From Robert Heinlein’s sci-fi novel of 1961, Stranger in a Strange Land:

Mr and Mrs Campbell Harrison VI had a son and heir by host-mother at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital while the happy parents were vacationing in Peru.

On BBC News today we read: Sex and the City star Sarah Jessica Parker and her actor husband Matthew Broderick are expecting twin daughters through a surrogate. The couple, who already have a son aged six, are "overjoyed", said a statement from their publicists. The babies are due to arrive "later this summer".

Will the parents be in Peru?

SJP has Moon trine Uranus, and Ceres (also associated with motherhood) in a wide opposition to Uranus. So she has an unconventional approach to being a mother. Uranus can also suggest a separation, in this case the surrogacy. Her children are likely to pick up a sense of independence off her, but maybe also a sense that she is not always reliably present in their lives. Her Aries Sun and Capricorn Moon between them are likely to be more interested in career and achievement than motherhood (she didn’t have her first child until she was 38.) Having Capricorn Moon, however, she is no doubt a responsible, if not very cuddly, mother.

Jupiter-Neptune-Chiron: Flu Pandemics and Disappearing Bees

A pandemic is always a heightened possibility when Jupiter conjuncts Neptune, as it is now doing in Aquarius. Neptune is connected to infectious diseases, and Jupiter expands whatever it touches. There was a Jupiter-Neptune conjunction in 1919/20 during the global Spanish flu pandemic, which is estimated to have killed 50-100 million people. It has been described as "the greatest medical holocaust in history".

In today’s news we read: A new flu virus suspected of killing up to 60 people in Mexico has the potential to become a pandemic, the World Health Organization's chief says… Health experts say tests so far seem to link the illnesses in Mexico with a new swine flu virus that sickened eight people in the southern US. Since writing this yesterday, the number of deaths has gone up to 81.

It’s worth remembering, however, that most Jupiter-Neptune conjunctions do NOT result in pandemics, and the stars are NOT saying that there will be a pandemic this time. If there is one, the sign of Aquarius and the presence of Chiron suggest there could be a man-made aspect to the virus. For example, it may be that, originating in swine, the virus is a product of the artificial and intensive conditions under which many domestic animals are kept.

The stars also seem to confirm a man-made component to the recent collapse in bee colonies. No-one yet knows why this has been happening, but the evidence points strongly to a new generation of pesticides used in farming. Jupiter-Neptune describes this widespread bee ailment, and Chiron and Aquarius point strongly to a man-made origin.

Aquarius is Science, and Chiron in Aquarius is the inherent flaw we find in science, which is its tendency to assume that the detached, ‘rational’, mind reigns supreme. There is nothing wrong with Science except for this assumption, which I think has come about due to its huge practical and theoretical successes. It’s like a country thinking that because it is big and powerful, it must be right. And that's when you start making big mistakes. It is and always will be human nature to think like this, which is why Chiron is the 'incurable' wound.

It is interesting that the word rational has come to mean narrowly logical. It comes from the word ratio, which means proportionate or balanced, which is a wonderful concept. Nowadays, something is only balanced, only reasonable, if it can be justified in these much narrower terms.

It is the triumph of Blake’s Urizen (‘your reason’). “Not a benevolent character, Urizen oppresses Orc, who embodies revolutionary passion and creativity, and who serves as a suffering saviour figure. He is also an enemy of Luvah, the spirit of love.”

Urizen seems to be a good portrayal of the shadow side of Chiron in Aquarius. The conjunction with Jupiter and Neptune will be going on for the rest of the year, so we may see a continuation of this theme of man-made ailments and diseases, which also serve as a warning about the limits and dangers of science.

It is important, however, not to go to the other extreme and be unduly suspicious of Science. It has done some wonderful things and will no doubt continue to do so. Chiron is also the healer, and a teacher of heroes: he helps us achieve what was once thought to be impossible. This triple conjunction may, for example, also result in cures for diseases like cancer and Aids. Or in the achievement of the Holy Grail of energy production, controlled nuclear fusion (the Americans will be attempting this in June).

There is a particularly pokey aspect in the sky at the moment: Mars conjunct Venus, square to Pluto. Mars has just entered Aries, and Venus will do so tomorrow (Friday). Pluto is at 3 degrees Capricorn, so this square will be intensifying until Sunday.

No wonder Hillary Clinton has announced that the situation in nuclear-armed Pakistan represents a ‘mortal threat’ to world security, and also that the US is preparing to up the ante over Iran’s nuclear programme. In today’s New York Times we read: Pushing deeper into Pakistan, Taliban militants have established effective control of a strategically important district just 70 miles from the capital, Islamabad, officials and residents said Wednesday. “They take over Buner, then they roll into Mardan and that’s the end of the game,” a senior law enforcement official in North-West Frontier Province said.

Hillary is now a diplomat (Venus), dealing with highly confrontational situations (Mars in Aries square Pluto). What she has just said represents the outcome of her first 3 months in the job, during most of which time Venus has been performing a complicated dance in square to Pluto. Venus is currently at 29 Pisces, back where she was on 1st Feb, but now for the final time, so we have the outcome of what was begun then.

