Astrology of Today’s News

Economic mismanagement leading to widespread hardship, sham elections opening the door to constitutional changes giving the demagogic Nicolas Maduro unlimited power; opposition leaders arrested – and Venezuela slides further into chaos. The Venezuela attorney general lambasted the recent election. “This is the end of freedom of expression.” The US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, slammed it as a “sham” which would bring Venezuela “another step toward dictatorship”. US national security adviser H.R. McMaster compared Maduro to Bashar al-Assad and Kim Jong Un; and US sanctions have frozen Maduro’s assets in the US.

Yet Venezuela under Hugo Chavez and then Maduro was supposed to have been a shining beacon of socialism at work. The country contains the world’s largest oil reserves which they promised to use to alleviate poverty and reduce inequality. The result of their efforts has been catastrophic shortages of food, electricity and medicines. Child malnutrition is widespread; maternal mortality went up by 66% last year. Inflation is expected to reach 1000% this year. Amnesty International reports a “mass of human rights violations” with 100 protesters killed since April and another 400 have been imprisoned – including judges and opposition politicians. The army has been expanded. Corrupt officials openly profiteer from their access to hard currency and basic goods. Venezuela has become a favoured route for drug-trafficking and is awash with arms. Tens of thousands of Venezuelans have fled to neighbouring countries.

In the UK, the hard-left Corbynites, enthusiastic supporters of the Chavisti approach to government, have been remarkably schtum about the present situation.

Nicolas Maduro, 23 November 1962 9.03pm Caracas (astro com) has certainly all the signs of an inflated ego with a focal point Sun Mercury in Sagittarius in the grandstanding 5^th squaring onto Jupiter in a risk-taking (chancer’s) opposition to Uranus and in a forcefully-pushy opposition to Pluto. His Sun is also square his Mars/Pluto midpoint which does suggest a ruthless approach; though that apart it is not an especially brutal chart.

His Mars in Leo (where else?) will catch this week’s Lunar Eclipse and widely the Solar Eclipse, which will tend to make him more volcanic than usual. His birth time is based on a birth certificate so should be there or thereabouts. His midheaven will catch the tr Pluto square from early 2018 through 2019, which will shake him on his perch and further damage his reputation. And tr Neptune will square his Solar Arc MC in 2018/19 which will undercut his ambitions.

This fits with his Presidency chart, 10 April 2013 2.05pm, which has tr Uranus conjunct the Sun Mars in Aries from April 2018 for a year; at the same time as tr Neptune squares the 10^th house Jupiter in Gemini – violence, insecurity, disruptions and dashed hopes. And he’ll be increasingly at odds with the populace over the next year with Solar Arc Saturn square the Moon.

Neither of the two Venezuela charts – 24 June 1821 and 22 September 1830 – look hopeful ahead for two or three years. The 1921 will get the discouraging tr Saturn in Capricorn bouncing off the Cancer Sun Venus opposition Uranus Neptune from this New Year. Plus tr Uranus conjunct the Jupiter Saturn in Aries till March 2018 – which is interesting in itself since it shows a country struggling to balance idealism with materialism. Ideological socialism has won out recently but with disastrous financial consequences.

The 1830 chart has a discouraging and aggravated tr Saturn square to the Mars opposition Virgo Sun this year; and then picks up a devastating tr Pluto conjunct Neptune in 2018/19.

If ever there was an example of be careful what you wish for – this is it. Voters promised the earth and end up with even less than before.

Austria is holding a key snap election on October 15^th with polls surging for the young Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz; falling for Chancellor Christian Kern; and anxieties about the far-right HC Strache’s hopes for the top seat – the last is a particular worry since a far-righter nearly made it to the (largely ceremonial) presidency in a recent election.

Kurz, 27 August 1986, is campaigning on tax cuts and immigration curbs. He is a Sun Virgo sextile Pluto, square Saturn, trine Neptune and is on a roll this year and next with tr Pluto sextile his Jupiter in Pisces and square his Solar Arc Jupiter. He does have tr Jupiter conjunct his focal point Pluto from early November, which all looks hopeful. But he’s got a disappointing tr Neptune square his Sun/Jupiter; and tr Uranus square his Jupiter/Saturn over the election which usually don’t augur well.

Christian Kern, 4 Jan 1966, is a Sun Capricorn sextile Saturn and trine Uranus Pluto; with an expansive Mercury in Sagittarius opposition Jupiter. His chart is the usual election muddle of good and bad. Tr Pluto square his Mars/Jupiter midpoint could suggest a win, but he’s in a generally lack-lustre year with Solar Arc Neptune conjunct his Sun; and tr Neptune conjunct his Saturn. Tr Uranus is in an insecure square to his Sun/Mars at the election and there’s a downbeat tr Saturn opposition his Jupiter, dampening his enthusiasm and confidence, in the days after the election.

