Astrology, Prediction and Comment

There are only a few days left in September.  The planet Mercury is now in Scorpio, and this means that our thought processes may become darker and more subterranean.  Rather than discuss our plans openly, we’ll want to do it behind closed doors.  And sometimes our thoughts will be so unpleasant that we won’t want to talk about them.  On the plus side, there will be serious thinking, and mysteries and problems can be solved.

On Monday or Tuesday the planet Saturn comes to a standstill, from the Earth’s point of view.  It happens when Saturn is at 25 degrees 20 minutes Capricorn.  Now that’s interesting, because at the moment of its standstill Mars will be at 25 degrees 31 Aries.  In other words, there will be an exact Mars-Saturn square on Tuesday September 29.  As I have said on previous occasions, this is a really difficult time, and the emphasis will be on death and destruction.  It is not a time, for example, that you want to have a presidential debate.

Yet on September 29 2020, at 9 pm in Cleveland, Ohio, we have the first Presidential debate.  The chart at the top of this article is set for the beginning of this debate. We can see a conjunction between the Moon and Neptune, in Pisces. This suggests that the debate will be a confusing event, with plenty of scope for obscuring the truth.  It is also worth noting that the Midheaven is zero degrees 21 Aquarius – the degree of the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction on December 21 2020.  In fact, the conjunction takes place at 0 29 Aquarius.  This means that the debate is somewhat symbolic of the changes that will be taking place in America over the next year or two.

However, it may be that the debate doesn’t matter – it simply coincides with the Mars-Saturn square.  This square is nasty, and as I have mentioned in previous articles, it hits Donald Trump’s natal Venus.  Venus is not just the planet of women, it is also the planet of money, and it is significant that information about his tax returns has come out just as the Mars-Saturn aspect became exact.  Regardless of whether Trump wins or loses the debate, the Mars-Saturn aspect shows us that the damage has been done.

At this stage, I want to revisit a horary question I asked in early May.  The question was “Will Donald Trump get re-elected to the White House in November?”.  Here’s the chart:

Donald Trump is signified by the Moon, as ruler of the Tenth House of leadership. The Moon is placed in Scorpio, and is moving to an opposition of the Sun.  I took this as a clear sign that he was going to lose in November, assuming he stood.  The Sun was in the Second House, which I took as the nation’s finances.  However, with the latest news it seems that his finances, and his tax returns, have a bearing on the situation, and will contribute to his downfall.

On September 10 2020 Diana Rigg died.  If you’re nostalgic for the 1960s, this was a big deal.  As Emma Peel in The Avengers she was iconic, the face of a long-gone era.  She also played Teresa di Vicenzo, in the Bond film On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.  At the end of the film Teresa married James Bond, and a few hours later she was gunned down, still in her wedding dress.

Arguably Diana Rigg, through Teresa’s on-screen death, was acting out her horoscope.  If I want to know about the kind of relationship someone has with death, I look at their Mars-Saturn midpoint.  In her natal chart Diana Rigg had the hypothetical planet Cupido square her Mars-Saturn midpoint.  Cupido is the planet of love and marriage, and what better image for Cupido on the Mars-Saturn midpoint than a bride with a bullet wound in her forehead.  Interestingly John F. Kennedy also had Cupido on the Mars-Saturn midpoint – the aspect was  a semisquare.  This tells us something about his real-life death – he was shot in the head sitting next to his wife in full view of the public.

But I am digressing.  I want to talke about Diana Rigg’s real death.  It is a post hoc analysis, in relation to her lunar return – the time every month when the Moon returns to the place it was at birth.  I am not claiming that it would have been possible to predict her passing, particularly if one didn’t know that she had terminal cancer.  Rather, I am going through the exercise of seeing if there was anything in Diana Rigg’s September 5 2020 lunar return that pointed to imminent death.

Diana Rigg was born on July 20 1938, at 2 am, in the Yorkshire town of Doncaster.  Here’s her horoscope:

It is a tough chart, with two major conjunctions: the Sun conjunct Mars and Pluto in Cancer, and the Moon conjunct Saturn in Aries.  Maybe she lived out these conjunctions through her stage and screen roles, but overall her chart suggests an uncompromising person, who didn’t spend too long thinking through the pros and cons of a particular action.  You might also expect the two conjunctions to be in some way connected with her death, and this is suggested by her solar arc directions, set for September 10 2020.  Her solar arc directed Mars was at 17 41 Libra, directly oppostion her natal Saturn at 17 57 Aries.  In fact, solar arc Mars was opposition her Saturn-Hades midpoint, which was at 17 45 Aries.

