Tug Of War

The Health Care Battle & U.S. Psychology

     As the health care reform bill edges toward a final decision, supporters and detractors alike are slamming each other in the media and via the airwaves (telephone and e-mail) with desperate last-minute arguments, darkly tinged with suspicions -- not to mention influence-pedaling rumors in many shadowy corners!

A strong, benevolent and devoted Jupiter in the U.S. chart is the primary planetary symbol here.       On this left edge of the nation's bell curve is an expansive heart, a foundational influence for democracy, equality, fairness and philanthropy -- which also tightly binds society.  (Even the Civil War couldn't destroy the Union.)        Historically, the influence arises from the earliest immigrants seeking freedom from Europe's political and religious autocracies and then banding together to form a more perfect union.  The quality is freedom through interdependency, an aspect of selflessness.  Yet, there is also risk in being overly giving.      On the right bell curve edge is an equally potent karma for freedom through independence, again a response to repressive Europe.  Warrior Mars and Rahu (the head of the dragon/snake eclipse point) are the primary planetary symbols.  Mars is in the seventh house of relationships, disrupting and breaking these.  Poisonous Rahu hides in the deep eighth house of life and death, bringing intense fears, turmoil, even calamity.

United States July 4, 1776  Philadelphia Pa, at 6:17 PM

     This is essentially the selfishness necessary for self preservation.  It's the Don't Tread On Me libertarian concept explained in the February 10 Celestial Wheel.  Here again is that flag.

     Yet, there is also a negative quality to this independence, a paranoid mysticism that, beyond rejecting Europe's repressions, has old and deep roots in the country's religious extremism.  From cults to fear-based interpretations of the Bible, there's a common thread of dread that is also eager for Armageddon.  The Rapture is just as much a fabrication as Scientology's science fiction religion.  Notice the potent symbolism in the flag's Mars red color in the rattle snake image.  It brings to mind the old saying, just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me!   Yet this Mars' discord and Rahu's fear are not all bad, for they can restrain excess as well.

     These qualities thereby strike a balance between the overly giving heart and the selfish one.  Help your neighbor harvest his crops, but don't give all your's away!

     These bell curve edges border the center, the great middle of the bell curve, where the great majority call home.  Moderates of both left and right and independents populate this center, and elections thereby hinge on their support.  The center moderates excessive partisanship.  The tightly bonded society, fought over by the two extremes, brings raucous and often acrimonious debates, paving the way to a sensible productive middle road that is truly the American experience.  It's just unfortunate the process is so messy -- but truly, would we have it any another way?

     A challenge, of course, is for the extremes to accept the middle's centrist integration --the winner not to crow and the loser not to hold a grudge. But that is a high hill to climb.  So, even as victors and losers shake hands in good sportsmanship, they also keep their opposite hands in their pockets, or behind their backs.  Recall how the entire nation succumbed to the right's mystical paranoia after 9-11 -- and is still recovering lost confidence and objectivity?  Torture adherents still lurk.  Rahu, as an eclipse point, is a shadow that once activated, is compelling and traumatizing. 

     As discussed many times in The Celestial Wheel (including the March 4, 2010 Commentary) furious debating results as we shift from the Second Gilded Age, through the Millennium Contraction and finally into the Second Progressive Age -- repeating the sequential pattern from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Historical Planetary Cycles

     First, let's consider the U.S. planetary cycles (called Dasas), signaling the above sequence.  The December, 2004 In-depth Forecast, The United States Through Its Planetary Cycles, Part I and Part II, tracked and matched the nation's evolution from 1776 through these cycles. 

