Friday Bite 5 June 2026

Rinse and Repeat²

“I really don’t care. I couldn’t care less. If they’re over [talks with Iran], they’re over. If they’re not, you know, I think they took too much time.” Donald Trump, 1 June.

 “Talks are continuing, at a rapid pace, with the Islamic Republic of Iran.” Donald Trump, 1 June.

 “Ideological conditioning and two-tiered policing are glaring symptoms of civilisational decline. They must be rejected across the West. The United States sends our condolences to the family of Henry Nowak and the people of the United Kingdom at this troubling time.” The White House, 4 June

YOU ARE PROBABLY not the only one feeling that you are in an endless loop. One moment you are on the way to sorting a problem, and the next, it’s back again with a new twist. The war in Iran is in its ninety-eighth day, and despite “ceasefire agreements”, threats and counter threats, the Strait of Hormuz remains largely closed to international traffic while oil prices are poised to rise even higher and oil reserves set to sink lower.

Here in Blighty, Prime Minister Starmer remains in place despite many attempts to oust him, and given the furore over the murder of eighteen-year-old Henry Nowak and the spotlight it has placed on Britain’s policing, you’d think he’d positively welcome handing over an impossible job to someone else. And if Andy Burnham, Mayor of Greater Manchester, has anything to do with it, he will be next in line for that thankless task. (Yesterday, Burnham announced his intention to run in a leadership bid against Sir Keir.)

Henry Nowak was killed in a knife attack on 3 December last year. The brother of the perpetrator called the police, falsely claiming that they had been the victims of a racially-motivated assault. When the police arrived at the scene, officers refused to believe Nowak was injured and instead handcuffed him as he lay dying on the street.

On Monday, Vickrum Digwa was sentenced to life-imprisonment for Henry’s murder. Almost immediately, claims of “two-tiered policing” emanated from far-right corners, hence, the above post by the White House and numerous posts by Elon Musk. The thing is that for decades Britain’s police forces have been accused of racial bias toward black people, in fact research earlier this year showed that black people were forty-eight times more likely to be stopped and searched in parts of London than their white counterparts.

President Trump has had a difficult week, although a good part of it was spent MIA after his appointment at the Water Reed Medical Centre on 26 May. On Monday, he had a difficult telephone conversation with Benjamin Netanyahu over Israel’s continuing attacks on Lebanon and on Tuesday, Attorney General Tod Blanche was forced to announce the dropping of the $1776 billion anti-weaponization fund, set up to help “victims” of lawfare and those unjustly targeted by the Biden administration. On Thursday, the House of Representatives passed a measure preventing the president from taking further military action in Iran and in the early hours of this morning the House approved legislation to provide aid for Ukraine and impose sanctions on Russia. 

And if that wasn’t enough to indicate the beginnings of a pushback against the Trump administration, on Thursday, the Kennedy Centre directed its employees to remove all references to Donald Trump from its communications in order to comply with a federal judge’s order blocking the president’s name from being added to the performing arts centre.

Then there are the new arrangements hastily being put in place for the 250th birthday celebrations since seven of the nine musical acts have pulled out. On Wednesday, Mr Trump told the artists to “stay at home” and instead there would be a “rally to end all rallies”.

Speaking of birthdays. Next Sunday is Donald Trump’s eightieth. And it comes sandwiched between a Mercury-Saturn square, a new moon and a Venus-Pluto opposition. I thought we’d take a look at his solar return.

There are two ways to set up a chart for the return of the Sun to its natal position each year: one from the birth location and the other at the place where the birthday is celebrated. I’m not sure where the president will have his special day, so I have used his birthplace. However, whether he spends his birthday in Washington, New Jersey or Florida, the Ascendant only varies by four degrees.

Clearly, the main feature of the solar return is the T-square created by the nodal axis and Uranus and the Moon. The nodal axis represents the point at which eclipses take place so any such configuration is suffused with an aura of fate and destiny. Uranus is conjunct an angle which adds to its significance, and since the angle is the Descendant, other people may have a lot to do with any Uranian events. The Sun is also to be found in the seventh house so relationships are a major focus for the year ahead.

