virgo. Which validates the notion that Sag Moons tend to airbrush out what they don’t want to see. [Ever since Solaia pointed it out I have found countless examples.]

 The other is another comment from Jennifer Arcuri who seems, contrary to appearances, to be perceptive. ‘She saw him as an introvert, a depressive who enjoyed solitude, and someone who needed to be alone. Paradoxically, particularly on those days of his greatest public successes, he could decline into an intense depression.’

  Which might explain his astrology when he won the last election when all his chart indicated was negativity.  Ditto Cummings. A psychological trait to ponder – and to keep in mind for election predictions.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8802035/Boris-Johnsons-mother-tells-TOM-BOWER-familys-deepest-secret.html

   He’s undoubtedly a talented if anguished man, which latter need not prevent him from making a considerable impact. His leaving-a-legacy-for-history 17th Harmonic is strong; as is his 15H = a magic number in numerology which rules alchemy, black magic, need for erotic experiences, actors and eloquent speakers. It is a “tricky” number, not always lucky, and sometimes it can be associated with illness. His 7th harmonic is also marked which suggests a seeking soul who needs peace and can be cold and self-centered. His can-be-self-defeating 10H and 16H are also notable.


Trump & Melania – the fickle finger of fate

Trump fatigue is setting in as his capacity for hogging the headlines knows no bounds. Now he appears to have caught Coronavirus along with Melania and Hope Hicks.

  His age and obesity will put him especially at risk. His Progressed Moon (in Virgo) is exactly square his 10th house Uranus now and for the next few weeks. He has Aquarius and thus Saturn and Uranus ruling his 6th house of health. Tr Pluto is moving to a challenging and discouraging opposition to his Saturn from late November so both his 6th house rulers are under strain at the moment. Plus he has had a highly pressured run of difficult transits to mid points:

The catastrophic tr Uranus square his Mars/Saturn midpoint, to which Ebertin ascribes accidents, illness or tests of nervous strength, was in place till late September in which latter days the virus may have been gestating; at the same time as the disruptive tr Uranus square his Pluto.  Mid August to late November he has tr Pluto opposition his Mars/Uranus which will bring a struggle for survival and a real test of nerves. He is under a staggering amount of strain coming in from all quarters.

  His Lunar Return from 23 September for four weeks has the Saturn Pluto conjunction on the cusp of his 6th.

  Melania’s chart is showing acute frustration and irritation till late November, followed by a truly stressful four weeks till late December. Late October to late November – high tensions, seclusion, nervousness, separation. She also has a blocked Solar Arc Sun square her Pluto very soon. That may not all be illness since she’s in the eye of the Trump storm.

There’s nothing much showing on Hope Hicks’ chart without a birth time apart from a few discouraging days late this November into December with tr Saturn square her Libra Sun.

Armenia-Azerbaijan – local squabble becomes global

Another proxy war has broken out to add to global tensions this time in the Caucasus, stemming from a local territorial dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan. It is pitting Turkey against a surprising coalition of Russia, France and the USA.

 FT: ‘Mountainous Nagorno-Karabakh was an autonomous region when both Armenia and Azerbaijan were part of the Soviet Union. The conflict began when the region’s Armenian-majority population sought to join Armenia, sparking a war that killed more than 20,000 people before a Russia-brokered ceasefire in 1994 ushered in an uneasy stalemate.’

   Turkish President Erdogan’s support for Azerbaijan and his warmongering rhetoric has been condemned by Moscow and Ankara’s Nato allies. Russia and Turkey already back opposing sides in the Libya and Syria civil wars. Both Moscow and Paris have accused Erdogan of sending mercenary fighters from Syria to Azerbaijan. Macron has taken an increasingly tough line against Nato ally Turkey in recent months, over Libya and Ankara’s contentious gas exploration in the Eastern Mediterranean.

  Just to add to the complexity from an astrological viewpoint there are a plethora of charts for Azerbaijan and Armenia stemming from the messy break-up of the Russian Empire post-1917 and the equally confused dissolution of the USSR in the early 1990s.

