With the Moon in Libra as of 11:05p Sunday, its need for social graces, peace, fairness and balance is sorely challenged by fallout from the early AM’s (1:14AM ET) square between rebel Uranus and ruthless Pluto. On the plus side, there’s no Moon void to toss a wrench into your efforts to move forward in a straight line. In the late hours of the evening, note the potential for turbulence as the Moon makes its weekly clash with Uranus and Pluto just after midnight ET.
General planetary patterns of note this week include mental Mercury’s shift from open-mouth-insert-foot Sagittarius into practical, earthbound Capricorn just before midnight on Tuesday. So perhaps we’ll speak no more of that dreadful yet utterly unsurprising batch of Sony emails that were released to the Free World last month, suggesting that racism, sexism and other crass behavior are alive and well among people whose PR machines might prefer we believe are admirable role models. (It seems that nothing has changed in Hollywood since I started my career there eons ago). Then again, given that Venus (social expression, women, money, art) will clash with the Uranus-Pluto square on Saturday, we’re likely to see more upsets and witchy-bitchiness in the headlines, along with stories of unconventional attractions.
Sunday features a New Moon, the Winter Solstice and rebel Uranus turning direct.
Your Moon voids for the week are: Wednesday 12:40AM until 9:52AM ET; a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it break on Friday at 4:11 -4:55PM ET, and a nearly all-day chill time on Sunday, which will end just before the New Moon at 8:36PM ET. Said New Moon occurs at 0 Capricorn — on the Aries Point and thus portends a new lunar cycle of exceptional prominence.
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And now, the news.
Writing this as a hostage drama in Sydney continues to dominate headlines around the world. It started several hours before the sixth exact Uranus-Pluto square, at a time in Sydney when aggressive “rebel with a cause” Mars was on an angle. For dominant headlines on the fifth Uranus-Pluto square in April, look here.
You may recall one April headline about a Princeton study formally declaring that the U.S. is now officially an oligarchy. So it should surprise no one to see in the 1500+ page trillion dollar spending bill that no member of Congress likely read in full (but passed anyway), that key priorities included 1) upping the permissible amount of campaign contributions that can be made by individuals tenfold — to $1.5 million dollars, and 2) rolling back financial regulations that protected taxpayers from assuming the risks of investments made by potentially punch-drunk investment bankers. The “rollback” item, as this article explains, was introduced by Representative Kevin Yoder, Republican of Kansas (the state that also brings you the Koch Brothers), but it was actually drafted by Citigroup.
Are you OK with that? If you are, perhaps you’ve never read The Big Short by Michael Lewis? It’s a riveting book.
Another priority: for the first time in 40 years, middle-class retirees in certain “multi-employer” pension plans may now see their benefits severely cut. Here are a few other “achievements” from the monster spending bill.
Clashes between Uranus and Pluto suggest uprising, and thousands continue to take to the streets around the globe, protesting police brutality against African-Americans here in the U.S. Here’s one from Harvard Medical School. In a related story, the NYT published a report on how disciplinary measures against schoolgirls differ radically depending on race and hue.
Police brutality (Plutonian control vs. Uranian freedom) is pulling focus in other countries, too: Brazil and Mexico, for starters. And in Belgium, the whole country ground to a halt today, paralyzed by strikes — not over police brutality, but over other issues of disparity.
In other news, a mild huzzah is in order in Lima, as that climate change conference I mentioned earlier this month did produce a “breakthrough” agreement “committing every country in the world to reducing the fossil fuel emissions” — as anticipated. Unfortunately, the delegates at that conference are not the people currently serving in the U.S. Congress, whose aforementioned monster spending bill included provisions like this:
The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association scored several victories that require the government to keep its regulatory hands off farms and ranches.
The bill says the government cannot require farmers to report “greenhouse gas emissions from manure management systems.” Nor can it require ranchers to obtain greenhouse gas permits for “methane emissions” produced by bovine flatulence or belching. The Environmental Protection Agency says on its website that “globally, the agriculture sector is the primary source” of methane emissions.
Let’s end on a positive note. It’s the holidays, and there are plenty of acts of random kindness and senseless beauty happening, too. Here’s a list of a few recent generous deeds to inspire your day. There really is enough to go around, if we can all play nice and share our toys.
Thank you for reading this forecast. To find out how planetary patterns are impacting your own personal world, why not schedule a consultation. It’s a great way to start the New Year.