HC Strache, of the Freedom Party, a one-time supporter of pro-Nazi Jorg Haider, 12 June 1969, is a Sun Gemini square a pushily-confident Pluto Jupiter Uranus in Virgo. Tr Saturn is opposing his Sun and square his Pluto from now till the election, and square Jupiter Uranus in the aftermath, none of which look good for him. He has some minorly positive influences on the exact date, but more negative ones thereafter.

Austria, 12 Nov 1918 4pm, looks thoroughly confused this year with the Solar Arc Neptune conjunct the Sun, now until the end of 2017. Support for the two main parties, who have alternated in power over recent decades, is sinking, as it is elsewhere (Pluto in Capricorn deconstructing old ruling systems again). The economy is growing with the integration of Central and Eastern European countries into the EU benefiting Austria more than other countries.

But the Austria/EU relationship is fractious at best and sagging through 2017 to 2020 with tr Neptune square the composite Sun, Mercury, Mars; and there’ll be upheavals and disruptions in 2018; with huge discouragement in 2019/2020.

If the start time for Austria is accurate then tr Pluto will conjunct the MC from early 2018, which does suggest a challenging period ahead, where government is concerned, with the old order further collapsing.

The Bank of Austria chart, 1 June 1816, is less undermined than it has been in recent years, though problems pick up in 2019/2020 with what looks perilously like a crash.

Add on: There’s another chart for Austria – 15 May 1955 11.30am Vienna, when it was re-established as a sovereign state. Both will have a validity though the earlier ones usually work best.

Like the earlier chart it is overwhelmingly Fixed with Pluto on a Leo Ascendant opposition Aquarius Moon Descendant square Saturn IC opposition a Taurus Sun MC. So change comes only very slowly against great resistance. There’s also an Air Grand Trine of Moon trine Neptune trine Mars in Gemini, formed into a Kite by Moon opposition Pluto – so again tremendous endurance though not much adaptability. Influences are mixed ahead with a constructive tr Pluto trine MC in 2017/18; and heading for a Solar Arc Sun conjunct Uranus Jupiter after mid 2018 which will bring a morale boost and a few surprises. But there’s also in late 2018 and 2019 a major shock and dead-halt from Solar Arc Mars square Sun and then conjunct Pluto. The latter much like the Bank of Austria. And the relationship with the EU is sagging badly on this chart as well right through till 2020.

Sam Shepard, the playwright, who portrayed the darker sides of American family life in plays like his Pulitzer Prize winning “Buried Child” has died of Lou Gehrig’s disease. The NY Times wrote: “He was widely regarded as one of the most original voices of his generation, winning praise from critics for his searing portraits of spouses, siblings and lovers struggling with issues of identity, failure and the fleeting nature of the American dream.” He wrote more than 40 plays, two others nominated for Pulitzers; and was nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar for his role in The Right Stuff; and starred in films like Black Hawk Down as well as co-writing Paris, Texas. Most recently he was in Netflix’s Bloodline.

Born 5 November 1943 3.45pm Fort Sheridan, Illinois, he had a former bomber pilot father ‘a dedicated alcoholic’, and after leaving school graduated to the Off-Off-Broadway scene where he learnt his craft.

He had a deeply buried, intensely emotional and secretive 8^th house Sun Mercury in Scorpio square Pluto and North Node in the performing 5^th – so his angst about not being in control as a child was channelled into his art. His Pluto was further emphasised being on the focal point of a creative mini-Grand Trine of Uranus and Neptune. His military father is also reflected in his Mars Saturn conjunction in Gemini in his communication 3^rd house square his Venus – unkind, uncaring about Sam’s needs. His 12^th house Aquarius Moon opposed Jupiter which suggests a tolerant if hidden mother. A 6^th house Jupiter can be overly indulgent and in his latter years there were arrests for drunk driving.

His chart is replete with creative quintiles and septiles – his 5^th Harmonic ties together Pluto with Mars and Moon Venus, which fairly describes the bleaker, crueller side of family life; and his inspired 7H highlights imaginative Neptune, as well as tough Saturn Pluto.

His writer’s 21^st Harmonic is also notable and stark, linking Saturn to Pluto and Mars Moon and Venus. While his leaving-a-legacy-for-history 17H is well aspected, giving hope that his work will live on.

