J.D. Vance and Marco Rubio have been sent in to negotiate peace with Iran with explanations running from – 1) Trump needing someone to blame when it does not work; 2) Kushner and Witkoff, the first team, being either incapable of understanding the technicalities of a nuclear deal or according to the Iranians being deliberately obtuse, too close to Israel and never intending to make peace; or 3) Vance is more palatable to the other side since he was against the intervention in the first place and spoke out last year against Israeli ambitions to seize more of the West Bank.

   Vance, 2 August 1984 8.11 am Middletown, Ohio, in his relationship with Trump looks rattled at the moment until early April with tr Uranus square their composite Sun/Mars, Venus/Saturn and Mercury/Pluto midpoints which adds up to aggravation, not feeling the love and running into hard resistance. April 6th to 25^th together they look confused and devastated with tr Uranus square their Neptune/North Node midpoint. In June tr Uranus squares his composite Ascendant with Trump which may cause a major upset between them.

   On Vance’s personal chart he has his Solar Arc Pluto conjunct his Uranus exactly to a minute of a degree hinting at a radical turn in his life, perhaps not the one he had in mind. Now till early April will be argumentative, insecure, edgy with tr Uranus square his Mars/Node midpoint. Late March to late April tr Neptune square his Solar Arc Midheaven looks the opposite of progressive – muddled, indecisive.  In April as well tr Uranus opposition his Neptune/Pluto midpoint won’t be an enjoyable experience with major anxiety and confusion. Mayhem and muddles continue till the first chink of good fortune in the second half of May. Though tr Neptune then moves to square his Jupiter till August which can dent high hopes.

  One cosmic black joke is Vance’s Chariklo = eternal suffering through a partner which is catching the August Solar Eclipse,  highlighting the pain.

 Vance’s relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu has never been good with a teeth-gritting dislike from a composite Mars Saturn conjunction. Again all on a Neptunian slide through most of this year.

 Rubio is not having a good year nor a great 2027 with high anxiety this April with losses; dented hopes late April to the end of May with tr Uranus opposing his Jupiter Neptune conjunction – and that extends  across midpoints to the Sun into 2027 when it upends his Sun.  His relationship with Trump looks irritable and argumentative late April to mid June and beyond. Plus he has the upheaval of tr Uranus square his Pluto in the second half of the year to contend with. He’ll wish to be anywhere other than where he is.

ADD ON:  Vance has evidently been influenced by neo-reactionary Curtis Yarvin who spouts extreme views applauding authoritarianism and elitism.  He wants to replace American democracy with a techno-monarchy since he sees liberalism as creating a Matrix-like totalitarian system. He has defended the institution of slavery, and has suggested that certain races may be more naturally inclined toward servitude than others; argues that whites have inherently higher IQs than black people and opposes U.S. civil rights programs.  He is a notable figure in American conservatism, having influenced people like Steve Bannon, JD Vance, Michael Anton and Peter Thiel.

  Born 25 June 1973, New York, he has a toxically-angry and hate-filled Mars in Aries opposition Pluto square a Cancer Sun; with a mixed Fire/Water Grand Trine of Mars trine Neptune trine Mercury in Cancer. And may (depending on birth time) have a yod onto an Aries/Taurus Moon.

 He is on a slide until early 2028 with tr Neptune square his Sun and conjunct his Mars – and later this year into January 2027 opposition his Pluto. So sinking into a swamp. Plus a nerve-stretched tr Uranus opposition is Neptune from this August on and off till early 2028. Pre the 2028 election he’ll mount a revved up effort but it will fizzle early on.

Vance’s relationship chart with him is fairly tied together with high enthusiasm for an agenda of domination. Though it will hit a bump or two from this June onwards with tr Uranus square the composite Saturn.

Valerie Perrine, the Las Vegas showgirl who fell into acting and gave memorable award-winning performances in Lenny playing his stripper girlfriend and Superman as Lex Luthor’s moll has died. The 1970s were her peak and while she continued to act afterwards never gained the same heights.

  Her life featured a few high risk moments: In 1969 she was due to attend a party in the Hollywood Hills with her then-boyfriend, the celebrity hairstylist Jay Sebring, but after one of her fellow dancers fell ill, she was called upon to work instead. The party was crashed by the so-called Manson Family, and Sebring numbered among their victims. Five years later a flight carrying her to promote Lenny crashed shortly after take-off. She emerged unscathed and returned to the wreck to collect her make up.

  She never married but had been engaged early on to a gun collector who died when the pistol he habitually carried fell from his waistband and discharged in a freak accident one month before the couple’s planned wedding.

