Recently in Politics Category

Honduras is not a country that has been much in the news, but in June of this year president Manuel Zelaya, who had attempted to rewrite the constitution of that country to permit a president to serve two terms, was ousted by a military coup ordered by the Honduran Supreme Court.  Zelaya re-entered the country illegally last week and demanded reinstatement and the fall of the replacement government.  The government reacted by suspending civil liberties and instituting martial law in many places in the country just as Saturn opposed Uranus exactly.

My bible for national charts is Moon Moore's Book of World Horoscopes, but written back in the 1960s it lacks the benefit of knowledge of more recent history.   Moon used the date that Honduras seceded from the Central American Federation as the date for the national chart of Honduras, but the military ruled the country for many years until 1979 when the country returned to civilian rule (source: WIkipedia).  A new constitution was approved in 1982. Still, the new constitution did not particularly change or alter the country in any way so I am going to go with Moon's original date of November 5, 1838. 

That chart reflects very well the nature of the Honduran government, which like many Latin American countries has bounced back and forth between civilian and military rule   The Sun in this chart is in Scorpio, the planet of power and drama.  Scorpio is not very concerned with democracy or the will of the people - there is an intense desire and passion with Scorpio that holds on to power with an iron grip.  The Sun conjoins Mercury, planet of communication and movement, signifying that despite the fixed nature of the Scorpio Sun, the national identity (Sun) is changeable or Mercurial  (Mercury).  The national identity is further stressed by a square from Neptune, planet of illusion and confusion, making it difficult for this country to settle on a role that suits it for any length of time.

The Mercurial nature of the country is reflected in the unaspected Gemini Moon, since Gemini is ruled by Mercury.  The Moon in a national chart describes the common people and the public mood, and in Honduras they are not afraid to make changes where changes are needed.  

Mars (aggression)  in the chart is opposed by Uranus (revolution), so we would be surprised not to see a continual erosion of the power structures (Scorpio Sun) by rebellion and radical changes.  However, Saturn (restriction and oppression) forms a square to both planets, reflecting the power (Scorpio Sun) of the military (Mars) to squash any such rebellion (Uranus).

Over the past few months transits to the Moon in the Honduras chart revealed that change was coming (Uranus square to the Moon) but that this change, though potentially uncomfortable, would ultimately facilitate healing for the nation  (Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune trine Moon).  But now that Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune have moved away there is just the square of Uranus and Saturn to the Moon, and martial law has been declared to quelch (Saturn) the rebellion (Uranus) that has resulted from the militarized society.  

Transiting Pluto is in a tight square to the nodes of the Moon in the chart - the evolutionary path of the country, an indicator that the current events will have an ultimately transformative (Pluto) effect that will have the power to create lasting change. 

Just after the opposition between Saturn and Uranus culminated last week, tens of thousands of protesters filled the streets of Tehran on Friday in a rare show of opposition against the pro-Palestinian rhetoric of Iranian president Ahmadinejad whose anti-Israeli speeches on Jerusalem Day gave rise to chants like this one:  "Not Gaza, Not Lebanon, I'll sacrifice my life for Iran."

Tension has been fomenting in Iran since the Iranian elections in June when Ahmadinejad won in a widely disputed landslide over challenger Hussein Moussavi, and we can see the events on the ground reflected in the astrological signatures.  The progressed Sun (national identity) in the chart of Iran last year conjoined Chiron (sensitivity and wounding/healing) at the very top of the chart, the point that we call the Midheaven, the point that represents the national government and its place in the world community.  Iranian dissidents are more and more sensitive now to their place in the global environment, and more and more open in their disdain for the oddly apocalyptic ideas of their President.  

We are in the third phase of the opposition between Saturn and Uranus, and this conflict between the desire to return to the safety of the past (Saturn) and the desire for that which is new and revolutionary (Uranus) is clearly seen in the leadership of Ahmadinejad.  He is both a  revolutionary (Uranus) and a reactionary (Saturn), wanting to return to repressive conservative values (Saturn) while blowing Israel off the map (Uranus).  This phase of the opposition of Saturn to Uranus is aspecting exactly Mars in the chart of Iran.  Mars is the warrior - the aggressive instinct that seeks self-preservation and the gratification of desire.  There is a tremendous amount of anger in that country at the moment that will need to find some kind of release. 

With Saturn and Uranus preparing to oppose each other exactly next week, the middle of the night resignation of Van Jones as the "Green Jobs Czar" in the Obama administration may be a hint as to which of the planets is winning.  Saturn represents society and structure, and Uranus is rebellion and new ideas.  When the conservative media discovered that Van Jones had signed a petition asking then Attorney General Eliot Spitzer to investigate possible government complicity in the September 11 tragedy, the resulting firestorm among conservative pundits exacerbated the already heated debate over the policies of the Obama administration. 

