September 28, 2004
NewsScope for September 28, 2004
Election 2004 Recount?
"With the controversial 2000 election still weighing on many voters' minds, the 2004 election season is showing signs that the contest will be close enough that it could be stolen. Democrats, Republicans, and civil rights groups collectively boast of having some 30,000 lawyers poised to observe the election process, especially in the swing states where a handful of voters could decide the outcome. ..." Michael Wolfstar, StarIQ
September 27, 2004
 "Voting arrangements in Florida do not meet "basic international requirements" and could undermine the US election, former US President Jimmy Carter says."
"He said a repeat of the irregularities of the much-disputed 2000 election - which gave President George W Bush the narrowest of wins - "seems likely".
"Mr Carter, a veteran observer of polls worldwide, also accused Florida's top election official of "bias".
"His remarks come ahead of the first TV debate between Mr Bush and John Kerry. ..." BBC News
Bullies at the Voting Booth
"What if Republican shenanigans tip the election? Many members of the media are looking at the dangers voting machines may pose to the integrity of the national election. Others are wondering whether voters may be disenfranchised by use of faulty felon lists, as happened in Florida in 2000. But there is another danger: Republicans may use a variety of tactics to suppress the vote of racial minorities in swing states. These tactics could determine control of the White House or the Senate. ... The Progressive
September 17, 2004
Election 2004 & Other Ruminations
 I've gotten a lot of mail from Starcats readers and readers of Sally McDonald's Astroworld in recent days asking me to come forward with predictions for Election 2004. I am grateful for this and I thank you. I have been reluctant to write anything for nearly a year now for three reasons.
First, it became an exercise in futility to write about the daily, weekly or monthly shock and awe of the Bush adminsitration's reformist/revisionist practices. Born of the three Saturn in Taurus -Uranus in Aquarius squares of 2000 and 2001, the unchecked Uranus side of the square won out. Unbridled, unconscious, and without shame, this most important of all the political energies launched a few fanatics on a course of reckless, extremist policy making which turns out to be the intellectual product of simple-minded throwbacks to the 1950's.
What I said in numerous articles from 2000 to 2003 summed up what we all knew to be true. We were and are in great trouble because of the Bush administration. My predictions of disaster in Iraq and how Karl Rove would thrive on dark and dirty machinations have been proven true. It didn't take the mind of a Nostradamus to work all that out. It was abundantly clear which way the tide would go. All you needed to do was
1) examine the 1999 Fixed Grand Square Eclipse; the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction in Taurus in 2000 (also the mega line up of transiting planets in that sign in May 2000/the USA's 6th house of the military); and
2) the three Saturn-Uranus squares mentioned above: Saturn=brittle. Uranus=disruptive. SNAP! (Visualize THE TOWER card in the Tarot deck!)
Second, when the United States invaded Iraq on March 18-19, 2003, I went into a long depression that re-emerged again in February 2004 at the death of my cat, Draggie, one of the three original Starcats. Draggie sat on my feet when I coded the original "html" for the very first page that constituted Starcats.com in early February 1998. He was (and always will be) at the heart of things here.
Third, I got tired of the hate mail. Since I'm not being paid a couple hundred grand a year to write about this stuff or talk on TV about it, I couldn't come up with a sufficient reason to subject myself to it. Starcats has always been "free." It's my gift to the world. I figure if anyone doesn't like the gift, hit the back button on your browser and bug off. I don't want to hear about it.
Contrary to what you might think, dear reader, I got as many hate letters from the so-called "peaceful Left" as I did from the vitriolic Right. The Left lambasted me because it thought me "dark," "pessimistic" and "unspiritual." That would be as if politics and the realm of "saturn" (earth) were actually compassionate and uplifting. Politics isn't, and only a very few beings in history have really been transcendant, so let's move on.