     The December, 2007 In-depth, Through The Second Gilded Age, next focused upon the three planetary cycles of Moon, Mars and Rahu that brought:  the First Gilded Age in the 1880s, the Financial Panic of 1893 (which lasted four years) and finally the First Progressive Age beginning in the late 1890s.  As these cycles began repeating starting in late 2008, they map out the same sequence:  Moon 1998 to 2008 -- Second Gilded Age.  Mars 2008 to 2015 -- the Millennium Contraction.  Rahu 2015 to 2033 -- the Second Progressive Age.  So, the U.S. is currently in the early stages of Mars' seven year cycle signaling the Millennium Contraction -- when Second Gilded Age excesses are rejected and wrung out of the economy -- and Progressive concepts are formulated and early reforms are contested.

     Naturally, Second Gilded Age corporate and banking interests won't give up their power and wealth voluntarily, which is why popular protests arising from the Millennium Contraction are resisted.  It's a war pitting liberals against conservatives.  We also call the former progressives and the latter (small government) libertarians.  There's a caveat though, for the Second Gilded Age benefited the only the very rich, corporations and the bankers, a totally different group from populist common-man libertarians.  That the rich use the common man to protect there interests by fanning the flames of paranoia about big government is obvious but rarely acknowledged.

Current Planetary Cycles

     The planetary karmas operating now show that health care reform is an early battle in the war between Second Gilded Age proponents and Second Progressive Age adherents.

     The primary and underlying karma in the U.S. chart's  planetary cycle (Dasas*) is Mars major and Rahu minor.  As explained above, Mars disrupts seventh house relationships and Rahu brings eighth house turmoil, figuratively and literally a life and death struggle.  It's natural, then, that this opening battle in the war is health care reform, which impacts how well and long we live and how and when we die.  Mars/Rahu awakens America's mystical paranoia, injecting fear and hate into the debate.  This Mars major and Rahu minor cycle began April  28, 2009 and will end May 17, 2010.

     The secondary but still potent karma, is the transit* of warrior Mars in Cancer, where it is fallen and thereby harmful in its weakness -- like a sick dog will snap, even bite.  This is natural zodiac's fourth house of the home, emotions and devotion and has some influence.  For the U.S. chart, Cancer is eighth house of catastrophe and turmoil, and this is more impactive and specific.  Both are applicable.  We can see in the former in the religious abortion issue in the health care debate and in the latter, no-holds-bared tactics.  This transit began October 7, 2009 and continues for eight long months to May 27, 2010.

     With birth chart Rahu in the U.S. chart's eighth house of Cancer and active in its planetary cycles, and transit Mars in the eighth house, that is the key house/sign to consider and understand.  The eighth house is deep and mysterious.  It symbolizes the unconscious, including mysticism and sex, which is why it brings such scandals.  Experiencing that dark realm is standing on the edge of the abyss of our own minds.  One client, always brave and self assured, recently stated, I don't trust anybody.  Another used the word apprehension.  Recall the old saying, Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get me!

     When the Vedic planetary cycles and transits match, the karma is confirmed, actualizing in the most impactive and potent results.  This is the case in the U.S. Dasas being Mars/Rahu and the tough Mars transit. 

     That potency is clearly shown in the health care reform debate.  It began last spring with the U.S. Mars/Rahu cycle starting in April, and it became a raging conflict with the Mars transit in Cancer starting early last October.  So, the issue is contested now, and that battle will be fierce until the end of May -- when the U.S. Mars/Rahu planetary cycle ends May 17 and transit Mars finally finishes in Cancer May 26.  Whether the health care reform bill passes or not, fur will fly until June.  

     Here's an example of how vicious the conflict has become -- and how it's lead by the rich.  Yellow Journalism, which first surfaced during the first Mars Dasa's Financial Panic of 1893, was a battle between newspaper titans Pulitzer and Hearst.  Both papers were accused by critics of sensationalizing the news in order to drive up circulation, although the newspapers did serious reporting as well.  We can see Yellow Journalism reborn today, and some of its nineteenth century qualities are eerily evident, again from Wikepedia,

     Although newspapers, web sites, talk radio and cable TV on both sides have all indulged in Yellow Journalism, the star is Glenn Beck, who joined Fox News in October 2008 -- just one month before the U.S. Mars Dasa began.  Beck's popularity, and his sensationalism rose starting last April when the Mars/Rahu cycle started.  It really blossomed beginning last fall, coinciding with the October, 2009 beginning of Mars' transit through Cancer.  Did another charismatic fear-monger join Fox recently?  Or to ask the question another way, who is Sarah Palin?