   Her approach to acting was casual and she regarded it as an enjoyable social activity. Renowned for her wild parties which ran, she said, on cocaine, she also dropped a reputed 400 doses of LSD.

 Born September 3 1943 9.20pm Galveston, Texas, with a military father and former dancer mother she spent most of her childhood in Japan. In her final years, she battled severe health issues from wear-and-tear incurred during her dancing days and was diagnosed with Parkinson’s.

 She had a Virgo Sun conjunct Venus on the cusp of her hard-working 6^th house which was in a volatile, explosive square to Mars Uranus in Gemini. It would be that which attracted her, consciously or unconsciously, to adrenaline-packed moments on the edge. She had Jupiter North Node in Leo in her performing 5^th house giving her confidence and exuberance as well as luck; with her Jupiter in a doubly self-assured conjunction with Pluto. A 7^th house Libra Moon looked in need of support though she never married. It was in a cool trine to Saturn. Neptune in her 6^th does hint at delicate health which would not appreciate rampant drug use.

  When she missed the Manson killing in 1969 by a stroke of destiny, transiting and Solar Arc Jupiter were hard at work sparking off various elements of her chart. Although it would undoubtedly shake her with her Solar Arc Mars square her Neptune.

  Her chart is all lower hemisphere apart from her Moon suggesting that she was not exactly career-driven and would be more concerned with her personal life.

Alan Ritchson, the epitome of a hard-man has earned him success in TV’s Reacher, now out for the fourth season. A recent squall with a neighbour which hit the headlines has fizzled out after police said he acted in self-defence. In the past he has admitted to being bi-polar and prone to depression but appears to be a settled husband and father.

  What is intriguing is his chart, 28 November 1982 3am Grand Forks, North Dakota, which in one significant way is similar to that of Virginia Guiffre, the Epstein victim, born a few months later. Both have the bleak Saturn Pluto conjunction square Mars suggesting a good deal of risk, unfairness and mistreatment in their lives.

 Ritchson has talked about his early modelling days as being akin to ‘legalised sex trafficking’ and left the industry traumatised after being sexually assaulted on a photoshoot with a ‘very famous photographer.’ Even later on when his acting career took off, a business associate threatened to accuse him of sexual assault if he did not sleep with her.  

 An afflicted Mars can work out in different ways and makes him suited for morally ambiguous, brawler roles, soaking up his anger, though his manic streak evidently leaks out on film sets at times.   He will tend to attract strong reactions from others whether he initiates it or not. So finding a constructive outlet will help.

 He has an independent-minded Sun Uranus conjunct in Sagittarius with a charming 3^rd house Mercury conjunct Venus also in Sagittarius. His Taurus Moon in his 7^th will appreciate the stability and security of a close partner. Though his Moon opposition Saturn Pluto which is square a 4^th house Mars hints at a chilly, under-supportive and overly disciplined childhood with a military father.  

In the immediate future for a few weeks he has Jupiterian bounty of success and rising confidence from two of his midpoints.  He is in the midst of his unsettled Uranus Half Return and mid-life crisis this year. And his Sun Uranus is moving by Solar Arc to conjunct his Mars after mid this year and through 2027 which will be a testing time, with his short-fused Mars feeling the strain. Plus his SA Mars is square his Uranus and soon his Sun for much the same effect.

Please add below. Older posts under News on top bar and in search.

   Pondering on how the recent eclipse provided a backdrop for the present conflagration in the Middle East, the previous ones in this 18.5 year Saros cycle are significant if not cheering. Though it would have to be said in addition to problems there were also positive outcomes.

 Last time in 2008 oversaw the financial crash.

1990 oversaw the Gulf War 1.

1972 – Watergate, Munich Olympics massacre.

1954 – division of Vietnam which was the forerunner to the debilitating US war. Soviet escalation of the Cold War.

1935 – intensifying aggression leading into WW11. Italy invaded Ethiopia, which created significant international friction. Nuremberg Laws: Nazi Germany passed laws that deprived Jewish people of citizenship and banned marriage between Jews and Germans. Hitler instituted mandatory military service, violating the Treaty of Versailles. Persia/Iran: Persia was formally renamed Iran

Maria Vorontsova, a Russian pediatric endocrinologist is the elder child of Vladimir Putin. She was married to a Dutch businessman and living in the Netherlands, until calls for her expulsion in 2014 after Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down by pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine. She now lives in Moscow and is married to an oil and gas executive.