Venus has in fact been stationing at 29 Pisces. What a place to station, the final degree of the zodiac! The end of an era. How fraught with significance are the outcomes we are now seeing! And the sign Venus is in, Pisces, is one in which she can be very powerful. But not in an aggressive way: we have to wait for Aries for that. You could say that Venus stationing at 29 Pisces means you are, in a sense, helpless: you have to yield. What can the USA do about the Pakistan insurgency? Not much. What can she do about the Iran nuclear programme? Not much, it seems, apart from threatening sanctions, which isn’t going to stop Iran.

On Monday, President Ahmadinejad of Iran called Israel a 'racist state' at an anti-racism conference. Iran has natal Mars-Mercury at 25-27 Pisces, which transiting Mars, Venus and Uranus were lined up alongside in late Pisces. The involvement of natal Mars shows Iran's belligerent intentions. Loads of delegates walked out when Ahmadinejad said this. What no-one is admitting, however, is that he is right. Israel is a racist state. They have a mythology which appoints them to be God's Chosen Race, and their treatment of the Palestinians in Gaza has strong echoes of what the Germans did to the Jews. Within Israel, non-Jews are legally discriminated against. Unfortunately, Ahmadinejad has also said he would like to destroy Israel, and that the Holocaust did not occur. He is far more racist than Israel, for genocide is on his agenda. But, with Uranus conjoining Iran's Mercury, as his country's representative Ahmadinejad had a Uranus moment, he said something that you are not 'supposed' to say, which was a home-truth about Israel. The trouble is, the people who dish out home truths are often unpalatable in other ways - like Rev Wright in the US - for they are Uranus, they are outside what is conventionally acceptable. And this makes their valid points easy to dismiss.

Venus is also a planet of money, and Pluto a planet of riches and money as power. So we are now seeing the outcome of the first task of the Obama administration, which was to pump loads of government money into the economy. As Venus has gone direct, so are there the first signs of stability in the economic crisis. Venus stationing at 29 Pisces is also saying, however, that yes you may have had some success in stabilising the economy, but all that could have been done has been done. You can only pump in so much money without building up ridiculous levels of government debt, and there is growing political resistance to further fiscal stimuli. You can’t do much more at this stage beyond waiting and seeing. The US Venus is at 3 Cancer, hard-aspected by the current Venus-Pluto cycle, which shows how economically defining the past few months have been. Obama’s Venus is at 2 Cancer, again hard-aspected by Venus-Pluto, which shows how defining in terms of personal popularity the last few months – his first real test – have been. Stage one of his Presidency – ‘the first 100 days’ – is coming to a close.

On a lighter note, the President of Paraguay, who used to be a Catholic bishop, and who was only released from his vows of chastity by the Pope last July, has reluctantly admitted to fathering 3 children, ranging from 2 to 6 years old, by different women. The process of him owning up is another instance of the recent series of Venus-Pluto squares. Venus is about popular appeal in a politician, as well of course as the relationships that led to the children. Pluto has been forcing the issue, and Venus stationing in Pisces meant he had to yield, to own up. The controversy has only caused limited damage to the President, however, because Paraguayans, being a Latin society, are impressed by displays of virility.

Born 30 May 1951, the President has a Sun-Mars conjunction, sextile to Jupiter in Aries. Cojones!

More personally, many of us will have been through a defining process around relationships and money over the last few months. This is now coming to an end. In both cases, the issues will have involved our personal sense of confidence and power: either in learning to put our case, in not letting ourselves be pushed around; or the opposite – there may have been hard lessons around not getting our way, in having for once to yield. On the broader stage, this has been exactly what has been happening to America, both at home and abroad: a sense of powerlessness, which is acting as a natural antidote to its sense of itself as the world’s superpower.

The Stock Market 2009-10

One of my readers, Geoff King, wanted to know how I thought Stock Markets would fare over the next couple of years. I said I didn't have a clue and what did he think? This is what he said, along with suggesting I collate what everyone else thinks as well - so dust off your crystal balls!

Up to July 10th Neptune’s first of three conjunctions with Jupiter is pretty easy to predict. Oil and the expansive stocks (i.e. those that prefer a boom) will improve at the expense of defensive stocks (things like discount retailers, the stocks that people prefer in a depression.) This period is, I would suggest, merely illusion. With what is happening with Pluto, Uranus and Saturn there are fundamental changes going on that are far more powerful than a “mere” Jup / Nep conjunction. These two planets conjunct again in Aug and finally Dec of this year but if you haven’t already done so, the Aug conjunction will be the time to sell expansive stocks and buy defensive ones. (Working on the principle of selling when things are high and buying when they are low.)

I think come early Nov, Pluto and Uranus will see us back in economic mid-winter but with Uranus involved I think we will see a dramatic shock at this time rather than a gentle stock market decline. Working again on the principle of buying when things are low and selling when they are high I think that once the initial Uranian shock has happened, then would be the time to buy expansive stocks. My guess then would be oil related stocks, and maybe green energy generation. The reason for saying that is that you have on numerous occasions pointed out that the Middle East looks very dangerous in 2012. Uncertainty in the Middle East would certainly push up oil prices (and gold) and that in turn would encourage investment in green technology.

Also, I feel that oil is underpriced at the moment and that Pluto in Capricorn puts a sensible value on all commodities. There is a waste not, want not quality to Capricorn and that is what I think will show here. (In case you haven’t already guessed from the subjects I’m talking about I have a Capricorn moon and a prominent Saturn!)