     Returning to the resistance against progressives, Fox is a giant news corporation, part of The Second Gilded Age's avarice and no-holds-bared competition.  Owner Rupert Murdock is a billionaire.  Fox is only libertarian by ostensibly promoting the rights of the common man against what it calls liberals or progressives to capture market share, which si done via Yellow Journalism -- tapping into America's paranoid mysticism.  This populism is at odds with Fox's reason for existence  -- to protect its Gilded Age power and money against the interests of the little guy.  Do we smell a conspiracy here?

     If you still doubt that Yellow Journalism has returned, consider Fox News' top three inflammatory claims against the democratic controlled Congress: the nuclear option, jamming the bill down our throats and slaughter.  Only Fox News head, the legendary Roger Ayles, who ran Richard Nixon's campaigns, could have thought of these!

The Upcoming Planetary Cycle

         The U.S. planetary cycles change to Mars major and Jupiter minor May 17.  Jupiter's moderating and benevolent influence will both tone down the conflict and bring opportunities for resolution -- regardless of whether the health care reform bill passes or not.  Wisdom. confidence and sound judgment will begin to calm the sea of paranoia.  Sanity will thankfully return, and we'll look back and wonder how nuts everything was!  Fox News' galaxy of stars will fade, especially Glenn Beck.  And too bad for you too, Sarah Palin, but then you've both certainly have been entertaining!  Bill O'Reilly will of course archly claim, I told you so.  This is a fairly long minor cycle, continuing until April 22, 2011. 

     Since the health care diatribes will continue until the end of May, it doesn't really matter whether the current bill passes soon.  In fact, the public's disgust arises in large part from the bill putting thousands of band-aids on a broken system, where all parties are at the trough.  Trying to control costs by reining in health insurance companies and physicians simple isn't enough.  It doesn't work.  For example, doctors suffer from outrageous malpractice premiums and educational costs.  Reforming the tort system and rolling back exorbitant education costs are necessary before doctor's fees can be restrained.  Because the entire system is broken, all aspects of it must be reformed.  That is what the Millennium Contraction will do, regardless of politics, and it's a nasty, unpleasant, long, yet essential process.

(*Vedic Astrology's Dasas are primary because they are analogous to the river of life, down which individuals and nations travel.  Transits, where the planets are in today's skies, are like weather on the river, potent but not as determinative.  Dasas are determined by the all-important Vedic Moon, and transit impacts result from the dispositions of the planets in the signs/houses.)

The Granddaddy Of Conspiracies?

     Does a conspiracy actually control the world?  Is there truly a wizard behind the curtain pulling the strings?  Is it the Illuminati, the Federal Reserve, the Rothchilds, the Neoconservatives, Rupert Murdoch, the Masons, the U.N., aliens?  Is Glenn Beck right about the hidden meanings in Manhattan's gargoyles and statues?  Is there a truly deeply-hidden and nefarious master conspiracy?

     If you answer yes, then Roger Ayles et al have won in their attempt to prey on American's mystical paranoia to preserve their own power. 

     If you answer no, then maybe you're right and actually sane, but what about the unholy alliance between Bill Gates and  Warren Buffet, the two richest people in the world, the latter of whom is called The Wizard of Omaha?  Glenn Buck would say, well, if Buffet is known as a wizard, then he must be part of the conspiracy, maybe even the guy who pulls all the strings.  Yet, Roger Ayles looks suspiciously like Jabba The Hut, and President Obama sue appears an incarnation of a certain Pharaoh...

     And, Dick Cheney?   Well, we all know Star Wars' favorite villain, Yoda.

     June can't come soon enough!