This complexity explains at least in part why global geopolitical
dynamics seem so frenzied at the moment. In the last
post here, we explored in some depth what’s going on with the Saturn-Pluto
cycle, and we considered what we can look forward to in the new January 2020,
late Capricorn cycle.
In this post we’ll dig into the Jupiter-Pluto
cycle to consider similar dynamics: first, how this cycle has manifested in history and how the current waning cycle is
manifesting in its final months; and second, (in the next post), what the
inception chart for the new cycle that launches in April, 2020 has to say.
In a nutshell, the Jupiter-Pluto
cycle drives how raw, intellect-and-belief-based Power (power over; power to) is deployed and exercised in
society. For instance, the 1845 cycle, launched at 23+Aries in May of that
year, provided the aggressive “philosophical” pretext of Manifest Destiny to
justify the young American nation’s expansion from sea-to-shining-sea, and it
clearly didn’t matter who happened to
call the lands at stake their home. Manifest Destiny was used to justify the
expansionist war with Mexico in 1846, the annexation of Texas, California and
the entire southwest. From Wikipedia:
“…[I]n 1845, O'Sullivan wrote an essay titled Annexation in the Democratic
Review,[19]
in which he first used the phrase manifest destiny.[20]
In this article he urged the U.S. to annex
the Republic of Texas,[21]
not only because Texas desired this, but because it was ‘our manifest destiny
to overspread the continent allotted by Providence
for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions’[22]
…
And that claim is by the right of our manifest destiny to overspread and
to possess the whole of the continent which Providence has given us for the
development of the great experiment of liberty and federated self-government
entrusted to us.[24]
That is, O'Sullivan believed that Providence had given the United States
a mission to spread republican democracy (‘the great experiment of
liberty’)…O'Sullivan believed that manifest destiny was a moral ideal (a
‘higher law’) that superseded other considerations.[25]”
How convenient it is for those who intend to expand their power anyway,
to have a philosophical pretext (“Providence gave it to us?”) that is ready-made for the purpose! I’m sure we
can imagine other “truisms” that unleash questionable behaviors—they’re the
stuff that political ideologies and “gold rushes” are built upon. Never mind
that other intellectual tenets
underpinning the new American democracy at that time claimed to respect the
“life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” of all.
This respect has been sadly loopholed and reserved for the
privileged few in the course of our history: “all” turned out to mean only white
male property owners, and they weren’t the people whose lands the
new nation coveted when the wagon trains began
moving west. |
| "American Progress," by John Gast represented the spirit of Manifest Destiny. |
So not only was this 1845 Jupiter-Pluto cycle characterized by
a determined, self-serving intellectual justification for westward expansion,
there was a convenient void in the
legal definition of person (i.e.,
right-bearing being) that allowed the
atrocities that followed.
Needless to say,
these “intellectual” ploys—based on notions of supremacy, at their core—(a toxic Jupiterian notion), are
hard at work again today, as the Trump administration works to rid the nation
of anyone he feels does not “belong.” In an interesting parallel, the 2007 Jupiter-Pluto
cycle that is waning to completion by April, 2020, began in December,
2007 at 28+ Sagittarius—another aggressive, mentally-driven fire sign.
Expanding the nation’s power over the lives and even the bodies of immigrants (anyone Trump sees
as challenging his control of American “boundaries”) seems to be the new
“destiny” his administration lays claim to, and we’ve been seeing the heinous
results.
Sinking to a new low that simple boggles the mind, however,
Trump has now singled out the undocumented families of severely ill children who
have been receiving life-saving care in the U.S. due to President Obama’s
“Medical Deferment” program, targeting them for rapid deportation.
Although
there has been some confusion and chaos attending all this, the Trump
administration has apparently now ended Obama’s deferment program, sending
deportation notices to these families, with some notices reaching them in hospital rooms!
The cruelty and depravity required to even contemplate such a
move takes your breath away, yet this is certainly in keeping with the cruel
outrages inflicted upon Native Americans in the 1840s and 50s, and upon
African-American slaves and their descendents throughout our history. Interesting
historical note: when the first slave ships arrived at our Virginia shore in
1619, Jupiter and Pluto were still conjunct in Taurus—a sign that supports
the pursuit of property and wealth.
 |
| For some, the 1619 narrative isn't regarded as the most accurate or constructive. |
If you haven’t seen the New York Times Magazine’s amazing
compilation of articles that document the U.S. slave trade from the perspective
of these 1619 roots, it’s well worth a look. Astrologically, this timing makes a lot of sense, yet there are some historians and researchers who differ--it's an ongoing, consequential discussion that we need to have.
