The cartoonists are having a field day with Home Secretary Suella Braverman who has deliberately defied No 10 by attacking the police over the pro-Palestinian rallies and her claims that for the homeless rough sleeping is sometimes a “lifestyle choice”. Getting rid of her is not an easy option for Rishi Sunak since she represents the hard right of the party who would not be pleased. And she might well appreciate being fired and dissociating herself from a government destined to be defeated, allowing her to take over next year as a “clean break” leader.

  Born 3 April 1980 she is an upfront, pro-active Sun Aries (like Priti Patel) in a controlling opposition to Pluto. On top of that she has a prominent Mars in Leo conjunct North Node square Uranus and square Venus.

  Interpretations for Mars Uranus squares run from self-willed, through obstinate, intolerant, argumentative, reckless, risk-taking, erratic and impatient about overthrowing the established order. Great for high-risk, solo adventurers for whom constant adrenaline rushes are vital, less so for a reliable team mate.

  This weekend’s Mars Uranus opposition will have her rattled up though it is not quite exact on her chart. On second thoughts, her Solar Arc Sun may well be exactly square her Mars at the moment if she was an early to mid morning baby and that will detonate her Semtex qualities.

  Her Term chart as Home Secretary is the same as Rishi Sunak’s PMship – 25 October 2022. Both are in the midst of a panicky phase with the smell of failure creating havoc. Tr Neptune square the Mars has been running through October staying in place until Friday 17^th next week and returns December 27 to early February. So an administration in trouble. Which does not mean it has to collapse but morale will be at an all-time low.

  Her relationship chart with Rishi Sunak is sagging badly, has been sagging badly for some time and will continue to do so for months ahead whether she is reshuffled or not.

  Braverman’s intemperate language over migrants and the homeless has run slap bang into the middle of the impossibly entangled Israel-Palestine mess which is peculiarly ill-suited to snappy soundbyte rallying cries from politicians or anyone else. Some of the free-Palestine demonstrators appear to have no understanding of who/what Hamas are. And equally the pro-Israel lobby refuse to consider the backstory and context.   All of which land in the midst of the Remembrance Day solemn memorials, important in the country’s history and especially dear to the hearts of the Tory Party, plus a discredited Met police – and it is a recipe for disaster.  

Portugal has lost its Socialist prime minister Antonio Costa, in power since 2015, as he resigns amid a corruption investigation linked to his government’s handling of lithium and hydrogen projects. He denies the allegations and said he would dissolve parliament after the November 29^th vote on the 2024 budget. It aims to scrap tax breaks for well-off foreigners, cut income tax for others, increase social benefits for the poorest and increase public investment to spur economic growth.

Antonio Costa, 17 July 1961, is a Sun Cancer opposition Saturn with his Sun conjunct Procyon, the fixed star which can carry the individual to great heights and then have them crashing down. He has an ultra-determined, can-be-ruthless Pluto Mars conjunction in Virgo which has moved by Solar Arc to cross his Neptune in the past three years, worsening the devastation over the next two years. Whatever happens with this investigation it won’t be his shining hour.  

 His third term chart, 30 March 2022 has a ratchety, prone-to-setbacks Mars Saturn conjunction with Mars square Uranus – and Saturn catching the disruptive tr Uranus square exactly now. This term also started on the prone-to-scandals Jupiter Neptune conjunction.

 His original First Term chart, 26 November 2015, has a bulldozing and over-controlling feel with Uranus opposition Mars square Pluto. The Solar Arc Mars is exactly opposition the Uranus now for an almighty jolt, ending his premiership with shocking suddenness. Tr Saturn has also been square the Sun through this year.

  Both his first and last term charts do appear to work reasonably well against events – Uranus Mars was clearly his signature. He started on it and has been cut down by it.

  The election is scheduled for 10 March 2024 when – a Mars in Aquarius square Uranus is in place. It will continue to edgy, uncompromising mood.