On the longer term Pluto will conjunct China’s Jupiter (22 degrees of Cap) in about 10 years time. That will surely mark, among other things, the peak of the Chinese stock market.

Susan Boyle: Overture To Another Summer Of Love?

Britain was wowed 10 days ago by Susan Boyle, a most unlikely candidate on the Britain's Got Talent singing show. Here is what she did. (Get your hankey out.)

Gill Gage, one of my readers, suggested I write a piece on it. I suggested she write something instead and here it is:

Like 100,000 or so other people, I was drawn to this particular new version of the Cinderella story.


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I am guessing that she was born at around 10.00a.m. because all the astrology falls into place so nicely. She had a difficult birth ‘starved of oxygen for a short while’, so Uranus-Mars in Leo (the performer) on the Ascendant works for that and also gives us the somewhat quirky uranian character. Which places the current transit at her moment of fame, of Jupiter, Chiron, Neptune on her Descendant. It also lines up the natal opposition between Neptune and Venus on her MC/IC – which has Progressed Sun in Leo currently squaring it from her 12th house. Moon in Cancer works well for a close relationship with her Mum and the strong Neptune theme, together with the strength of the Saturn in Capricorn in the sixth gives us her faith and dedication, her love of music and the regular practising that a good voice requires.

The chart for 18th April the weekend when she came to the attention of most of the British and American public shows the conjunction of Uranus, Mars, Venus in Pisces, in her 8th house (her Neptune is in Scorpio). ‘Music is (her) release’ she says. Chiron in Pisces in her 7th can reveal a picture of a soul who suffers from lack of friendship, but who is ultimately strengthened by this. This experience is perhaps what gives her songs: ‘I Dreamed A Dream’; ‘Cry Me A River’ and ‘Killing Me Softly’ the depth of feeling, the special quality that has touched so many.


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Looking at the charts for the final of Britain’s Got Talent on May 30th : the Sun has moved into her 10th house and the progressed MC is conjunct her natal Sun. Transiting Mercury, the Sun ruler, squares the Asc/Desc axis; transiting Venus (and Mars) trines her busy Ascendant, as does progressed Moon. Looks like a winner to me.

Susan dreamed a dream, sang a song of the same title, and produced a worldwide catalytic response because we’re all ready for a universal truth to reappear one which feels better than any we’ve been living with. We want a reason to love, to feel that vibe again that ran rampant in the sixties and seventies brought in on waves of pop music. So, first Paul Potts then John Sargent now Susan Boyle. One journalist defined her success as ‘redemption’. What better word, given the astrology at work here.

Venus, the planet of money, has changed direction in the last few days, and like clockwork the economic news has taken a turn for the better. How much of this news has been massaged by governments I do not know, but the vitality of the economy is based on people’s confidence in it as much as anything, so presenting a smiling face is almost a responsibility of governments in times like these. In the US, Obama’s upbeat message, like Roosevelt before him, has probably got a lot to do with the economic progress that seems to be occurring.

With Jupiter and Neptune so close to their first conjunction, it is easy to raise hopes: Jupiter (big/unrealistic)-Neptune (hopes, dreams, illusions). These planets have 2 more conjunctions to complete during the course of the year. So there is a process here, which will probably involve testing and making real hopes and dreams for the future.

The US Venus is at 3 Cancer, conjunct Jupiter at 6 Cancer. So while this aspect gives a strong tendency towards economic expansion, it also suggests bouts of recklessness and excess. Pluto’s current opposition to the US Venus-Jupiter is providing a correction to the most recent of these bouts. At the same time, Jupiter-Neptune is starting to conjoin the US Moon (the people) at 27 Aquarius. And Pluto is squaring the US MC.

Putting this together (and I’ll leave out Chiron, or I’ll never manage!), this year’s transits to the US Sibly Chart suggest new hopes and dreams for the American people, based on an economy that has its feet on the ground again, and no longer living off cheap borrowed money. All of it propelled by a re-empowered government (Pluto-MC). Of course, the MC is also the US's place in the world, but that is another story.

With Uranus coming within 5 degrees of a square to Pluto this July, the one thing we can feel certain of is uncertainty (probably!), and that world events will become less and less predictable over the next few years as Uranus and Pluto home in on each other.

So what we are seeing economically may be a false dawn. Certainly there will be a long haul back, and greater realism about what is and is not possible needs to be established. But the headlong fall of recent months seems to have bottomed out, and the vast amount spent stimulating the western economies seems to be having an effect. Recessions caused by financial crises apparently take longer to recover from, and a world recession takes longer than a local one, because there are no buoyant economies to stimulate the ones in recession.

So at best this recession is likely to last a while. The big difference compared to the 1930s is that the scale of bank collapse is much smaller, due to deliberate government intervention. In the 1930s the financial crisis was allowed to deepen much further. Less action was taken in the beginning because, like today, there was an ideology of self-regulating markets. Even though collectively we showed we had not learnt from history when we allowed the same sort of crisis to arise 80 years later, collectively we did seem to have learnt how to respond better to such a crisis.

