OBAMA VS. McCAIN

Less than a week to go until the USA decides who is to clear up after G.W.Bush! Who has the makings of a President? To whom is that great gold finger pointing from the heavens, scrawling 'It's for YOU!' ...?

Birthcharts first. According to a newly-discovered Birth Certificate (thanks to AstroDataBank and all involved) John McCain was a sunset birth at 18h25 EST in Colon, Panama, with Jupiter close to the MC in the 10th, so a high profile and expectations of success there, then.

(May I say at this point, that any remarks I make about John McCain are entirely contingent on the accuracy of this newly presented birth time. If astrologers and public have been led up the garden path - as politicians and their enemies so often love to do - then half of all that follows will be nonsense! But let's go for it... Two more things to note - these triwheels are centred on each man's Draconic chart; and if you need a clearer view, right-click on the image and save it to your PC.)

Like most Virgos, McCain is a sidereal Leo on the public stage, and it shows. That Leo Sun/Desc joins his tropical Mars, so this guy is as aggressive as they come when he's up against it or his ego is on the line. Another provocative Republican. Yes, he has what it takes to be a 21st century President, but whether we need it or the USA wants it is another matter.

Obama, now, is a tropical Leo, and again born at sunset! His Sun, helpful in the 6th, is a little below the horizon, not as strong as McCain's; but he has a nice communicative Gemini Moon right on the IC. Both Lights on angles = famous! OK, but will he make President? Both men have a lot of contacts from their draconic charts to sidereal and tropical, so each is a man of strong purpose and principle. McCain's draco Sun is in fun-loving Sagittarius ('No-one will interrupt a World Series game with an infomercial when I'm President!') so he is driven by the power of positive thinking; 'everything is for the best in the best of all possible worlds'. But Sag also believes in Money ... and we have a Credit Crunch. Obama is a draconic Piscean, hence an idealist - maybe a dreamer - and will be carried strongly by his faith. On his draco MC is tropical Venus in Cancer, but opposite is sidereal Saturn; sidereal Jupiter joins a Capricorn draco Moon, and on his draconic Virgo Ascendant tropical Mars rises! This orator will give less away than he lets on, wants to stay in control, and is a pussy-cat with sharp claws. Pursuing conscience politics will certainly make him very attractive. Between tropical and sidereal there are also conjunctions of Sun/Pluto and Saturn/Ascendant. Someone on the radio today said Obama had plenty of power under the bonnet; I second that! This man is serious, and determined to make a difference. McCain the Virgo is a small man with big ambitions; Obama is a big man with imagination and a love of his country. Which will be chosen?

Annual progressions are the next stop - and the converses, because these, as usual, are showing stronger patterns at this tipping-point in each man's destiny. McCain's shows a nice feisty Moon/Venus/Mars conjunction on the Gemini Descendant - lots of publicity then, attracting the ladies, drawing the crowds ... but this is all moving back to the square with Saturn, and already his choice of running mate, his Moon/Venus/Mars/Desc Sarah Palin, has come in for a lot of negative attention and may have compromised his campaign. Barack Obama just has his annual sunset ... but it is stronger now; and the annual converse Ascendant is at 29 Sagittarius, right on transiting Pluto. Which has finished with McCain. Advantage Obama.

I have set the Solar Returns for Washington DC, as I have no idea where each candidate spent his August birthday, and there is nowhere else more likely to throw up a useful pattern. Obama has Moon/Mars-Uranus straddling the horizon with Pluto at the IC, suggesting a very public and somewhat bumpy ride to the ballot box and beyond, with much power to his elbow. But will it be Presidential power? The Sun close to the approaching S.Node reminds us that the eclipse of August 1st fell conjunct his Sun, and this always presages significant steps along the path of the soul. McCain's Return has that S.Node rising, however, a position not to be envied as Self always has to come last, and planets nearby can signal the cause of one's undoing. Here, it's the Moon. This could be Sarah. Neptune sets with Chiron and the Dragon's Head, so he pursues his dream, but it could come to nothing if he has fibbed about his citizenship and skewed his birth details! (You need to follow the link from the bottom of his page at AstroDataBank to appreciate what I'm suggesting here.)

OK. To me, Obama is looking the stronger candidate for the White House. If he wins, it will mean he has a really special day coming up in January - the Iauguration. Since 1937 this has take place by custom on January 20th around noon - although there have been occasional necessary deviations. How does that date look for our hopefuls? Well, John McCain's converse daily progression is the only one of his patterns to throw up an angular planet, which is Uranus on the DCMC. A change or surprise of some sort for him on the 20th - otherwise the Inauguration chart itself, depending on the time the ceremony climaxes, may pick up his progressed Sun and Pluto on the Desc and IC.

