This just in from The Washington Post, January 15, 2002
A Time for Outrage . . .
By Richard Cohen
". . . No, this is not a political scandal. This is a cultural event, a systemic collapse, an outrage so breathtaking that we poor scribblers have no category for it. We do not know how to say "crook" or "thief" or "creep" in describing business executives who sold $1.1 billion worth of shares in their own company while -- possibly, allegedly and just maybe -- knowing that some $600 million in debt was hidden off the books. It was in nooks and crannies where even Arthur Andersen, the totally unaccountable accounting firm, could not find it. These executives also may have sold knowing that Enron had overstated its profits year after year. . . ."
Afghanistan to implement Islamic law
"ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: Afghanistan's newly appointed chief justice Fazal Hadi has announced he will implement Islamic laws in his country, saying thieves will have their hands cut off and adulterers will be lashed or stoned to death, the Afghan Islamic Press reported Saturday.
"The murder cases will also be decided under the Islamic laws," the agency quoted Hadi as saying.
Hadi claimed that the Prime Minister Hamid Karzai has also assured him of his full support in implementing the Islamic law in Afghanistan.
"The world and United Nations had recognized Afghanistan as an Islamic country and that all decisions in Afghanistan would be taken under the Islamic laws," Hadi said. Times of India
I May Be Very Wicked, But Does A Remedy Suggest Itself?
Do you see how the two stories above could connect?
MGM reportedly on auction block
- - - - - - - - - - - -By Associated Press
Jan. 15, 2002 | LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, one of Hollywood's most venerable movie studios, may be up for sale for $7 billion.
The entertainment company has hired investment banking firm Goldman Sachs to solicit bids that are due this week, sources familiar with the auction told the Los Angeles Times for Tuesday's editions. The buyout price is believed to be $7 billion, sources said, but the studio's Wall Street value is about $5 billion.
Potential suitors include Viacom Inc., the Walt Disney Co., Vivendi Universal, News Corp., and AOL Time Warner Inc. None of the companies is believed to have made a bid for MGM because the asking price is too high, sources said.
Neither MGM Chairman Alex Yemenidjian nor any of the rumored companies commented about a possible buyout Monday.
Most of the major studios are interested in MGM's extensive film library, which includes the James Bond franchise and the "Pink Panther" movies. The studio's library has more than 4,100 titles.
MGM is controlled by billionaire Kirk Kerkorian, who first acquired the studio in 1969. He has an 80 percent stake in the company after buying it for a third time in 1996 when he led a $1.3 billion buyout from Credit Lyonnais. The French bank auctioned off MGM after taking over the studio in 1992 from Italian financier Giancarlo Parretti, who is under indictment for allegedly acquiring the company through false transactions.
Since taking over MGM, Kerkorian has purchased the Mirage Resort hotels in Las Vegas; Orion Pictures and the film library of Polygram Pictures; and a 20 percent stake in four national cable channels that include Bravo and American Movie Classics.
Kerkorian and his ex-wife, former tennis pro Lisa Bonder Kerkorian, are currently embroiled in a child support dispute. Bonder Kerkorian, who had a monthlong marriage and 10-year romantic relationship with the casino mogul, is seeking $320,000 a month to support their 3-year-old daughter.
Kerkorian is seeking at least $30 a share for the company, sources said. MGM's shares closed at $19.88 on Monday, down 50 cents on the New York Stock Exchange. Salon Magazine
I've Got It!
Kerkorian buys Enron; Enron buys MGM; and chief justice Fazal Hadi buys stock in Ginsu Blades. . .
New Moon, January 13, 2002
Commentary
In my December 2000 column, Capricorn Ingress, I stated the following:
"Read My Lips, No Lower Taxes
The Capricorn ingress chart "births" at the Solar Eclipse on Christmas Day. The Midheaven (7 Capricorn) is only a degree shy of December 30, 2001's Solar eclipse (8 Capricorn MC), a degree already sensitized by virtue of the fact that our Christmas eclipse does have an 8 Capricorn Midheaven if cast for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, birthplace of the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. The MC and South Node ( both Saturn ruled) for the eclipse in Philly falls in the Declaration of Independence chart's second house: the people's assets. The first words out of my mouth? "There goes our money." ... "
"Not over my dead body with they raise your taxes." -- G.W. Bush, January, 2002.
The January 13, 2002 New Moon chart, in bi-wheel with the Declaration of Independence chart, shows just how prescient my December 2002 column was. The NM's Venus, Sun and Moon conjoins the USA's 2nd house Pluto of "mega money" and trines the USA's Neptune (oil, gas, energy).
The USA's natal Pluto and Moon are both in the degree of the transiting Lunar Nodes (27 Sagittarius/27 Gemini) setting off houses 1, 2, 3 and 7 in the USA's chart. Transiting Mars at 26 Pisces, sextiles the USA's Pluto and is only 1 degree, 1 minute shy of a perfect T-Square with the transiting Lunar Nodes. On January 19, 2002, Mars reaches 0 degrees North Declination in the sign Aries signifying that a new "war" is about to begin. Follow the headlines up to the Full Moon of January 28, 2002 (8 Leo, conjoined to Bush's natal Ascendant). What comes to a head during this Mercury retrograde period is sure to haunt us for the rest of 2002:
- Moussaoui Zacharias' trial
- John Walker "Taliban Johnny's" trial
- The Al-Qaeda detainees at Guantanamo Base, Cuba
- OBL and Mullah Omar
- Enron
- Afghanistan & Warlordism
- Somalia
- Iraq-Iran
- The Phillipines
- Bush's "not yet ready for prime time" Domestic Agenda
- November 2002's Mid-term elections
Starcats, January 21, 2002
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As his pawns fall, Arafat faces checkmate