He was with actress Jessica Lange, a Sun, Venus, Mercury in Taurus with Moon Jupiter in Aquarius, for over 25 years, but they split in 2009. For a time they were a real power couple, with a composite New Moon opposition Pluto square Jupiter, so it would be close, supportive and complementary. Although it had its rougher edges with her Saturn conjunct his Jupiter and her Uranus conjunct his Saturn – and so ultimately they went their separate ways.

Jeanne Moreau, one of the legendary stars of the French cinema – Orson Welles called her “the greatest actress in the world” – has died. Best known for her role in Truffaut’s Jules et Jim, she had a prolific, award-laden career into her 80s, ultimately directing and writing as well.

Born 23 January 1928 at 11.15am Paris, France, to an English Folies Bergere dancing mother and restaurateur father, she made her debut at 19 and rarely stopped thereafter. She had two marriages, the second to American film director William Friedkin. Director Tony Richardson left his wife, Vanessa Redgrave, for her but they never married. She also had affairs with directors Louis Malle and François Truffaut, fashion designer Pierre Cardin, jazz trumpeter Miles Davis and Theodoros Roubanis, the Greek actor/playboy.

She had a career-oriented, ambitious 10^th house New Moon Mercury in Aquarius; with her Sun sextile an adventurous and lucky Jupiter Uranus in vibrant Aries; which in turn was in a high-octane square to Mars in Capricorn. Not a lady who did things by halves. She had Neptune in her performing 5^th house, trine Mars; and on the focal point of a Yod of Sun sextile Uranus Jupiter. So her filmic Neptune was highlighted. She had another Yod of Mercury sextile Saturn inconjunct Pluto which would make her influential and give her a dislike of superficiality. Yods tend to produce a very focussed approach to life, once the right road is found. Before that everything feels strained and out of gear. Luckily she found her path early aged 16, when a theatre performance of Jean Anouilh’s Antigone pointed the way for her.

Her 8^th house had Saturn and Venus in Sagittarius, which would give her the ability to project an aura, but was perhaps also why she formed multiple attachments rather than settling to longer term commitments.

Her actors’ 15^th Harmonic was powerful joining Mars Pluto to her Moon and Uranus. She has been described as ‘smokily seductive’; ‘sensual, gravel-voiced’; ‘hauntingly expressive’.

President Macron today said of her: ‘She had in her eye a sparkle that deflected deference and inspired insolence, freedom, the turbulence of life that she liked so much.’

The Galway Races, the memorable seven-day Irish horseracing festival which inspired a WB Yeats poem (“flesh being wild again”) and a popular song, kicks off again today.  There are complaints about high prices of hotels which a local councillor described as ‘overkill and opportunistic’; and there will be heavier security than usual with a ban on backpacks and large handbags, and physical searches, given the global situation.

The first meeting was held on 17 August 1869 which gives a Leo Sun Mercury with Sun square Jupiter Pluto in Taurus, which certainly fits an entertaining spectacle involving a confidently determined physical sport with much money won and lost at the bookies.  No suprises HM Queen is a Sun Taurus given her keen interest.  There’s a showbizzy, publicity-attracting Mars in Libra opposition Neptune in a thrills and spills, highly-strung and high-adrenaline square to Uranus. It’s a Fire Earth chart highlighting formidable energy and enthusiasm, not given to subtlety.

This year’s may be edgier than usual given the security concerns with tr Pluto square the Mars, as well as the Sun/Saturn midpoint so perhaps not quite as exuberant and laid-back as usual; maybe riskier for the horses.

Will the veil be lifted allowing us to see into an alternative reality? Or will we pulled further into the madness of an increasingly chaotic world? The Lunar Eclipse at 15 degrees Aquarius/Leo next Monday August 7^th sits exactly on the Neptune/Pluto midpoint, which can offer sixth-sense awareness or manic instability. Dion Fortune, a notable White Magician, neatly paraphrased the fine line between the two, writing about ‘those strange byways of the mind that the psychic shares with the psychotic.’

Pluto’s domain in astrological terms is the deep, dark realm of wealth, sex, death and rebirth, power and control. It has a Scorpionic intensity, a need to plumb the depths to find the heights of transcendence.

Neptune’s realm also has a double-faceted quality – revenge and cruelty often sit side by side with extreme compassion, great creativity and strong religious yearnings. Financial and other scandals always have a whiff of Neptune about them, with its quality of deceptiveness and its persuasive sleights of hand. Confidence tricks come under Neptune’s banner, with its inability to set boundaries or to distinguish between thine and mine, and its tendency to lie and distort.

