Obama’s 2nd oath

When I was writing about the inauguration, it was difficult to imagine such a strange consequence of the Moon void of course (void of course means “nothing happens”, or business without fructification) – yet, in the context of the presidency, it produced the 2nd oath for Obama, 31 hours after the inauguration.

This happened to two US presidents before, Chester Arthur and Calvin Coolidge, so it is not an exceptional event. However, in the astrological terms, it changes the inauguration chart of January 20th for the new one:

One can immediately notice that the ascendent here is Leo, its ruler being in the sign of Saturn, Aquarius (Leo is the sun-sign for Obama, for he was born in August). This makes the new chart more coherent with his nativity, unlike the previous one, which had Taurus rising (with all his charm, Obama is rather a Saturnine than Venusian person).

This time, the 10th house of supreme power is empty; its ruler Venus, although exalted in Pisces, is badly placed in 8th house of fears and comes to conjunct Uranus and oppose retro Saturn. The ruler of ascendent Leo is in detriment in 6th house – weak and working hard, yet coming to join Jupiter (which will be combust then). Jupiter rules 5th house of fun, so this is not good for the country in the sense of having fun, I am sorry to say.

Moon, the significator of people, has left Scorpio where she was detrimented, but now is coming to square Saturn and Uranus – still not good. The retro Saturn is placed just on the cusp of 2nd house of finances – this is already known to each and every one: people are experiencing financial problems.

This chart is much less shiny than that of 20th January – yet more realistic. Problems, less fun, hard work...

I cannot see much of that in the chart, but I wish good luck to the American people in the next few years.

Update of 17 March 2010. After more than a year since writing this post, I just want to add this YouTube link to confirm my predictions and opinion about Obama.

US primaries prediction

Before the US primaries on March 4, when Obama was effectively leading the Democratic campaign, mass-media and statistics predicted defeat for Hillary Clinton, and even psychologists gave detailed explanations why she lost and what was wrong with her image.

I am not quite familiar with the complicated US system of delegates, superdelegates, caucuses, etc., nor am I interested in particular candidates, but when a member of “AngelicusMerlin” Yahoo group asked a horary question about the primaries on March 3, one day before the event, I was interested to try to predict it.

Here is the chart for the question “Will Obama win?”

I needed some background information to choose the right significator, because Obama was not the candidate of the person asking the question, so it was not clear whether Obama was signified by the ruler of ascendent or by the ruler of 10th house of the state power. Then I was told the Tony Rezko story which helped me to choose, because in the chart, 11th house has Mars heading its fall in Cancer: this made me think that Obama should be assigned to the ascendent in Leo (Obama is Leo, indeed, born on August 4) – Sun is peregrine in Pisces and exalts Venus, which rules 10th house of power.

The Moon is in detriment, void of course and heading Aquarius, sign of Sun’s detriment. In the mundane chart, Moon signifies people of the country. Being void of course and weak, it shows that the people are undecided, and when Moon comes to Aquarius, the people start dislike Sun, i.e. the person in question, Obama. Evil star Algol is culminating in the chart. All these indications show nothing like a victory. Moon void of course signifies no major change in the course of the events.

Therefore, yesterday, before the primaries of March 4, I wrote in AngelicusMerlin the following: “…probably no final decision right now, postponement till later primaries or the party conference in summer. I would understand these indications as Hillary getting more voices in the primaries this week to balance their current statistics”.

As we know today, March 5th, Hillary Clinton has revived her campaign with primary wins in three states. Her delegate score against Obama is 1,391 – 1,477, which is rather balanced now.

Ketu conjunction

Ketu and Rahu are south and north lunar nodes: the points where the Moon orbit intersects the ecliptics. These are very important, because when Moon and Sun meet near Rahu or Ketu (conjunction or opposition), an eclipse occurs. They are among the most ancient astrological/astronomical objects, because they were used by magis to predict eclipses (and to intimidate the ignorant peoples by their magical power).

Although in the western tradition Ketu (south lunar node) is considered as “minimising” bad effects of malefics (Saturn and Mars), and not much attention is paid to this “fictitious planet", in the oriental Jyotish tradition (Vedic), it is stressed that conjunctions with nodes (south Ketu and north Rahu) are very powerful and make manifestations of any planet erratic and catastrophic. The effect increases especially in those periods when the fast-moving Moon forms tight aspects with an afflicted planet.

This can be illustrated in the recent dramatic events when the Moon was moving through Pisces in opposition to conjunction of Saturn and Ketu (11-13 January 2008)

In these three days, there was unusual number of accidents. To mention a few, seven deaths in fire in S-Petersburg, explosion in Kazan, explosions in Kazakhstan and Donbass mines, fires in Rostov, Habarovsk and Orenburg, electricity cuts in Moscow, Makhachkala and Barnaul; death accident in the queue for money return in Ukraine (this is really weird, Saturn-Ketu indeed); fog in England, Bulgaria and Hong Kong, frozen deaths in Afghanistan; flight accidents and flight delays in Mexico, Atlanta, Chicago, Ohaio, Italy, Makedonia, Argentina, Bulgaria, France, Belgium; heavy road accidents in Poland, Austria, Nigeria, Namibia, Canada, Kazakhstan, and Moscow (here a famous journalist died); shooting accidents in Russia, Spain and USA; landslide in Vietnam, avalanche in Italy, crash in Thailand aquapark, garbage problem in Naples; a guy died in Los Angeles falling from escalator. Not to mention bank problems increasing again, these were triggered by the previous Saturn-Ketu period in the autumn of 2007 (the constellation fell on the ascendent of the USA chart).