  One date which both seem to share is 28 May 1918 when they took a tentative step towards independence. If it is sound, there is an undermining tr Neptune square Jupiter and opposition Mars which runs on and off into early 2021; with a short, sharp shock from Solar Arc Uranus conjunct the Sun soon; and a high-tension, paranoid, suspicious tr Uranus square Saturn and the Neptune/Saturn midpoint into spring 2021.

   The 1991 charts are so muddled they are hardly worth looking at.

  Erdogan’s 4th Term chart, 9 July 2018 4.30pm Ankara, is keyed up with an over-reactive tr Uranus square his stubbornly cantankerous Mars in Aquarius, repeating exactly late this month and through November, again next spring. He’s in a risk-taking mood. But will run into a major blockage with Solar Arc Sun opposition the Term Pluto, exact in six months. He’ll be stop start through 2021, over optimistic at points and then nailed down.

  The Turkey chart, 29 October 1923 8.30pm, is also facing mountainous problems with tr Pluto square the Saturn through 2020/21 suggesting hardship, deprivation and internal discontent; with an upbeat tr Pluto sextile Jupiter at the same time. If the start time is right then significant financial problems lie ahead, worsening along with other restrictions from 2023/24 onwards.

   The relations between Turkey and Russia (1917) are deteriorating this year and through 2021 with tr Neptune opposition the composite Mars Saturn; with further tensions erupting from April 2021 onwards into 2022 with tr Uranus square tr Saturn in hard aspect to the composite Sun square Neptune – stress levels will rise.

  France which has an oddly toxic relationship with Turkey at the best of times, will be chilly, critical and seething by this New Year. Though the worst aggravation will wait till 2022/23/24 as tr Pluto is in hard aspect to the composite Saturn, Venus and then Mars and Pluto.

Dominic Cummings – a talent for being disliked

Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s special adviser and ‘dark arts’ practitioner, has garnered a toxic reputation like many PM advisers before him which eventually led to their downfall and ousting. Indeed he’s been round this circuit before as bagman for Michael Gove in the Department of Education when the dirty tricks and abusive name-calling of opponents got to such a pitch in 2014 that Gove was removed to a political sinecure.  Cummings reinvented himself via the successful if less than honest Vote Leave campaign into Brexit and thence onto No 10.

  He’s had significant crashes in his career including early on involvement in a “spectacularly unsuccessful” project to set up an airline in southern Russia where he spent three years after university.

  Described as “mad, bad or brilliant – perhaps all three”, he’s known not to suffer fools or those who disagree with him gladly and is openly contemptuous, often in offensive language.

  Born 25 November 1971 in Durham, he has a Sun Neptune in Sagittarius opposition Saturn in Gemini square Mars in Pisces. A focal point Mars tends to be strong-willed and aggressive, attracting antagonism and conflict. In a Mutable sign it makes him scattergun in approach and high-wire in temperament, often not successful because he goes off in too many directions at once and lacks focus.

   I’d hazard a guess at an Aquarius Ascendant given his boho-anorak style of dressing and because it would mean tr Saturn was heading downhill in his chart over his Russia fiasco in the mid 1990s.  That possible birth time circa 1pm would put his self-righteous Jupiter in his 9th with his antagonistic Pluto in his 7th, and Mars in his 1st. Maybe wrong but makes sense.

   His chart was head-scratchingly obtuse over Boris’s win and indeed Brexit – he clearly has odd reactions. Though on a 1pm birth time it would put tr Saturn heading for his Midheaven and now moving through his upper quadrant thereafter until 2021/22 which would make sense. Thereafter he may sink again.

  For all his sang froid he looks seriously shaken this month, which is when the Boris government chart starts its meltdown. (See previous post).  Cummings will be jittered, jangled, nerve-stretched and making bad decisions for several weeks. He’ll get a lift in this December and next February but is heading for real disaster come mid-March into April 2021, repeating in September and the New Year into 2022. He’ll be tripping over  one disaster after another. The Solar and Lunar Eclipses from mid 2020 to late 2021 are rattling up his five Sagittarius planets so it will be a crisis point in his life.