Our new financial age was marked by Pluto’s entry into Capricorn in Jan 2008. The chart for that moment has Pluto conjunct Venus and Jupiter and trine to Saturn, Capricorn’s ruler. This is a chart that, as I have said before, we can feel optimistic about economically, despite the almost inevitable economic correction that Pluto in Capricorn would bring. (With Pluto's opposition to Mars, this is not a chart to feel optimistic about militarily.)


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What I think we do know from the upcoming astrology, particularly Uranus square Pluto, is that the financial turmoil of the last year is just the beginning of a much bigger change that is going to take some years to come about. It is something we all have to go through, and it will eventually be seen as the series of events that really began the 21st century.

So even if the element of stability that seems to be creeping into the economy does not prove to be a false dawn, the astrology is saying that we will not be clambering back, after several years hard work, to where we were before. More than that I find it hard to say.

It wouldn’t surprise me, however, if there are some major world events over the next few months, as Uranus approaches Pluto, and as Saturn once again approaches its opposition to Uranus, that start to make the world look a very different place.

This might be due to developments not so much in the world economy – which may indeed have stabilised, albeit with a long road back to what we call ‘health’ – but in what for the West are unwelcome political and military developments in other parts of the world. The obvious contender here is the Middle and Near East: events at present are unfolding rapidly in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, as well as a bit further over in North Korea. What seems likely to happen over the next few years is that we will see 2 nuclear-armed militant Islamic states: Pakistan and Iran, who are neighbours, and from opposing Islamic sects, Sunni and Shia respectively. They will be united, however, in their opposition to Israel. Big trouble is brewing in this part of the world, so crucial to the West for its oil reserves. The Uranus-Pluto square, with all its tendencies towards conflict and unpredictability, seems to be the planetary alignment under which these coming shifts in the balance of power will take place. There will, of course, be huge consequences for the West.


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Mars will exactly square Pluto in a week, so we can expect an upsurge in aggression between now and then, particularly after Mars moves into its own sign of Aries on 22nd April. Mars is still also conjunct Uranus, and I think the recent jailing of an American 'spy' in Iran belongs to both these aspects. It was an act of aggression towards the US (Mars), it was unexpected and explosive in its effects (Uranus), but is also part of a longer term power-play by Iran (Pluto). Iran has Mars in the 8th at 25 Pisces, trine Uranus in Scorpio, so it is natural for it to assert itself in a secretive and unpredictable way. The Iranian Mars hard aspects the US Mars-Neptune square, and all of this is being hard-aspected by Uranus at present.

With natal Mars-Neptune, the US has its own deceptive ways. Bring in the Uranus transit, and we can certainly expect an entertaining game of cat and mouse between Iran and the US, but it is unlikely that things will go the way either Iran or the US expect them to. Obama is not Bush, but America is still America, and the Iranians would be right in assuming that America's ends remain the same, even though the approach is less confrontational.

Throwing shoes at visiting politicians who you do not like is becoming popular in India, with classes on offer. The practice, of course, started last year with the Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at George W Bush on his farewell visit to Iraq. Astrologically, this phenomenon has been taking place under the Saturn-Uranus opposition. Saturn is the establishment figures, and Uranus in Pisces is the rebellion (Uranus) involving feet (Pisces) that is taking place.

Pisces is also the ocean, so the recent escalation in piracy off the horn of Africa is also described by the Saturn-Uranus opposition, triggered by the conjunction of Mars to Uranus over the last couple of weeks. Though Saturn and Uranus are in the middle of a 2 year series of oppositions, they are currently out of range of each other, so it is perhaps to Jupiter-Neptune we need to look: they are currently 4 degrees away from the first of 3 exact conjunctions. Neptune is the ocean, and Jupiter is piracy.

Jupiter-Neptune also fits quite nicely with the current attempts to enforce the law (Jupiter) over the Mexican drug trade (Neptune). A lot of US Presidents begin their term with a promise to address this issue, so what we are seeing is not necessarily anything new. It’s hard to do much about it, though, because Americans like their cocaine too much, and this is perhaps where Chiron, which is also conjoining Jupiter and Neptune, comes in.

In Pakistan, the Taleban are making decisive inroads into the country. Until now, they only had serious influence in the border regions, where the government recently ceded control to them. Now they are spreading into the Punjab, a region that contains half of Pakistan’s population. They are exploiting class divisions such as workers' resentment of landlords, and they are using threats to force the closure of barber shops, music shops etc, because they do not conform to strict Islamic Law.

Pakistan has the Sun (government) at 21 Leo, which is currently being opposed by Jupiter-Neptune: the dissolution (Neptune) of the rule of law (Jupiter). And Chiron as well: there may not be much the government can do about it. Jupiter-Neptune-Chiron will not be finished with the Pakistan Sun until the end of 2009, so we are perhaps seeing a year-long process in which the Taleban becomes a mainstream fact of life in Pakistan. The country is so chaotic and increasingly unstable that the ruthless, power-hungry Taleban could make this sort of rapid progress.


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Pakistan has Sun square to Angular Jupiter in Scorpio, so the religious fundamentalists gaining power would seem to be a sort of eventual destiny of the country. Just like when you see Sun in hard aspect to Pluto in a country’s chart, you’re likely to eventually get rule by a strongman (e.g. Iran, Russia, Zimbabwe and South Africa, which looks like it’ll soon join the club).

