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F.W. de Klerk has died who was the South African President who brought an end to apartheid and freed Nelson Mandela. Throughout his political career he had supported racial segregation but finally reckoned it would lead to civil war if it wasn’t dismantled. After the 1994 election put Mandela in as president he served as Deputy in the coalition government but resigned after two years.

  He was born 18 March 1936 11.30pm in Johannesburg, and had a 4^th house Pisces Sun square Jupiter in the 12^th and trine an influential 8^th house Pluto. He also had a resourceful and implacable Mars in Aries square Pluto and in an adventurous trine to Jupiter. And he had the signature Neptune opposition Saturn in Pisces of the day across his Midheaven/IC axis. Neptune can be caring; Saturn Neptune hopes for a better society. In the event he was unpopular both for his lack of fulsome apologies for the evils of apartheid and with the entrenched whites for having dismantled their power base.

  When Mandela was elected in 1994 the tr Uranus Neptune in Capricorn was opposition his Pluto, altering his life in a radical way.

 His relations with Mandela were strained which is hardly surprising given that Mandela’s Cancer Sun was conjunct de Klerk’s 8^th house Pluto for a deep and uncomfortably tense cross-over and power struggle which manifested as a hostile composite Mars Pluto in their relationship chart.  

  De Klerk’s connection to the South Africa 1910 chart is strong with a composite Jupiter trine Pluto trine Uranus North Node in the relationship chart. And that earlier South Africa chart was on its first Uranus Return when it transformed into a non-apartheid state.  

Whatever his failings he was strong enough to see which way the winds of change were blowing and adjusted his sails accordingly. 

Russian troops are massing on the Ukrainian border with warnings of a possible invasion. Belarus (a Russian client state) has engineered a migrant crisis on its border with Poland that could spiral into violence with most of the migrants want to get to Germany. And Russia has cut gas supplies to Europe, sending prices soaring with winter looming. The theory is that Putin is testing Western resolve in a world without Angela Merkel. She has long been seen as the only western leader with any influence on Putin and she’ll soon be gone.

  Putin’s 4^th Term chart, 7 May 2018 11.05am Moscow is brutal and crises-ridden with a Mars Pluto conjunction square Uranus. The Solar Arc Midheaven is conjunct the Uranus now and for several weeks ahead which could suggest a decisive shift of direction. Tr Pluto will conjunct the Mars through 2022 as it has done this year which can be frustratingly trapped or ruthless as he seeks to ride roughshod over obstacles.

Internally Russia is facing a a triple threat of rising coronavirus cases, new lockdown measures and surging inflation, veering towards 8%. The Solar Arc Pluto will conjunct the Mars exactly in 16 months but will be in effect before then which doubles up on the logjammed mood. This could stem from a myriad of problems not all foreign relations – though desperate leaders can make desperate decisions to divert attention from domestic problems. Tr Pluto is also square the 10^th house Uranus in 2023/2024 which will be unstable in the extreme.

 Alexander Lukashenko, the Belarus President, first installed on 20 July 1994 and sworn in for a 6^th term after a disputed election on 23 September 2020. Both these charts are under extreme stress through this December and across 2022. So if he hangs on it’ll be by the skin of his teeth.

  Joe Biden’s Mars in Scorpio is close to his Descendant when his chart is relocated to Moscow, so it is a toxic hotspot for him. For Warsaw, Poland he has an indecisive Neptune on his Descendant.  He’ll be irked certainly. Whether he takes radical action is less sure.

See previous Post on Ukraine 13 April 2021.   

Geoffrey Cox MP is giving fat-cat politicians a bad name, appearing only twice in Westminster to vote in 13 months and reportedly using his Commons office for his £1m-a-year legal sideline which takes him off to the sunny tax haven of the British Virgin Islands. He evidently offered the Islands legal advice recently in a corruption probe by the UK Foreign office.

 He was also Boris Johnson’s legal cheerleader as Attorney General over one of Bojo’s early dirty tricks in shutting down parliament in late 2019 to avoid discussion of Brexit. Cox’s advice which greenlit the dodgy deal was firmly quashed by 11 Supreme Court Judges, at which point Cox went off in a Shakespearean rant/toddlers’ tantrum in the House lambasting Brexiteers. See post September 26 2019.

   None of which should be a surprise and he’s a bit player in the UK-down-a-sink-hole saga but his chart is so apt it seemed a shame to waste the example.