Neptune and Pluto together create a fey, mystical mix of energies, both wonderful and terrifying at the same time. Historically the combination is connected with the rise of great powers with epically brutal leaders; with art, especially erotic literature; with scientific advances in such intangibles as electricity, radio and telephone; with religious events; and with scandals.

Neptune in its visionary aspect, mixing with Pluto’s power drive, creates a delusional though often devastatingly effective megalomania. Neptune puts the dream above reality, writes off human sacrifice as a necessary cost to gain the end. Pluto as the arch controller reduces individual humans to objects, pawns on the chessboard; the puppetmaster reigns supreme.

Ebertin talks of the Neptune/Pluto midpoint as a purified soul-life and clairvoyant visions OR frauds, falsehoods, utter confusion, obsessions, addictions. It’s a delicate balance.

Dion Fortune herself was born with the Neptune Pluto conjunction in Gemini of 1894 opposing her Sun. Hitler who dabbled in black magic to fuel his megalomania had a Neptune Pluto conjunction in his access-to-other-realms, power-hungry 8^th house. The ISIS 2006 chart has its Sun (Venus Mars) square its Neptune/Pluto midpoint. The UK’s Capricorn Sun sits exactly on its Neptune/Pluto midpoint, which in its ‘glory days’ led to colonial over-reach with an empire on which the sun never set.

It’s a powerful energy which can rise to great heights and, when the coin flips, its hubris, arrogance and sense of divine entitlement bring it crashing down.

The individual’s answer as ever to such heady energy is: 1. Grounding, stay rooted in the body (exercise, eat healthily, don’t over drink/drug); 2. Common sense and rationality. Keep in mind that the Solar Eclipse of August 21^st is in a Saros series which warns of distorted and false information. Not all hunches and presentiments will be accurate, worries will magnify out of proportion and most will prove to have been a waste of nervous energy. Be like the Ladakhis – happy despite problems. There’s the additional surge of super-confident energy leading to over-reach of the Jupiter square Pluto on Friday 4^th. It tends to bring out pride, wilfulness and a dogmatic streak which brushes social niceties to one side and fosters a law unto itself attitude. Tr Pluto is exactly square Trump’s natal Jupiter with his Jupiter Return – so unlikely to induce moderation or manners.

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Launching a government on an exact Full Moon in Sagittarius/Gemini squaring onto Neptune in Pisces, as Theresa May’s did, was never going to lead to constructive progress. The list of attributes to such a focal point Neptune is not heartening – disorganised, credulous, gullible, chameleon-like, misleading (intentionally and otherwise), lacking willpower, disliking meeting obstacles head-on, poor observational qualities, a tendency to escape away from reality into an imaginative world which feels more comforting.

Just as Chancellor Philip Hammond, capitalising on Theresa May’s vacation absence, brought some sane business plans to the table about a transitional exit period, saying there was a broad consensus in the Cabinet, he was promptly slapped down by the ever-excitable Liam Fox and Boris Johnson. The Full Moon, of course, is also split and Neptune is not the planet to tie the opposing extremes together into a coherent direction.

Matthew Parris, Times columnist and former Tory MP, has described the Conservative Party as ‘criminally irresponsible’ for turning Brexit into ‘a humiliating shambles.’ ‘Thirteen months since the referendum and the Conservatives still can’t decide even the broadest outline of the terms on which we hope to leave.’ ‘It now appears they and their leader started the countdown to Britain’s expulsion without even the vaguest plan for what we’d be aiming to achieve, let alone realistically likely to achieve.’

Tr Neptune has now reversed to exactly square the Government MC and hovers thereabouts into 2018 by which time it picks up the Sun/MC midpoint and then squares Sun and Moon in 2019 – if it lasts that long, and there’s nothing too obvious pointing to a total collapse, the shambles will continue.

Philip Hammond and Amber Rudd have the most help from lucky Jupiter willing them on through 2017/18. Though Hammond has a downer from early this October to early January 2018 as tr Neptune squares his Sagittarius Sun Mercury. Amber Rudd looks completely undercut during that Oct to Jan period as well, though it may be different problems since as Home Secretary she has ongoing responsibility for law and order amongst a broad portfolio. Hammond will bounce again in 2018, though with some significant upheavals as well; and looks completely crushed by 2019. Gove is limping along, trapped in 2018/19 and in danger of career losses. Fox also looks enraged, frustrated and cornered in 2019. Davis is back against the wall in 2018/19 as well. And Theresa May is on the longest downhill slide of her career from now till 2020.