Portugal, 25 April 1974 5.15 pm Lisbon, has an 8^th house Taurus Sun which caught the recent Lunar Eclipse exactly so a crisis was always due. The Solar Arc Mars square Pluto is also catching the present tr Uranus opposition Mars for jolts and shocks.  Tr Neptune Saturn moving into Aries from 2025 will not make the two years after that a walk in the park  as it squares the Portugal Saturn Mars in Cancer and opposes the Pluto – uncertain, panicky, muddled; with tr Pluto waiting in the wings to square the Taurus Sun in 2026/27 – it’ll be a long haul and a transformed country when it emerges out of all of that.

Add On: President Marcelo de Sousa, 12 December 1948, has been in the position since 9 March 2016. He is a Sun Sagittarius as befits an academic, with his Sun trine Pluto and opposition Uranus. He has suffered various ailments in recent years and does look downbeat at the moment with his Solar Arc Sun opposition his Saturn.  His Presidency is moving into an unsettled, potentially disruptive time so may not last through 2024 and certainly 2025.

Worth watching out for is the following New Moon to a Solar Eclipse which often sparks up significant events. The Scorpio New Moon this coming Monday will be ramped up by the explosive Mars in Scorpio opposition Uranus and follow the powerful,  angry and forceful Libra Solar Eclipse of 14^th October.

  This New Moon will be primarily focused on Israel/Gaza since it falls with the New Moon Mars on the Midheaven there opposition a disruptive Uranus in the 4^th.

  But there does seem on a different level to be more mayhem than usual in various countries – the Myanamar rebellion against the illegitimate military government has scored notable victories; the Portuguese government has collapsed due to corruption allegations; the UK is in political chaos with the Home Secretary jousting with the police and prime minister; in the US the political circus gets more bizarre with Trump trials garnishing his credentials, the GOP hopefuls tearing out each other’s throats metaphorically; and Joe Biden abseiling down the polls and getting dragged into his family’s dubious China dealings during his VP-ship. Sigh, oh for the days of peace and boredom.

[From today’s Times: – ‘Think dear Uncle Joe’s angelic? Think again’

While attention is on Donald Trump’s corruption trial, evidence suggests the incumbent is no stranger to a ‘dodgy deal’

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/think-dear-uncle-joe-biden-angelic-think-again-comment-qvk6nxtbf

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Patrick Dempsey, formerly McDreamy of Gray’s Anatomy, has been named by the celeb magazine People as their sexiest man alive for the year. An accolade which has been handed to all the top male movie stars since Mel Gibson in 1985 onwards.

 Dempsey, born 13 January 1966 11.45am Lewiston, Maine, is smiling winsomely at the fuss, but clearly happy to have arrived at the top of the pile. In addition to acting he is also a racing car driver which as I recollect did not go down well with producer Shonda Rhimes on Gray’s Anatomy which he finally left in 2015.

  He is a Sun Capricorn on his Midheaven with charming and ambitious Venus Mars in Aquarius in his 10^th also, suiting him for a public career. His Mars is in a showbusiness square to Neptune and an exuberant trine to Jupiter in Gemini and a Libra Moon. So an Air Grand Trine plus a Capricorn Sun trine Uranus Pluto in Virgo in his sporting 5^th house – air and earth, a calming mix despite Uranus Pluto’s disruptive tendencies.  

 He was married initially to his manager and acting coach, Rocky Parker, whom he met when he was 18 and she was 44 which ended five years later in a messy divorce with her claiming abuse, which allegations she later withdrew. He has been married to beauty and hair care entrepreneur Jillian Fink since 1999 with three children.

  He does have Neptune in his 7^th so won’t always find close relationships easy and his present marriage nearly split a few years back.

  His first wife Rocky Parker, 26 February 1940, was, not surprisingly given the age gap, a highly Saturnine connection with her Saturn in Aries square his Sun and his Saturn conjunct her Sun – both have Libra Moons. Their relationship chart was expansive but also power struggling with a sticky yod with Mars on the apex – bound together but not enjoying it.

  His second wife, Jillian Fink, 4 February 1966, is less than three weeks younger than him. So their outer planets are in the same place. She has an Aquarius Sun in a conjunction to his argumentative Mars and like him Venus in Aquarius. Her Moon is probably Leo. Their relationship chart is affectionate and upbeat though with more pressures approaching after 2025.

  He is in a good phase career-wise with Saturn moving through his upper quadrant for several years. And especially now with Jupiter moving across his Taurus Ascendant.