  Born 30 April 1960, he has a classic money man and businessman’s chart. His acquisitive Taurus Sun is in an Earth Grand Trine to Pluto in Virgo trine Jupiter in Capricorn. Earth Grand Trines have organizational ability especially when it comes to material achievements. His Sun is also in a practical trine to Saturn in Capricorn, square an innovative Uranus and opposition an elusive Neptune.

  The fates handed his career to him on a platter.

  But for all that he is rattled at the moment by tr Saturn square his Neptune exactly now and then both tr Saturn and tr Uranus battering on his Sun into early 2022; with a panicky-failure tr Neptune conjunct his Mars continuing on from this year throughout 2022.

  His impassioned support for Boris in 2019 hasn’t earned him any support in this fiasco as his situation has thrown fuel on the ire about sleazy MPs. And he has fallen victim to Boris’ lifelong tendency to dump erstwhile friends who are no longer of use.

  Their relationship chart has a pushily-confident, power-couple composite Pluto opposition Jupiter which can often joust about rules and regulations as being only applicable to others. That opposition squares onto the composite Sun so is all the stronger. Jupiter Pluto relationships fly high as long as both sides’ agenda coincides. When they diverge it can turn nasty.

There is also a focal point slippery Neptune squaring Saturn opposition the NN. The composite Venus is conjunct Algol so catching this month’s Lunar Eclipse for an emotional crisis. The composite Mars is also getting hammered in 2021/22 by a tr Pluto square which will make both feel trapped and enraged.

A passing kerfuffle but maybe symbolic in the greater scheme of things about the present downward chute.

As a cartoonist pointed out recently – it’s not one rule for everyone else and a different one for us, according to those in power. It’s more that there are rules for others and no rules at all for the elevated ones.

Ghislaine Maxwell has lost key rulings ahead of her 29^th November trial on charges of procuring underage girls to be sexually abused by Jeffrey Epstein. The judge ruled that prosecutors can refer to her accusers as “victims” and can have their identities kept anonymous.

 On a list of potential expert witnesses for the defence is Elizabeth Loftus who testified at Harvey Weinstein trial that victims’ memories of sexual abuse are unreliable. But she  failed to convince the jury that Annabella Sciorra’s memory of a 1990s rape by him was defective. Loftus appeared for the defence in the Ted Bundy case, trying to throw doubt on the only victim left alive who could identify him; as well as giving evidence in the OJ Simpson and Bill Cosby’s cases. Time’s Up has called Loftus’ ‘false memory’ work a ‘tool that has been used to try to discredit survivors of sexual assault for decades.’ False memory syndrome has not been ratified by the American Psychological Association and is labeled ‘controversial’ and is ‘not [an] accepted diagnostic term.’

   Maxwell, 25 December 1961 3.20pm Maisons Lafitte, France, has tr Saturn poised to conjunct her Midheaven and her 10^th house ‘lucky’ Jupiter as the trial opens. Saturn can begin a consolidated, hard-working peak period of several years – but it can oddly have the opposite effect of bring home chickens to roost as Saturn’s karmic kickback goes into operation. If you don’t work diligently and prepare well in the years before, hey presto you get landed with a harsh lesson. Jupiter in the 10^th can be lucky but is also entitled and Saturn gives a sharp reality check when Jupiter has flown too high. Her 4^th house Leo Moon is also taking a fair battering from tr Saturn in opposition and tr Uranus square until early 2022.

More significantly tr Pluto will conjunct her 9^th house Saturn in Capricorn from March 2022 to late 2023 which will be a discouraging and depressing slog. In which she is not alone since Prince Andrew’s Venus Mars in late Capricorn also catch the tr Pluto conjunction in 2022/23; as does Virginia Guiffre, his accuser in the civil suit. None of them look remotely cheerful.

 Loftus, 16 October 1944, is a Sun Libra with a complicated tangle of Uranus trine Neptune sextile Pluto, Saturn square Neptune and trine Mars in Scorpio; with Mars square Pluto. Influential, innovative, impatient, angry, super-determined. She looks blocked in December; in turmoil through January and worse from mid January onwards. Trapped and powerless through 2022/23.

  She’s an odd match with Maxwell with Loftus Sun square Maxwell’S Saturn; and Loftus’ Saturn opposition Maxwell’s Mercury Sun. Plus a game-playing Pluto opposition Jupiter.

  No one is any doubt that memory is fallible but I would have thought hauling Loftus in, given her track record of defending the indefensible could well backfire badly if she is called.

