Lies and slander have a Neptunian feel but when they are delivered with toxic intensity as poison-spreaders with destructive intent they are more of a Plutonic attack – a venom that lingers. Trump’s playbook was out in force this week with a slanderous reprise of an old alt-right conspiracy theory about the accidental death of Lori Klausutis, who died a decade ago when a faulty heart valve caused her to faint and fatally hit her head on a desk. Trump insinuated her death involved MSNBC reporter Joe Scarborough, her employer then, who wasn’t even in the state when she died.
It follows a Trump pattern of targeting his critics by going after their families or friends, who are wholly unconnected to his grievance but become collateral damage, as his rancid followers then keep up the assault month after month and year after year. The NY Times mentions the Khans, parents of a dead veteran, who appeared at a Democratic Convention making a stand against Trump’s immigration policies, who were slagged off by Trump and are still getting hate mail four years later. Mr Khan said: “We have realized that this is a very calculated scheme, a very deliberate way of causing pain in others: ‘I will utter this, then I will go quiet and then I will let my followers take it from there. This is in his operating manual — this is not unintentional or in the heat of the moment.”
All of which got me pondering about what it was in his chart that leads to such behaviour.
Gemini can be wayward, uncaring about tramping on others’ sensitivities and while admittedly it does turn up as a serial killers’ sign, it’s not usually thought of as malevolent. A Sagittarius Moon can be overly blunt but not usually devious.
His Pluto in the 12th has always struck me as a key planet and one which is often triggered by targets of his vituperative ravings. Pluto in the 12th does indicate an inner raging storm of emotions of the darker hue – hatred, greed, lust – and since it is unconscious tends to act without moderation.
His midpoints are also illuminating in this regard.
His Pluto is conjunct his Mars/Saturn midpoint – described by Ebertin as ‘the fury of destruction and brutality.’
His Saturn is conjunct his Mercury/Pluto midpoint = a quarrelsome nature, exposed to bitter attacks. Mercury/Pluto is associated with slyness, cunning, misrepresentation.
His Saturn is conjunct his Sun/Mars midpoint = also quarrelsome, hot-blooded, violent,
His Saturn is conjunct Mars/Node = difficulties in co-operation, depression.
Plus his Midheaven is conjunct the destructive Fixed Star Algol – associated with the snake-covered decapitated head of Medusa, whose death stare turned men to stone.
His 9th Harmonic, supposedly what gives him pleasure, has a stressed Yod of Saturn sextile Mars inconjunct Pluto – which indicates a coercive, manipulative temperament, for whom the wielding of power is an end in itself.
The answer is there in his chart though maybe not obvious at first glance.
He may have met a more bullish opponent than usual in Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter, 19 November 1976, who is finally putting his foot down about Trump false facts and calls to violence. Dorsey is a Sun Mars in late Scorpio opposition Jupiter in Taurus widely square Saturn in Leo – not a man who’ll budge in a hurry. (With the caveat that business considerations may cause him to back off somewhat.) Dorsey’s Uranus is square Trump’s Pluto so he will have the capacity to unsettle him. Their relationship chart has a controlling composite Sun Pluto conjunction. When operating in unison this gives them influence as a pair, but when differing agendas crop up it turns nasty.
Joe Scarborough who has crossed swords with Trump since he was elected, 9 April 1963, has his Mars in Leo conjunct Trump’s Pluto for a combustible interface.
Just as a footnote. The USA’s Mercury in Cancer opposition Pluto in Capricorn which is an enduring strand of the American psyche is being triggered this year by the tr Saturn Pluto conjunction and the next three years by tr Pluto in hard aspect. So heated and toxic debates will be even more foreground than usual.
The New York Times has helpfully pulled together various examples of Trump’s slanderous attacks..