Jupiter and Pluto conjoined again in Taurus in 1857,
as the anti-slavery abolition movement was strengthening and the national
debate over new western territories becoming either “free” states or “slave”
states was reaching peak intensity. In other words, the same issue that played a central role in colonizing this New World in the 17th century returned to tear us
apart in the 1860s. Whether or not 1619 is the best beginning point for the practice of holding slaves is quite another story.
So a government and its people must first be able to conceive of and justify megalomania (Jupiter-Pluto at its
worst) before they can muster the power infrastructure (laws, institutions,
etc.—the province of Saturn-Pluto) to implement the
policies that emerge from it. As we know from history, the Civil War didn’t solve the slavery/white supremacy issue in America, but it
seems to me that the current Capricorn cycles are calling us to do so. I'm guardedly optimistic that we can make progress in this--more on that in the next post.
As with every planetary cycle, potential
positive and negative expressions co-exist and are influenced by the Zodiac
signs and aspects involved. Gross abuses of power and shirking of
responsibility (the two often co-exist) spawn great resistance, as well—witness
the sorely mistreated coal miners protesting in Kentucky these days because
Blackjewel, their company, simply stopped paying them when it ran into financial problems.
The former CEO got paid; the workers have been waiting for weeks.
Happily, the miners aren’t taking
this abuse lying down. They may not realize this, but they’re following in the
footsteps of railroad workers who chose to strike the powerful Chicago-based
Pullman Co. in 1894, the same month a particularly influential new Jupiter-Pluto
cycle was about to launch in early Gemini, also conjunct Neptune.
The
Pullman Strike is considered by many to mark a critical turning point for U.S.
labor law and the American labor movement. Unfortunately, both of these are
weak shadows of themselves today, but there are signs of hope. A dynamic new labor
leader—this time a woman named Sara Nelson,
who comes to the movement from the important airlines industry—is gaining
influence, and she will be one to watch.
As for the miners, coal mining is a
controversial industry that is—of necessity—being phased out gradually and
replaced with more sustainable, climate-friendly energy options, but the
industry’s workers need to be assisted
as they are forced to transition into other fields. They and their communities
certainly don’t deserve to become the
“fall guys” for the harsh economic and environmental realities their companies
face. As with all industrial transitions (change is the only constant), this dilemma is solvable, given the positive Jupiter-Pluto political will and vision to do so.
 |
| Blackjewel coal miners in Kentucky, blocking a train in protest over no pay. |
Cycle
characteristics
The Jupiter-Pluto cycle is
relatively brief, usually lasting just days more than 12 years. Pluto
moves slowly to Jupiter’s more rapid “1 sign per
year” clip, so Jupiter catches up to its counterpart at least once in every
sign it traverses. For those signs where Pluto lingers for more years (its
orbit is highly elliptical), there are multiple cycles beginning in one sign.
I’ve detailed the starting points for cycles going back to America’s founding
below, in Table 1 so we can get a
sense of how this happens.
Table
1. Jupiter-Pluto cycle inception data.
Inception date
|
Jupiter-0-Pluto
|
2/1771
|
18+Capricorn
|
1/1784
|
9+Aquarius
|
3/1796
|
28+Aquarius
|
5/1808
|
14+Pisces
|
2/1821
|
27+Pisces
|
3/1833
|
11+Aries
|
5/1845
|
23+Aries
|
6/1857
|
6+Taurus
|
7/1869
|
17+Taurus
|
4/1882
|
27+Taurus
|
5/1894
|
9+Gemini
|
6/1906
|
22+Gemini
|
8/1918
|
5+Cancer
|
5/1931
|
19+Cancer
|
8/1943
|
6+Leo
|
11/1955
|
28+Leo
|
10/1968
|
23+Virgo
|
11/1981
|
24+Libra
|
12/1994
|
28+Scorpio
|
12/2007
|
28+Sagittarius
|
4/2020
|
24+Capricorn
|
Notice that the multiple cycles in
one sign have the effect of expanding the generational “signature” of each Pluto
sign. This may explain why periods like 1857-1894 were so tumultuous in this
country, with three Jupiter-Pluto cycles launching in earthy Taurus, with its
powerful materialistic ambitions. Again, the entire U.S. Civil War (1861-65)
was fought over the issue of property and
over whether “free” or “slave” states would dominate our western expansion.
The
1862 Homestead Act gave hundreds of thousands of easterners the incentive to
surge westward to claim land the government “gave” them. Indigenous peoples at
home in those territories were either killed or forcibly moved to make way for
white settlers.
