As Dominic Cummings flounces out of No 10 for the final time – despite his actual office being round the corner and thus less sexy for a photo-op – it’s worth pondering on Matthew Parris’s perceptive and prescient thoughts in The Times from July 2019.
‘Dominic Cummings is the sharp‑tongued recruit who could cut Boris Johnson down.’ ‘A brilliant and prosecuting intellect. …. a free spirit who cares not a jot whom he offends or what people think of him.’
‘That he will fall out with his new master within months is almost certain. That, when he does, the world will know about it in coruscating language, equally so. Not least among the compensations for the chaos that awaits us is the anticipation of Mr Cummings’s blogs, once he turns against Mr Johnson.’
‘Mr Johnson ….. is prepared to box himself in ………..by creating a cabinet that will destroy his premiership if he doesn’t deliver. He has set his own time bomb ticking. And in Mr Cummings, he has appointed his own literary executioner.”
See previous post below from October 1st 2020. I’d hazard a guess of a Sagittarius, Capricorn or Aquarius Ascendant for Cummings. So tr Saturn is now heading downwards into his lower profile First Quadrant as it did in his failed-Russia airline days in the early 1990s.
October 1 2020 post:
Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s special adviser and reputedly ‘dark arts’ practitioner, has garnered a toxic reputation like many PM advisers before him which eventually led to their downfall and ousting. Indeed he’s been round this circuit before as bagman for Michael Gove in the Department of Education when the dirty tricks and abusive name-calling of opponents got to such a pitch in 2014 that Gove was removed to a political sinecure. Cummings reinvented himself via the successful if not entirely honest Vote Leave campaign into Brexit and thence onto No 10.
He’s had significant crashes in his career including early on involvement in a “spectacularly unsuccessful” project to set up an airline in southern Russia where he spent three years after university.
Described as “mad, bad or brilliant – perhaps all three”, he’s known not to suffer fools or those who disagree with him gladly and is openly contemptuous, often in offensive language.
Born 25 November 1971 in Durham, he has a Sun Neptune in Sagittarius opposition Saturn in Gemini square Mars in Pisces. A focal point Mars tends to be strong-willed and aggressive, attracting antagonism and conflict. In a Mutable sign it makes him scattergun in approach and high-wire in temperament, often not successful because he goes off in too many directions at once and lacks focus.
I’d hazard a guess at an Aquarius Ascendant given his boho-anorak style of dressing and because it would mean tr Saturn was heading downhill in his chart over his Russia fiasco. That possible birth time circa 1pm would put his self-righteous Jupiter in his 9th with his antagonistic Pluto in his 7th, and Mars in his 1st. Maybe wrong but makes sense.
His chart was head-scratchingly obtuse over Boris’s win and indeed Brexit – he clearly has odd reactions. Though on a 1pm birth time it would put tr Saturn heading for his Midheaven and now moving through his upper quadrant thereafter which would make sense.
For all his sang froid he looks seriously shaken this month, which is when the Boris government chart starts its meltdown. (See previous post). Cummings will be jittered, jangled, nerve-stretched and making bad decisions for several weeks. He’ll get a lift in December and next February but is heading for real disaster come mid-March into April 2021, repeating in September and the New Year into 2022. He’ll be tripping over one disaster after another. The Solar and Lunar Eclipses from mid 2020 to late 2021 are rattling up his five Sagittarius planets so is a crisis point for him.
His relationship with Boris is one of the world’s great mysteries since there’s a bad-tempered and restrictive composite Mars Saturn which is (even worse) in a hostile inconjunct to Pluto; an argumentative, conflicting-standpoints Mercury opposition Uranus Pluto and a needs-space Venus conjunct Uranus. And their synastry is no better, with Cummings T Square of Sagittarius Sun Neptune opposition Saturn square Mars colliding with Boris’s Saturn in Virgo opposition Uranus Pluto square Mars in Gemini. They are absolutely not what the other needs since both go off at tangents and spin around like Catherine Wheels in a Force Nine gale.
Their relationship chart doesn’t indicate an instant separation but there’s a decidedly swampy, undermining and dissatisfied feel with tr Neptune opposition the Sun/Pluto midpoint now and then opposition Pluto around that sinkhole phase next March 2021 and continuing on in the same vein into 2022. They don’t look in lockstep or harmony over the alleged exit point on December 31st.