Obama, now, has his daily progressed Ascendant still close to the Sun, while the converse daily Descendant is right on Jupiter. That nice Venus of his is a whisker away from the DPMC - and transiting Pluto is opposite on the DPIC. What is more, the Sun/Mercury conjunction of Inauguration day is conjunct his Jupiter and the noonday Moon is shining on his natal MC. Most striking of all, when you put the two draconic charts together - Obama and the Inauguration - it is his Sun on the noon Midheaven, his Ascendant opposite the Sun/Mercury, his angular Moon on the 7th cusp. McCain is nowhere.

Lastly, as for every day of his life, each man has a 'Q' chart for Inauguration day, which should show what it has in store. It is Barack Obama who has the Sun/Jupiter conjunction on the meridian from the IC in Washington at his birthtime of 19h24 AHST, and picking up his natal Mercury/Jupiter opposition. To me, that strongly suggests a victory speech.

DEATH AND THE Q-CHART

Once again a tragic loss of life has come painfully close; last week in the Talking Newspaper studio I was having to read a report of that terrible accident on the M6 motorway that killed a family of six, when their car went under a lorry in a five-vehicle collision and burst into flames. They were from Llandudno, and they were on their way home. Michelle should have been back in Clifton Road with her new baby daughter and thinking about getting back to work at the estate agent's round the corner, the other three children should have been back at junior and nursery school; the boys should have been at Karate club next evening at’The Dojo’ just up the road from my house, and serving at the altar with my friend Father Jones on Sunday. And on that following Sunday, October 26th 2008, David would have been 39 and opening cards from his mates at the local college where he worked as a chef.

He, with the rest of his family, came from Birmingham ; I thought I would take a look at his chart set for the time of the crash near Sandbach that took his life, the ‘Q’ chart.

A police notice appealing for witnesses to the accident gives the time as 10h30pm on the night of October 20th . The Moon was rising just as the Uranus/Saturn opposition, on David’s Nodes, hit the meridian; draconic Uranus was at 3 Taurus opposite David’s Sun at the draconic crash IC; transit Mars had run into his draconic Sun. On the day David Statham was born, October 26th 1969, at the crash time of 22h30 BST Pluto was at the IC conjunct David’s sidereal Mercury in 26 Virgo, and Mars (square Mercury) was setting - its sidereal position at 29 Sagittarius, on transiting Pluto! Draconic energy drives the story of the soul, sidereal strength in a pattern always implies a public or historic impact; and here, written into David’s script, is his sudden, shocking, violent, fiery end on a fated journey that made national headlines and left our town in tears. Already waiting for him in the drama of life was his ‘Q’ for exit. It was time to go home.

PLUTO, CAPRICORN, AND THE CRUNCH

I’m sure it hasn’t escaped your notice that Ingresses are major aspects to the Aries Point, arguably the most dramatic being outer-planetary squares from the Solstices. Accordingly, they impact on the entire human race and especially those bosom children of the Tropical zodiac, the citizens of the Western world.

The last time Pluto strode over a solstice point was in 1914, and the 1st World War, the Great War, the War to end all Wars, broke out. The King of Darkness was entering Cancer, since when any protective shell can be shelled and nowhere can be called a safe haven. Next he invaded Leo, making a fiery trine to the Spring Equinox; it was 1939 and the 2nd World War broke all the promises made at the end of the 1st, dramatically re-drawing the map of power. Now on the cusp of Capricorn it is the turn of global business empires to be shocked to their socks, time for new rules to be written in all areas of competition, worldly aspiration and control.

Two weeks ago, Pluto, still finishing its business at the end of tropical Sag but heliocentrically well into the first degree of Capricorn, was rejoined around the Sun by Venus after an absence of eight months and all hell broke loose in the world money markets. Back in 2007, things seemed very different - Pluto, visiting and revisiting 28 Sagittarius and helped by Jupiter, utterly seduced the English through their sidereal Sun into thinking the property boom years would never end. So we were all behaving as if they wouldn't. Property prices had been mushrooming since 2003/4 when Pluto hit on the UK’s sid. Sun at 18 Sagittarius: one house wasn't enough - we had to have two; one source of income wasn't enough - we all had to be property developers and buy to let. We had to have the perfectly finished designer home plus the luxury holiday pad, and we could do all this on dirt-cheap debt which banks and building societies were able to sell to each other and eventually bury somewhere overseas like the rest of the UK's rubbish. Many years ago I read a great story by Kurt Vonnegut where science had found a way to shovel all humanity's unwanted detritus through wormholes in space and leave our world lovely and`clean; unfortunately while people were enjoying their hedonistic lives, hyperspace filled up and a disgusting torrent of filth burst back through a zillion gaps in reality to overwhelm the globe. We are getting our come-uppance, big time. It's our fault.