We’ve talked about family patterns here before. It’s interesting (if chilling) to look at Trump’s German grandfather, Friedrich Trumpf, 14 March, 1869. He is the founding patriarch of this family, a draft-dodging, brothel keeping, hotelier and property man….Pisces Sun squares Trump’s Gemini Sun. No birth time, but from the planetary line up, there’s a fixed Leo Mars square Pluto in Taurus….and a flaming grand trine with Mars in Leo, Jupiter in Aries, Saturn in Sagittarius (conjunct Trump’s Moon and opposite his Uranus) Neptune in Aries (opposite Trump’s Jupiter), Nodes in Leo. Friedrich’s Uranus was conjunct the USA Sun in Cancer. It squares DT’s Chiron in Libra……There’s more, but I do think there’s some potent family “karma” going on here.
It’s somewhat off-topic to astrology but I remember at the end of March (just before lockdown in the UK) when I watched a woman online do a tarot reading on certain countries regarding the pandemic and lockdown and more about how they would handle it. When she came to the USA it was a pretty dire reading in which she stated America and Trump will be having their ‘collapsing tower moment’, and much of it is deeply karmic (chickens coming home to roost) which must be raised to the surface and dealt with. Karmic for both Trump and the country. You can’t get any more deeply karmic than the disturbing racist energy that makes up the American identity, an identity Trump personifies to the T.
I’m sure, way back, Marjorie wrote an interesting post looking at the psychology of America and how it is constantly looking for an opponent to antagonize, as if still in the wild west, in order to build its own fractured identity, but when there is no opponent to goad (as is the case under global lockdown) it would implode because it cannot look at its own dark shadow regarding how it treats those who are not white because it has never come to terms with its own racial diversity that is built on questionable and unsavory foundations. All the ugliness is forced to the surface. I can’t remember the title or date of the post but it was a good read.
Let’s not forget that Trump lost the popular vote for the presidency by 3 million votes. The archaic and idiosyncratic structure of the Electoral College gave disproportionate power to a few gun-mad, right wing, underpopulated states. It’s my personal nightmare that it will happen again this year, though Trump’s been exposed so often as an Emperor Without Clothes, and his rhetoric has become so vile, that one hopes he’ll be crushed in the election. I don’t know if there is reliable information about date/time of the establishment of the Electoral College, but I wonder if it might be possible to look at its future, particularly around Election Day in the U.S.
Then people wonder why people don’t vote. With any modicum of logic this speaks for itself…… Just saying!!
Your comments made me curious! The Electoral College founding date is 6 September, 1787. It has Jupiter and Mars in Gemini, trine Saturn in Aquarius, and with Mercury in Leo fitting into that. The Uranus is 28 Cancer, so Pluto will be opposing that soonish. Neptune will square the Mars, Jupiter (24-26 degrees) too. If you look at Trump’s natal horoscope, it ties into the Electoral College’s planets in quite a few interesting ways. The Mercury in Leo is right on Trump’s Mars and it’s Saturn opposes that, for example. The Electoral College’s Neptune in Libra is right on Trump’s Jupiter, while he also has Neptune in Libra natally. What kind of foggy dream was this?
Larryc, “I suspect Americans are quite broken/dysfunctional inside. Trump may have been elected thru some unconscious desire for someone to lead the country that is as broken and dysfunctional as themselves.”
I completely agree with this statement of yours. I have believed that the reason there was so much hate for Obama was because people were unconsciously ashamed of themselves for not measuring up to Obama’s greatness and envied him for it.
thank you. i hv a cousin whom i no longer speak to, such are her foul-mouthed rantings toward obama, “that hillary”, and most democrats. But…the GOP is no better, she admits. Her life and that of her kids are totally out of control, a freight train going rail to rail. her son now spends every cent on cocaine and ignores his two shildren. her daughter has been trying for years to become pregnant…by only her gay boyfriends. her latest rants are about fascist democrats “in power” forcing everyone to wear facemasks against an unproven so-called virus.
i wish her better than she gives me. there’s something wrong with this picture. Burning down the entire town won;t change a damn thing.