Alfred Witte and Hermann Lefeldt, in their Rules for Planetary Pictures, wrote as follows about Mars on the Saturn-Hades midpoint: “The health suffers through the work. Death as a result of long illness or by a weapon. Sad death. To be exploited”. The description is broadly appropriate, though I don’t know if her death was particularly sad.  She was 82 and had lived a very full life.

Let’s now look at her lunar return, set for September 5 2020.  I take the location as being the place of her birth, not the place of her residence:

The Ascendant is at 15 degrees 6 minutes Sagittarius.  It is exactly opposite Diana Rigg’s natal Ascendant, at 16 50 Gemini.  Seventeenth Century astrologer John Gadbury, when reviewing the solar returns of Charles I, remarked that the switching of the Ascendant and Descendant signs in a return is an unfortunate signature.

The Moon in the lunar return is exactly conjunct the IC – in other words, right at the bottom of the chart.  This the end of the matter, the person disappearing from view.  We also note that the Moon is applying to a square of Saturn, and is widely conjunct Mars.  This repeats the signature of her natal chart, where she had the  Moon conjunction Saturn and widely square Mars.  It is also worth noting that in the lunar return the Moon is five degrees from the square with Saturn, and Diana Rigg died just under five days afterwards. There is another link.  In her natal chart the Moon is 7 degrees and 15 minutes short of a square with Mars.  In the lunar return, the Moon is 7 degrees and 7 minuntes short of a conjunction with Mars.

I am not suggesting that lunar return are always worth doing.  In my experience, they can be hit and miss.  However in the case of Diana Rigg her September 5 2020 lunar had a powerful resonance with her death.

On September 2 2020 there was a Full Moon, which occurred at the same time as an opposition aspect between Venus and Saturn.  In an earlier article, I took the view that this Full Moon could be bad news for Donald Trump.  The Venus-Saturn opposition was hitting his Venus-Saturn conjunction and this suggested problems with women. I wrote:

We might therefore expect Donald to have Venus-Saturn experiences around the time of the Full Moon.  Some of which may never become public.  He may have problems with women and he may behave badly towards them.  He will be particularly vulnerable to revelations about past behavior, relating to women, money or both.  If Donald has behaved sleazily in the past, his sleaze might bubble to the surface.  Put another way, if anyone has got any revelation to make about Trump, now is the perfect time to bring it out into the open – it would cause maximum damage.

Generally one can expect the impact of a Full Moon to be a fortnight, though Saturn, in late Capricorn, is opposition Trump’s Venus through September and October.  To put some numbers and positions on this, his birth Venus is at 25 degrees 44 minutes Cancer, and transitting Saturn started September at 25 58 Capricorn and ends October at 26 13 of the sign.

On September 17, the  day of a New Moon, The Guardian came out with a story that Amy Dorris, a former model, had been sexually assaulted by Donald Trump at a tennis match in September 1997.  This kind of story is exactly what I was expecting, with Saturn transitting his Venus.  Of course sceptics might argue that in the run up to the election it was inevitable that women would be crawling out of the woodwork with claims of sexual impropriety.  After all, we are dealing with Donald Trump.  Yet he does have a conjunction between Venus and Saturn in his natal chart, and he is extraordinarilly vulnerable to attacks from women.  It started with his niece Mary, and with the Saturn transit I am expecting more women to step forward.

As far as Amy Dorris is concerned, she was born on October 1 1972.  Here is her chart, set for midday:

We can set that again Trump’s chart:

When you look at Donald Trump and Amy Dorris’ charts, the first thing you notice is the conjunction between Venus and Mars.  Donald Trump’s Mars is at 26 47 Leo, Amy Dorris’ Venus at around 26 Leo.  In other words, they are closely conjunct.  In standard astrology, this conjunction relates to a physical attraction, and according to Amy Dorris’ account, Trump found her very appealing.  As the Guardian reported, “He just shoved his tongue down my throat and I was pushing him off. And then that’s when his grip became tighter and his hands were very gropey and all over my butt, my breasts, my back, everything”.

But we do need to remember that Venus-Mars contacts are often one way affairs.  Mars is the planet of male sexuality, and Donald Trump’s Mars is conjunct Amy Dorris’ Venus.  Something about her as a woman may have excited  and aroused him.  On the other hand, Venus might have experienced Mars as something aggressive, and perhaps also course and gross.  Particularly as Amy Dorris went to the tennis match with her boyfriend.

