Marjorie

Nicholas Sarkozy, the former ‘bling-bling’ president of France, is facing a raft of charges, and maybe the first of separate trials for corruption and influence-peddling. He allegedly tried to bribe a magistrate in return for information about an investigation into his party finances. Prosecutors also suspect that he and several associates received millions of euros of Libyan cash to fund his 2007 presidential campaign, at a time Gaddafi was in power. All hotly denied.   

  Jacques Chirac, another former right-wing president, was given a two-year suspended prison sentence in 2011 for diverting public funds and abusing public trust during his time as mayor of Paris.

 Sarkozy, born 28 January 1955 10pm Paris, France, has a grandstanding 5^th house Aquarius Sun sextile a hyper-active and assertive 7^th house Mars Moon in Aries, so a full-on personality. He has a lucky Uranus Jupiter in his career 10^th; an unrealistic and slippery Neptune in his 2^nd house of finances trine Mercury, sextile Venus in flamboyant Sagittarius. His Mercury opposes Pluto on the cusp of his 12^th square Saturn in obsessive Scorpio – more than a bit stubborn.

  What’s most telling at the moment on his chart is his Progressed Mars which is moving to square his Pluto, exactly in three months, but in effect now – scary, trapped, powerless. Tr Saturn is also in an uncertain and worrisome square to his 2^nd house Neptune in the final days of this month and the first week of December over the duration of this immediate trial. His Progressed Moon moving through his 12^th for almost a year ahead will be discouraging, a time of endings and soul-searching. Tr Pluto opposing his Uranus from late January 2021, on and off till late 2022, will be unsettling, a time of his ambitions turning upside down.

  His wife Carla Bruni looks less than delighted from late March 2021 onwards with tr Neptune opposition her Virgo Moon and then Pluto for more than a year, which will undermine her domestic security. Plus her Solar Arc Sun is moving to a confused and discontented square to her Neptune within months as well.

   He does have a lucky Jupiter in his 10^th so may escape the worst of adverse judgements. Though it’ll be a sweaty few months ahead. And more beyond that when tr Uranus catches his Fixed T Square towards mid decade.

He has a strong get-it-together 5^th harmonic; a ‘rise-and-fall’ sometimes self-induced 10H; and a marked 9H, which is pleasure and money-seeking.

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Bobby Brown, the US singer, songwriter, rapper and actor has suffered another family tragedy with the loss of the second of his seven children.  Bobby Jnr who was following his father into the music business was found dead at home aged 28. Five years ago Bobbi Kristina, Brown Senior’s daughter with Whitney Houston, then aged 22, was found unconscious from a drug overdose and never recovered, dying six months later. Three years before that Whitney Houston died also from drugs. Her fifteen-year marriage to Brown Snr was marred by drug abuse, violence and infidelity and he was blamed for her downhill slide.

  Born 5 February 1969 at 5.21am Boston, Massachusetts, he was diagnosed with ADD and in his thirties with bi polar disorder and was alcoholic from a young age.

  He has a 2^nd house, financially-oriented Aquarius Sun square a hard-driving and ambitious Mars in Scorpio in his 10^th. What is striking about his chart is challenging Saturnine Yod with his Mars sextile an 8^th house Pluto and Virgo Moon inconjunct Saturn in forced-to-be-self-reliant Aries in his 3^rd house. Yods usually accompany a sense of strain and with Saturn on the focal point it requires great maturity, self-discipline and self-control to handle well – which he clearly has never been able to muster up.

  The 3^rd house can also indicate mental problems, not emotionally based but because there is too much pressure put on the ego-shell.  Although a combination of Mars, Pluto, Moon and Saturn suggests a great deal of emotional turmoil and angst as well.

  He wasn’t handed an easy hand of cards to play, for sure. And working in an addiction-prone business wouldn’t help.

Dolly Parton, a year ago was on a high with a Grand Ole Opry jubilee performance at Nashville being aired on NBC as well as a Netflix series dramatizing the stories behind her songs. Never one to slow down even at nearly 75 she’s got a book, an album and a movie out for Christmas. And her foundation is credited with handing over $1 million for coronavirus research and supporting the work of Covid vaccine company Moderna. Her jam-packed schedule in addition to fitting in song and book writing, performing on stage and in movies, running her charity which donates books to children also includes heading her theme park, Dollywood which is the biggest ticketed tourist attraction in Tennessee and an important local employer.

  Over a sixty year plus career she’s managed to sidestep politics, mastermind a varied and successful career, appealed to a wide cross section of the public and presented what could be a caricature drag-image of a busty blonde and still come across as sympathetic and witty.