We have had a rough week here. CNN is partly to blame, as they gave him a platform due to ratings. There is shadow-stuff going on. Trump would not be able to do anything unless he was enabled by the Senate and the House Republicans, with only Romney standing up to him. Ann Coulter turned on him this week on twitter. So, the checks and balances that were set up are not enforced by the Senate Republicans. So, he is a symptom of something larger. I am no fan, but the first time I heard him speak (on C-Span radio) I realized he would likely be elected. Frontline did a series on “The Great Divide” and Scaramucci was on for 1.5 hours – you can find it on youtube. He talked about the “Forgotten Man”. It is a thing here – Nafta has not been all that kind to many towns. I am sure Trump is enabled in the background as well. The destructiveness right now here is not helping, but it is pure Pluto. We have burning cities. So I would argue these are long term unkind cycles. Europe had multiple situations of the peasants rising up. Not lately, but think in terms of that. I will look at the astrology and report back on that more.
So then…Kati…what is your latform?
“We have had a rough week here. CNN is partly to blame, as they gave him a platform due to ratings.”
Where are you to have a bad week? Certainly what you write is obvious – burning cities, destruction, failure of NAfta. Why is it that Nafta should be blamed for economic failures in towns?
” Europe had multiple situations of the peasants rising up. Not lately, but think in terms of that.”
What is your message? Arise, noble workers of the proletariat?
Hahaha, larryc. You have hit the nail on the head with a hammer and sickle.
On Mother’s Day this year, Trump said, “In my mother’s eyes I could do no wrong.” Spoiled rotten perhaps?
He certainly comes across as a man-child/spoiled but that Venus conjunct Saturn in Cancer of his doesn’t really give off a warm, loving parental relationship feel. His mother (10/5/1912) has a Taurus Sun conjunct Saturn and her Venus in Taurus squares Uranus in Aquarius which suggests her parental relationship may also have been also rather lacking in warmth or overly disciplined. His father (11/10/1905) has a combust Sun/Mercury in Libra, Mars/Uranus in Capricorn and as a father himself was authoritarian – Trump’s mother would compile a list of misdemeanours committed by the children which was read out to the father at the end of each day whereupon disciplinary action would be applied. It doesn’t really suggest a loving parental relationship. Both parents were strongly Protestant and Fred Trump was one of 7, arrested during a KKK march on Memorial Day 1927. It’s interesting that Trump denies this ever happened. Interestingly, Trump and both his parents have Mercury square Neptune in their natal charts as if distorting the truth is a strong element of the family fate.
I seem to recall DJT was sent to Military Academy because his parents couldn’t deal with him anymore at 13. He himself frames it as being “bit of a wiseguy”, and there are stories from contemporaries in Bronx who tell he was physically abusive towards a piano instructor and a friend. At this point, he probably was already bigger than Fred, who wasn’t a tall guy, so I think his parents got scared.
Later, when DJT was divorcing from Ivana, Mary Trump sided with her and has been reported to saying she regretted giving birth to “that monster”.
Yes, Trump’s Sun at 22 degrees of Gemini conjuncts his father’s Pluto at the same degree and Trump’s Jupiter Conjuncts his father’s Sun at 17 degrees of Libra. Would you say that there’s some kind of power struggle there? I’ve heard Trump praising Fred and then boasting that he had surpassed his father. Even his own parent doesn’t escape from his narcissistic projections.
Sorry, saw this only now, but I think a lot of Trump’s fragile ego results from not measuring up to Fred. Who, by all accounts, was a horrible person, but a formidable presence and wielded true power on “his side” of The Bridge. Trump argueably moved to Manhattan real estate market to “show his father”, because while not necessarily more lucrative than Queens market, it’s more prestigious. After initial success with Trump Tower, he pretty much screwed it up, and Fred had to give a hand. Late 2018 There was a big story on how Fred funneled over 400 million dollars to Donald through different avenues. Some means he used were arguably illegal, but any crime would have met statute of limitations. He also dropped a couple of millions by buying coins he never used at Taj Majal when it was near bankrupted shortly after opening.