US rappers Travis Scott and Drake are being sued for having “incited mayhem” after eight people were killed and dozens injured in a crush during a Texas concert. About 50,000 people were in the audience in Houston when the crowd started pushing towards the stage as Scott, whose company had organised it,  was performing, triggering chaotic scenes. They continued to perform the suit said even as the “crowd became out of control”.

 Drake was born 24 October 1986 2.31 am Toronto, Canada and brought up by his mother with his father imprisoned for drug offences. He certainly looks poleaxed by the tragedy with tr Saturn exactly square his Pluto when it started and conjunct her Mars from this weekend for two weeks – and even more panic-inducing his Solar Arc Neptune is conjunct his Mars as well, almost exactly now.

  He is, at the best of times, a ramped-up individual, with an intense Sun Pluto in Scorpio square Mars. He’s also got a creative Water Grand Trine of Jupiter in Pisces trine a Cancer Moon trine Pluto maybe Venus in Scorpio.

 Travis Scott, born 30 April 1991 in Houston, was brought up by his grandmother in a high-crime area, which he said gave him the edge to succeed and get out of that lifestyle. He’s a Sun Taurus with Pluto widely in opposition and a volatile, overly excitable Mars in Cancer opposition Uranus Neptune in Capricorn square Mercury in Aries. Not a calm temperament. And a chart fairly similar to Chris Brown, with whom Drake had a famous falling out – who has a Taurus Sun opposition Pluto and Mars in Cancer opposition Uranus Neptune – all combustible high-wire individuals.

  Travis Scott’s year of birth was in doubt, though seems to have settled at 91 rather than 92. He looks less shaken than Drake instantly but his December looks like a sinker with uncertainty stretching through 2022.  

Lou Taylor, Britney Spears’ former manager, has filed legal documents to halt Spears’s lawyer Mathew Rosengart asking for full accounting over the last 13 years of Taylor’s involvement in the conservatorship, after he claimed he believes the star’s money had been mishandled. Allegations and hot denials are flying in all directions and Taylor has already issued a defamation suit against a Britney fan. So as well to tread lightly until a court clarification. Taylor denies being involved with the alleged bugging of the star’s bedroom or controlling her medical treatment.

 Taylor’s company Tri-Star parted ways with Spears in August 2020 amid allegations that she and others were getting death threats. A recent CNN documentary reported that Spears blames Taylor for many conservatorship-related issues. Taylor has a Rolodex of celebrity clients, including Jennifer Lopez, Steven Tyler, Gwen Stefani, Reba McEntire, Priyanka Chopra, Mary J. Blige and several Kardashians. She appears to be a devout Christian with a pastor husband.

 The potential termination of the singer’s conservatorship is expected to be addressed in court on November 12 midway between Mars square Saturn and Mars opposition Uranus so it will be high tension and aggravated.

  Lou Taylor, born 30 October 1965 in New York, is a Sun Scorpio trine Jupiter in Cancer and trine Saturn in Pisces – capable, private, creative, not always realistic. She has a passionate Venus Mars in Sagittarius in a relentlessly determined and volatile square to Pluto Uranus in Virgo, so when push comes to shove she won’t budge easy. She has a steely core.

At the moment she has her Solar Arc Saturn opposing her Sun for a discouraging setback; early this December looks deflating and unlucky; 2022 will be enthusiasm-denting; but her major problems pick up in a calamitous 2023/24.

  Her Sun and Neptune Mercury in Scorpio all fall in Britney’s financial 2^nd house so money would be the main draw with some confusion arising (Neptune). Taylor’s Uranus Pluto is also conjunct Britney’s Mars in Virgo and square Britney’s Sun and Neptune which is a damaging connection with Taylor wielding the power but in a chaotic way. Taylor’s Jupiter is also on Britney’s Midheaven which could suggest a profitable career partnership or Taylor’s status being raised by her position on the Spears bandwagon.

  Their relationship chart has been wobbling badly since 2020 with tr Pluto upending the composite Uranus, with aggravations this year – but the more telling problems will come in 2023/24.

  Britney’s own chart has that tr Neptune opposition her Mars right through till early 2023 so she may lose a few battles along the way before clearing her feet of this mess.

See previous posts: September 13 2021

Pic: Mike Maguire

Spooks, politicos and lawyers collide to throw more questions than answers around the Steele Dossier which purported to show Trump’s Kremlin connection before the 2016 election. A Russian analyst has been arrested by US authorities for lying.  He was the source for the most incendiary allegation that Trump was compromised during a trip to Moscow in November 2013 for the Miss Universe beauty pageant. Trump has denied the claim however, a report by the Senate intelligence committee said that the FSB spy agency presided over a network of secret cameras inside the Ritz-Carlton hotel where Trump stayed, including in guest bedrooms.

