Oligarchs owning vast tranches of the US media is Orwellian since they control the narrative that inform swathes of the electorate. Larry Ellison owns Paramount and CBS, soon possibly Tik Tok and CNN. Jeff Bezos the Washington Post. Mark Zuckerburg Facebook and Instagram. Lachlan Murdoch Fox News. Musk Twitter/X.
Ellison, 17 August 1944, a New Moon and Pluto in Leo, with Venus, Mercury, Mars in Virgo square Uranus in Gemini, looks to be going from strength to strength with only a few blips ahead, most notably around the turn of the decade.
CBS, 27 January 1927, will have a few upbeat moments this year with tr Uranus square the Jupiter but will be pressured with tr Pluto conjunct the Sun in 2027/28, alongside an uncertain Solar Arc Neptune conjunct Saturn; followed by a collision-type shock in 2028 from Solar Arc Sun conjunct the Mars.
CNN, 1 June 1980, will also have some lucky breaks this year with tr Uranus square the Jupiter alongside a few ripples of unease from tricky hard aspects to several Solar Arc planets but would seem to be roaring ahead by 2029 with SA Jupiter opposition the Pluto at a time of considerable change with tr Uranus conjunct their Gemini Sun.
The Washington Post, 6 December 1877, is confused and undermined in 2026/27 with tr Pluto square the Neptune; and in a long drawn out phase of considerable challenges and setbacks from SA Mars square the Pluto in 2024 and moving on to conjunct the Uranus in 2029; with disappointments (financial and other) along the way.
Jeff Bezos, 12 January 1964, is similarly afflicted by Neptunian and Saturnine woes right through till the turn of the decade – which may be because of his other interests not progressing to plan.
Fox News, 7 October 1996, the Trump cheer-channel, is floundering this year with tr Saturn opposition the Sun and tr Neptune square the Saturn; with more disappointments ahead in 2029/30 financially and otherwise.
Fox owner Lachlan Murdoch, 8 September 1971 9pm London, UK, will be jangled this year by his Solar Arc Uranus opposition his financial Saturn with tr Uranus continuing to rock his boat in 2027/28 conjunct his Saturn. But his greatest test comes across the turn of the decade into the early 2030s with a tranche of unfavourable Solar Arcs.
The New York Times, 18 September 1851, is having a high-tension year of change till the end of 2026 with tr Pluto square its Saturn Uranus conjunction; with some uncertainty in 2027; but it will be 2030/31 when it faces its greatest test. The owner, AG Sulzberger, 5 August 1980, will be similarly afflicted around 2031/32.
Facebook, 4 February 2004, and Twitter, 21 May 2006, both with planets in mid Aquarius will be feeling the winds of change at storm force bellowing at the end of this decade into the early 2030s.
There do seem to be challenges across the board in four or five years and on. At that point tr Neptune will be square the USA Cancer Sun and tr Saturn Uranus will be heading for the USA Mars.
George Orwell: “If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”
“The very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. Lies will pass into history.”
The fall of the “legacy” media into the hands of ultra-wealthy ideologues is a tragedy.
This includes the NYT under A.O. Sulzberger, a libertarian twerp and nepo baby whose advent as publisher in 2018 coincided with an accelerated slide of the former “newspaper of record” from hard-hitting, top-notch reporting that strove for objectivity–and an editorial position oriented toward “comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable”–to its current embrace of a more right-wing, pro-oligarch agenda and “sanewashing” of DJT and his presidency. Not that there isn’t still great reporting coming out of the Times (e.g., the recent expose of the White House’s apparent criminal conspiracy to cover up the Epstein connections), but it’s a shadow of its former self. It’s very disheartening.
Similarly, CBS’ parent company, Paramount Skydance, being taken over by mediocre unqualified billionaire ideologue and Trump associate David Ellison (son of Larry, b. 1/9/1983 in California), was the nail in the coffin of CBS News, a once-great news organization. The network of Edward R. Murrow, Eric Sevareid and Walter Cronkite isn’t quite “Fox Lite,” yet, but it’s close to it now. However, due to the recent debacle at “60 Minutes,” many are at least now aware of CBS’ slide.
A couple of points: more Americans now get their news from podcasts than they do from the legacy media, which, despite all the worries about “news tribalism,” indicates a suspicion among ordinary people that they aren’t getting the full story from the mainstream media, and a desire to learn the truth. It’s a hopeful sign that millions are now awake to some of the ways the news has been compromised, and are seeking a variety of viewpoints on alternative media in an attempt to find a balance. Anecdotally, that seems to be more and more true, especially Gen Z and Millennials.
If/when the Democrats regain Congress in the midterms, we’re in for a long but necessary slog toward accountability on all levels of government, which I hope and believe will include enforcement of antitrust laws, as well as rules against concentration of ownership in media markets, that have been allowed to go moribund under the Trump administrations, or that have been killed off altogether.
It won’t be until January of 2029 (after the Republicans are ousted from the executive branch in the 2028 elections and a new Democratic president is sworn in) before it will be possible to begin truly reforming the FCC and the FTC, and to possibly reinstate some safeguards such as the old Fairness Doctrine; so if these media potentates are due to experience rough weather from 2028 through the early 2030s, that timing gives me hope.
It might be helpful to learn what’s in store, astrologically, for the younger Ellison as well. Unfortunately, he’s a big part of this story.