Friday Bite: 20 December 2024
Pour que la honte change de camp
(The shame has to switch sides)
“I have never regretted this decision. I now have confidence in our ability to collectively seize a future in which each woman and man can live in harmony with respect and mutual understanding. I thank you.” Gisèle Pelicot, 19 December 2024
“When everything is calm, measured, stable, we are bored… As soon as action starts, everything whistles at our temples, and seconds, and bullets, unfortunately… we are scared. What a horror,” Vladmir Putin, 19 December 2024
“These are the times that try men’s souls… Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered.” Thomas Paine, 19 December 1776
THE ABOVE COMMENT made by Vladimir Putin on Thursday was in response to the opening question posed by a moderator, “when the world is going crazy, how does Russia manage not only to hold on, but even to grow.” It certainly seems as if the world is going crazy, and in this cosmic environment, were we not to be witnessing all manner of weird and wacky developments, it would be strange.
The past week was dominated by a Sun-Neptune square – the essence of chaos and confusion – so we should not be surprised that we are, in large part, being fed a lot of fairy tales by those in whom we place our trust – our governments and leaders. Of course, Putin in his annual televised show, The Direct Line, would be using smoke and mirrors to pacify the Russian people, but the truth is that the country has been almost broken by his invasion of Ukraine, and, together with the humiliation of seeing his ally Bashir al-Assad toppled just over a week ago and his top general assassinated last Tuesday, his hold on power is decidedly fragile. And as I have previously commented, when Putin goes, it will be sudden and everything will unravel quickly.
On Thursday, the judge in the trial that has gripped France, and beyond, sentenced fifty-one men, including Gisèle Pelicot’s husband, to between three and twenty years for their parts in her mass rape. Madame Pelicot waved her right to anonymity, and her serene presence has graced every single day of the trial. In the process, she has become an icon for the feminist movement.
For almost a decade, Gisèle Pelicot was unknowingly given sedatives by her then husband, Dominique, who not only raped her while she was unconscious but invited men he had recruited online to do the same. He was eventually caught because a security guard reported him to police for taking photographs under women’s skirts in a supermarket.
The shock of the discovery must only have been exceeded by the betrayal Madame Pelicot must have felt, “I thought we were a close couple,” she told the court. Instead, her husband was going on a notorious but now banned website called Coco.fr to invite local men to their home to have sex with her while she was comatose.
“I was sacrificed on the altar of vice.”
Neptune’s misty tentacles were all over events in the United States this week. In brief, on Monday, Judge Juan Merchant ruled that former president Donald Trump cannot claim presidential immunity to overturn his felony conviction in the “hush-money” case. On Thursday, a Georgia Court of Appeals disqualified Fani Willis from prosecuting Mr Trump and his co-defendants in their election-interference case. Even though the case will pass to another district attorney, it is unlikely it will ever be prosecuted.
What just happened? Sun square Neptune.
In case you’ve forgotten, the reason Ms Willis was up for disqualification was her romantic relationship with the prosecutor she had hired to help run the criminal racketeering case. Nothing Neptunian about that…
Still in America, and still covered in confusion, the government is poised to shut down. On Thursday, Elon Musk launched a torrent of posts on his social media platform, X – has no one pointed out the curious coincidence that X is also to be seen stamped on Russian tanks currently engaged in the war in Ukraine? – condemning a bi-partisan spending bill designed to keep the government open. A second bill with alterations approved by Donald Trump failed to pass last night. In his factually incorrect and skewed posts on X, Mr Musk revealed his lack of understanding about the running of government, which should be a red flag given that he is the power behind the throne, if not, co-seated on it.
Those of us who are distanced from the goings-on in Washington, and especially those of us of a European disposition, find the events taking place as Mr Trump fashions his administration, distinctly bizarre. Some of the characters he has nominated for key positions seem so out of place. It’s almost farcical. But, people whom we usually take seriously are taking Mr Trump very seriously, with a stream of media and tech billionaires making the pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago to kiss the ring and donate some of their millions to the party.