A Native American friend was telling me this the other day: some Indians he knows were hanging out on the reservation, and they were offered jobs by the white people, who had arranged to build a hydro-electric dam nearby, partly with the intention of offering employment to the Indians. The Indians said no to the jobs. The white men got angry, saying look we’ve set this up for you, don’t you want to work? You’re just lazy layabouts etc. At that point an Elder intervened, and said to the white men: “You’re the ones who invented work, you do it!”

Uranus-Pluto: It's Time for Big, New Ideas

There are strong parallels, both historical and astrological, between the present and the late 20s/early 30s. In the 30s there was a worldwide depression brought about by insufficient regulation of the financial markets. In 2009 we are entering a worldwide recession, if not depression, and again it has been brought about by insufficient regulation of the financial markets. In 1932 there was a Cardinal square from Uranus to Pluto, 3 years after the Wall St Crash. In 2012 there will be another Cardinal t-square from Uranus to Pluto, 4 years after the financial turmoil of 2008.

Most of the major powers have significant points in the early to mid Cardinal signs, such as the US Sun at 14 Cancer, and the UK Sun at 9 Capricorn. So just as the Uranus-Pluto square of the 30s wrought profound change across the western world, so too will the coming square. Cardinality is about taking action and about initiating, so we are likely to see a new world come into being.

There is an astrological difference, however, between the 1930s and now, which is that the 1930s Uranus-Pluto square was the closing square of a 104 year cycle, whereas the 2012 square will be the opening square of a new cycle that began with the conjunction of the 1960s.*

So the new world that the 1930s square brought into being was at the same time the concluding phase, the death throes, of an old cycle. It may seem to us that WWII followed by the post-war world was very much the destruction of an old world followed by a huge new beginning, in which a very new and wealthier world order was created. But the astrology tells us that this was not so, that yes it was very big and very new, but at the same time it constituted the death throes of an old order.

I find this an interesting point, because it seems to contradict our experience. But I think this is only so if we look too narrowly – if, perhaps, we are too enchanted by the western democratic, capitalist model. Though this model continued to thrive for some decades after the 1960s, there were at the same time seeds sown during the 1960s, and seeds take time to grow. The 1960s were also a time of mass protests against western militarism and capitalism. There was a feeling of dissatisfaction on the part of a lot of people with what we had become, and would go on becoming.

I think that the economic collapse (Pluto) we are currently seeing creates space for big new ideas(Uranus). As Uranus approaches its square with Pluto, we will start to see some big new ideas coming into the collective, that have resonances going back to the conjunction of the 1960s. The Jupiter-Neptune conjunction – big dream - of 2009 may also help form some of them.

The 1929 Crash led directly to the Great Depression, they were part of the same process. In 1929, Uranus and Pluto were 10 degrees off a square, so I think we need to see that degree of separation as valid. This July Uranus and Pluto will be just 5 degrees off a square, so a fortiori this square is already very much with us, destroying our present reality in a big way, but also starting to provide the inspiration for some big new ideas.

We may, for example, see a resurgence of Communism. I was watching a French philosopher being interviewed on TV, and in response to this idea, the interviewer said isn’t that old hat, a dated 20th century idea that’s been proved wrong? And the philosopher said no, we just got the application wrong, but as an idea it still remains valid. But, he added, we also need some new ideas as well.

The capitalist model we have been living under is taking a hammering. The politicians are having to drop their ideologies and be intensely pragmatic in order to save the world economy. So space is opening up for new ideas. If the suffering were to reach the levels seen in the 1930s in say Germany, then those ideas could be military and fascist. Fortunately, the politicians are in some respects doing a better job than in the 1930s, for the banks are not being allowed to go under. I think this means the new ideas are more likely to creative.

What these ideas will be remains to be seen. I’m not going to try to second-guess outer planets! But it wouldn’t surprise me if part of the mix involves a desire to create an economics of sufficiency and fairness rather than gratuitous, competitive expansion; and a desire to create a different kind of democracy, where the electorate is given real choices rather than vague promises.

I think that current events are bringing us closer to a politics of survival, rather than a politics of excess. In the West, it is a long time since we have had to worry about survival. Though survival issues can create deep fear and irrationality, they have also been a normal part of existence for most people throughout history. It is healthy, it keeps your feet on the ground, it helps you realise what is important. That is why people look back fondly to wartime Britain, tough as it was. Many people were healthier and happier then. New ideas formed on this basis stand a good chance of being down-to-earth and sane, but nonetheless possibly revolutionary. Like the Labour government of 1945 in the UK. There was a deep desire for change coming out of the wartime years, and the new government delivered radical change, despite a wrecked economy: the creation of the welfare state, the dismantling of the Empire, the nationaliation of many basic industries.

*In the 1930s, Uranus was in Aries and Pluto was in Cancer, so Uranus was approaching Pluto, and would finally catch up 30 years later, completing a cycle that began in 1851. What we will have in 2012 is Pluto in Capricorn and Uranus again in Aries (we are experiencing the Uranus Return of the 1930s!), and Uranus therefore moving away from Pluto.