  His relationship with Boris is one of the world’s great mysteries since there’s a bad-tempered and restrictive composite Mars Saturn in their relationship chart which is (even worse) in a hostile inconjunct to Pluto; an argumentative, conflicting-standpoints Mercury opposition Uranus Pluto and a needs-space Venus conjunct Uranus.  And their synastry is no better, with Cummings T Square of Sagittarius Sun Neptune opposition Saturn square Mars colliding with Boris’s Saturn in Virgo opposition Uranus Pluto square Mars in Gemini. They are absolutely not what the other needs since both go off at tangents and spin around like Catherine Wheels in a Force Nine gale.

  Their relationship chart doesn’t indicate an instant separation but there’s a decidedly swampy, undermining and dissatisfied feel with tr Neptune opposition the Sun/Pluto midpoint now and then opposition Pluto around that sinkhole phase next March 2021 and continuing on in the same vein into 2022. They don’t look in lockstep or harmony over the alleged Brexit point on December 31st.

  Cummings and Carrie Symonds are not remotely sympatico and the gulf between them will widen late this November into December with tr Saturn conjunct the composite Mercury, Sun. with upheavals through December and aggro over the New Year till late January; with more fireworks from mid 2021 onwards.

  With his old buddy Gove, he’s sensing panic in the air now with a definite chill between them from mid November through December; by late March 2021 onwards they won’t know where to turn – and whatever they had going as a partnership will be sinking in a morass of question marks.

   With the Chancellor Rishi Sunak, he has an odd connection with a supportive composite Sun trine Jupiter; but the Sun also on the focal point of a composite Yod of Saturn sextile Venus – so a fated bond that will irrevocably change both their lives. It’s under darkening clouds from late February onwards for two years with a discouraging mood between them.

  Cummings and the Tory Party 1912 aren’t a great match with a hostile, power-struggling composite Mars square Pluto which is being upended from July 2021 onwards worsening through 2022.

  The UK are no more enamoured of him with a ratchety-dislike composite Mars square Saturn. There’ll be more discontentment and disappointment between them from February 2021 onwards, with the March/April dip marked on this chart as well.

  Nothing definite regretfully from the astrology. Though none of this batch look remotely chipper as they set foot into 2021.

  His chart is better suited to an airline business (albeit unsuccessful) than affairs of state. He does have fairly extensive business interests some of which have raised eyebrows about conflicts of interest.

Taiwan worrying about war threat

China is ramping up the pressure on Taiwan, conducting military exercises off the coast and summarily removing an agreed median line in the Taiwan Straits which helped prevent military accidents. Opinion is divided as to whether Beijing is trying to provoke a reaction or to shake Taiwan’s morale and indicate displeasure about closer contacts between Taipei and Washington and a possible arms sales. Officials say it is the worst escalation of military activity in more than two decades.

  The history of modern China is so muddled there is no clear chart for Taiwan though the 1 January 1912 chart did show up the three Taiwan Straits Crises with China in 1954/58/95, so has a validity.

  On that chart tr Pluto is opposing the Neptune at the moment until late this November for maximum confusion and high-anxiety; and that rolls on through 2021/22; with indications of a total turnaround and massive upheaval come 2022 with tr Pluto conjunct the Uranus. Along the way 2021 looks economically stressed with tr Uranus conjunct the Saturn in Taurus with tr Saturn in square; at the same time as a high-risk, scary, trapped tr Pluto trine Mars. Muddle and mayhem will run on till 2024. Part of that will be pandemic and consequent economic damage.

  The China 1949 chart is in bullish mood till late this November with tr Pluto conjunct the Jupiter; and will be on high-alert and aggressive form from July 2021 onwards as tr Uranus starts to square the 7th house (= neighbours) Mars in Leo and moving on to square Pluto in 2022. When tr Uranus is in hard aspect to Mars it usually tests an individual or country’s self-esteem and the likelihood is of rash over-reactions to prop up morale.