  Born dirt poor, the fourth of twelve children, on 19 January 1946 8.25 pm Little River, Tennessee, she started on the Grand Ole Opry aged 13. She has an amazing chart with a charming and ambitious Sun Venus Mercury in Capricorn in her performing 5^th house opposition a tough Saturn Mars in Cancer square Jupiter in Libra in the 2^nd. Mars Saturn will have provided more than her fair share of setbacks and mishaps but also gives her discipline. This heavyweight opposition squares onto a 2^nd house Jupiter, focussing her drive into making money. 

   Her maverick Uranus on her Midheaven is trine Neptune and sextile Pluto – giving her a unique talent, a need to control and the ability to have influence. All the planets in her chart bar one are tied up in those two configurations – a Cardinal T Square and a mini-Grand Trine. The odd one out is her sparsely aspected Virgo Moon in the 12^th which is sextile Jupiter and her North Node and inconjunct her Sun. That may contribute to her sense of aloneness – despite a long marriage, she’s almost never seen with her asphalt-contractor husband (a Sun Cancer with a Libra Moon) and they are apart for long stretches; and have no children.

  She’s been under pressure in the last few years with first tr Uranus in Aries elbowing its way round her Mars Saturn, Sun, Venus and then Jupiter; followed by tr Pluto opposing her Mars Saturn in 2018/19 which would have been punishing. Tr Pluto is now heading to conjunct her Venus and square her Jupiter from February 2021 to late 2022. This will be challenging emotionally, very intense, but also super-confident and lucky.

  She’s one tough lady and a national treasure.

The much-hyped antipathy between the Queen and Margaret Thatcher when PM, is featured in the latest episode of Netflix’s The Crown. Despite criticism that much of this season’s series has played fast and loose with the truth, there were grounds for covering the spat which surfaced in the Sunday Times in July 1986, with HMQ describing Thatcher as ‘uncaring’ for her stance in refusing to condemn apartheid in South Africa. In the heated aftermath the Queen’s press secretary Michael O’Shea was forced to resign.

  In reality there was never as much ongoing hostility between the two grande dames as was made out. Though their similarities wouldn’t always make for a relaxed connection. Both had Saturn in obsessively conscientious Scorpio – Thatcher on her Ascendant and HMQ on her Midheaven, so neither found open-hearted friendliness easy. Both also had Moon Neptune in Leo, so had an inclination to stand on their dignity.

  HMQ’s Mercury in Aries opposed Maggie’s Mars for a mildly argumentative interface.

  Their relationship chart had a private Water Grand Trine of Sun and North Node in a business-like trine to Saturn in an innovative trine to Uranus, formed into a Kite by a friendly Sun opposition Venus. It was hardly at daggers’ drawn though it did have an assertive and impatient Mars on the Ascendant trine Moon.

    There would be minor rough edges which is hardly surprising given their different backgrounds and the fact that the Queen was probably to the left politically of Maggie’s true-blue Tory inclinations – though she’d never admit to it.  

  In later years the Queen extended personal honours to Maggie so there was clearly no lingering animosity.   

Douglas Stuart, a reluctant fashion designer, has won the Booker Prize with ‘Shuggie Bain’, an autobiographical novel, about the lonely gay son of an alcoholic mother in 1980s Glasgow. Described as ‘heartbreaking’ ‘both beautiful and brutal’ it fictionalises Stuart’s love for his mother despite her flaws and his determination to survive and thrive in a homophobic early environment.

  Born 31 May 1976 (wiki), in a housing estate in Glasgow, his father walked out when he was 4, died when he was eight. His mother died when he was 16 of alcoholism.  He credits his childhood with giving him “a large amount of self-reliance, determination. I’m incredibly resilient and focused. I see that a lot of my peers don’t have those things — not knowing the keen edge of need, the fear of having no safety net. Those are the positive things of the way I grew up.”

At 16, he rented a room, working on the tills at a supermarket, while he finished his schooling. He went into textiles, without much enthusiasm but it felt like a safe space being a women-oriented environment after his bullying schooldays.  He became a knitwear designer for Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Banana Republic and Jack Spade. “There was no reverse gear,” he says. “There was nowhere to go back to.” He lives now in New York with his husband, Michael Cary, a curator at Gagosian.

  He started writing Shuggie Bain a decade ago and had it rejected by 32 publishers before it came out to rave reviews.

  He’s a Sun Venus in Gemini opposition Neptune and trine Pluto – that’s a combination which has produced many notables both from 1975 Geminis like Angelina Jolie and Marissa Mayer, ex-CEO Yahoo; in 1976 like Cillian Murphy  (25 May) and Colin Farrell (31 May). Neptune and Pluto in aspect to the Sun appear to generate a sense of driving ambition.