There are also several septiles, bi-septiles and tri-septiles in the chart, which although indicative of joy and fulfilment, also mirror the aforementioned T-square with its theme of a strongly fated year.

If we didn’t know this was Donald Trump’s chart, we might leap to the conclusion that he was going to separate or divorce his wife or engage in a scandalous affair. But not only do Melania and he seem to have settled into a marriage of inconvenience with merely a nod to togetherness, it seems unlikely they would suddenly divorce. And given the president appears to have some health issues, an affair is unlikely.

However, I thought I’d check out Melania’s chart just in case.

And what do we find but natal Mars at five degrees of Gemini. Uranus is set to conjoin Mars later in June and through July while transiting Pluto is squaring her Sun. Surprises and shocks, and certainly some unscheduled events, are in store. We do not know Melania’s time of birth so I have used a sunrise setting. The Moon entered Capricorn at 12:27 that morning so there is a chance it is in the final degree and minutes of Sagittarius. But there is a greater chance that the Moon is in the early degrees of Capricorn and therefore currently under the influence of Neptune and Saturn. Loss, confusion, illusion-delusion. Whatever the case, the Uranus and Pluto transits are enough on their own to preside over one of the most unsettling periods of her life.

Maybe there is more to come out regarding her association with Jeffrey Epstein. Perhaps she knows where the bodies are buried. Or maybe she’s about to experience some developments that will rock the world in which she and the Trump family live.

Certainly, we should be watching events on and around the Venus-Pluto opposition of 17 June, although the more volatile influences coalesce on or near Independence Day. Mercury will be in retrograde by the fourth of July and days before, a full moon will have triggered Trump’s natal Mercury and the USA’s Sun-Jupiter midpoint. While none of these in and of themselves is a cause for concern, seen together with the transiting Mars-Uranus conjunction (exact on July 4), protests and explosions of the real and metaphorical kind, could be in the pipeline.

Returning to President Trump’s solar return, given that the closeness of Uranus to the Descendant and its conjunction to the Moon are unlikely to augur a marital separation or divorce, they could instead symbolize a break-up between the president and the country, or some random event that affects Mr Trump’s ability to lead America. And although there are twelve months in which such events could unfold, that Mars is poised to trigger the configuration later in June and July, could bring such a scenario forward.

Whatever ultimately transpires on and around America’s 250th  anniversary, controversy is surely in the mix. And that’s probably the best-case-scenario.

Friday Bite 29 May 2026

Recollections May Vary

“I have obviously been married to someone I didn’t know at all.” Nicola Sturgeon, former First Minister of Scotland, upon hearing of her ex-husband pleading guilty to embezzling more than £400,000.”  25 May.

“The Use of government power to target individuals or entities for improper and unlawful political, personal or ideological reasons should not ne tolerated by any administration.” Trent McCotter, DOJ official, in a written statement regarding the $1,776 billion slush fund inspired by Donald J. Trump

“Oman will have to behave like everybody else, or we’ll have to blow’em up…”  Donald J Trump, 27 May

IT’S BEEN AN explosive week. Consistent with last Friday’s Sun-Uranus conjunction and Tuesday’s Mars-Pluto square, a gas explosion occurred at a coal mine in China’s northern Shanxi province killing eighty-two people and injuring one hundred and twenty. In the United States a series of explosions on Staten Island proved to be not deadly, although unusual, while in California, thousands were evacuated in and around Garden City when it was feared an overheating chemical tank would explode. And then there was yesterday’s spectacular explosion during a test of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket at Cape Canaveral.

And there were other kinds of explosions, or perhaps in Tulsi Gabbard’s case, expulsion would be the correct word. Last Friday, Trump’s director of national intelligence resigned, citing her husband’s cancer diagnosis, although it was common knowledge that she had been kept out of any sensitive, high-level meetings, including the kidnapping of Venezuela’s Maduro and Operation Epic Fury. Such was the extent of her exclusions that White House aides would joke that DNI stood for Do Not Invite.