If we look back at the previous conjunction of Ketu and Saturn in 1996-1997, it was a gloomy period in the Russian politics. In the summer of 1996, Yeltsin was again elected a president - those elections were known as corrupted and were much less fair than, for example, the recent Parlamentary elections in Russia (so heavily criticised in the West). Yeltsin was elected, although he was already ill (later in the year he underwent heart surgery) and he created a goverment with Chernomyrdin as prime-minister. This government had two periods: with Potanin (14.08.1996-17.03.1997) and Chubais & Nemtsov (17.03.1997 -23.03.1998). The latter were "young reformers" who started extravagant economic moves which led the country (together with short-lived government of Kirienko in 1998) to the ill-famous default of 1998.

Not to put here my emotions and pain about my country, I just give a quote from Wiki: "...to finance Russia's growing foreign debt and gain support from the Russian business elite for his bid in the 1996 presidential elections, the Russian president prepared for a new wave of privatization offering stock shares in some of Russia's most valuable state enterprises in exchange for bank loans. The program was promoted as a way of simultaneously speeding up privatization and ensuring the government a much-needed infusion of cash for its operating needs. However, the deals were effectively giveaways of valuable state assets to a small group of tycoons in finance, industry, energy, telecommunications, and the media who came to be known as "oligarchs" in the mid-1990s. By summer 1996, substantial ownership shares over major firms were acquired at very low prices by a handful of people. Boris Berezovsky, who controlled major stakes in several banks and the national media, emerged as one of Yeltsin's most prominent backers. Along with Berezovsky, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Vladimir Potanin, Vladimir Bogdanov, Rem Viakhirev, Vagit Alekperov, Alexander Smolensky, Victor Vekselberg, Mikhail Fridman and a few years later Roman Abramovich, were habitually mentioned in the media as Russia's oligarchs."

This is what Ketu-Saturn can do to a country. So, do not be surprised with the loan market crisis of 2007-2008. Just as it is said in Jyotish, this constellation is erratic and catastrophic.

The period will last until the beginning of May 2008, when currently retrograde Saturn finally turns for direct motion and separates from the wide conjunction with Ketu (which normally moves retro).

Lisbon

After an intensive workshop in Spain, I got a free weekend which should be used properly. I came to Portugal to see Lisbon – mainly to add yet another item to my list of visited places. My opinion was rather stereotyped: Portugal sounded as provincial Europe, a bit outdated and not too wealthy. Only after landing, in the airport, the poster slogan reminded me: this country once ruled half the world.

Portuguese invented caravel and advanced naval techniques which allowed them to travel to Latin America, Africa, China, India, and Japan. Their influence is still there, from language in Brazil to music in Cabo Verde. Their architecture and crafts are amazing, just look at the photos - Jeronimos monastery:

with wonderful inner garden:

and amazing interior:

or Monastery de Sao Vincente de Fora with incredible oak and marble masterpieces:

and Portuguese tiles:

In a church, I counted six types of marble used for decoration:

And these are just few fragments of the great beauty which was destroyed in devastating earthquake, tsunami, and following fires on November 1, 1755, when 85% of the city buildings were crashed, and about 150,000 died.

The Lisbon chart of great conjunction in 1742 indicates the coming disaster:

with ruler of ascendent Mars in fall on IC.

Closer to the event, the Sun ingress to Libra in 1755, which shows seasonal events, has the same detrimented Mars, again ruling ascendent and placed in 8th house of death:

Finally, the chart of the new Moon preceding the earthquake has detrimented watery Mars in 4th house – this is the bottom of the chart, describing the ground, the shake and the water:

The earthquake started with detrimented Mars in 8th house (ruling 4th house):

Look what is happening to midheaven in this chart. It has a combination of Moon and Jupiter (afflicted by wide square with Mars) - Jupiter rules ascendent, and Moon rules 8th house of death. Still, the combination with angular benefic is benevolent enough to symbolise protective power. This is interesting, especially if we look at the ruler of midheaven which is detrimented Venus in 11th house. The ruler is weak, but there is another force which is capable to substitute it and to diminish the disaster. Who were they, the ruler and the substitution? The ruler was King Joseph I of Portugal who by chance was away from the city that day. The ruling power was Marquis of Pombal
who said “Bury the dead and feed the living”. Guess the sun sign of this pragmatic gentleman. Right, he was Taurus:

This outstanding politician not only restored the city in short time after the earthquake, but also implemented seismically-protected design of new buildings (world’s first earthquake protection, tested by marching troops). Despite the disaster, there were no following epidemics, and the order in the city was perfectly preserved. Marquis of Pombal also designed a survey sent to every parish of the country to ask about unusual behaviour of animals prior the earthquake, changes in wells waters, etc. In fact, this was a valued contribution to seismology.

It is rather late to predict the Lisbon earthquake, but one can clearly see it in the above charts.

Thinking about the dramatic event which certainly broke down the city, I was walking in the hilly streets, gazing at survived buildings and artefacts. Near the city castle I heard a nice song in open-air theatre. This was famous Teresa Salgueiro, whose singing helps to understand roots of art of another performer, Cesaria Evora.

In two days, I fell in love with Portugal, with language, with people who live there. What a great civilization...