  He’s also got a risk-taking Uranus square Mars and square Saturn; and an indulgent Jupiter in money-magnet Taurus. His Moon is in Cancer trine Uranus and square Pluto hinting at a close bond with mother (Cancer plus Pluto) but one who was also erratic and unpredictable (Moon Uranus).

  His writers’ 21^st harmonic is well-aspected. He intends to give up fashion and take to writing full time.

Another inspirational tough-childhood tale.

Jan Morris, the celebrated travel writer and author, well known as a transgender pioneer, has died aged 94. She led an extraordinary life, a cavalry officer during WW11, marrying and having five children, climbing three-quarters way up Everest to witness Edmund Hillary conquer it in 1953, and reporting in Egypt on the Suez crisis with details that led ultimately to Anthony Eden’s resignation as prime minister. And went on to be an acclaimed writer and historian. All this despite having been aware since she was three or four that she’d been born into the wrong body. She only started to transition in her forties and eventually underwent reassignment surgery, after which she wrote a well-received book about her experience – Conundrum.  She remained attached to her wife and although they divorced they stayed together and formed a civil partnership.  

  Born 2 October 1926, no birth time sadly, in Clevedon, England, she was a Sun and Mercury Libra trine Jupiter in Aquarius and square Pluto – so not lacking in confidence or the ability to communicate with insight. What is most striking about her chart is a Fixed Grand Cross of Saturn in obsessively conscientious Scorpio opposition Mars in Taurus square Jupiter opposition Neptune and perhaps Moon in Leo. A Fixed Grand Cross gives immense endurance, perseverance and obstinacy – much like the Queen and David Attenborough both born in 1926. Mars Saturn has a military connotation and gives discipline and the ability to cope with tough conditions but also suggests an element of unfairness, even cruelty, in childhood. The Jupiter and Neptune would soften the effect. If it was an after noon time birth with the Moon is tied in, it would certainly make the feminine a major issue in life.

  Her Venus in workaholic Virgo also opposed Uranus forming a Mystic Rectangle with the Saturn opposition Mars. Having three central oppositions in the chart she would have a constant struggle to balance the opposites in her temperament.

  Her transition started fittingly enough on the Uranus Pluto in Virgo conjunction of the 1960s – Uranus Pluto pushes the boundaries back, and in Virgo, in particular in the area of health and medicine. But the time of her surgery Pluto had just moved into Libra and tr Uranus was just over the conjunction to her Sun – both bringing profound changes to her identity and life.

 Boris’s adviser on ministerial standards has resigned after he found the Home Secretary Priti Patel guilty of breaking the code in a bullying inquiry and had his finding overturned by the prime minister. Ministers are normally expected to resign if they break the code.

   Says it all really. No shame, no moral authority, no decency.

 Patel was born 29 March 1972, of second-generation immigrant Ugandan-Indians, and is a longstanding Eurosceptic. Under Theresa May she was Secretary of State for International Development though was forced to resign after a political scandal involving unauthorised meetings with the Government of Israel. Patel has been criticised by political opponents for defending the tobacco and alcohol industries.

  She is a Sun and Mercury in pro-active Aries opposition both a controlling Pluto (Moon) and a rebellious Uranus in Libra square Jupiter in Capricorn so she will be ambitious for money and success, as well as status; is overly excitable and wayward. She will be pushily confident with her Sun opposition Pluto square Jupiter, never mind short-tempered from Mars Saturn in a slippery opposition to Neptune.

Simon Jenkins wrote in the Guardian: “Patel’s greatest fans would not laud her subtlety and sensitivity. A lack of experience and chequered ministerial career restored her to high office only because Boris Johnson wanted a right-wing loyalist who would carry his anti-Europeanism to extremes. Patel has set about this with a bludgeon.”

   Her relationship chart with Boris is controlling and marginally chaotic, not quite as bad as his with Dominic Cummings but hardly sympatico.  He does attract himself to dysfunctional relationships.  She did not get on with Dom Cummings and her supposed ‘sisterhood’ pact with Carrie Symonds may be shaken over coming weeks and is sagging badly through 2021. Patel and Gove are also not in lockstep now or moving ahead.

  Her own chart indicates a career loss from late January through February 2021 which sometimes accompanies a firing but may be a mishap of a different variety.