With her natal Uranus at 29 Scorpio, Tulsi is just emerging from her Uranus opposition – a time of sudden upsets, awakenings, shocks and surprises. She has four planets, including the Sun, in Aries and transiting Saturn has recently crossed over her Mercury and opposed its natal position in Libra. She must surely be feeling discouraged and rejected. While she may be deserving of our sympathy, some of her colleagues hold a less than high regard for her, describing her as “calculating, cautious and keenly aware of cultivating her image”.

Which brings us to Monday and the revelation that Peter Murrell, former CEO of the Scottish National Party (SNP), had managed to embezzle a sum of £400,310.65 from the party’s accounts. He pleaded guilty in court and will be sentenced in a month’s time. What is almost as shocking as the crime itself is that his wife, Nicola Sturgeon, former First Minister and leader of the SNP, was completely ignorant of the dastardly goings-on in her own back yard. On Monday, at a public appearance in Ireland to promote her new memoir, Frankly, she said, “I have been misled, I have been lied to and I have been betrayed, and I won’t be the last woman betrayed by her husband.”. Quite how her now ex-husband managed to explain away the presence of a brand new £100,000 motorhome in their front garden remains a mystery. Then again, a Sun-square Jupiter and trine to Neptune, is a combination that tends to see the best in people.

I would normally have given you a chart to look at, but among my own Sun-Uranus-Mars-Pluto issues has been a teeny-weeny problem with Microsoft, which is preventing me from creating Pdfs and worse, periodically freezing my Word programme. So we must make do with a description. La-di-dah.

Nicola is a Sun Cancer with Scorpio rising and a Moon in Aquarius. And she has a seventh-house Saturn. Aside from this placement suggesting marriage/partnership with an older person of Capricorn temperament – Peter is six years her senior, not a huge age-difference but his Saturn conjoins her IC, and he is a Sagittarian with a Moon in Aquarius and Mars in Virgo. Saturn in the seventh house can point to marital stability and a partner who is reliable, if not a pillar of the establishment, but what we know for sure is that Mr Murrell, while gravitating to positions of power and influence, is far from trustworthy and is in fact a criminal. And he is clearly a Saturnian burden she must bear.

Nicola also has an interesting configuration based on the septile – her south node is tri-septile her Moon and both are bi-septile her seventh house Saturn. The septile is an aspect with mysterious properties. While we could simply say that her seventh house Saturn is indicative of a partner who comes with a degree of pain and suffering, the septiles make a point of revealing that one or more partners have a fateful part to play in the unfolding of her destiny. And while Nicola was not romantically involved with former First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond, he was her ally and mentor and played a huge role in her political journey.

There is no time of birth for Peter Murrel, but whatever time he was born, the Sun is exactly square Pluto – within minutes – and his Mars in Virgo is tightly sandwiched between Uranus and Pluto. We can surmise from these factors that Mr Murrell is fiercely ambitious and I suspect quite vindictive. And if there is a reason other than greed and ambition behind his embezzlement of funds, it may well be a sense of stealing a march on those who thought they were better than him.

In last week’s Bite, in light of the then forthcoming Mars-Pluto square, I suggested that a further assault on Iran could not be ruled out. On Monday, in a Truth Social post, Donald Trump announced that he was not going to be launching a “scheduled attack of Iran” on Tuesday, although he had instructed his military chiefs to be prepared to go forward with a large, full-scale assault at a “moment’s notice”. On Tuesday, the United States did launch new strikes on southern Iran, targeting Iranian missile sites and boats attempting to place mines, which it claimed were in self-defence. Now (Friday afternoon) we are waiting for Donald Trump to agree to a framework-for-a-memorandum-for-an-interim-agreement-for-a-sixty-day-extension-to-the-ceasefire (!).

Don’t hold your breath.