Both the Right and Left went into paroxysms over the article I did on Karl Rove. At this juncture, the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame In GOP hack Robert Novak's newspaper column (Fmr. Amb. Joe Wilson's wife), the Swift Boat attacks on Kerry; Zell Miller's ugly McCarthyite speech at the GOP Convention; and Dick Cheney's intimating that a vote for Kerry is a vote for death and terror should be enough to prove the point. That's Karl Rove's "vision" for America. He is the orchestrator of the aforementioned and that's just some of his side work. That is true whether you're on the Right and love Karly boy or on the Left and think me "grim." (See, Starcats' June 10, 2003, "In Defense of Mundane Astrology"
I know you're hoping that I'll predict a victory for John Kerry on Nov 2. You will probably be disappointed at discovering that I don't see that happening. GOP Right Wing extremists dominate the United States. The fanatic wing of the GOP controls all three branches of the government. More and more extremist judges are being appointed to the federal bench. All bets are off. There are numerous planetary patterns that show a deepening fissure in American politics both in the short and the long term. For now let's look at:
1) Bush is coming upon the first hit of his Saturn return (26 Cancer), a point that rolls over the USA's Mercury and opposes the USA's Pluto.
Saturn opposite Pluto is probably the most savage and brutal alignment of what we classically call "malefics." (The conjunction and square aspects are also). You will recall that Saturn's transiting opposition to Pluto from Gemini in 2001 led to the attacks of September 11, 2001. The attacks were the physical manifestation of cosmic powers locked inside the two planets. The dialogue between the two is dire. Saturn is unyielding. Pluto is Shiva, the destroyer. The more brittle the condition, the more violent the resistance causing Pluto to act more lethally.
Add to foregoing that the USA's Mercury of "the message" (24 Cancer) is conjunct Bush's natal Saturn (26 Cancer) and is in opposition to the USA's Pluto (27 Capricorn). This planetary dialogue is one of utter disdain for what we commonly refer to as "civilized." Pluto is savage. It (and the other outer planets) care nothing for social convention. Saturn, stern and punishing, shows itself as a crushing force when in confrontation with light-hearted Mercury and seething Pluto. This is a recipe for a political blood lust associated with warmongering. The transiting Mars cycle is the detonator. Both, Mars and Uranus (recently in dialogue across the Virgo-Pisces axis) are explosive. With Mercury, it's a "take no prisoners" propaganda blitz. Mars's position in the "information" sign of Gemini in the USA's 7th house is the resounding phrase: "You're either with us or against us."
Karl Rove's tactics, for example, are a savage assault on truth and decency. His style of undermining (Pluto) the perceived enemy (Mars in the 7th house) by lies, rumors and innuendo hark back to one of the core identifiers of the Bush "presidency." Neptune of propaganda and scandal sits in the 10th house of the 2001 Inauguration chart. Sadly, Neptune is again in the 10th house of the Inauguration 2005 chart. Using Koch houses, Neptune is intercepted in the 10th drawing Chiron at 27 Capricorn onto the Midheaven of the chart. The scandals become more subtle (the interception) but the wounds will be crushingly (Chiron opposite Saturn in the 4th) obvious.
The election contest then is blood sport between the Democrats, who abjure anything dirtier than a wine glass, and the Republicans who thrive on rolling in the gutter (Ann Coulter is a good example of a gutter fighter). What passes for civility and common sense in American society have become increasingly more coarse and vulgar (Saturn-Pluto). The election campaign seems more like gladitorial games than a grappling with issues that confront us at the new millennium.
2) John Kerry's decision to run for the presidency (official announcement) on September 3, 2003, 10:15 am, Charleston, SC, Asc: 22 Libra, has Mercury retrograde in the 12th house. Mercury retrograde is tantamount to a message that keeps getting revised and can't be heard (buried in the 12th house) over the din of Right Wing propaganda.
The Kerry "Announcement" Ascendant at 22 Libra will be hit by the October 13th Solar eclipse (21 Libra). This eclipse will have an effect on the presidential debates during the run-up to the election. John Kerry could be helped if Bush slips and falls on his own tongue. Since eclipses are wild cards and, like Uranus, are unpredictable by nature, something dreadful such as the rising blood tide in Iraq, a terrorist attack on our own soil, or an assassination attempt on either Bush or Kerry could derail the process.
The Lunar Eclipse of October 27th (Moon 5 Taurus, Sun 5 Scorpio) directly affects the military and centers around Iraq but also refocuses the debate around Bush and Kerry's participation (or lack of it in Bush's case) in the Vietnam War.
The Saturn Return of Nixon's resignation of the White House and the planetary patterns that influenced it (and the Vietnam War) 30 years ago might well indicate that Bush gets the White House again this November only to lose it as Nixon did during his second term.