This, just a few years after the
frenzy of the California
Gold Rush (1848-55) which brought thousands of men (and some adventurous
women) from all over the country and the world to that territory. Bottom line,
the sign in which a Jupiter-Pluto cycle launches says a lot about a society’s
priorities and ambitions during that period. These cycles provide a very
revealing lens on history, in fact—we’ll see more examples of this as we
go.
 |
| Epicurus's perennial logical quandary regarding the "problem of evil." |
Jupiter-Pluto & the problem of evil
With its natural rulership over death, sex, taxes and chthonic
resources that must be extracted from the “Underworld,” Pluto’s connection to the
phenomenon of “evil” seems natural, although there is, as with every planetary
energy, a positive-to-negative spectrum available for Pluto’s expression. It
comes far less naturally to think about optimistic, charismatic, even generous Jupiter as contributing
to “evil” in any way.
Even so, if we consider Jupiter’s propensity for extreme
behaviors and ideological overreach, the ways in which this planet might
contribute to or support evil become more apparent. Jupiter’s raw impulse is
towards growth, expansion, and improvement, but when it hangs around
with chthonic Pluto, its ambition may manifest in ways that are unscrupulous,
ruthless, overly-controlling, or simply toxic in some way. Hence the stubborn,
unyielding power of the fossil fuel lobby!
No surprise—fossil fuel billionaires
and powerful political “kingmakers” Charles Koch and David Koch (recently
deceased) have strong Jupiter-Pluto
aspects in their nativities (Charles, a Scorpio-Cancer trine; David, an
Aries-Leo square).
Power to can easily morph
into power over—far too easily a
recipe for overreach and abuse.
A somewhat recent historical example illustrates this point well, and
it reminds us that societies lapse into evil periodically as the local power
dynamics fall drastically out of balance and become concentrated in corrupt—in
this case, toxic nationalist, religiously intolerant hands. Such was the case
with the Srebrenica massacre on July 11, 1995 (Chart #1 below), in which approximately 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men
and boys were lined up and killed by Bosnian Serb nationalists in what the
Hague International Court later deemed a genocidal “crime against Humanity.”
I’ve written about this chart in the context of radicalized youth and its
relationship with the 1988 Saturn-Uranus cycle (see here), but here we’ll briefly consider the Jupiter-Pluto dynamics involved.
Chart #1: Srebrenica Massacre, July 11, 1995, 11:00 a.m. DST (news
reports), Srebrenica, Bosnia. Tropical
Equal Houses, True Node.
The Bosnian Muslim community suffered utter devastation as a result of this massacre, perpetrated because the Serbs were consolidating their control over Bosnian lands after this former province of
Yugoslavia was officially recognized as an independent republic in April, 1992.
In the scramble, this quest for territory unleashed centuries of hatred against
Muslims in the Balkans, probably harking back to the Ottoman Empire.
Srebrenica became a refuge to Bosnian Muslims fleeing Serbian military encroachment, and
ultimately it became a city under siege. So a toxic mix of xenophobia,
nationalism and territorial ambition drove the cruel atrocities and ethnic cleansing
campaign on the ground.
Jupiter
Rx conjoins Pluto Rx (wide-Scorpio to Sagittarius); Jupiter Rx trines Pallas
(Leo) and squares Ceres (Virgo). The Jupiter-Pluto cycle in question with this conjunction actually
launched in December, 1994 at 28°+Scorpio—Pluto’s home sign. Interestingly, the attacks on Bosnian
Muslims by Slobodan Milosovic’s Serbian military began in 1992, during the
final waning phases of the November, 1981 cycle that took off at 24°+Libra. Cycles that launch in the mid-to-late
degrees of cardinal signs are often highly significant in terms of geopolitical
power plays, and this one certainly lived up to that.
It’s worth noting here that not only are Jupiter and Pluto
significant players in this chart, but because they both occupy the
signs they rule (Jupiter in Sagittarius; Pluto in Scorpio), they are actually
co-final dispositors of this chart!
So, even if every aspect involving these two isn’t dramatic on the surface,
their joint influence overall shouldn’t be underestimated.
Once the new Jupiter-Pluto cycle launched in Scorpio
late 1994, the power balance (the 1981 cycle began in Libra) in that region had
been destroyed, and despite the U.N. Security Council declaring Srebrenica a
“safe area” for Bosnian Muslims, the Serbian military overreached and basically
ignored that declaration. The U.N. apparently failed to demilitarize the safe
area, which provided a pretext (Jupiter trines Pallas) for the
Serbian forces to maintain their weapons.