Evil, insanity and scapegoating are a toe-curling trio selected by Liz Greene for a seminar, collected into a reissued book – The Dark of the Soul: Psychopathology in the Horoscope. It sounds like a niche subject of interest only to true crime aficionados but there are insightful thoughts on many standard chart aspects which will ring a bell as well. Plus the fact that psychopaths are not all serial killers. Many operate as senior managers in business and the less murderous variety are to be found in families and amongst friends.

  Psychopaths are 80% male, most suffered childhood abuse and often have a psychopathic parent. Their characteristics – grandiose self-worth, low boredom threshold, cunning, lack of remorse and empathy, parasitic lifestyle, lack self-control, lack of relatedness, don’t accept responsibility.

 Moon aspects to Pluto, Saturn, Uranus don’t come out well. A Pisces Moon opposition Uranus Pluto is highlighted as an indication of Oklahoma bomber Timothy McVeigh’s instability stemming from his relationship with his mother –  a fear of engulfment sits side by side with a fear of abandonment; smothered then abandoned, repeat. He is also marked up by his Jupiter square Neptune giving him messianic tendencies.

Charles Manson is another example of a Moon in hard aspect to Uranus and Pluto. His mother was a prostitute who was imprisoned and he ended up in an orphanage.  Moon Uranus, she remarks, disengages from personal hurt to focus instead on a universal context; while Moon Pluto destroys.  Astro research on violent criminals indicate many have Moon Saturn or Moon Chiron.

   Uranus Chiron Saturn occur with frequency amongst psychopaths.

  The myths behind madness are explored including a comment on Uranian madness reflecting “a cosmic vision of perfection.” Uranus, the god, condemned/rejected his earthily children because of their ugliness. Which I confess I had never considered as an attribute of Uranus before but could be pertinent to the Aquarius shift ahead. Uranus, the castrated god, always being considered as anti-biology.

  The seminars initially took place during the Yugoslavia carnage in the 1990s, a reminder that war and savagery are on a constant loop as is scapegoating the ‘different’ other.

  Scapegoats in mythology were sacred, healing agents for a society to expel sins. In modern examples, the scapegoats whether in a neighbouring people or an individual within a family are made to feel inferior but in reality are seen as a powerful threat to stability.  For countries, fighting battles outside the borders leads to internal cohesion. In families, a child who sees the emperor has no clothes and threatens to disrupt the social glue will be scapegoated.

 Slobodan Milosevic, the Serbian leader, ultimately charged with war crimes was a Sun Leo square Saturn with a Moon Chiron Pluto conjunction. Self-important yet harbouring self-doubts plus unhealable emotional damage from childhood. Both his parents committed suicide in later life so it must have been a depressed atmosphere for him as a child. Barbra Streisand also has a Moon Chiron Pluto so there are positive ways of living it out though it has clearly left its mark on her downbeat approach to life.

 The scapegoat syndrome inclines towards Sun Chiron,  Sun Saturn, Moon Pluto and Moon Neptune. 

  No great conclusions at the end since all these aspects appear in the charts of normal, law-abiding sorts but there is a wealth of astrological insights to be gleaned amongst the mythology and psychology.

“Sun Saturn says I’m not good enough, I’ll do something to make them approve of me.” Sun Chiron says: I’m not good enough and I never will be. They will always hate me whatever I do.”

All political careers end in failure is the accepted wisdom unless the incumbent dies first. But pinpointing the exact moment of exit is not an exact science.

 Catherine the Great of Russia ascended the Russian throne as Pluto moved into Capricorn in 1762 and died two Pluto sign shifts later in 1796 as it was poised to enter Pisces.  

Stalin was less clearcut though he died on a Saturn Neptune conjunction in late Libra and there is a Saturn Neptune conjunction approaching in 2025, though in early degrees of Aries.

  What resonates across all the different Russia charts are fixed signs around 18 to 22 degrees. Russia 20 September 862 AD has Neptune at 21 Aquarius. Russia 28 March 1462 has Pluto at 22 Leo. Russia 8 November 1917 has Uranus at 19 Aquarius. Russia 8 December 1991 has Pluto at 21 Scorpio.