The Astrology of Nuclear Fusion

In June the Americans are going to conduct a nuclear fusion experiment, in which they will simultaneously fire 192 lasers at a pellet the size of a ball-bearing containing heavy hydrogen. The total power of the lasers will be about 500 trillion watts – more than the whole of the USA uses at its peak – but it will only last for a few nanoseconds. The idea is that this burst of energy will heat the hydrogen up to the millions of degrees required to initiate nuclear fusion and that, crucially, the amount of energy released will be significantly greater than that required to initiate the reaction – of the order of 10 to 100 times as much, it is hoped.

If it does work, then it will be a landmark in the 50-year quest to produce controlled nuclear fusion, which is a kind of Holy Grail, promising unprecedented amounts of energy, an unlimited supply of raw material – water – and a virtual absence of waste products. So far all we have had is uncontrolled nuclear fusion, in the form of hydrogen bombs, which are that much more powerful than fission explosions.

It will take several hours for the lasers to recharge. What will be needed for viable production is to have several pellets being lasered every second. So presumably very large arrays of highly efficient lasers will be needed.

At the same time, an international consortium is building another sort of experimental reactor in France. It is called ITER, and the idea here is to ionise the heavy hydrogen so that it can be contained in a magnetic field, and then heat it up to 10 million degrees or so, at which point hydrogen fusion will begin (just like in the Sun). The plasma would obviously melt any physical container, hence the need for the magnetic field.

The basic chart for nuclear energy under human control is for 2 Dec 1942 at 15.25 in Chicago, when Fermi achieved the first controlled fission reaction.


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This chart had a progressed New Moon in Jan 2007, showing the new era of nuclear power stations that is upon us, as well as the nuclear proliferation which has begun in recent years. The Progressed chart for Hiroshima – the chart for nuclear weapons – remarkably had a New Moon 2 months earlier in Nov 2006, again showing the nuclear proliferation that we are starting to see. It is generally some years between a Prog New Moon and the seed it has planted becoming visible.

Given that the basic nuclear chart describes all uses of nuclear energy, the 2007 Prog New Moon could also be seen as describing the latest experiments in achieving nuclear fusion.

The chart for man-made nuclear fusion has to be the chart for the first H-bomb, which was exploded in the Pacific on 1st November 1952.


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In the basic nuclear chart, the central symbolism is the Saturn-Uranus conjunction: the splitting (Uranus) of matter (Saturn). In the fusion chart, the central symbolism is the Saturn-Neptune conjunction: the fusion (Neptune) of matter (Saturn). Both charts have an angular Pluto, showing the sheer power involved.

This year Jupiter-Neptune is hard aspecting the Angles of the fusion chart, showing the resurgence of this 50-year old dream. The Holy (Jupiter) Grail (Neptune) of technology (Aquarius). Over the next 6 years, Prog Saturn-Neptune will cross the Prog MC of this chart. So nuclear fusion (Saturn-Neptune) will be achieving a much higher public profile (MC).

Straight after that, Uranus then Pluto will hard-aspect the Moon-Saturn-Neptune-Uranus t-square. This suggests all sorts of developments coming out of that higher public profile.

The astrology suggests to me that finally controlled nuclear fusion is coming our way, for better or for worse. I expect to see the first power station around 2020, as Pluto finishes empowering the natal Neptune of the fusion chart.

One of my first blogs, back in 2006, was on nuclear issues, which you can read here.

The Western Saturn gets a Hammering

Pluto in Capricorn and Saturn opposite Uranus together indicate a massive restructuring of the financial system. That is without the Uranus-Pluto square which will soon be upon us.

This restructuring hasn’t yet happened. What we are still seeing is the necessary first step, which is a breakdown of the old.

This is why, whatever world leaders do to try and revive the economy, it doesn’t seem to make any difference.

The G20 meeting on Thursday was hailed as a ‘historic step’ etc, huge fanfare, $1.1tn of commitments to help the world economy, but I’m sure even the politicians know that the thing is out of their control. ‘World trade in freefall’ announced one headline last week. The day after G20, the New York Times announced a further 663,000 job losses in the US in March.

The G20 meeting took place with retrograde Venus almost exactly square stationing Pluto. This shows just how challenging the agenda was, and being a collective decision, how likely it was to be ineffectual.

In July, Uranus will move to within 5 degrees of a square to Pluto. This will still be early days, but nevertheless I think that, being 2 outer planets, this aspect will start to make it clear, once and for all, that we are not going back to the old, and just how deep these changes are going to be. The outcome still won't be visible, for we will still be in the breakdown phase, which I can't see coming to an end before the conclusion of the Saturn-Uranus opposition in July next year.

Beneath the fanfare of the G20 meeting remained the split between Europe and the US on how to deal with the economy. The US wants to chuck more money at it, Europe wants to wait and see what effect the spending to date has, and introduce new rules for financial institutions. As I wrote on Wednesday, the astrology lies with Europe on this one. Pluto in Saturn-ruled Capricorn and Saturn opposite Uranus point to huge Saturn lessons for the world. The US has natal Sun square to Saturn, making these lessons particularly challenging for the US.

Squares are dynamic, and in the case of the US, this square has propelled them to the top of the world (natal Saturn in the 10th and ruler of the 2nd house of wealth), and given them a ferocious work ethic. This is classic Sun square Saturn. But what is also classic Sun square Saturn is the over-identification with this achievement, the sense that you are worth nothing unless you are working hard and making good amounts of money. You judge yourself by this measure, and you judge others. You enjoy the feeling of superiority to those who aren’t doing so well, you feel humiliated by those who are doing better, and you will doff your cap at them.

