JUNE 2008 Black hole case study

It’s the political junkie’s gift that keeps on giving—as the 2008 Democratic Primary season grinds on to the bitter end, voters may well wonder if in fact this thing will ever be resolved. Take heart—with the final primary on June 3, it’s almost over.

Or is it?

Having virtually crawled across broken glass in her never-say-die pursuit of Barack Obama’s continually increasing lead, Hillary Clinton appears to defy not only political mortality but the laws of mathematics in her relentless quest for the presidency. Will anything short of a convention brawl satisfy her sense of entitlement for this job? Her 2 Scorpio Sun lies on the midpoint of two Black Holes, at 28 Libra and 6 Scorpio, within the event horizon, or orb of influence, of both, and she has had to call upon every ounce of her considerable energy reserves to get her this far. Although allied to these Black Holes, it has usually been the Quasar at 4 Scorpio more closely conjunct her Sun that has seen her through, responsible for her success and visibility, the latter both a blessing and a curse. This cultured and refined daughter of elite Wellesley and Yale, former First Lady of Arkansas and the United States, best noted previously for her shrill tone and aloof coldness, found her voice and her common touch in the last half of this campaign from hell, knocking back boilermakers with the boys, and promising relief from the Federal taxes on the gasoline she did not know how to pump.

Barack Obama has had his own troubles, quite independent of Hillary Clinton. Knocked off his post-partisan, post-racial pedestal and ground underfoot by the virulent pronouncements of the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, his pastor of 20 years; forced to defend his off-the-record psycho-anthropological analysis of the bitterness of rural voters, his distressing sartorial lack of flag lapel pins, and his love of arugula, Obama, too, has found it expedient to guzzle brewskies within camera range. All to appease an American electorate which seems to still vote on the basis of a fantasized kibitzing with their future chief executive over a cold one. His Sun at 12 Leo both conjoins a Maser and opposes a Black Hole, the former providing the electricity and excitement which has propelled his campaign, but also the controversy and volatile sentiments which threaten to derail it; the latter posing the as yet unanswered question—can he remake himself in an image that voters find compelling?

The subtext of this epic struggle is the ongoing translation of Pluto from fiery, idealistic Sagittarius to stolid, pragmatic Capricorn. The first portion of this primary season, until January 25, showed Pluto in Sagittarius, and coincided with the groundswell for Obama and Huckabee, two populist, inspirational, rhetoric-heavy candidates driven by a philosophy of governance more than detailed policy positions. But based on the shift to Capricorn, when we previewed the season in January, I expected to see an ultimate resurgence of candidates representing the old guard, the establishment viewpoint, ones whose resumes showed voters the right stuff.

On the Republican side, with their winner-take-all primaries, this indeed proved to be the case, with pre- and post-Tsunami Tuesday withdrawals from the race by chief rivals Giuliani and Romney leaving party elder McCain the clear eventual nominee (read McCain profile, this issue). Significantly, however, former Baptist minister Huckabee, the Sagittarian candidate, remained in the race, continuing to benefit from the old Plutonian tide, until McCain officially had his Party’s nomination numerically locked up.

On the Democratic side, with its proportional division of delegates, it was much harder for Clinton as the establishment, Capricornian candidate, to overcome Obama’s Sagittarian surge, but she has remorselessly followed the Huckabee model, fighting on until another candidate actually gains the required number of delegates. The chief difference is that Clinton, aided by an election system which this year will not allow either candidate to win this thing on voters’ choices alone, has been able to continue her struggle throughout the campaign season, and quite possibly beyond. Her brief resurgences on March 4's “Mini Super Tuesday” and the Pennsylvania primary on April 22 parenthesized Pluto’s 1 Capricorn station, and represent the period of “buyer’s remorse” on the part of voters for the Sagittarian candidate, which we expected to see as Pluto shifted signs.

But it was not enough. Clinton’s only remaining path to the nomination is to gain a majority through persuading superdelegates to support her over the numeric leader, superdelegates which, due to their position as elected officials and party insiders, represent the very essence of Capricorn, and may well decide for the Capricorn candidate. However, by the time they make their decision in mid-late June, Pluto will be back in Sagittarius, and once again favoring Obama. We’ll galactically dissect the Illinois Senator next month; for now, Hillary Clinton will be the focus in our analysis of the last half of this never-ending primary.