  Putin came to power as prime minister on 31 December 1999 with Uranus at 14 Aquarius which had moved to 20 Aquarius square Jupiter Saturn Sun in Taurus when he was elected President in May 2000. So transiting Uranus rattling up these fixed degrees through 2023/24 is a hint of seismic changes . On the Russia 1917 chart the Uranus will catch the tr Uranus square for a final time from mid this December to mid March 2024 which may well be critical – at the same time tr Uranus will conjunct the Saturn on Putin’s first presidency chart for escalating tensions, eruptions and divisions. And on the Russia 1991 chart tr Uranus will continue to upend the Pluto until April 2024.

  Putin’s 4^th Term chart, 7 May 2018 11.05am is under huge strain with a deadlocked and desperate (can be ruthless) Solar Arc Pluto conjunct the Mars and at risk of being capsized by tr Pluto square the Uranus in 2023/24. But that chart also has a lucky Sun opposition Jupiter which has moved by Solar Arc to catch the transiting Uranus hard aspects which might just might provide unexpected opportunities to escape the worst of Pluto, Mars, Uranus.

  Hamas are done for whether it takes tr Neptune square their Uranus over this winter or SA Mars conjunct their Sun in 2025. Everyone in the region including the Arab leaders as well as those in the west think they need to be removed from existence. Though what comes next should not be left to Netanyahu.  There is a scary and deeply depressing piece in the Daily Beast laying out the Israeli extremists views on removing all Palestinians from Gaza and the West Bank and sending them into the desert.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/israeli-extremists-believe-now-is-the-time-to-deploy-their-ethnic-cleansing-plots?ref=home

Princess Anne shows how to be a proper ‘spare’ to the monarch, which she isn’t but should be, as she stepped up to provide a ceremonial bodyguard for her brother King Charles at the Opening of Parliament. She acted out the role for the May coronation, riding on horseback, this time in a carriage behind Charles and Camilla.

  A royal source said: “This further cements the Princess Royal’s role as his most trusted lieutenant.”

  She was also the Queen’s support when she was recovering from the trauma of having her Buckingham Palace bedroom invaded by disturbed intruder; and accompanied her coffin on the route down from Scotland.

  She was born 15 August 1950 11.50 am London and has a controlled and controlling though influential Sun Pluto in Leo in her career 10^th and a workaholic, conscientious Virgo Moon conjunct Mercury and Saturn in her 11^th. She also has a healing Water Grand Trine of an ultra-determined Mars in Scorpio trine Jupiter in Pisces in her 5^th house trine Uranus in her 9^th. She is much travelled round the globe for her work with Save the Children which fits her 5^th house Jupiter. She has said she is not overly fond of children at close quarters but is keen to see they get a decent life.

  Not a natural ally for Scorpio Charles, she will have been drawn to him in later years because of the shared peculiarity of their Royal situation and she is undoubtedly private, as well as being divorced like himself which would help. I’d doubt if she was censorious about his relationship with Camilla given her own not-much-publicised but active romantic life. Charles 10^th house Taurus Moon sits in her 7^th house so she will have a sense of partnership with him.

  Their relationship chart has a composite Sun square Moon Uranus which suggests two differing personalities who need their own space and independence. Though a composite Sun trine Jupiter will help to smooth round a few rough edges.

  She is married to retired Vice Admiral Tim Laurence, a former equerry, whom she met when her first marriage to horseman Mark Phillips was breaking down. He was born 1 March 1955, no birth time (I have 2.30am but no idea where it came from). He has a Pisces Sun which falls in Anne’s sociable and sporting 5^th house conjunct her Jupiter; with his Uranus Jupiter in Cancer falls in her 9^th conjunct her Venus so there may be a sense of shared interests. His Neptune is exactly conjunct her Ascendant which will soften her image to a degree; and his Mars in Taurus falling in her 7^th opposes her Mars in Scorpio which will be argumentative. 

  Murmurs are that they are not overly close – though they go on parade very properly as a couple and go sailing together.  The relationship chart is not overly affectionate.  