  Xi Jinping’s 2nd Term chart, 24 October 2017 12.30pm Beijing, is moving into shaky territory from May 2021 onwards with tr Neptune square the Saturn; though the effects of that will come sooner as tr Neptune squares the Moon in late February/March. Tr Pluto is also square the Term Uranus from late February 2021 on and off to late 2022, which is usually a time of maximum instability for an administration – and that extreme wobble will be exacerbated by Solar Arc Uranus opposition the Sun exact in early 2022 for a shocking surprise.  If he survives that still clinging onto his perch then tr Pluto squares the Term Sun in 2023/24 putting him under severe pressure; and after that tr Pluto squares the Jupiter in 2024/25. He may or may not survive politically to rise again from the ashes when the Pluto Jupiter effect rescues him.

Trump in meltdown

Chris Wallace, senior television anchor and journalist with Fox News, had the unenviable task of attempting to moderate the Trump-Biden first debate. By all accounts he lost control but in fairness there would be little chance of reining Trump in when he went off on one of his semi-psychotic rants. A hefty dose of opioids was about the only lever that might have done the trick and avoided what was described as a national embarrassment, an epic moment of shame for the ages – as well as a dumpster fire, a car-crash etc etc.

  Wallace, 12 October 1947, has his Sun, Neptune and Venus spread out through Libra; with a penetrating Mercury in Scorpio square a hefty collection of Saturn, Pluto and Mars in Leo.

  If anything, he’d lean more towards Biden with a composite Sun Venus in a workmanlike trine to Saturn; and an enthusiastic Mars Jupiter in their relationship chart.

His relationship chart on the other hand with Trump has a palpable dislike and power-struggling composite Sun, Mars, Pluto.  It’s a good deal starker in terms of outright aggravation than the Trump/Biden relationship chart. Wallace would press Trump’s buttons.

  Trump was in any event even more out of control than usual for two astro-reasons.  One was Mars Saturn and the other Pluto. Firstly there was a celestial Mars Saturn square yesterday which was activating his Venus (conjunct Saturn) and tr Saturn had until a couple of days before been inconjunct his attention-hogging Mars in Leo. Mars Saturn mixes two very different energies. Mars is go-ahead, assertive, competitive, angry when pent up. Saturn is restrictive, putting blocks in the way of forward movement. It’s why it is associated with accidents and broken bones since hot-headed Mars running smack into Saturn’s rigidity and brick-wall qualities isn’t a good combination.

It’s also associated with both assassinations and the military. Saturn’s Grim Reaper plus Mars’ warlike tendencies = death.  But it also points to the necessity for soldiers to obey, which means they have to suppress their personal wishes in order to do as they are told. This breeds an underlying resentment over time, which builds up and can have explosive consequences.  Dysfunctional childhoods – cruel parents – often show up as Mars Saturn in a chart – and it does breed self-discipline, the ability to withstand tough conditions. But there’s also a simmering volcano effect, whereby the underlying anger only stays hidden for so long and then blows, often with destructive effect. At a more trivial level it’s very ratchety and irritable.

   The other is his Pluto – from what I can gather, not having watched, he wouldn’t let anyone else speak and constantly interrupted, which suggests a desperation to exert control on everything and everyone in his environment. Allowing any other voice or presence floor space would pose a death blow to his shaky self-esteem and that threatens psychological implosion – it’s narcissism on steroids.

  He’s just had tr Uranus upending his 12th house Pluto which is conjunct his Mars/Saturn midpoint, both at 10 degrees Leo, so he’d go into the debate standing on very shaky ground. Falling poll numbers and the NY Times expose of his tax returns indicating his claims of being a financial genius were built on sand would have penetrated through even his rhinoceros hide to shatter his illusions of grandiosity, entitlement, and superiority. What lies underneath that in him is inner inadequacy, shame, and vulnerability. Shame is especially corrosive for a narcissist and they will go to the ends of the earth to avoid facing it or worse feeling it.  And of course it could well be a dementia symptom.

“Some people try to be tall by cutting off the heads of others.” —Paramahansa Yogananda