Each time Pluto enters a sign he creates upheaval in pretty well any area of life associated with that twelfth of the sky - often through the way he seems to empower a fresh section of the human population. Unfortunately the folk who are spiritually asleep - and there are many - fail to recognise that charge of power as a shot of divine energy to purify and transform their lives, and instead turn into swaggering narcissists who throw their weight around and spark off a whole new slew of cultural problems. Pluto in Sagittarius enticed the whole developed world onto a quest for endless growth, wealth, mobility, knowledge and perfect bodies, and of course millions, manipulated shamelessly by rampant media, tumbled onto the bandwagon. We were all tested by the Tempter and found lamentably wanting. We were offered faith, but chose intolerance. Materially rich, we created poverty. The world was our oyster - we left it dying. In pursuit of fitness, we filled with vanity. Liberty became licentiousness, exams became quizzes, the law all letter and no spirit in a minefield of litigation and political correctness. A compensation culture where everyone knew their rights created the monster ‘Health and Safety’. The exhilarating, dangerous, Sagittarian adventure was to understand our place in the living universe, so of course we chose cheap flights, chatrooms, 'Big Brother,' and scoffed at God.

By the time he reached 29 Sag, Pluto had finished downloading WiFi, texting and YouTube to the UK sidereal Moon at Gemini 27 and was pointing squarely at England's tropical Moon in the end of Pisces, at long last provoking a country blighted by slobs and yobs to start cleaning up its act. The booze culture is still England's shame, but at last her streets are cleaner, her lungs healthier, and recycling bins busier. In the 1066 sidereal chart that undisciplined Moon was still in Pisces; so with the culminating Sun in sidereal Sag , the English nation has always been known for profligacy and adventure, high culture, great learning, immense greed, exhibitionism, bursts of surprising altruism, and a delight in comedy. If this country were a client we would be urging her to work hard now with Pluto's new Capricorn energy to capitalise on her strengths and drive out her demons. The Moon’s Nodes as usual tell the story - the South in disorderly Pisces, the North in Virgo with Saturn; she needs to accept Saturn's demand for a return to self-discipline, that a culture of growing selfishness and irresponsibility needs to be replaced by one of thrift and attentive service to the needs of ordinary people, particularly the old, the lonely, the sick and the deprived.

World map for Pluto's 1st ingress into Capricorn, based on London, UK

The hand-over of power is nearly complete: at 02h37 Ut on January 26th this year Pluto made his first brief but crucial entrance into the 10th sign, and on November 27th 2008 Pluto will finally exit Sagittarius at 01h03 UT to start its 16-year journey with us up Mt. Capricorn. I think it’s in the English Lake District that there is a little tour bus called The Mountain Goat ... this will be some tour! In London it is marked by the Saturn-Uranus opposition across the Asc/Desc, so expect the unexpected and a long-term reality-check. When he gets to 5 Capricorn the IMF’s Sun will be in the firing line after all the alarming activity of the past two years (Venus, Ceres, S. Node... ) so it may be staring at emptied coffers by then, Heaven help us all, and going through ‘death and rebirth’! Crunch time will be when Pluto hits the English/UK/EEC Sun in 2012/13, also impacting Australia (which, like the IMF, has been having an eventful time lately and may be ready to say Cheerio to the Queen), the British Diplomatic Service, and The Times. Will we have got our collective act together to celebrate a memorable Olympics? Or will it be another failure of planning and imagination, a damp squib to match the River of Fire and the Millennium Dome? Will we give the cold shoulder to Europe? Or will our benighted islands reluctantly embrace the Euro? Will we realise we no longer have ‘human rights’, only debts? Will we bring back the real spirit of competition in which we re-learn the art of losing gracefully? Limits will have to be set - flights grounded, populations controlled, behaviour schooled, promiscuity checked, standards raised, purse-strings tightened, freedoms curtailed. Will we see the end of the throw-away society, and a return to older, more lasting values? Or will it be the end of Freedom Food and the hope we still had for the planet? It could be the new age of the entrepreneur - or a field day for the ruthless.

Maybe we should all emigrate! At the first ingress Saturn, Uranus and Moon close to the UK meridian promise a lonely and rocky ride, while Jupiter rising at Baghdad (!) culminates over burgeoning China, and the third, final ingress chart sees Jupiter rising in Tokyo, setting in New York. But he is debilitated in Capricorn, so joy may not be unconfined. As in all aspects of life a sound structure is the prerequisite for true freedom. Only through determined self-discipline, moderation and careful planning are any of us going to survive what the globe could throw at us if climate continues to change. Sagittarius wants to magic it all away; Capricorn hunches his shoulders, gets his goal in focus, and plods on.

It would be nice to think that power might yet rest with the hitherto powerless, that the poor and the ill and the old and the lonely and the cold and the homeless and the hungry will be heard, honoured and rescued from unhappiness ... but I fear that as ever the controllers may strengthen their grip on our lives and our pockets, the heartless may walk over us, and the ambitious will toss us off their mountain. Grey power risks penalising the young; grey men may drain colour from the world. Yet perhaps in chillier, darker, frugal times there will be a return to commonsense, humility and a love of quietness - perhaps we will find an ordered simplicity in which we can take stock of who we are, learn to be self-sufficient, know our limits and use our time more wisely; perhaps when we are hardest-pressed and there is nothing left but prayer we will bend our knee on the highest summit of all, take God’s hand, and even come to realise the blessing of death.