The net result was that the Serbs
intensified their genocidal campaign against Bosnian Muslims (Jupiter
squares Ceres). It may seem odd that Jupiter would support
such negativity, however its alliance with Pluto was still quite active and
impactful (both in ruling signs), and Pluto was heavily connected into the
angular dynamics of this chart.
 |
| True crimes against Humanity were committed in Srebrenica. |
Chiron-Mars
(Virgo) conjoined ASC (Virgo) and opposed Saturn Rx-DSC (Pisces). Pluto Rx
(Scorpio) sextiled Mars and trined Saturn Rx. These aspects point to the militant power
dynamics in play—the Serbian forces saw their opportunity to attack, and as
we’ll see, this opportunity was powerfully reinforced by the Uranus-Neptune
(both Rx, Capricorn) conjunction that Mars trined and Pluto
and Saturn sextiled.
The geopolitical powers basically stood by and
watched the Srebrenica genocide unfold—it wasn’t until 1999 that the U.S. got involved under the
Clinton administration, and
that was to stop a second ethnic
cleansing campaign in former Yugoslav republic, Kosovo.
So the “evil” that can be supported, enabled, and even promoted under a
Jupiter-Pluto
cycle may unfold as much through action
and overreach as through inaction—a sort
of Pontius Pilate “washing of the hands” that gives destructive
forces free rein. Or an "unwilling God," in Epicurus's terms. Those in power regularly try to safeguard their "omnipotence" by declining to act. This cycle resists responsibility in so far as it restrains
the quest for power.
Playing “God”
In mythology, Zeus (Jupiter) and Hades (Pluto) were two of the three
“gods” ruling various dimensions of earthly life—Zeus the Skies, Hades the
Underworld, and Poseidon the Oceans. Humanity was useful to these ruling
forces, as long as the sacrifices kept coming and they didn’t get too full of
themselves with pride and hubris, but these three were also famously irritable,
when crossed.
So, implied in this breakdown of powers has always been the
dominion these “gods” have over human life. To “play god” has always implied
power over human life, sometimes in
the most “no-win” situations, and I would argue that when Jupiter and Pluto
are dominant astrological forces, these situations can become trickier
than ever.
Consider what has happened in natural disasters we’ve seen, when this
power over other’s lives can become
an unwelcome burden. We saw this with the medical crews charged with evacuating
hospitals in hurricane-ravaged New Orleans in 2005. When the storm approached
peak intensity in New Orleans on August 29th, these crews were
forced to “play God,” deciding which patients (many terminally ill) could be
evacuated and which could not. Local nursing homes and hospitals like New
Orlean’s Memorial Medical Center suffered the highest fatality rates in the
storm, and some staff members were arrested and charged with wrongdoing after
the storm.
The point here is that these medical professionals were faced with
absolutely no-win situations in which having “power over” their patients played
out quite tragically for all concerned.
On August 29, 2005, with Katrina at peak intensity over New Orleans, Jupiter
(Libra) formed a waning sextile to Pluto (Sagittarius), not too
different from the situation we find ourselves in today, with Jupiter
transiting Sagittarius and Pluto hovering semi-sextile in
Capricorn. The opportunism of the 2005 sextile was exploited by the many ways
both planets tied into the rest of the event chart that day (not shown here).
Jupiter
conjoined Venus-So. Node (Libra), opposed Eris-No. Node (Aries), inconjoined
Mars (Taurus), trined Neptune (Aquarius) and widely squared Moon (Cancer,
with chart cast for noon). The waters rose to levels never anticipated
(Jupiter-Neptune
trine), with devastating consequences.
For its part, Pluto formed a grand fire trine with
Mercury and Eris, squared Part-of-Fortune (Virgo) and inconjoined Mars. Particularly
with both Jupiter and Pluto inconjunct Mars, it’s no
wonder that a lot of people found themselves at the mercy of some unmerciful,
disruptive “gods” that day, yet some few profited from the aftermath of that
day as well (Jupiter-0-Venus, both sextile Pluto).
Leveraging a tragic or
potentially deadly situation (Pluto) to some benefit (Jupiter)
is deeply characteristic of this cycle; the manner in which it is leveraged
often depends upon other connections in the chart.
 |
| Politicians aren't the only ones "playing god" these days! |
This leveraging dynamic is being pushed to extremes these days in many ways, of course--scientists are "playing god" in regards to fertility, AI engineers are basically deciding who will have jobs in the future and who won't, and so on. Lots to talk about here, and some of it (not all) may be very positive. If science can come up with a way to "play god" and solve the climate crisis, more power to them!