None of them look remotely happy or successful. The only cut off point I can see on the UK/EU relationship chart is late 2018 when tr Saturn is conjunct the composite Sun, but that’s a mild enough influence and comes round in hard aspect every 7 years and to the conjunction every 29 years. I have truly no idea how this is all going to end.

A final act of remembrance for the deaths at Flanders one hundred years ago in the First World War will be held this weekend. Passchendaele was one of the bloodiest battle of WW1, leading to 320,000 allied deaths and German losses of between 260,000 and 400,000 men. The Allied assault was launched at 3.50am on 31 July 1917 in torrential rain, the mud swallowing up men, horses and tanks. After just over three months of brutal trench warfare, the Allies had made just five miles (8km) of ground. Paul Nash’s evocative paintings of the Menin Road recorded the bleak scene for posterity.

When it started there was a brutal Mars Pluto in Cancer sextile Venus, with an exact Neptune Saturn (and Sun) conjunction in Leo on the midpoint. Uranus opposed Mercury squaring onto Mars as well. The Mars Pluto points to the destructiveness and Saturn Neptune to the chaos, hysteria and sacrifice.

The 12^th Harmonic which relates to victims was stark – a Pluto Neptune Saturn conjunction quincunx Uranus; Uranus in turn opposed the Sun and was tied into Mars. Neptune Pluto carries as one of its meanings an insanely over-the-top energy.

Passchendaele wasn’t the costliest battle of WW1. That dubious record went to the Battle of the Somme fought two years earlier in November 1916, when there were 485,000 British and French casualties and 630,000 German. That started with a Sun Pluto conjunction in Cancer; a Yod of Saturn in Cancer sextile Mars in Virgo inconjunct Uranus in Aquarius; and there was a Neptune opposition North Node square Jupiter in Taurus. Sun Pluto craves power, is associated with physical suffering, martyrdom. A Yod focal point Uranus can be lawless and disruptive. And Jupiter was playing its usual disaster role in magnifying the bad.

The Somme 12^th Harmonic had a Sun trine Saturn Uranus trine Pisces Node, with Sun square Mars and square Neptune. Both 12H charts have marked Saturn Uranus aspects = a difficult battle for life in overcoming danger.

Tr Pluto in Cancer (which overstayed its welcome) picked in 1914 at the outbreak of WW1 and lasted through the 1930s depression years till 1939, and more than anything contributed to the break-up of the family certainly in Europe.

The deaths in the First War and the Second were, of course, what led to the impetus to set up the EEC and then the EU as a way of avoiding future conflict between Germany and Europe, which tends to get forgotten in all the Brexit squabbling.

Superlatives proliferate when swimmer Adam Peaty’s name crops up. At the World Championships in Budapest this week, he won the 100m, again, and the 50m, again. He broke his own championship record in one event, and his own world record in the other, twice. Rebecca Adlington, double Olympic champion said: “He is the poster boy for swimming across the world, not just in Britain. No one is even close to him, so you ask yourself how much more can he improve”. The only man who has matched Peaty’s winning margin in a sprint is Michael Phelps.

A commentator said: “He has the perfect physique. Large hands, large feet, and hyper-mobile, double-jointed knees and ankles. But in swimming, the gifts you’re born with are never enough. It demands lunatic commitment.”

He gets up at 6am to train, completing three two-hour sessions a day, six days a week. In peak training, he will swim seven miles a day, every day but Sunday. That’s 1,680 lengths a week, up and down the same lanes. He eats 8,000 calories a day, but he only has 6% body fat and has an extraordinary cardiovascular system.

Born 28 December 1994 in Uttoxeter, England, he famously disliked water as a baby, but at one point decided that swimming was all he was good at. He’s a Sun Capricorn trine Mars in Virgo; with Mercury, Neptune, Uranus also in Capricorn – very earthy and ambitious. His Moon along with Venus and Pluto are in intense Scorpio and his Saturn is in Pisces – so it’s a Water Earth chart which gives him great inner strength and determination. What really dominates his chart is a T square of a disciplined Mars opposition Saturn squaring onto a supremely confident Jupiter in Sagittarius conjunct Pluto. So he’s turned an afflicted Mars – square Pluto and opposition Saturn – to very constructive ends.

He evidently does have strong self-belief and likes to quote Mike Tyson. “Every step I get closer to that ring, I tell myself I’m a God and no one can beat me.”

He says he would be a Royal Marine if he wasn’t a swimmer, which would also suit his Mars.