   The other Cabinet member whose continued presence is a shameful astonishment is Robert Jenrick, Secretary of State for Housing, whose planning decisions have raised eyebrows and then some. Born 9 January 1982 (same day as KateM Duchess of Cambridge) a Capricorn square Mars, Saturn and Pluto in Libra, his chart has nothing to indicate anything impeding his progress in the near future. His relationship chart with Boris is an entrepreneurial dream with a composite Fire Grand Trine tied into a Kite with a Sun opposition Pluto – so adventurous, confident, and difficult to unpick.

  While I’m not supporter of an unelected fiancee making political decisions, Carrie, despite her chaotic and volatile triple conjunction in Capricorn plus Mars, does appear to have marginally more sense than Boris. She loathes Jenrick, and vice versa – with a composite Sun Mercury square Mars Saturn in their relationship chart. Mind you she’s not over fond of Rishi Sunak either – perhaps because she sees him as a risk to Boris’s position.

  What a pigs breakfast.

Maybe the Boris government chart with a slippery Neptune trine Mars in vindictive Scorpio sextile a hidden Saturn Pluto Venus in the 12th. Pluto in the 8th and/or 12th in administration charts usually indicates dirty dealing behind the scenes. Saturn in the 1th certainly indicates lack of practicality.

Se previous post: Priti Patel: 24 February 2020

Robert Jenrick 25 June 2020

Lewis Hamilton is now the most successful driver in the history of motor racing with his seven World Championship titles an all-time record (tied with Michael Schumacher). Questions are being asked about why he hasn’t been given a knighthood like other leading sportsmen.

  Motorsport UK chairman David Richards has written to Downing Street saying he deserves it: ‘Throughout Lewis’s journey to the top he has walked a lonely path as the only black driver in F1 and the Black Lives Matter movement has allowed him to speak candidly about his experience. His story is a remarkable one of sheer application, dedication, sacrifice, supreme skill and determination to enter a sport where the odds were stacked immeasurably against him.”

 He does charitable work for the Make A Wish foundation, Save the Children and UNICEF.

 Born 7 January 1985 in Hertford, England, with no verified birth time, he’s an ambitious and successful Sun Jupiter in Capricorn. He was born at the time of the Full Moon in Cancer (split parents) and the opposition is sextile/trine an obsessively conscientious Saturn in Scorpio. He’s also got Pluto in an ultra-determined and courageous trine to a passionately enthusiastic Mars Venus in Pisces; with Mars in a high-octane square to Uranus. He started go-karting when young and progressed on from there.

  This year (and last) are his peak with tr Pluto conjunct his Jupiter with Solar Arc Uranus also conjunct his Jupiter. 2021 won’t be as successful with tr Neptune square his Sun/Saturn midpoint at points; but he will bounce back in 2022 with tr Uranus square his Mars/Jupiter.

  Looking at the quandary of why no honour after his 2008 MBE, his relationship chart with the UK has a fraught and hostile composite Mars opposition Saturn square Pluto Sun, so not an entirely amiable chemistry. He is tax resident in Monaco but so are other sportsman and it hasn’t stopped honours for them.  

Marie Stopes International (MSI) named after the controversial birth control pioneer and women’s rights campaigner is to change its name because of concern about her views on eugenics. In her writings she called for new laws that allowed the “hopelessly rotten and racially diseased” to be sterilised, wrote fiercely against interracial marriage, believed in the creation of a super race and corresponded with Hitler.

Born 15 October 1880 4.10am Edinburgh, into an educated and scientific family she studied botany at university. She had a four year marriage which ended acrimoniously as she claimed it had never been consummated and her husband counter-claimed she was super-sexed to an almost pathological degree. She published a sex manual called Married Love after the divorce. Her son from the second marriage aroused her hostility because of his choice of a bride and she tried to sabotage the union, eventually disinheriting him because of it. 

  She had a combative Sun Mars in Libra opposition an 8^th house Saturn in Aries so would be short-tempered, unsentimental, hard-edged. Interesting to note that Sigmund Freud who also ‘emancipated’ sex as a topic had Saturn in the 8^th.  

   Her persuasive Mercury Venus in Scorpio opposed an 8^th house Neptune; and her emotionally erratic Pisces Moon opposed a 12th house Uranus. A see-saw chart leads to relationship problems and a lifelong struggle to integrate opposites. Her Pluto was in the opinionated 9^th.  

  Her get-it-together 5^th harmonic and perfectionist 7H were strong though her most notable is the leaving-a-legacy-for-history 17H. She did open Britain’s first birth control clinic in 1921 in London, despite medical and religious opposition.

Despite being an influential catalyst for positive change, she was not a pleasant human being.

Pic: https://wellcomeimages.org/indexplus/obf_images/18/45/f14896c5658187a0a1b687a9e268.jpg