The thing is, all is not as it seems. The ministry of disinformation is alive and well all over the world. One statement given out one day is countered the next. Ukraine is an example. Recently, Zelensky has talked about the prospect of peace. Putin has insinuated that he might talk peace when Donald Trump is in power. On the other hand, the United Kingdom is planning to send forces to Ukraine to directly train soldiers there while the EU vociferously denies that it plans to send troops to Ukraine, even to monitor a cease-fire. Likewise, as Washington descends into chaos, the sitting president is nowhere to be seen. Where is Mr Biden? And then there’s those “drones” over New Jersey and the east coast. Why has there been no official statement?
The above chart captures the moment the sentencing in the Pelicot case took place. It serves to give us a picture of the current times. Pluto, Uranus and Neptune remain in their tripartite arrangement, with the nodal axis generating a Kite configuration. I have discussed this in other recent Friday Bites, but suffice to say this alignment is presiding over some tumultuous global developments. (We are learning the power of the Kite as we go.) Aside from the Kite, the opposition between Mars and Pluto remains in play and the Sun square Neptune is almost exact. Indeed, the Mars-Pluto opposition yields another Kite configuration (here outlined in red) increasing that sense of fate and forces beyond our understanding being in charge.
The trial of Dominique Pelicot and his fellow rapists began on 2 September. As the court opened, Mars had just culminated (conjunct the Midheaven) squaring an angular Neptune (conjunct the Descendant). Libra rises, with Venus, the ruler, rising, in opposition to Neptune and squaring Mars, thus forming a T-square. Mars is also inconjunct Pluto. Poetry in motion. The case is about justice not just for one woman but for all women (Venus in Libra) and it centres on rape and sexual assault (Mars, inconjunct Pluto, square Neptune square Venus).
How fitting then that it should end on a Sun-Neptune square and a Mars-Pluto opposition. And, with Venus rising again, this time trining Jupiter. Given the theory of the harmony of the spheres it seems as though a kind of symphony for justice is going on.
As you might expect, both Gisèle and her ex-husband, Dominique, have a strong Neptune influence in their respective charts. Gisèle has Venus squaring Neptune and Saturn and opposing Uranus as does Dominique. They were born ten days apart, which explains their shared patterns. You may note in Gisèle’s case, solar-arc progressed Jupiter has reached an exact opposition to her natal Venus and is squaring her Saturn-Neptune conjunction while Mars is opposing the Saturn-Neptune conjunction and squaring Venus, thus creating a Grand Cross.
Neptune is arguably the most complex planet in our solar system. It can inspire genius and madness, sainthood and godlessness, love-divine and sexual depravity, sacrifice, betrayal and suffering. In our lifetimes we may not sink to the depths of Neptunian despair or depravity but we will all meet betrayal and loss, and we will suffer for our pains. What is so interesting with Gisele and Dominique is that each has become the catalyst for the other’s Neptunian descent, on the one hand, and ascent, on the other.
A morality tale for our age of atonement.
Friday Bite: 13 December 2024
Out of the Frying Pan, into the Fire
“I left this land over 20 years ago, and my heart longed for this moment…Sit quietly my brothers and remember God almighty.” Mohammed al-Jolani, leader of HTS
“I will not touch bread if it’s moist.” Kemi Badenoch, leader of the Tory Party
“Our great strength is each other – that we’re all committed to the same mission, and to accomplishing it the same way – the right way, every time. That’s what the rule of law is all about. Unfortunately, all too often in today’s world, people’s standard for whether something was fair or objective – a Supreme Court decision, a verdict in a high-profile case, the investigation we brought, or the one we didn’t bring – is whether they liked the result, whether their side won or lost.” Christopher Wray, FBI Director
SYRIA, SYRIA. THERE are plenty of other stories, not least the capture of Luigi Mangione – he who assassinated the head of UnitedHealthcare in Midtown, New York, last week – and the resignation of FBI director, Christopher Wray, but the seismic events of the past few days in Syria have to take precedence.
First, moist bread. Those of you who do not live in the United Kingdom will probably be unaware of the above comment made by Opposition leader, Kemi Badenoch, during an interview with The Spectator in which she maintained, she didn’t go out to lunch, “lunch is for wimps”, and that sandwiches weren’t “real food”. Given that Lord Sandwich, a native of these lands, gave birth to the sandwich, we Brits take exception to any slur on its character. The comment provoked endless commentary in the British media.