Born 28 April 1985, 2.30 am Leningrad, Russia she certainly has a chart reflecting an overwhelmingly powerful father. She has a Taurus Sun opposition Pluto in Scorpio; with her Sun in the trigger point of a yod of Mars sextile Venus inconjunct Pluto. Her Sun opposition Pluto also squares an 8^th house Leo Moon – fixed, enduring, stubborn, intense. Her Saturn in obsessive and conscientious Scorpio opposes Mars for a tricky childhood which inculcated discipline but left her having to suppress her identity and assertiveness. Though her Jupiter square her North Node opposition South Node would give her a sense of entitlement.

  Quite some chart.

  For whatever reason her life is undergoing considerable change exactly now and over the next two/three years. At the moment her Solar Arc Sun is opposing her 12^th house Uranus, on the same degree now and exact within weeks. Tr Uranus will give her an additional jolt when it is conjunct her Mars in the second half of this May and again in early 2027. And tr Pluto is wending  inexorably round her Fixed T square from early this year, square her Pluto, opposition her Moon and in 2027/28 square her Sun. It will bring significant changes to her life under maximum pressure.

  The first ever oil strike – 28 August 1859 4pm Titusville, PA, USA.

  It has an 8^th house Sun Moon Mercury in practical, earthy Virgo and a Saturn Mars Venus in money-oriented Leo also in the 8^th. So six planets in the deeply buried 8^th house which has connections with business finance.

 Neptune (the traditional ruler of oil) is in Pisces (ruled by Neptune) in the 3^rd house of everyday travel which fits though Neptune isn’t especially strong in the chart.  On the midpoints Neptune = Sun/Jupiter and Jupiter/Uranus both of which are lucky and successful. Pluto is on the IC which does suggest very Plutonic energies (wealth and power) coming from deep down. Pluto is semi sextile Uranus with Neptune aiming to semi-sextile Pluto in the years following.

  The 1980 oil high has Neptune sextile Pluto with Uranus on their midpoint.  2008 has Neptune sextile Uranus with Pluto just past the square to Uranus. All three oil high charts have that odd challenging Mars Saturn in the 8^th in Virgo so a pressure to make money in tight circumstances? Two of them have Jupiter in the 8^th and the other has Jupiter in the 1^st.

Above from an old post of 2011.  No time for further research but anyone who is interested feel free to look over highs and lows since.

  Achieving an outright victory in a war that increasingly seems unwinnable may spur Netanyahu onwards. But Trump, as ever, gets spooked by the markets plunging, with his smash n’ grab raid turning into an expensive stalemate, costing US lives and threatening the economy.

 A former head of Iran research for Israel’s defence intelligence agency, argues that the previous Iranian leadership, now largely dead, were “cautious, calculating” actors. They had reportedly signalled that Iran was prepared to significantly dilute the country’s stock of enriched uranium, a critical component in the development of nuclear weapons. In his view, “US negotiators appeared to struggle to fully grasp the technical and strategic implications of this offer.”

 Netanyahu’s banner-waving for warfare as the only answer obscures the fact that Hamas is still entrenched in Gaza and the assassination of the Hizbollah leadership in 2024 did not end the Lebanese militant group’s threat. His recipe for perpetual war against a backdrop of rapidly declining international support for Israel, including in the US is a formula for disaster.

  A growing belief is that the biggest long-term strategic threat to Israel is not Iran — but the potential loss of the American support on which Israel relies. Israel’s brutal campaign in Gaza in the wake of Hamas’s October 2023 attacks has led to a change in sentiment.

  Scouring around for a chink of hope in the swamp, several astro-thoughts.

 The 2025 Inauguration Trump Second Term chart, starting on a do-or-die-determined, ruthless Mars opposition Midheaven Sun Pluto square a 6^th house Libra Moon always did look as if it would peak in its bullying approach in February/March this year as the Progressed Moon moved to square the Sun Pluto and Progressed Pluto by mid May this year and will lessen in effect thereafter. Before then the Trump Administration will be facing an extremely anxious April with two Neptune midpoints catching a hard square from tr Uranus bringing crises, sudden upsets, weakness, mourning and even more indications of confusion and off-the-wall meanderings from fantasy land.  

 Trumps’ natal chart through April also indicates weakness even illness caused by anxiety, alongside excitability. His birth time being exactly accurate tr Uranus will also square his Ascendant in April.

 Trump’s relationship chart with Netanyahu has been showing their joint power drive being undermined through March; but it is late May to mid August which will be most noticeably undermining and disappointing for their association with tr Neptune opposition the composite Venus and square the composite Saturn, which repeats into 2027 – so there will be a distancing.

  The USA/Israel relationship chart has been undermined since tr Neptune Saturn moved into Aries opposing the composite overly-hopeful Jupiter Neptune and square the Mercury Venus from late this month to late May – and that lessening of friendly feeling extends into early 2028. Where it reaches total rupture point will be around 2029/30 as tr Uranus squares the composite Sun and opposes the composite Uranus Sun.