Cummings and Carrie Symonds are not remotely sympatico and the gulf will widen late this November into December with tr Saturn conjunct the composite Mercury, Sun. with upheavals through December and aggro over the New Year till late January; with more fireworks from mid 2021 onwards.
With his old buddy Gove, he’s sensing panic in the air now with a definite chill between them from mid November through December; by late March 2021 onwards they won’t know where to turn – and whatever they had going as a partnership will be sinking in a morass of question marks.
With the Chancellor Rishi Sunak, he has an odd connection with a supportive composite Sun trine Jupiter; but the Sun also on the focal point of a composite Yod of Saturn sextile Venus – so a fated bond that will irrevocably change both their lives. It’s under darkening clouds from late February onwards for two years with a discouraging mood between them.
Cummings and the Tory Party 1912 aren’t a great match with a hostile, power-struggling composite Mars square Pluto which is being upended from July 2021 onwards worsening through 2022.
The UK are no more enamoured of him with a ratchety-dislike composite Mars square Saturn. There’ll be more discontentment and disappointment between them from February 2021 onwards, with the March/April dip marked on this chart as well.
Nothing definite regretfully from the astrology. Though none of this batch look remotely chipper as they set foot into 2021.
His chart is better suited to an airline business (albeit unsuccessful) than affairs of state. He does have fairly extensive business interests some of which have raised eyebrows about conflicts of interest.
An interesting re-read after today’s revelations in the committee hearings.
Jaw dropping even by the standards of this administration!
Just thinking about the Asc. I quite like Scorpio not only because of his monikers – ‘Rasputin’, ‘Svengali’ etc, but it could put Cancer on the 9th house cusp and the Moon would still be in Aquarius. Moon in Aquarius could indicate isolation, being the odd one out, a contrarian when it comes to 9th house issues. (Could Scorpio also could be associated with strong likes and dislikes too?)
I think his dress sense is actually quite Sagittarian in the sense it is a bit like the eternal university student. Also he has Sun Neptune opposition Saturn which could be seen as undermining authority and established codes of convention hence the scruffy attire. All sorts of trickery, illusion and deception are indicated by the Sun Neptune opposition Saturn in Gemini – great for three word slogans, psychometric targeted ads on Facebook etc. TBH, I think his genius is ‘over’-stated by the media – which again could be a combination of the Sagittarius/ Neptune influence.
I was born 10 days after him, same year 1971, with a mid Libra ascendant. Interesting to see what will happen next.
“His chart is better suited to an airline business (albeit unsuccessful) than affairs of state. He does have fairly extensive business interests some of which have raised eyebrows about conflicts of interest.”
I’d say IT, as well, especially if his Moon is on Aquarius side. Which he, obviously did, with certain competence.
Thanks Marjorie, both you and Matthew Parris were spot on
Panto season is upon us it seems, theatres or no theatres. I’ll resist the temptation to assign roles.
I feel Cummings, who is kind of tall and gangly probably has an Aquarius ascendant. I’ve noticed with Aquarian men, they can have a sort of uniform, a wardrobe which is very basic. My partner is an Aquarian and has this black T-Shirt, black jeans, black overshirt thing going on!
Cummings was undoubtedly toxic, a bully and deranged. Neil Tweedie wrote “The Vote Leave mob, drunk on their success in the referendum and the election, believed they were untouchable.” He told how Cummings held “spad school” Zoom meetings, delivering monologues while “sitting at the end of the cabinet room table, the union flag draped behind him”. An excess of Sagittarius can be suffocatingly overbearing, a Jupiter-ruled sign plus Neptune and Jupiter in it to amplify the god complex even more. The centaurs were disruptive, riding roughshod over everything and everyone, hunting for victims, a law unto themselves, it’s the dark side of the sign.
But with Cummings gone, to what extent will the weakness of Johnson’s leadership be exposed? Johnson appears to have no political compass and his lack of fixed signs other than the Moon suggest he lacks the ability to determinedly plod on through a storm, instead he is easily blown about by the changing currents.