Whether Bush finishes a second term or not, he is likely to be identified as the most reviled president in American history. (At this point, greater minds than mine will ever be have already said that Bush is the worst president in American history). His administration will unravel like a ball of yarn in a cat's paws. Bush himself will descend a mental slippery slope while living in seclusion and paranoia. It's is what Richard Nixon did when the lid exploded off Watergate.
George Bush does not have the strength and fortitude that characterized Richard Nixon's generation. Nixon went bad, yes, but he at least started out as a humble man who worked hard. He developed his intelligence by excelling in academics and by cultivating a naturally curious mind. He was the last Republican president to have a social conscience. Nixon believed in helping the poor. He believed that tax dollars should be appropriated for social services to provide for those less fortunate. By contrast, Ronald Reagan's presidency in the 1980's steered the GOP to the Right and into the "greed is good era," of gilded age politics. Nixon sacrificed reputation for power. Bush sacrifices the very little he is on the alter of dirty mammon.
Will the Bush administration, if it secures a second term go down just like Nixon? Well, something fairly close to that scenario seems likely. As Mark Twain said, "History doesn't repeat itself; it rhymes." Planetary cycles reveal to us the rhymes of history.
From what I've analyzed in numerous charts (and assimilated from my reading), I postulate that Kerry will win the popular vote by a narrow margin (a narrower margin than Al Gore's in 2000) and that Bush will win via the electoral college.
This, of course, will be another fraudulent electoral win but this time it appears Bush will not have Nino Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court to rescue him from those evil-doer Democrats.
The Bushies will take a swing state or two (or three!) and use the close voter margins as challenges to "recounts." Imagine the irony.
I gravely suspect that there will be election machine rigging (Diebold electronic voting machines are owned by a Right Wing Republican in Ohio who has sworn "to do whatever it takes to re-elect [what, he was elected??] George Bush). JEB is already busy purging voter rolls in Florida (again) and Johns-Hopkins University has already proved that Diebold voting machines can be hacked by high school students. I think we'll see brute force used at the polls by way of intimdation and beatings may be the order of the day in some districts across the country.
This scenario sounds more like a CIA set up in Nicaragua or Argentina than a U.S. election, but that's what we've come to.
Election 2004 is another "practice session" for how far the Right Wing can push the United States towards the creation of a "Christian constitutional dictatorship." If that sounds weird, or like an oxymoron, just think about "compassionate conservatism." The concept is so mind bogglingly Orwellian as to give one a migraine.
The Right Wing propaganda machine has been perfected and the past four years have provided enough time for the Right to plant sleeper cells in all 18 swing states for voter intimidation.
Assessing the upcoming election astrologically means letting go of the idea that this is "politics as usual." The above-mentioned planetary themes that spell out a rebirth of fascism means viewing current politics through a different lens.
The rise of reactionary fascism in the United States is coupled with a Christian fundamentalist "true believer" obsession:
Pluto transiting Sagittarius; Uranus's past transit through "one-world, one-mind" Aquarius; and its current mutual reception from Pisces to frenzied Neptune in Aquarius. A glimpse at transiting Pluto's opposition to the USA's blood thirsty Mars in Gemini (the enemy within and without: Castor & Pollux/Cain & Abel) forming a t-square to the USA's Neptune in Virgo (purity of the nationalistic/puritanical vision) is chilling. It is no wonder that the paranoid Right Wing finds an antichrist under every rock.
The re-emergent "purity of the puritanical vision" was ripe to explode long before September 11th.
America's need for an enemy/antichrist "out there" has been made manifest via the genocide of the American Indian; the demonizing of the "Liberals;" the Joe McCarthy era of "Are you now or have you ever been a communist?" The hunting and savaging of President Clinton; the internment of the Japanese in camps in the USA during WWII; Abu Ghraib prison torture in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay; the ongoing "culture wars" where gays, blacks, women's rights, immigration, religion and stem cell research are used to whip the uninformed and terrified into a froth of reptilian brain reactionism.
Conditions as they now exist in the USA reveal many of the earmarks of a country ripe for dictatorship. There is deep fear. A deep existential anxiety. These fears are fed by the Bush Administration's constant fanning of the flames of religion, smarmy patriotism, anti-intellectualism, culture war, class war, and other related forms of demagoguery.