All of this explains, however, why the Jupiter-Pluto cycle can also be a major
force during cycles of corruption—especially the kind that involve big money
and overwhelming influence. The so-called “Great” recession of 2008-9 was most
likely related to the December, 2007 Jupiter-Pluto conjunction in late
Sagittarius (see Table 1 below), but
the actions and conditions that led
to that recession were a product of the waning period of the December, 1994
cycle in late Scorpio—debt-sensitive
Scorpio.
Unscrupulous mortgage lending practices had gained steam during that
cycle and had helped create a 2004-6 housing bubble (Jupiter), compounded by a
seriously overextended consumer debt situation—all of which helped to bring on
the broader 2008 financial crisis, causing thousands of homeowners to lose
their homes to foreclosure or to find their mortgages “under water.”
Credit
ratings plummeted and borrowing power became absolutely unavailable to
millions, as well. As we now know in retrospect, the finance industry had built
a precarious “Jenga” tower of illusory, uncapitalized debt, which came
perilously close to crashing the entire economy as the reality hit.
A bit further into the 2007 Jupiter-Pluto cycle, the U.S.
Supreme Court made its controversial (and IMHO, totally irresponsible) decision
known as Citizens United—effectively
putting political offices and democracy itself on the auction block. Citizens
United came into force on January 21, 2010, with Jupiter (Pisces) conjunct Neptune
(Aquarius) and sextile Pluto (Capricorn), and with Saturn(Libra) tightly square
Pluto and quincunx Jupiter.
The lure of unlimited corporate cash
flowing through election campaigns like an undammed river (water sign Jupiter
conjunct and disposed by Neptune) apparently overwhelmed the better
judgment of the U.S. Supreme Court (Saturn)—in other words, the
opportunity for corruption presented itself and found an outlet in the
remaining chart connections.
Interestingly, our national Sibly chart was caught up in its eighth Saturn
return when this transpired, and with Jupiter strong in Pisces
(co-ruling with and beginning a new cycle with Neptune), the law was
conveniently distorted to satisfy powerful players with agendas to
purchase.
Perhaps the most disturbing example of this “playing god” dynamic that
we’ve seen recently, however, has been the Trump administration’s decision to
eliminate Obama’s “medical deferment” program for undocumented immigrants, as
mentioned earlier in this post. This decision is even more heartless than usual
for Trump, who’s basically deploying the awesome power of the American presidency to attack the “least of these,” individuals
with life-threatening diseases and conditions who will, according to medical
experts, likely die if they have to
leave that care behind.
Not surprisingly, a massive outcry against this Trump move ensued, and
in response the administration said it would reopen some cases for
reconsideration, but no new applications are being considered.
So, Trump is indeed playing god—probably just because he can—but he’s not playing the merciful
kind. The cruelty is gratuitous—like a mean little kid who pulls the legs off
insects just to see them squirm. Have we really sunk as a nation to this level?
 |
| There's a Jupiter-Pluto story here, for sure! |
Delusions
of grandeur
Perhaps because Jupiter co-rules Pisces
along with its illusion-spinning colleague Neptune, delusions of grandeur and
compulsive hubris (a more extreme expression of the same delusion) are also
potentials of the Jupiter-Pluto cycle. Let’s consider first what such delusions
are about. According to Medical News Today:
“Delusions of grandeur can
manifest in virtually limitless ways. Some of the most common types include:
- an inflated belief in one's own importance, such as having the power to end war
- a belief that one is famous or occupies a high position in society
- a belief that one is a religious leader
- a belief in one's ability to live forever
- a false belief that one cannot be harmed by disease or injury
- an inflated sense of intelligence
- a belief that one possesses magical skills, such as the ability to read minds”
When such delusions take over the individual’s personality and
relationships, they are also characteristic of patients suffering from a range
of psychiatric diseases, so there was true reason for concern on August 21st
when Donald Trump laid his grandiosity out for the world to see even more
starkly than usual.
In a rapid series of rambling statements
and tweets, Trump laid out a fragmented narrative, but in retrospect, the
pieces did hang together around one core reality: he has an overblown sense of
entitlement and the belief that he’s the “Chosen
One.” Chosen for what is less clear, but his desire to wax messianic was revealing.
Remember in the 2016 campaign when, speaking about what he called our “rigged
election system,” he said “I
alone can fix it?”