Thanks Marjorie. Astrology is certainly helpful when trying to understand this influential character. He’s clearly quite anarchic, and comes across as an odd mixture of angry and shy. Maybe that’s the t-square with Saturn, Mars and the Sun/Neptune slipping and sliding all over the place. He’s been dubbed ‘The Marxist of Downing Street’. And although Karl Marx (5 May 1818) was a Sun/Moon Taurus, he had Aquarius rising, Sagittarius MC, and a raft of mutable planets – Saturn and Pluto in Pisces, Uranus and Neptune in Sagittarius, Mercury and BML in Gemini.
I agree his ascendant is probably Aquarius or Sagittarius. Probably Aquarius, although his choice of ‘street’ or semi sporty outfits could be Sagittarius too. He looks so uncomfortable in anything vaguely formal.
Well, more to come no doubt. He’ll either turn on everyone, or continue to work “from home” in some shadowy Sun/Neptune capacity. If he did choose to spill the beans, I’d guess he has many beans to spill! Sagittarian strategist and advisor to a Gemini leader, Steve Bannon, has had a spectacular fall, and turned nasty (or just even nastier in his case). We shall see.
Cummings may not be a conventional Marxist but as I mentioned on an earlier thread his chart is much closer to that of certain left wing revolutionaries such as Frederick Engels than conventional conservatives.
Cummings has the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, Neptune in Sagittarius and Mars in Pisces.
Engels had the Sun, Mercury, Mars, Uranus and Neptune in Sagittarius and Jupiter and Pluto in Pisces.
Both charts are highly mutable and both have Jupiter squaring Mars.
The fact Cummings Sun Neptune opposed Saturn meant he was always going to be a poor fit with the Whitehall establishment.
Marx and Engels were essentially failures politically in their lifetimes but wielded long term influence through their later writings. I wonder if Cummings will do the same.
Thanks Hugh. Very interesting what you say about Cummings and Engels. It’s hard to tell quite what Cummings wants to achieve from my perspective outside the Westminster bubble. Or what kind of ambition drives him. Perhaps the Sagittarian propensity to see the bigger picture but overlook the details has been his mistake, at this point at least.
I think he will forever be remembered in association with Barnard Castle and the Rose Garden press conference where he displayed his arrogance to the nation.
Yes indeed, the most famous eye test, with added tiny child, in recent history! I do also suspect some kind of neurodiversity too. Or is that neurodivergent? Anyway, he sometimes seemed baffled by conventional responses. I am no fan (understatement), but do understand that response, as I’ve noticed this with my own, and others’ dyslexia. I seem to remember you’re dyslexic too VF – is that right? As my dyslexic cousin once observed, it can be quite a challenge to be normal!
Could be, Jane. I would say I’m word and number blind to an extent, but not serious enough to be dyslexia (haha – you should have seen how I spelt that word before spell-checker kicked in!)
I often wonder how Cummings is in the domestic sphere as it’s often the case that such personalities can be ferocious in a professional capacity but pussycats at home. For all his faults he’s not the womaniser Johnson is, and seems like a loyal family man.
“A week is a long time in politics” – Harold Wilson
Dominic Cumming was an odious man whose fall was inevitable.
It is interesting to note that like the truly dreadful Donald Trump who was swept
from power a week earlier, Joe Biden has become the catalyst for change in one
form or another.
“It is interesting to note that like the truly dreadful Donald Trump who was swept
from power a week earlier, Joe Biden has become the catalyst for change in one
form or another.”
Interestingly, I think this is much Harris’ effect. Unlike Biden, who may start receiving Intelligence briefings on “need to know” bases in the next couple of weeks, Harris has been member of Senate Intelligence Committee, and, according to a Politico article, stellar in that. She knows a lot more about Mercer sphere operators, such as Cambridge Analytica, and now it appear, Parler. So, this might be pre-emptive “clearing the isle” for things that are going to come out as soon as Biden has sworn in and 117th Congress with if not a Democrat held Senate Majority, at least an extra seat on Committee as well as Presidential prerogative to declassify certain Intel might lead to some new discoveries (while not determining factor in 2020 Election, Dems might be itching to demostrate their Russia briefings were not a hoax).