 The Iran attack, 28 February 2026 9.45 am Teheran, which launched on an intense Moon opposition Pluto will clear that aspect which comes exact by progression in early August this year. This would coincide with thoughts about the 12 August Solar Eclipse which – “brings a time of breaking out of a negative, hopeless situation into positive phase with more options. A worry will disappear as solutions appear that need to be grasped.”

  None of this is decisive but I would hazard a guess that Trumps’ stomach for this foray does not outlast April if it even gets that far. Late May to August will be critical for a US/Israel fall out and general disarray with tr Neptune at 4 degrees Aries square Netanyahu’s Uranus for high-anxiety and it also squares the Israel Venus for emotional discontent.

Muddle and mayhem. Deranged Don wrapped in his Superman fantasy allied with Netanyahu obsessed with destroying Iran – both in different ways entirely unrealistic. I have long thought that Israel was walking itself up a cul-de-sac. However sympathetic about the Jewish people’s terrible history of persecution, there is no mileage on stoking up yet more blood feuds in a region where memories are long.

  A cautionary tale about reality TV, social media influencers and religion in an arena way off my radar.

 Taylor Frankie Paul with 6 million TikTok followers, known for her comedy, dance and mothering content, lately featured in The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, whose “messy” reputation has become part of her brand has been the cause of the new ABC series of The Bachelorette, due to premiere this weekend, being expensively cancelled. Some reckon the fall out will be in eight figures to the network.

  TFP earned national fame in 2022 when she announced that she and her husband Tate Paul were divorcing, and that they had been “soft-swinging” with other couples within their mostly Mormon circle. She was then arrested in 2023 for an incident in which she is pushing and kicking her then partner, with her daughter present. That video has now been published by TMZ.

  It would hardly be worth spending time on – apart from the light it throws on the dreg end of popular culture – but her chart is an eye-opener.

Born 23 May 1994 in Pueblo, Colorado, she has a Sun Gemini and a Scorpio Moon which is a fairly conflicted combination – alternatively detached and chatty and intensely emotional. But more significantly she has a highly-string Uranus Neptune conjunction in a short-fused square to Mars in upfront Aries. Her Neptune Uranus sextile Pluto are also inconjunct her Sun on the apex of a yod, giving her problems moderating her ego drives. She has another yod of Venus in Cancer sextile Mars inconjunct Pluto which again will give her problems moderating her need to be in control. It can be manipulative and coercive. She also has a wide Water Grand Trine of Saturn in Pisces trine Jupiter (Moon) in Scorpio trine Venus, which can lead to a personality which is cut off in some respects from reality.

 The Church of Latter Day Saints (Mormon), 6 April 1830 in Utah, hooks into her Uranus Neptune conjunction in Capricorn with its Neptune Mars in Capricorn. Its chart has been troubled recently with Solar Arc Pluto opposition its Aries Sun and its Solar Arc Sun square Neptune – so the ‘swinging’ publicity would not have gone down well. There’ll be another shock coming soon with SA Sun square Mars – and a major history-changing phase across the end of the decade into the early 2030s with tr Pluto conjunct its Uranus and opposition its Saturn; followed by SA Pluto square the Neptune and by mid 2030s the Mars for a dead halt.

Actor Chuck Norris during a near-60-year acting career became ‘a pop culture emblem of alpha-male indestructibility.’  His films – Forced Vengeance, Hellbound, An Eye for an Eye, A Force of One, Silent Rage, were what they said they were. After the movies he moved into television in the 1990s with Walker, Texas Ranger. He has died aged 86.

 He was born 10 March 1940 3am Ryan, Oklahoma, with a WW11 veteran father who took to drink. His older brother was killed in Vietnam. Chuck served with the US Air Force in South Korea, and then competed in international martial arts tournaments, running a chain of karate schools in California. Bruce Lee invited him to take part in The Way of the Dragon, the highest-grossing Hong Kong film in history, which established Norris on the film scene.

A Sun Pisces opposition Neptune would suit him for movies but it was his explosive Mars Uranus conjunction in Taurus, sextile his Sun and trine Neptune which gave him his specialism of violent action. And the destructive Fixed star Algol in his performing 5^th house.

 His intense 7^th house Pluto was square Saturn in forced-to-be-self-reliant Aries conjunct Venus in Taurus – not an easy temperament emotionally – bleak and hard. His Sun/Moon midpoint was opposition his Neptune so he would find commitment an effort. His Chiron was in his 7^th house of close relationships and his Aries Moon was trine Pluto. Quite a mix of troubled, possessive and inconstant.

 He was an outspoken Christian and Republican.