There is another, important connection between Donald Trump and Amy Dorris’ charts, and it relates to her Saturn, at 20 36 Gemini.  This Saturn is exactly conjunct Donald’s north node, and it is also conjunct his Sun and opposition his Moon.  Saturn is the planet of Karma, and having to face the consequences of one’s actions.  Saturn also blocks and restricts, which may say something about the way Amy Dorris claimed to have responded to Donald Trump’s alleged advances.  Overall, it may be the case that the Saturn link-ups will be significant, in terms of damaging Trump’s electoral chances.

Finally, let’s look at the chart for September 5 1997:

I don’t have exact times for the event, or indeed for Amy Dorris’ birth.  So I am not going to spend too long looking for a match up between Amy Dorris and the events of September 5 1997.  Indeed, I am going to look at just one thing, her Venus-Mars midpoint. Its position is approximately 13 degrees 10 minutes Virgo. At the time of the alleged assault, Neptune at 27 28 Capricorn was relatively close to making an 135 degree aspect to this midpoint. But it wasn’t exact – the full force of the contact would have been earlier in the year.  Nonetheless, it was a time when she was susceptible to unusual sexual experiences.  We then notice that on September 5 the Sun was at 13 Virgo – in other words, it was exactly on her Venus-Mars midpoint.  That was the trigger for her alleged encounter with Donald.

We can get further details about Amy Dorris’ Venus-Mars midpoint by considering any planets that might have been aspecting it at the time of her birth.  She has the hypothetical planet Zeus at 13 degrees Virgo, bang on the midpoint.  In Greek mythology Zeus was known for ravaging young women who caught his fancy, in sudden and dramatic ways.  And on September 5 1997 the Sun was exactly conjunct her Zeus… and Donald Trump allegedly chose that day to do a poor impression of a Greek god.  An alternative interpretation of Zeus on the Venus-Mars midpoint was provided by Witte and Lefeldt, in Rules for Planetary Pictures: “Intimate acquaintance or relationship with leading people”. Whatever you think of him, Donald Trump is a leading person.

One final point.  On September 5 1997 Venus was at 23 Libra, opposition Saturn at 19 Aries.  That’s not surprising, is it?

I know virtually nothing about the Kardashians, except that they are a rich American family, who have made a lot of money from reality TV.  The most famous Kardashian is apparently called Kim, and she was born on October 21 1980, at 10.46 am in Los Angeles.  Here is her horoscope:

It’s appropriate that Kim Kardashian has the Sun in Libra.  This is a very sociable placement, though it can sometimes lack depth – skimming along the surface, moving from one social interaction to another.  But what really stands out is her Jupiter.  It is at 28 degrees 52 minutes Virgo, exactly on the Midheaven.  It is conjunct Saturn, which is at 3 degrees 41 Libra.

Jupiter is in Virgo, the sign of its detriment.  People with Jupiter in Virgo sometimes miss the big picture – they can be ambitious and forward-looking just for the sake of it, and can perhaps get side-tracked by material details.  Yet Jupiter is a benefic, and it is right on the Midheaven.  So there  was never any reason why she couldn’t be successful.

Having said all that, it may be that Saturn is the real key to Kim Kardashian’s success.  Her Saturn is in Libra, the sign of its exaltation.  Furthermore, it is a daytime planet in a day time chart about the horizon.  It is also a masculine planet in a masculine sign.  Her Saturn is therefore very strong, and is signfies someone who knows what it takes to be successful.

In terms of this article, what I really want to focus on is the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction.  Forty years ago, in the early 1980s, there was a Jupiter-Saturn conjunction, in Libra.  From a geocentric perspective, the conjunction happened three times: December 31 1980, March 4 1981 and July 24 1981.  However, it was operational from October 1980 through to September 1981.

Those born at the time of the 1980 to 1981 Jupiter-Saturn conjunction were in their late teens in the year 2000.  For reality TV it was an important year, at least in the United Kingdom.  The first series of the UK Big Brother launched on July 14 2000, just two months after another Jupiter Saturn conjunction, which took place on May 28 2000.  This underlines the point that Jupiter and Saturn have a 20 year cycle – every 20 years the two planets form a conjunction.  And if you’re born close to a Jupiter-Saturn conjunction, like Kim Kardashian, you may be very sensitive to the cycle.  An extreme example of this sensitivity was the singer John Lennon. He was born in 1940, a few months after a Jupiter-Saturn conjunction. He became famous in the wake of the 1961 conjunction, and he was murdered a few weeks before the 1980 conjunction.