I can’t do a synastry right now, and there isn’t an exact time of birth for Fred, but Fred himself was a Libra Sun/Mercury, and either Pisces or Aries Moon. I would go with Aries Moon. This would not be a bad match with DJT, per se. Fred’s is anything but emotional chart, and I’d say he probably did not suffer fools. Mary Trump had little education, but was reportedly smart. Although Fred had affairs, it probably was important to him to have a wife who was “no fool”. I’ve also mentioned his two daughters were educated and had careers well beyond what was expected for women in “polite societies”. They probably were more of Phyllis Schlafly types than feminists, but still, shows that education and academic success werevalued at Trump household. What’s interesting is that Fred Mars/Uranus in Capricorn possibly squaring Aries Moon opposes DJT’s Mercury. I wouldn’t be surpriced if his was the key issue in their relations. Fred more likely than not, thought his son was stupid, and made his thoughts known.
If you want a psychobabble explanation:- hatred and/or narcissistic rage is triggered when the immature individual does not have total control of their environment and that fear evokes primitive feelings of revenge, which lingers long after the threat is removed. Causing pain in others distracts from the pain caused to them by an under-nurturing mother. It comes from early wounding in the first few months of life which does not allow for the development of a mature sense of self-worth. So there is extreme sensitivity to any perceived threats which trigger a volcanic response to distract from the inner wound and also to remove the perceived threat by destroying it. Underneath it all there is a reservoir of deep shame which threatens to obliterate the personality when faced with failure. To other people, the rage is incoherent and unjust, since it impairs cognition and judgment. They are prone to shouting, fact distortion and making groundless accusations. Some even search for conflict as a way to alleviate their pain or suffering.
In Trump’s case all that bombastic ‘I am the Greatest’ is a desperate defence against ‘actually I’m nothing’ – that latter doesn’t even begin to describe what touching on primitive shame is like. In ye olden days narcissism was reckoned impervious to treatment though more recently that view has changed. Though it is the most intractable of conditions and since therapy only works if the individual is willing to try to change most often their fear of implosion is too great to allow them to contemplate it.
Trump may not be more complicated than other narcissists, he’s just been fated to find a larger platform from which to spray his primal shit.
The above is a standard psychoanalytic view of rage/hatred which focuses on baby development. But in fact Trump has his Pluto in the 12th which would suggest an even earlier wound during his mother’s pregnancy with him – 12th house planets are indicators of a troubled gestation.
Which goes back to DG’s question – why did we (Americans) do this to ourselves? Many politicians and celebrities have a strong narcissistic streak but not too many are as damaging as him.
“Trump may not be more complicated than other narcissists, he’s just been fated to find a larger platform from which to spray his primal shit.”
He is unbelievable simple even for a NPD person. I know two people who have the diagnosis – made by professional therapists their victims were seeing, since NPDs seldom seek help themselves – and they both have at least a wider range in hurting people they want to hurt. For instance, my very good friend temporarely lost custody of her kids and was literally run out of town when she divorced her covert narcissist husband. He wasn’t anyone “important”, but very smart and manipulative and successful at convincing social services on friend’s depression being more sever it really was. It took my friend over a year to get a joint custody. And when she got it, her ex completely lost interest in their children, because it was never about their wellbeing, but hurting their mother who’d been at home for 10 years
I suspect Americans are quite broken/dysfuntional inside. Trump may have been elected thru some unconscious desire for someone to lead the country that is as broken and dysfunctional as themselves.
“12th house planets are indicators of a troubled gestation.”
Thanks for this insight, Marjorie. My brother has a stellium in the 12th (and 11th) and he did indeed have quite a difficult birth.
KG, Larry: I stand corrected. You’re right. The word “complicated” implies that Trump has a measure of intellect, which he doesn’t. He’s a simple schoolyard bully…..and maybe a little bit crazy.
It should be remembered that the Medusa was finally beheaded.
Trump’s demons will turn on him eventually.
Regrettably Medusa continued to petrify men even after she was beheaded which is why she became a protective motif – tho’ still deadly. So the damage he did will linger on though hopefully with a few salutary lessons drawn.
thanks. i was drinking morning coffee and trying to scribble down a similar message. as long as trump remains such a symbol, a dysfunctional america will recall and emulate his behaviors.
My ex husband had Pluto in the 12th. Very abusive physically and verbally. Would spit venom. There was something there about his relationship with his parents and what he saw growing up that made him think it was ok. The other thing was the next day he would behave as if nothing happened. As if he didn’t remember what he said and did.