His office did try to walk back the
“chosen one” statement, calling it a “joke,” but what does his behavior say? For its part, his natal
chart endows him with a Jupiter-Chiron conjunction, a Jupiter-Uranus
trine, a Jupiter-Pluto sextile (Libra-Leo) and a Mercury-Neptune-Eris t-square (Cancer-Libra-Aries)—it
appears that delusions of grandeur fuel his “Me against the World” mindset.
 |
| Orwell's dystopic vision is chillingly real at the moment. |
Even
Trump's bogus attempt to “track”
Hurricane Dorian (including a clearly fabricated “Alabama” prediction)
reflects this mindset, which Washington
Post reporter Philip Bump suggests has “tipped into the Orwellian. ” He
cites Orwell’s 1984:
“In the end the Party would announce that two and two made
five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make
that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely
the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality was
tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense.” -
George Orwell, 1984
Trump, against all “external
reality,” insists that Alabama was in
Dorian’s crosshairs, when all his pronouncements did was put Alabamans into
needless stress. His stubborn digging in on this reflects the defensive twist we
see in Trump’s t-square, and we have to wonder if it perhaps shields him from
facing some deep wounds (Chiron), and his own truth, for that matter. He’s being seriously challenged
by Saturn
and Pluto transiting opposite
his natal Saturn-Venus conjunction (Cancer) as we speak—perhaps delusions
are providing him a haven from reality?
 |
| Click here for an interesting conversation about the pitfalls of hubristic leaders. |
Hubris
So the Jupiter-Pluto cycle
spawns extremes of all kinds, but let’s pause to consider its connection with hubris a bit more deeply—especially hubris
at the top ranks of government. This term comes to us from Greek myths in which
this extreme form of arrogance was deplored—even when it appeared in kings and
other powerful figures. Hubris easily tips over into tyranny—heads have rolled in history over this
classic offense. Many classical Greek tragedies are cautionary tales regarding
such arrogance, and those guilty of it always
met with the most vivid, hideous downfalls.
From Wikipedia:
“Hubris (/ˈhjuːbrɪs/,
from ancient
Greek ὕβρις) describes a personality quality of extreme or
foolish pride or
dangerous overconfidence,[1]
often in combination with (or synonymous with) arrogance.[2]
In its ancient Greek context, it typically describes
behavior that defies the norms of behavior or challenges the gods, and which in
turn brings about the downfall, or nemesis, of the perpetrator of hubris."
Jupiter
and Saturn have a somewhat
antagonistic relationship, of course, so it’s no surprise that hubristic
individuals, with their overblown ego needs, believe that society’s rules simply
don’t apply to them. In civilized,
rule-of-law-centered societies, however, this “challenges the gods.”
Fast
forward to the present, and according to House Judiciary Committee member Rep. David Cicilline, the House Judiciary and Oversight
committees can’t keep up with the never-ending stream of Trump violations of
norms and laws–too many to even catalog here. We know how Trump feels about
Congress overseeing him—could this overwhelm
be purposeful?
To make things worse, he’s been using the presidential power of the pardon
in ways that defy norms and perhaps even the laws he’s sworn to uphold. “Take the land,” he told aides recently, in reference to
building his border wall. When told that grabbing land from residents would be
illegal, he offered to pardon those who carry out his wishes. Isn’t that the opposite of enforcing the laws?
In fact, hubris can infect both the
personal and collective levels under the Jupiter-Pluto cycle: former Fed
Chairman Alan Greenspan has Jupiter conjunct Venus, inconjunct Pluto.
During his tenure he had a natural knack for steering the Fed’s monetary
policies through frustrating times, but he was blindsided by the precarious
situation when the new cycle launched in 2007, with transiting Jupiter
conjoined transiting Pluto in fiery Sagittarius, trine his natal Chiron (Aries) and Neptune
(Leo), square his natal Uranus
(Pisces) and quincunx his natal No. Node (Cancer).
In other words,
he failed to heed his own 1996
advice against the dangers of “irrational exuberance”—definitely a Jupiterian
excess, exacerbated by Neptunian irrationality, and when
finance and investment and a bit of reckless greed comingle, the perfect Jupiter-Pluto
pitfall.
To make the challenge a bit more
interesting, the 2007 Jupiter-Pluto cycle point fell conjunct the Federal Reserve’s Capricorn
Sun and squared the Fed’s Pisces Eris. This puts Trump’s
current enmity for the Fed into context—the 2007 Jupiter-Pluto cycle, with
its rulership over power dynamics and abundant resources, is now waning, and
this naturally portends a bit of belt-tightening down the road as the new cycle
kicks into gear.