The May 28 2000 Jupiter-Saturn conjunction marked the beginning of a 20 year cycle, ending on December 21 2020.  As we now know, the internet, social media and reality TV have been important features of this cycle.  There is the idea that anyone can be a star, and that you can be famous just because you are famous.  An ordinary person can be on reality TV, or have their own Youtube channel, and can be catapulted to stardom. At least that’s the theory.

In a UK context, the most famous and enduring reality TV star was Jade Goody.  OK, people might not have heard of her now, but fifteen years ago she was major.  An ordinary working class girl, she came second in the 2002 series of Big Brother.  Part of her selling point was her guileless ignorance – for example thinking that Saddam Hussein was a boxer.  And she seemed to demonstrate that anyone, regardless of background or education, could become a star.

Jade Goodie was a Gemini, born on June 5 1981. Another Jupiter-Saturn baby, with her Jupiter and Saturn respectively at 0 33 and 3 0 Libra.  Her story was inspirational but also tragic, and she lived and died in the spotlight.  While on Celebrity Big Brother 5, in 2007, she made racist remarks about another contestant, from India.  In 2008, as a kind of redemption, she appeared on the Indian version of Big Brother, Bigg Boss, and during the show she found out that she had cancer of the cervix.  It soon emerged that the cancer was terminal and she married her boyfriend in February 2009, a month before her death, in a very public ceremony.  OK! magazine paid around £700,000 for access to the wedding, and produced a Jade Goody tribute edition.

The day Jade Goody died, March 22 2009, Jupiter and Saturn were exactly 150 degrees apart.  This underlines the fact that Jade Goody’s life was strongly associated with the Jupiter-Saturn cycle.  The conjunction brought her huge success, and the 150 degree aspect symbolized her death.  The cameras were still running and the whole of the UK knew what was going on – the tribute edition of OK! came out while Jade Goody was still alive but nonetheless had her dates, 1981 to 2009, on the front cover.

Paris Hilton is another person born in 1981. To be precise, she was born on February 17 1981, at 2.30 am in New York.  The horoscope is below:

Paris Hilton, like Jade Goody, was a big star in the first decade of the Twentieth Century, and reality TV was part of her portfolio.  Of  course she was helped by her family connection with Hilton Hotels.  Yet her fame had a lot to do with the fact that she was famous. And if you compare Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian’s horoscopes, there are some interesting similaries.  Both have Sagittarius rising – Kim Kardashian’s ascendant is at 13 44 of the sign, Paris Hilton’s at 15 49. And they both have a Jupiter-Saturn conjunction on the Midheaven.  In fact, Paris Hilton has a super-close conjunction, with her Jupiter and Saturn being only 30 minutes apart.

Another thing Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian have in common is that they both have the Sun conjunct the Venus-Mars midpoint.  In Paris Hilton’s case the conjunction is within 78 minutes, in Kim Kardashian’s case 17 minutes.  The immediate interpretation of this aspect is “sex appeal”, or perhaps making effective use of one’s sexuality.  In this light, the two women have a shared experience.  In 2003 a tape of Paris Hilton having sex was released, and in 2007 the same thing happened to Kim Kardashian.  In terms of their careers, it didn’t do them any harm.

However, things are changing.  The Jupiter-Saturn cycle that started in May 2000 finishes on December 21 2020, when the two planets form a conjunction at zero degrees Aquarius.  The rules are going to change and the old strategies for success are unlikely to be successful.  It seems that Kim Kardashian anticipates this, at least on an unconscious level.  It has been announced that her family’s show, Keeping up with the Kardashians, is coming to an end in 2021.  The show itself started on October 14 2007, when the Sun was in Libra, and it has therefore had a thirteen year run. This is the approximate chart of the first show – I don’t know the time or the place:

The Libra Sun tells us that the show is about style and appearance, and the close Venus-Saturn conjunction is about something tighty controlled and choreographed.  It also reminds us that the show is about making money.  Jupiter is at 16 Sagittarius, close to Kim Kardashian’s ascendant, at 13 44 Sagittarius.  It was a lucky time for her!

Yet the zeitgeist is shifting.  Reality TV, and the social media culture, is about to end – at least as we know it.  In December 2020 the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction happens, in the sign Aquarius. As I mentioned in a previous article, Aquarius is the anti-Leo.  It is a sign ruled by Saturn, and it is antithetical to the concept of being famous for the sake of being famous.  If you want to be famous, there has to be a reason. Indeed, the question will be asked, “why are you more special than me?”. Or put another way, style will have to give way to substance.