The consequences are that frightened people inhabiting the "Red States" vote their own economic and social suicide by swallowing the apocalyptic pronouncements of Falwell and Cheney. The GOP extorts votes from the distressed then loots the treasury by transfering the country's wealth to the upper one percent of the country. That was the plan all along.
America is far from the "New Jerusalem" envisaged by the pilgrims when they drummed up the Mayflower Compact or at the time the founding fathers wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. The country has a dark side that the somnambulant electorate would rather not face. Hence, the constant focus on externals, the hype of "optimism," the derision of the poor, and obsession with the fiction of "our blessed way of life." It is as if our excesses can be equated with the goodness of Jesus on credit card binge.
The "blessedness" of our way of life (Ari Fleischer) will not spare us from old age and death. It will not save us from a world gone mad with fanatics and warmongers.
The Greek gods themselves could not triumph over death and often declined, or were powerless, to assist humans who remained stuck with their own bad luck. By contrast, the world embraced "salvation" through the New Testament --A Good Daddy who sacrificed his Dionysius-like son so that our sins could be washed clean. If we're "good," there is hope of resurrection from the dead. These factors, and the rescuing of widows, divorced women and children, were major selling points for early Christianity.
Christianity's (Neptune) archetypes, and the Barbarians (terrorists) at the gates of Rome, overtook the Empire. Uranus in Pisces is a cosmic/religious reversion revolution. Uranus's transiting square to the USA's natal Uranus in intellectual/rational Gemini is involved in a struggle between rational, scientific advance (stem cell research, anyone?) and an anti-intellectualism that favors religious reform that leads us toward the disaster of more closely merging church with state.
Keep in mind that we're still under the planet rays of the Uranus Return of the formation of the Nazi Party, created on February 24, 1920, 7:29 pm CET -1:00, Munich, Germany, Asc: 24 Virgo, which conjoins the USA's Neptune.
The Uranus Return of the Party's founding occurred on April 18, 2003, 4:29 pm, CEDT -2:00, Munich, Germany, Asc 28 Aquarius. The Ascendant conjoined the USA's Natal Moon. Uranus is in very early Pisces is in mutual reception with anti-intellectual Neptune in Aquarius -- the one-world/one-mind sign. What we have going on now is an international nervous breakdown.
The USA is not immune to collective psychosis. It is in the throes of one. Pluto's transit through the USA's first house (identity) shows its dark side. It so terrifies the nation that it would rather stay alseep than admit that its pious fictions, hallmark greeting card patriotism and surpressed psychic contents have ushered in a plutonic decline and fall of the American Empire. Pluto, Mars, Neptune and Uranus (whether transiting or studied in their natal positions in the USA's chart) have America lurching in blood lust to vanquish every terrorist "antichrist" by smoking them (Neptune) out of their caves (Pluto and Saturn). That, unfortunately, extends to any American citizen who disagrees with George Bush and Dick Cheney.
The USA's Sun progressed to zero degrees of Pisces on October 29th, and therefore becomes supersenitized to the Uranus-Neptune mutual reception just four days before the presidential election of November 2nd. (See Election 2004 Headquarters for lots of Chart Data
Suffice it to say, that America is playing out long planetary cycles where this presidential election (and the next one in 2008) are part of a global contest for power and struggles between those who want to wield it. Globalism is fueling a world revolt of the poor and oppressed (Arabs, among other groups) against a tiny minority that posseses the bulk of the planet's resources. As the philosopher Hegel said, it's always been a battle between the haves and the have-nots. He further said that he had always been astounded that the many could be convinced to sacrifice themselves for the very few so that they (the rich) could have it easy.
We are on the threshold of a world struggle that marches straight up to the USA's Pluto Return in 2022. New religions, new politics, and a terrible Jihad will define at least the first half of the 21st Century. The Inauguration chart of 2005 (you'll find it in Election 2004 Headquarters) tells the tale of the USA's next presidential administration. If Bush wins, he's a wounded creature for as long as his presidency can prevail over scandal and indictment. If Kerry wins, he will be crippled by the catastrophe Bush leaves behind in Iraq. He will also be hounded by the fanatic Right Wing of the GOP who will make what they did to Bill Clinton look like kindergarten.
This is what I see. This is what I read in the sky.
Starcats -- September 17, 2004.
Newsmakers 2004 Archives
June 8, 2004 Update: George Tenet
September 17, 2004 Election 2004 & Other Ruminations
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