She is in a phase of considerable emotional change with both her parents dying over the past two years so her Progressed Moon through her 8^th house is not surprising for two years ahead as she processes the loss. Though she also has tr Jupiter moving through her 8^th for a year from early 2024 which will help. Tr Pluto moving across her IC into her 4^th by 2025 and onwards does suggest more domestic and family upheavals and that coincides with tr Uranus square her Sun/Moon midpoint so she will be looking to put changes in place in her relationships both close and family.

Jordan’s Queen Rania says ‘anti-Semitism has been weaponised to shut down criticism of Israel’ and says ‘being pro-Palestine does not mean being pro-Hamas.’ She said there was a ‘glaring double standard’ around the world when it came to sympathy for the war’s victims.

  Her family are Palestinian and Jordan has taken in hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees, from the initial 1948 Nakba displacement and following violence and settler encroachment on their land in later years.

‘Even if Israel defeats every last Hamas member, then what?’ she said in a CNN interview. ‘Haven’t they left a trail of terrible memories that will create a new generation of resistance that is fiercer and more violent?’ ‘Most networks are covering the story under the title of Israel at War. But for many Palestinians on the other side of the separation wall, and the other side of the barbed wire, war has never left.’

  She was born on 31 August 1970 in Kuwait, did a degree in  in business administration, worked in marketing for Citibank, then with Apple Inc. in Jordan. After her 1993 marriage to Crown Prince Abdullah she had four children and was crowned Queen when he succeeded his father in 1999.

  She is a Sun in Virgo, with a Virgo/Leo Moon and an intense, communicative Mercury Pluto in Virgo as well. Her Mars in Leo conjunct BML squares onto a Neptune opposition Saturn in Taurus.  She is go-ahead and attention-seeking as she promotes  her favourite causes in seeking to improve children’s education and health and in creating cross-cultural and interfaith dialogue to foster greater understanding and tolerance.

 Mars, Saturn, Neptune is a powerful and uncomfortable T Square indicating a life involving risk, hardship and fear along with courage and determination. Transiting Uranus is rattling up the T square from this year right through till early 2026 so her life will be on edge and unsettled. Though she has tr Pluto square her Jupiter in Scorpio in 2024/25 so will be pushing confidently ahead, no matter what; with 2025 being an especially visible year as her lucky SA Jupiter squares her Pluto  and a year later her Solar Arc Sun is conjunct her Jupiter so she won’t be backing down.

ADDENDUM:

 A wise and informed piece in today’s Times by Max Hastings trying to make sense of an impossible deadlock.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/israel-may-destroy-hamas-but-then-what-d830t9xll

‘In every modern “war among the people”, politics have eventually proved to play a more important role in outcomes than did soldiers. This is not a pacifist argument: force is indispensable to counter-insurgencies, for the elimination of irreconcilable terrorists.’

‘ We should dismiss the nonsensical debate about the characterisation of Hamas. Of course its members are terrorists, just as were the 1950s EOKA killers in Cyprus and the Kenyan Mau Mau, the 1980s German Red Brigades and the IRA. Their chosen method of pursuing political aims is to perpetrate outrageous violence. Margaret Thatcher, as opposition leader, threatened to refuse to meet Menachem Begin because he was a former terrorist, leader of Irgun (militant Israeli group). Advisers persuaded her to relent, since in 1977 Begin had become Israel’s prime minister.’

‘One (Israeli) spymaster avowed that since the 1995 assassination of the prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, successive governments had made no serious attempt to pursue a peace process, instead contracting to the security forces the containment of Palestinian rage.’

  ‘They suspect that Netanyahu identifies his own political survival with a long war.’

‘The question persists: can the IDF defy the precedents of history and destroy Hamas by mere force of arms? It can kill terrorists who have forfeited any claim upon mercy. But can it root out the idea of resistance, among millions of Palestinians in a Gaza reduced to rubble, and the West Bank subject to creeping and indefensible Israeli annexation? The principal motive force among these people is not Islam but despair.’

A sad reflection on success comes from Barbra Streisand as she launches her memoir. “I haven’t had much fun in my life.” Having set out with driven determination to become a star after a loveless childhood she discovered “it was more exciting to dream about being famous than the reality. I don’t enjoy stardom.”

 250 million records, 10 Golden Globe awards, five Emmys and two Oscars, for acting and songwriting are testament to her towering talent and yet all the accolades still don’t drown out the inner negative voices. “Even after all these years, I’m still hurt by the insults and can’t quite believe the praise,” she writes.