Needless to say, this is not what Trump wants to face during the
upcoming election year, so he’s been bashing the Fed chairman he appointed, as if the Fed has a magic
wand that can suspend the natural flows of these potent energies.
 |
| Trump's empty chair at the recent G7 Climate crisis meeting. |
Vacuums
in leadership
Despite the fact that Jupiterian
individuals often have the charisma
to find themselves in leadership positions, leadership itself thrives in those
with a more balanced set of Jupiter-Saturn dynamics. Retired Marine Corps General
and former Secretary of Defense James N. Mattis was born[1] with
Saturn
conjunct Sun (Virgo), sextile Mars-Pallas (Scorpio), and with Jupiter (Rx,
Pisces) opposite Venus (Leo) and trine Uranus (Cancer). He has the
sober, competent and self-deprecating character of a Saturnian leader, yet he
clearly inspired trust and admiration in those Marines he led into battle in
the Middle East.
He inspired respect during his tenure because he extended respect to those he led, and to the administration he
served as Secretary of Defense. He even respected Trump enough to “tell truth
to power” and resign in protest. His Mars and Pallas-Saturn sextile seems
to have provided him the courage to stand his principled ground.
This is all relevant to our
discussion here because the Jupiter-Pluto cycle often seems
focused on minimizing responsibility (Saturn)
in favor of unfettered growth, expansion, etc. When Trump’s “empty
chair” at the climate policy meeting at the recent G7 conference hit the
news, it struck me as the quintessential Jupiter-Pluto moment—to participate
in that meeting would have been an admission on Trump’s part that denying
climate change is real isn’t fooling anyone, and that he (on behalf of the U.S. and the world) is responsible for rolling
back future greenhouse gas emission levels.
Thankfully, most leaders seem to consider
their power expanded when they
cooperate to save the planet from climate change. More of an outlier all the
time, Trump’s toxic perspective is especially baffling, as we watch a more
powerful hurricane season than ever unfold before our eyes. As with “Alabama,”
Trump demands his own reality; the big question is, whose interests is he serving?
Instead of attending that G7 climate
meeting, then, Trump chose
to lie and prevaricate about why he missed the meeting instead—what would
he have told his fossil fuel industry campaign donors?
Then, to make things
even more vacuous, while the Dems running for president in 2020 participated in
CNN Town Halls last night to present their programs for addressing climate
change and to answer questions from voters, Donald Trump was doubling down on
his bogus “Alabama” prediction for Hurricane Dorian. Deflecting attention?
Trying to fill the “empty chair” he left at the G7 with too little, too late?
 |
| Click here for more on why the Amazon fires are a global disaster. |
Interestingly, Trump also chose not
to work with our G7 allies to help Brazil address the fires currently
decimating the Amazon rainforest. It’s no wonder—he’s gone out of his way to
curry favor with Brazil’s new extreme right-wing leader, Jair Bolsonaro, and
that meeting was more about pressuring Bolsonaro to put business interests
aside to save the Amazon for the long term.
Scientists have characterized the
rainforests as the “lungs of the planet,” and under his leadership and Trump’s silence,
those “lungs” are gasping for breath.
Writing for the Brookings Institute, former World Bank economist Kaushik
Basu put this precarious situation into context:
“The Amazon rainforest has been burning for
weeks. Yet Brazil’s right-wing president, Jair Bolsonaro, mobilized the
armed forces to help contain the fires only in the last few days—in the face of
European leaders’ threat to suspend a major trade deal and the possibility of a
far-reaching boycott of Brazilian products. And though the Bolsonaro
government’s rollback and
weak enforcement of laws protecting the Amazon are root causes of the crisis,
encouraging ranchers to set
fires to clear land for agriculture, there has been no mention of any
policy change.
The crisis in the Amazon is a stark example of the damage that can be
done when governments bow unequivocally to business interests. It also
highlights an increasingly common phenomenon: the cynical manipulation of
anti-corruption efforts to undermine democracy and advance an authoritarian
political agenda.”
Bolsonaro’s (and Trump’s) determined
disregard for critical regulations and their shared willingness to sacrifice
the environment for corporate (and possibly personal) interests evokes the
toxic excess of an aggressive Capricorn Pluto, egged on by a libertine
Sagittarius Jupiter. We could dwell on “what’s in it for them” by seeing
how this cycle is playing out in their respective charts, but judging from
their actions, it’s apparent that they view the environment as just one more resource that they have
“power over,” a resource that is available to them for profit and political
benefit.