This attitude strangles everything around it, creating a wasteland in human terms in the midst of material abundance. I don’t think it is quite so intense in Europe, but it is still pretty central. It is barbaric, it is the enemy of civilisation. We think that because we are so rich and because we have so much technology that we are superior to those who don’t have these things. But in reality we are a barbaric culture where it is easy to feel wrong-footed if all you want to do is to be human.

Painful as it is, I think that one function of the current transits is to reveal this negative Saturn by revealing the consequences of it. Saturn themes are good on consequences of actions, and learning through them. I think that negative Saturn is the defining problem of westernised culture, which is increasingly the world’s culture.

So our Saturn is currently subject to the wrecker’s ball, and will be so for a while yet. Collectives don’t learn very easily, but maybe for a while, after all this is over, we may be a bit more civilised, at least for a while.

The Dorothean Triplicities

I’ve started listening to one of Bernadette Brady’s studyshops on medieval astrology. There is something called Dorothean Triplicities, out of which you can generate planets that rule the 1st, 2nd and 3rd parts of your life respectively. I tried it out at my astrology group last night, and it seemed to work pretty well.

I’ll describe the technicalities later, but I’ll use Barack Obama’s chart as an example.


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Using the technique, we find that Mercury rules the 1st part of his life, Saturn the second and Jupiter the 3rd. These periods are not set number of years; rather, by listening to someone’s life story, you can see where the periods change over.

So Mercury and the first part of Obama’s life. It is in Leo, and what his background does seem to have generated, for better or for worse, is a unique individual. Mercury is also associated with thought and curiosity and travel, as is Jupiter, which Mercury is closely opposite. All this fits with his early years. In his chart, Mercury rules the 8th, which describes his exploration of his ancestry, and the 5th, which describes the creativity that led to his books.

I’d say that he has moved into the second phase of his life, which is Saturn. Say no more! You could say it started around 1996, when he first assumed public office, as a member of the Illinois Senate. I’d also say there had been a gradual shift from Mercury to Saturn going on for some years before that. His Saturn is strong in its own sign of Capricorn, and in his chart rules the 12th House, describing his responsibilities (Saturn/Capricorn) for the collective in its widest sense (12th).

The final phase of his life will be ruled by Jupiter. It is in Aquarius in the 12th, conjunct his Saturn, and ruling the 11th House. So I see the last part of his life as being expansive, with a return to the community-based work of his earlier years, but with the world as his arena. He will be a world statesman, with a vision for the future.

I don’t understand why the Dorothean Triplicities are as they are, but this is how you generate them. Firstly, you need to identify the leading planet. If the Sun is above the horizon – a diurnal chart – then the Sun is the leading planet. If not, then you have a nocturnal chart, and the Moon is the leading planet. You then note the element the Sun or Moon is in, and read the following chart:


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In Obama’s case, his leading planet is the Moon (nocturnal chart), and it is in Air. So we read the Air line, which is Saturn, Mercury and Jupiter. As the chart is nocturnal, we swap round the first 2 planets, and we get the series Mercury, Saturn and Jupiter.

In the case of say George W Bush, he was born with Sun in Cancer in the 12th. So the Sun was above the horizon, and it is a diurnal chart. So the Sun is the leading planet, and it is in water. Reading this off, the relevant planets are Venus, Mars and Moon respectively.


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So Venus in Leo ruled his youth. He was the eldest son, the prince of a political dynasty (Leo) that was also wealthy (Venus). He indulged himself (Venus in Leo) and did not seem to fit in anywhere (Venus sextile Uranus). Venus rules the 4th House Libran Cusp, which is the political home he grew up in, and it also rules intercepted Taurus in the 10th, which describes the difficulty he had in establishing a career.

The second phase of his life, which I would say is now ending, is ruled by Mars, and I’d say this phase began when his life began to work: he began to be able to take effective action, which is Mars. This was from 1988 onwards, starting with being part of his father’s successful run for presidency, then making money through his share in Texas Rangers, and then his career as Texas governor and then US President. Mars rules the 10th House of career in Bush’s chart, describing how his ability to take action translated into career success.

Bush described himself as a ‘War President’, which is very Mars. His Mars is in Virgo, which you would expect to be analytical and considered and service-based. But it is also unaspected, which means that it functioned on its own, without being reined in by the rest of the personality. It was primitive and confrontational, and was ultimately disastrous for American foreign policy. It only seemed to be Virgo in the sense that he had a clear idea of who his targets were, too clear even, and therefore simplistic.

The final phase of his life, which I’d say he is now entering, is ruled by the Moon, which is in 3rd House Libra. Bush governed more by instinct than by reason, and this final phase of his life may be a time when the wreckage of the last years of his Presidency may give him pause for thought; it may be a time when he brings thought (Libra/3rd) to his instinctive responses (Moon), and develops a more balanced view (Libra) and even some wisdom (conjunction to Jupiter). The Moon square to his Cancer Sun further describes this need to balance head and heart. With the conjunction of Jupiter to the Moon, however, he may also return to his youthful self-indulgent ways, and develop a complacent view of his political career.