President Obama was elected on November 4, the exact day of the first phase of the opposition from Saturn to Uranus.  He was elected because the majority of the people in the United States wanted change.  He ran on a platform of affordable health care, bringing jobs to Americans, withdrawing troops from Iraq, and changing the partisan ways of Washington.  

Every attempt that he has made to fulfill these promises has been met with fierce opposition; not because of bad policy, but because conservatives want him to fail.  The downfall of Van Jones was orchestrated not by a debate over his usefulness, but because Glenn Beck, the ignorant clown on Fox News who is even more absurd than Rush Limbaugh, began to ratchet up the pressure after a group that Jones was formerly involved with urged a boycott of Beck's show. 

Many of the left are upset with Obama for continuing to try to build alliances with conservatives in order to accomplish his agenda, but they are missing the point.  In a Saturn/Uranus time such as this, any big change cannot occur without support from both sides and that requires a putting aside of one's need to be right.  Obama, with his Aquarius ascendant, understands this.  Unfortunately, it is the inability of the Democrats to rally behind him that could prove to unravel his presidency, not his inability to stand up to the Right.  

I'm going to classify this under both Saturn (making the hard choices) in Virgo (dealing with day to day life in a body such as health, diet and routines), as well as Pluto (transformation) in Capricorn (the way our governmental structures operate). The fact is, we need a complete overhaul with the way we look at health and healthcare, and not just the way we insure our health.  Offering a public option for health insurance is not enough.  

Before a society can make intelligent choices about something that affects its citizenry, it must know the facts.  In the United States the debate over health care reform is degenerating into violence and at least one congressman (Brad Miller of North Carolina) has received a death threat for his support of Obama's health care plan. There has been a carefully orchestrated misinformation campaign that has spread rumors that, among other things, Americans would be forced to give up their private insurance and that seniors would be euthanized.  Neither of these things are true.

Personally, I would rather see the government focus attention on ensuring that Americans can purchase their own health insurance no matter who they work for or what their pre-existing conditions are.  I also saw first-hand how medical centers give expensive tests to people (me) who don't need them just because insurance will cover them.  (I went in to an emergency room needing pain medication and ended up with $8000 in Cat-scans and EKGs.)  Clearly an overhaul is needed.  But why not discuss the situation intelligently?  Why must the debate become violent?

Thanks to Jill, I found this commentary by Paul Krugman.  Krugman shares this interesting anecdote:

The group that stands to lose the most from a public health care option is the insurance companies themselves, and one group funding the battle for health care reform is called Conservatives for Patient's Rights, or CPR.  CPR uses the same PR firm that devised the so-called Swift Boat attacks and is headed by Richard Scott, former head of the hospital chain HCA that was the subject of an FBI investigation resulting in 14 felony convictions and $1.7 billion in fees and fines for Medicare fraud.  As Krugman says, you can't make this stuff up.

Some commentators are using racial bias to explain this dramatic resistance to Obama's policies, but I feel that this can only go so far.  Certainly there is an element of that present, but the panic and anxiety that fuels this kind of intensity has its roots in a fear of change. 

Astrologically we can tie this to a couple of different planetary cycles.  First is the opposition of Saturn to Uranus which I discussed on the radio show this morning (you can listen to the archived show here).   The first phase of this cycle occurred on election day and ushered in a five-part cycle of tension between the status quo (Saturn) and a radical change from what we know (Uranus).  We are seeing this in virtually every area of life and every political system around the world.  The second of course is Pluto having entered Capricorn in 2008 and setting off the destruction and renewal (Pluto) of the societal structures that are the foundation of society (Capricorn).  

The Triple Conjunction of Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune have also had a significant effect here.  Chiron is the urge for healing, and Neptune brings illusion and a desire to transcend the limitations of the practical.  Jupiter in its role as King of the Gods can be arrogant and self-righteous as well as bountiful and expansive.  When three planets come together in a conjunction it can be either positive or negative, depending upon the individual and the situation.  This has been a very painful time for many people as the necessity for healing old wounds (Chiron) collides with their dreams and illusions (Neptune), and then the addition of Jupiter gives them the confidence they need to step out and aggressively defend their positions. 

The opposition of Saturn and Uranus will make its third exact hit (out of five total) on September 15, and the two planets are in alignment now.  Jupiter, Chiron and Neptune will be traveling together into the late fall, so this panic and anxiety that we are seeing will not soon subside.