Bolsonaro displayed this viewpoint
when he bristled at the G7’s plea that he consider the importance of the
rainforest for the health of the planet. His noon chart[2]
displays an interesting Jupiter-Pluto profile, with these
two in a waning semi-sextile, from Cancer to Leo, with Pluto
opposite Venus (Leo-Aquarius) and Jupiter conjunct Uranus (Cancer) and
inconjunct Venus (Aquarius). So he’s well-suited to play the
social/collective “disruptor” for the sake of profit, even if it means
unleashing toxic, corruption and
destruction, all wrapped up with an authoritarian “bow”—his Saturn
(Scorpio) t-squares his Venus-Pluto.
 |
| Click here for more on the Brazilian tribes who are uniting to save the rainforest. |
On the more positive, flip side of
that situation, fourteen indigenous tribes in Brazil
have put aside their historical enmities to join forces against the
Bolsonaro government for the sake of the Amazon. This response to tyranny and
corruption beautifully expresses the “higher angels” of both the Jupiter-Pluto
and the Saturn-Pluto cycles.
Not too surprisingly, however, Bolsonaro
has since reneged on his plans to attend the Amazon summit he proposed, thus avoiding discussions
with tribal leaders, but he’s planning to defend his policies regarding the
Amazon before the U.N. later this month. European nations are putting pressure
on trade deals with Brazil to influence Bolsonaro, but my guess is that little
will be resolved in this dispute before the new cycles begin in 2020. The
question is, will it be too little, too late for the Amazon?
Final
thoughts
Let’s hope the fast-approaching Jupiter-Pluto
cycle in Capricorn will have some pragmatic answers for the challenges
we face these days. I suspect it will, in fact, and I look forward to
discussing more of the positive potentials
of this cycle when we consider the cycle launch chart in the next post. An earth cycle should help to build
the political will and the power dynamics necessary for the transition to
earth-friendly technologies that we all need—as long as we’re able to shake the
quicksand of hubris at the top that we’re stuck in at the moment.
There’s some cosmic wisdom in this
quicksand, actually; to my view, it’s a call to serious self-reflection as a
society. For instance, are we as a nation also
caught up in delusions of grandeur under Trump? To whatever extent we are, this
needs to be addressed, or we’ll never get back on track for sage
leadership—either domestically, or abroad!
Objectively speaking, we rank nowhere near the top among nations when it
comes to the quality of our public education, to our access to quality health
care, to the mental health and stress levels of our youth, to our collective
sense of security (300 million guns do some damage to that), and so on.
 |
| Seems like we're sacrificing a lot for bloated defense budgets! |
Yes, we have a big defense budget and a big
economy, but those only go so far when it comes to quality of
life—especially since our wealth is very unevenly distributed. I could go on,
but you get the idea. This is just the objective truth, which as we know, our
present leadership would like to ignore and deflect with Reality-TV MAGA
rallies and Twitter rants.
Yet, we are a haven for many whose
home countries have even less to
offer, leaving zero-sum types like Trump to conclude that “outsiders” are getting
a better deal from our public resources than citizens do. Maybe the answer to
that is to offer a better shake to our citizens, without losing our national
Soul to heinous immigration policies? Better ideas are out there, ready to
manifest in the new 2020 cycles just around the corner, but we need to shake
the quicksand of this last cycle off our feet to make all that happen. Such is
life under waning cycles.
Meanwhile, there are signs of hope
that democracies can still survive in
the current cosmic circumstances: Hong Kong finally gave in to protestor
demands – see here – and surprise maneuvers in the British
Parliament are working to snatch power back from a renegade PM who wants to
send the country’s economy over a “no deal Brexit” cliff. Weighing love of
country and environment against support for one larger-than-life leader is
happening in many places these
days—definitely the territory of Jupiter-Pluto.
Let’s hold on to hope—first of all,
that Hurricane Dorian quickly moves out to sea and spares the rest of our east
coast. Our hearts go out to the Bahamas—we’re in this together!
More on this Jupiter-Pluto cycle discussion
in the next post!
 |
| The new cycle launches in April, 2020 in late Capricorn. |
Raye
Robertson is a practicing astrologer, writer and former educator. A graduate of
the Faculty of Astrological Studies (U.K.), Raye focuses on mundane,
collective-oriented astrology, with a particular interest in current affairs,
culture and media, the astrology of generations, and public concerns such as
education and health. Several of her articles on these topics have been
featured in The Mountain Astrologer and other publications over the years.
© Raye Robertson 2019. All
rights reserved.
[1]
Birth data for General James N. Mattis: September 8, 1950, Pullman, WA. Source:
Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Mattis. No birth time known.
[2]
Birth data for Jair Bolsonaro: March 21, 1955, Glicerio, SP Brazil. Source: Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jair_Bolsonaro.
No birth time known.
No comments:
Post a Comment