Of Smith, Brown and Banana Skins

Gordon Brown has seen the current economic crisis as his chance to become a global leader, cementing his reputation for pecuniary know-how after 10 glorious years at the Treasury. He made a great Freudian slip in Parliament a couple of months ago, when he referred to himself as having ‘saved the world’. (This hearkened back to his strategy of part-nationalising collapsing banks, and urging other countries to do the same). I don’t know what the opposite of charisma is, but Gordon Brown has lots of it: it is an absence that is described by his 12th House Sun, Venus, Mars and Jupiter, all in Pisces. Behind the greyness, however, lies a huge ambition in the form of a Moon-Pluto conjunction in Leo: he has an emotional need (Moon) to be a leader (Leo) that to him feels like his psychological survival depends on it (Pluto).


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This is why his view of himself can be so distorted. Without strong earth planets, other-worldly Pisces finds it hard to be clear about this reality. Add in the desperation of a Moon-Pluto, and the self-aggrandisement of a Leo, and it all adds up. His abundance of shape-shifting Pisces gives the capacity to project his self-image outwards, so that for a long time we did believe he was the ‘Iron Chancellor’. What is clear now, however, is that he was riding a wave of prosperity, and blind more than most to the underlying weaknesses of the western economic model: this is why the recession is hitting Britain harder than most, if not all, of the ‘developed’ countries. During his time as Chancellor, moreover, he found it very hard to accept that Tony Blair was anything more than a provisional Prime Minister, while he, Gordon Brown, was the man of substance who would in due course take over. He seemed to think it only natural that Blair would stand down after 2 terms, or even before, in fairness to Brown’s claims to the throne. This attitude naturally caused endless trouble within the government, and shows again his capacity for self-delusion.

Brown is at it again this week, hosting a G20 meeting of the world’s wealthiest nations to try and make progress on the recession. A split is opening up between the US and Europe on how to deal with the recession – the US wants to keep throwing money at it, while Europe is saying hang on, let’s wait and see if the vast sums we’ve thrown at it already have an effect, because otherwise we will be building up a huge public debt to no purpose. (I’m sympathetic to the European position, which also happens to chime with our new astrological age of Pluto in Capricorn: you can't avoid the consequences of living beyond your means, and you can't chase debt with more debt.)

In hosting this G20 meeting, Brown no doubt sees himself as the link man between the US and Europe, and therefore as the man who can lead the world at this critical juncture.

So we have this critical international meeting in a few days, Brown is striding the world stage, it his chance to build serious political capital at home, and what do the newspapers want to talk about? The headlines (until this morning) were not the G20 but the fact that the Home Secretary’s husband watched a couple of porn movies, and paid for them out of his wife’s parliamentary expenses. Total cost: £10.

You couldn’t make it up. Gordon Brown has a way of making himself, or his government, look ridiculous, and I think this is the flip-side of his inflated view of himself. Reality has a way of correcting itself, of balancing itself. Hubris has its own built-in banana skins.

And then there is the Home Secretary herself, Jacqui Smith. On the whole I am not very fond of these New Labour women who rise to the top. Because they are not men, they seem to have to always be proving how hard they are. And yes, they are hard, and that is why I don’t like them. And they all look like each other. Tessa Jowell left her husband when he fell foul of Italian law, because it would have harmed her career. The human thing is to support your spouse when they are in trouble, not leave them. I don’t like Caroline Flint either, the Minister for Europe. The one everyone liked was the late Mo Mowlam. She was human, and she didn’t last very long in government.

It’s a bit like how the Democrats in the USA have to prove how tough they are, because they are not Republicans, and this comes out in foreign policy. It was a Democrat, Truman, who dropped the first atom bomb; and it was another Democrat, Kennedy, who threatened to use them in the Cuban crisis. It was a Democrat, Hilary Clinton, who threatened to ‘obliterate’ Iran while campaigning for her party’s nomination (and who is now Secretary of State.) George W Bush, for all his swagger, never talked like this.

Jacqui Smith was born on 3rd November 1962.


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She has a Sun-Mars-Saturn t-square, and I tend to see that combination as hard and driven, because that is what Mars and Saturn can be like in challenging aspect, and more so when they join up with an important planet like the Sun to make a t-square. With Neptune also being part of the t-square, it probably softens the effect and adds idealism to her career. But it probably also masks the hardness within herself. Her Moon is in Capricorn, adding to the same picture.

So what about her femininity, her Venus? It is unaspected, at 25 Scorpio. Maybe, therefore, it doesn’t get much of a look-in. But unexpressed planets have a way of coming out. And if it is Venus, and if it is in Scorpio, it would be quite appropriate for it to get revenge (unexpressed Scorpio) through the husband (Venus) secretly (Scorpio) watching porn films (Scorpio plus Neptune transit). With Neptune currently squaring her Venus, and Chiron starting to square it, this is a big time for Jacqui Smith in her relationship. Neptune is stripping away illusions about this area of her life, and Chiron is revealing, perhaps, a woundedness, a dysfunctionality, that has been there all along. The public humiliation she is going through is synchronistic, it is an inner reality revealing itself to her, and the force of it is perhaps commensurate to the degree to which she is unconscious of her Venus.