  In 2019, special counsel Robert Mueller said no criminal wrongdoing had taken place between the Trump campaign and Moscow but he noted there were multiple contacts in 2016 between Russian spies and Trump aides. The Kremlin had run a “sweeping and systemic” operation to help Trump win, Mueller said. The bipartisan report by the Senate intelligence committee was dismissive of Steele’s dossier, but corroborated key elements in it.

  Former MI6 spy Christopher Steele, 24 June 1964 was born five days after Boris Johnson so has a similar Saturn opposition Uranus Pluto square Mars in Gemini – scattergun and uber-excitable. With the Jupiter opposition Neptune adding a streak of over optimism – all of which may have sent him jumping to conclusions and relying on his unreliable judgement. His Cancer Sun does trine Saturn which might give him some anchoring.

 His relationship chart with Trump is all over the place through this December and more so in 2022/23, so more may emerge to clear the fog.

  But who’d know? Some of the dossier appears to be on the money and intelligence is often straws in the wind, which sometimes prove to be accurate and sometimes not. And sometimes the truth only emerges fifty years down the line, if then.    

One of Hollywood’s darkest rumours from decades back has been given credence with a claim that Natalie Wood was, as suspected, sexually assaulted by Kirk Douglas in her teens. Her sister in a memoir says she was waiting outside in a car with her mother outside Douglas’s LA hotel suite into which the young Natalie had been despatched by her stage-mother-from-hell in the hope of gaining career advancement. She returned later dishevelled and upset and was told by her mother to “suck it up”. In later years Natalie discussed the assault with her sister.

 Kirk Douglas, 9 December 1916 10.15 am New York, was renowned both as a womanizer and having a ferocious temper, courtesy of his Mars in Capricorn opposition Pluto in Cancer. His Sagittarius Sun was inconjunct Natalie’s 8^th house Uranus and even more damagingly his Saturn in Cancer was conjunct her already over-stressed and frightened Sun, Pluto, Mars in Cancer. Her mother was already a monster with those planets in her 10^th and she was delivered on a platter to another. 

His Scorpio Midheaven was also exactly conjunct her North Node – so her karmic Scorpio journey with its overwhelming drive for success made her vulnerable to his career status.

  When the assault occurred around 1955 when she was 17 or thereabouts her chart was labouring under a life-changing collection of explosive and disturbing influences – her Solar Arc Moon was conjunct her 8^th house Uranus (8^th house ruling sexuality) and her Solar Arc Midheaven was in a blocked conjunction to her powerless Pluto. Tr Uranus was conjunct her Mars Pluto Sun with tr Neptune square Sun, Mars, Pluto; and tr Saturn in Scorpio trine. It’s a miracle she survived the psychological damage from that period.

  Sadly there’s no birth date for the mother.

  So beautiful and so much grief and pain.

For previous post on Kirk Douglas see February 6 2020

Not a good week for the House of Commons as a different scandal tainted the other side of the aisle.  Claudia Webbe, a Labour MP once a power figure on the far left, was given a suspended prison sentence after being found guilty of a campaign of harassment, including threatening to “use acid” and distribute naked pictures of woman friend of her partner. She had the whip withdrawn when charges were laid and now sits as an independent. If her appeal fails her sentence will prompt an automatic recall petition in Leicester East.

   That seat does not have a good record having been represented previously by Keith Vaz, who was infamous for a litany of offences (see wiki) for over thirty years – and mystifyingly survived them until unprotected sex with male prostitutes and cocaine did for him and he resigned some time after that exposure.

   Webbe was part of the Momentum set and has been supported by Jeremy Corbyn, McConnell and Diane Abbott over this debacle.

  Born 8 March 1965 she has four planets in Pisces including her Sun, Venus and Saturn and Mercury with a formidable and fearsome collection of Uranus, Pluto, Mars in Virgo across in opposition. That collection in Virgo is combustible, volatile and prone to aggravated outbursts. She’s also got a Boris Johnson type Jupiter (Moon) in Taurus opposition Neptune whose attributes run along a spectrum from visionary dreamers at one end to hypocrites and those who cause scandals through their own instability at the other.

  Maybe an early warning signal from next year’s Scorpio/Taurus Eclipses which will be rattling up both ends of this opposition.

Pic David Woolfall.