I should also briefly mention Luigi Mangione who has in the last few days become something of an avatar of social justice. He has been dubbed “the Adjuster” online. Spotted by an alert employee in a McDonald’s restaurant in Altoona, Pennsylvania, he was arrested, and is now fighting extradition to New York on five charges, including second-degree murder.
The reason I mention this is that the brazen killing of an American citizen on a Manhattan street has not been universally condemned but in many quarters seen as heroic. That it happened under such important alignments which are presiding over great global upheaval, is another nail in the coffin for our civilization. When society comes to the point that it can downplay and justify violence, whether by revising history or blaming the victims, we can no longer call ourselves civilized.
As Mr Trump continues to make choices that will give the presidency unprecedented powers, we should note the synchronicity of the downfall of one of the worst dictators in modern history, Bashar al-Assad.
SPEAKING OF WHOM. In the seven days since my last Friday Bite, matters in Syria have progressed apace. Gone is al-Assad and in his place, the former terrorist and leader of HTS (Hyat Tahrir al Sham), Mohammed al-Jolani. For the past seven years, al-Jolani has governed the province of Idlib, and although the regime has been authoritarian and run in accordance with Islamic Sharia Law, there have been none of the excesses of IS and other extremist organizations.
So, so far, so good.
Across a wide swathe of Syria, the people celebrate their freedom as daily, ever more horrors of the Assad regime come to light. There is continued fighting in some regions though, while Israel, despite UN protests, has launched a military incursion into the buffer zone that has separated the two countries since 1974.
In the middle of the week, we discovered that Bashar al-Assad was residing with his immediate family in Moscow’s elite sky-scraper district. According to reports, he followed his wife and children there on Sunday. The escape plan, orchestrated by Russian intelligence, was so secret that neither his younger brother, commander of the Army’s elite 4th Armoured Division, nor his extended family, nor his closest advisors, knew of the plan.
On Saturday, Assad chaired a meeting of army chiefs at which he announced that Russian Military support was on its way. Later that evening, he asked his media advisor to come to the palace the following day to write a speech to the Syrian people. When she got there, no one was home. Al-Assad was on his way to Moscow in a plane with its transponder switched off.
Just how thrilled Vladimir Putin is with his new resident is debatable. It is clear the Russian president has been humiliated by events in Syria. They have shown that he is no longer able to support his allies. Humiliated or no, Putin has given Assad a safe haven. He was not prepared to see an ally go down in the same way as Gaddafi. He’s putting a good face on it. I did note, however, that Dmitri Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, during his recent press conference, emphasized that the decision was the president’s, thus distancing the government from any future fall-out.
It is said that Putin and Assad have a “chilly” relationship. And the astrology would support that. Putin’s cool and clinical Moon in Gemini is at odds with Assad’s Moon in ambiguous and fluid Pisces. Assad’s Mars-Neptune conjunction, which adds to his ambiguity, falls on Putin’s Venus and opposes his Jupiter. This connection unites them in a kind of folie a deux. Similarly, Assad’s MC-IC axis squares Putin’s Pluto and his MC-IC axis. And two people whose angles criss-cross one another share an ineluctable destiny. Not exactly star-crossed lovers in the literal sense but metaphorically so.
At this point in time, Assad’s Solar arc progressed Sun has reached his natal Neptune, his SA progressed Pluto and Uranus have reached his Mars while his SA progressed Moon has reached his IC. Transiting Uranus is squaring his MC-IC axis. Such progressions and transits clearly mark his political demise. You may also note that his IC is within a degree of the fixed star Algol, which not only addresses the despotism and depravity to which he has sunk but also suggests his life is on a knife edge. Those who embarrass, deceive or oppose Putin have a nasty habit of falling off balconies or ending up in the wreckage of a plane crash.
I might describe Bashar as an accidental despot. The second of three sons, the role of his father’s successor was meant to go to his elder brother, Bassel, but he was killed in a car crash. Thus, fate stepped in and the former eye-doctor became president of Syria and a mass-murdering tyrant.
Clearly, it was his destiny to rule Syria; how to rule Syria was his choice.
To be continued…