She was born 24 April 1942 5.08 am New York, with her teacher father dying when she was 15 months old. Her mother remarried and both she and the stepfather continually put her down.  Leaving home at 16, she took a second job working weekend shifts as a theatre usher, so she could keep up with Broadway’s latest shows. When she won at talent contest in a bar aged 18, it started her singing career rolling. By 26 she was already a seasoned performer when her breakout role in Funny Girl put her at the peak.

 Her working relationships have at times been challenging even hostile which has clearly hurt her though she does not have an easy temperament. After a complicated love life she has settled in a second marriage for the past twenty years with actor James Brolin and armfuls of dogs.

  She has a 1^st house Taurus Sun Mercury – Taurus ruling the throat being often found with singers – square Pluto, Chiron, Moon in Leo in her performing 5^th. With Chiron close to her Moon and square her Sun she will have been aware through her life of the unhealable wounds emerging from a fractured childhood.

  Sun Pluto squares are often written up as applying solely to controlling, dominating fathers but occur frequently where the father died young – literally out of the child’s control, prompting the erection of strong controlling defences in the emerging adult as a protection against life’s destructiveness.  Similarly Moon Pluto mothers are often sloppily referred to as possessive making them sound smothering when often they can be destructive and damaging in other ways.

She has the creative Neptune trine Uranus of her year with Saturn close by in Taurus. Her fixed qualities and stubbornness will have made cooperation tricky at times but will have given her endurance. Her 12^th house Venus in musical Pisces, again points to a lack of love and self-esteem but will have given poignancy to her love songs.

 Her creative 5^th harmonic is exceptionally strong highlighting her ultra-determined streak. Her creative, seeking and searching, 7^th harmonic is also notable – influential, confident, lucky, forceful.

  Her husband James Brolin, 18 July 1940 11.10 am Los Angeles, at first glance is an odd match. He is a Sun Cancer opposition Moon in Capricorn with an equally obstinate collection of Jupiter Saturn and Uranus in Taurus plus Mercury, Pluto, Mars in Leo which is conjunct her Moon Chiron Pluto. That could have pointed to a whole load of aggravation. Though perhaps both having sailed through a variety of relationships were mellower and wiser about what it takes.

  His Sun in the cusp of her 5^th and trine her Venus would soften the mood; with his Venus in Gemini conjunct her Mars to add a touch of crackle and pop to passion. Her Sun falls in his 7^th which is also ideal for a partnership.

Add On: From reviews of her memoir  illuminating her Moon, Chiron, Pluto square Sun. 

Her mother, Diana, didn’t treat her well, claiming she didn’t have time to tell her daughter that she loved her. The cruel stepfather once gave her elder brother’s fiancée money to buy ice cream for everyone except Barbra because she was “ugly”. Childhood tinnitus was dealt with by being ignored.

  When Streisand played a huge Las Vegas concert in 1993, with a starry audience and a fee in the millions, she flew her mother out specially. But Diana skipped it for a night on the Strip, later wondering why anyone would pay her daughter all that money to sing. With Streisand the toast of the town as Funny Girl became the biggest thing on Broadway, her mother flipped out at the number of presents her daughter was getting. She screamed: “I’m the mother! She’s nothing without me!” As her daughter reflects: “She could kill any pleasure I felt in an instant.”

Diana Streisand, 10 December 1908, NY,  was a Sun Sagittarius opposition Pluto and square Jupiter – controlling and pushily confident; with Neptune maybe conjunct a Cancer Moon opposition Uranus = emotionally unstable. Her Mars in vengeful Scorpio (conjunct Venus) was square Barbra’s Moon, Pluto, Chiron and opposition her Sun Mercury. So an envious, spiteful connection.

 Diana’s hard-edged Saturn in Aries sat on Barbra’s Ascendant and square her Midheaven so she would be a downer on any public persona of success or career triumphs. Plus Diana’s Pluto was conjunct Barbra’s Jupiter and Mars for a power-struggling and hostile interface.  

Just as well Barbra has phenomenal endurance from her six fixed planets and tenacious Pluto otherwise she’d have been crushed.