Could Pluto in the 12th carry with it a collective shadow? As though the US’s Pluto return coincides with Trump as an embodiment of that shadow? Trump is incapable of acknowledging his own darkness and always projects it onto others. It’s becoming more disturbing as he becomes increasingly out of control and his targets are often powerless – he punches down. He typically plays the victim when he’s called out on his cruelty.
I have Pluto in the 12th along with Uranus and it is an intense placement though I’ve never wanted to kill anyone. I was plagued (and still am) as a child with horrible dreams of an apocalyptic and dark nature. Awareness of one’s own darkness, capacity for self-destruction and shining a light on it is a life’s work with this placement. The enemy is usually oneself.
I was watching Geoff Dunbar’s animation of ‘Ubu Roi’ (Alfred Jarry) the other day and felt appalled at how relevant it was.
Where is Pluto in the US chart?
27 degrees Capricorn. With Pluto transits -no human will ever experience a full cycle, but given Pluto’s eccentric orbit, there are people living today who experience their Pluto opposite Pluto transit -, I’d keep a tight orb of 1.5 to 2 degrees.So, we are still at “lead” period for The US, but I’m not surprised the dark side of the history being evoked right now.
Thanks
I was wondering which house it sits in and what that says about the country’s psyche ?
Jennifer, Mercury in Cancer in the USA’s natal chart of 4th July 1776 is in the 8th house therefore it’s natal Pluto is in the 2nd house. Am not well educated in horary astrology but in natal astrology the 2nd/8th house axis is to do with values, finances, personal possessions (2nd) and that which is hidden, collective resources, the shadow (8th house).
Julie, Trump isn’t complicated. He is a simple bully. His momma didn’t love him enough. His actions are probably a re-playing of how his parents treated him. His father was quite abusive.
He is a damaged person.
Not complicated at all.
The fates that have placed him in our group consciousness–well that has me curious! And why have we done this to ourselves?
“The fates that have placed him in our group consciousness–well that has me curious! And why have we done this to ourselves?”
I mostly blame Mark Burnett. He elevated this failing businessman to an icon of American Enterpreunership and completely duped millions of people with “The Apprentice”. But it’s undoubtable that many, many people tend to identify with the bully.
Americans who identify with “it is a free country” are very unbalanced. “I can do what I want; no one can tell me otherwise. ” All a justification to be unholy mean.
“His momma didn’t love him enough.”
Not at all accurate. Momma’s love won’t cure intrinsic evil. she did the best she could, I suppose, given what she knew of herself and of her environment. I’m willing to offer that up.
We will never know will we?
My comment is an insult I heard someone say once. (and they were teasing!) I just thought was apt.
It’s frustrating to see in the spotlight so many who express an enormous emptiness inside that they try to fill with the material, while also, at the same time, seeing them lash out with actions that are hurtful to others (I believe to push people away.)
It seems to me, the entire living ecosystem, of which we are just a small part, is hurting.
Often, as you see in injured animals, rather than accepting what is needed to heal (calmness, trust, rest, reflection), the injured, in pain, lash out. I don’t think it’s just Trump.
That said. I hate seeing him, his family, the alt-right folks. My anger seems bottomless and that’s my shadow stuff.
It hurts. I’m too idealistic. And lazy, I suppose–we had a such seemingly calm stretch. It’s good to have a spotlight on the things we still need to change. It’s be great if somehow we could calm down and be able to do the healing work, the spiritual work (accept that we are all of the same stuff–even if it’s just acknowledging in a “rational” way, that we are of the same stuff as the stars rather than a religious doctrine.)
Oh well….
I thank you all for giving me things to think about!
May you and all those you love be happy and safe!
In another life Trump probably could have been a serial murderer. The question now is, when he loses in November, will he go or will he force an almighty constitutional crisis? Admitting that he has lost is beyond him.
I have often wondered what in Trump’s astrology accounts for his ruthless, vicious nature. You have uncovered what lies beneath, answering a lot of questions re this very complicated man. Enlightening, to say the least. Thank you.
what makes him complicated? Im curious, Julie.
I’ve known such people with unlimited vile hatred. My mother was one such person.