M A Y A ' S   M O O N   R E P O R T ,   J U N E   2 0 0 2

"It’s incredibly ironic that one day after weakening the Clean Air Act, Bush travels to the center of the energy industry to collect more money. To let polluting energy companies off the hook one day, and then raise money two blocks from Enron headquarters the next, sends a disturbing message to the thousands of Houston children with asthma and other respiratory diseases."

But not all is gloom. The U.S. Senate voted to preserve the Inheritance Tax, despite the fury of the White House. The Supreme Court outlawed execution of the mentally retarded. In Lima, Peru, six days of protesting the privatization of the water system stopped the process. In California, a judge allowed a human rights violation case against Unocal to go to trial, a first. And the City of San Francisco held a constructive energy summit to address the problem of energy sustainability.

Re the earth: a Princeton epidemiologist finds that all diseases, affecting all species, are rising with global warming. And on the Pacific Coast, the fishing industry will be nearly shut down by a ban on catching depleted West Coast rockfish, which includes many, including some of the most tasty, West Coast fish.

There is much more. We have all been busy, and the U.S. government, with Mars in Gemini, is no slacker. Gemini is quicksilver, and can be elusive and hard to keep up with.

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This Taurus Moon Report

"New Moon in Taurus is about claiming our territory, stabilizing it, maintaining it, and making it productive."

I said that security and information would be the major themes. With the Gemini dominance, pairs are central, as in Israel-Palestine and India-Pakistan.

Israel, whose birthday occurred just as Mercury turned retrograde on May 15, is a Taurus state. Both Sharon and Arafat have Taurus moons, so we could expect a decisive tug-of war for the homeland (moon).

At the New Moon, Benjamin Netanyahu, leader of Israel’s far-right Likkud party, said publicly that "There will never be a Palestine State." Sharon proceeded throughout the month to smash, and re-smash, Palestinian towns and villages. By the end of the month he was talking about killing Arafat, and he was smashing Arafat’s headquarters around him, and shooting at him.

At New Moon, in Kashmir Indian soldiers' families were massacred by Kashmiri terrorists, sponsored by Pakistan. The rightist Indian government cut off diplomatic relations with Pakistan, and the war buildup on both sides escalated. There have been various meetings trying to defuse the conflict, but so far there are a million troops on the border, and tanks and fighter jets are in action, with lots of shooting. Both sides threaten nuclear war.

Latin America has been seething. The main theme was expressed at the Summit in Madrid of Latin American leaders, the European Union, and Caribbean nations: increased attention to globalization’s consequences, including growing poverty and inequality.

In the meantime, the U.S. Senate gave Bush Fast Track for signing the Free Trade Association of the Americas, FTAA, which represents a huge move to increase globalization. With this agreement, every aspect of our lives—in all of the Americas—is put under corporate control. Our hard-won laws of worker, environmental, and minority protection will mean nothing. Secret "trade" tribunals will, and are now, substituting for our courts.

For the Bush Administration, the territory is about expanding government-corporate control through expanded military options and security networks, both international and domestic. Centralization is the key to effective domination of the many by the few.

Every day there are moves in this direction. There are challenges as well, but the Administration skillfully brings another drama on the scene, or trots out another reform, just as things are getting embarrassing. Two major exposures have been the Enron case and the September 11 information problem.

On New Moon, David Duncan testified on the stand to criminal behavior at Enron. Now at the end of the moon month, we hear that Ross Perot Systems supplied the computer system for California energy, and set it up so that there were "holes" which helped the energy companies "game" California—with Enron being the major company involved in this game.

As the month began, GW was on the hotseat due to exposure of memos warning of a terrorist attack before September 11, plus high-level calls from other governments (e.g., Germany, Russia, and Israel) in August and early September warning that there could soon be a terrorist attack by plane on the World Trade Center.

Then Congress began an investigation of the FBI. This was followed by an FBI admission of problems and a planned reorganization of the FBI, including a much larger budget, more agents, and a closer CIA liaision.

The last development, by the end of the month, was Bush’s announcement of the creation of a huge Homeland Security cabinet-level department, combining dozens of other Federal bureaus, and with a $37 billion budget. By month’s end, the "security" and surveillance net in the nation was tightened dramatically.

As the FBI’s problems multiplied, Bush gave a speech in which he added 60 more countries to the list of terrorist threats, and possible targets of U.S. attack.

In regard to "security," at New Moon Bush also announced that construction of the missile defense complex in Alaska would begin June 14. The requisite six months has passed since U.S. withdrawal from the ABM Treaty, which has been a brake on nuclear weapon proliferation since 1972.

During this Taurus moon month, Bush also conducted an around-the-world display of U.S. dominance. GW and Laura Bush made separate trips into Europe and Russia, and Treasury Sec. Paul O’Neill traveled through Africa with rock star Bono.

In Moscow, Bush and Pres. Putin staged a public relations event by signing a nuclear weapons decrease treaty which in effect decreases nothing. In fact, the general commentary is that it increases nuclear danger. There are no specific target reductions, nor is there funding to ensure that reductions actually happen. Either side can withdraw at any time, without having reduced anything.

In Rome, Russia was accepted as a partial member of NATO, and by Full Moon, NATO was opening an office in Moscow.

In Germany, Bush deflected attention from his own totalitarian tendencies by giving a speech to Parliament in which he raised the ghost of Hitler, and said there is now a "new totalitarian threat." In the meantime, there were huge demonstrations in the streets in Germany against U.S. warmongering.

In Paris, Bush visited a WW II cemetery, and made a parallel to "terrorists." Thousands of Parisians demonstrated in the streets for two days, carrying such banners as "Enough greed, enough war," and "Bush, Chirac, Do not bomb Iraq. Let’s stop the war."

At New Moon Jimmy Carter arrived in Cuba to explore the political and economic situation in Cuba, and to open a bridge to the United States. He found that U.S. government claims of biological terrorism labs were false. He also gave a speech on national Cuban television asking for greater democracy in Cuba, and publicizing a group in Cuba which is working for democracy, Varela.

GW countered by going to Florida and giving a speech repeating his hard-line approach to Cuba, thus assuring the anti-Castro voting bloc of support for his brother Jeb in the coming Florida election.

Democracy and freedom took a huge hit during this Taurus month, led by that great paragon of democracy and freedom, the U.S.A. The odds of nuclear war, on the other hand, took a big jump. We might ask, what kind of world best suits the ruling arms makers?

As for me, my territory is my family, friends, and neighbors, and those connections have all been strengthened this month.