In addition to lying on the midpoint of those two conjunct Black Holes, Clinton’s Sun exactly squares a third at 2 Leo, but she hasn’t had to rely on these energies much, nor learn how to manage them. Her success and achievements have been primarily Quasar-based—first student to address the commencement audience at Wellesley, first First Lady to be charged with a major policy role, first former First Lady to attain political office in her own right, first female Senator from New York. These high profile moments are all courtesy of the Quasar, which acts to illumine and highlight the native in ways others find noteworthy. Success came easily to Clinton, and often Sun/Quasar natives find their path so smoothed that a strong sense of entitlement develops. Throughout, Hillary was able to be who she was—talented, forceful and strident—as any Sun/Quasar native strives to be, and that largely served her, even if it also served to attract corrosive dislike from political opponents who resented her opinionated but principled positions.

Hillary’s first brush with Black Hole reality seems to have come with the now-infamous universal health care attempt in 1993. Promptly dubbed “Hillarycare” by opponents and Harry & Louise’d off the public agenda by a brilliant Republican PR offensive, the abrupt debacle seems to have deflated Hillary’s aplomb. Combined with the devastating GOP sweep of Congress in the midterm elections of 1994, this signaled a period of withdrawal for Hillary, made worse by the public humiliation of the Lewinsky affair. The First Lady seemed to have lost her substance, and the Quasar’s guiding light waned, to be replaced with the uncertainty and insecure footing of the Black Hole.

Once her role as political spouse came forcibly to an end with Bill Clinton’s retirement from the Oval Office, and Hillary became a political figure in her own right with her election to the US Senate, more and more of the Black Hole posturing and self-defining came into play. In numerous Senate stances such as support for the authorization to use military force in Iraq and the outlawing of flag desecration, Clinton chose to play it safe from a national electorate point of view, with an eye to an eventual presidential run, endorsing actions and policies which offended a liberal base of support which had always seen her as more of a true believer in progressive causes than the obviously self-absorbed Bill. This crafting of a new persona is the essence of Black Hole Sun dynamics, but Hillary, unused to being other than what she was, took some time adjusting to it. The new persona was an ill fit, with conservatives suspicious of her motives and liberals feeling betrayed.

Positioning herself as the inevitable establishment candidate with the Clinton bona fides, striding serenely if remorselessly toward her coronation, became more of a minus than a plus in an election year focused on change and turning a fresh page. Ironically, the very experience of being side-by-side with Bill Clinton which gave her rather thin Senate resume substance and credentials, also identified her too fully with three decades of Bush/Clinton domination of Washington. By the time the campaign had this figured out, in the wake of Obama’s stunning 12 contest sweep after Tsunami Tuesday on February 5, there was simply no time to repair the damage or make up the loss.

And so the spin began. Unable to win on the merits, Hillary flailed wildly for weeks, seeking a new voice, an argument which would undercut her opponent’s mathematical superiority. Clinton or her surrogates compiled a dizzying list of alternative theories as to whose votes should and should not count for the nominating process.

Although, obviously, by Constitutional fiat all persons are created equal, apparently all states and voting methods are not, so according to the Clinton campaign talking points, we shouldn’t be counting wins in states with caucuses, where activists dominate the turn-out; nor should we count primary victories in states which are unlikely to vote Democratic in November. States which have never elected a woman to national office or as governor are also suspect. Even swing states don’t count, if her opponent is from them, or if they are contiguous to his home state. And we really shouldn’t be determining this contest by elected delegates in the first place, who in any case are not technically bound to fulfill their districts’ wishes, but should vote their conscience, based on who they believe has a better chance of beating the Republican in November. No, the nomination should be determined by whoever is leading in the popular vote, after we add back in the votes from Florida and Michigan, where Hillary’s was the only name on the ballot, and which we all agreed were not going to count months before the voting, based on their having broken the rules and moved up their primaries into January. These and other metrics were each trotted out in turn, given their lap, and retired.

Hillary’s Mercury at 21 Scorpio opposes the Black Hole at 24 Taurus, the likely source of this roll-out of a broad variety of parallel political universes. The inability to accept facts as facts; the dogged determination to rewrite the rules until a satisfactory predetermined outcome has been reached; the attempt to persuade others that it is they who are viewing events from an incorrect perspective, and that one’s own logic, however convoluted, is superior, are all hallmarks of an active Black Hole Mercury, which can also convey, as in Clinton’s case, a keen, penetrating intelligence, a gift for grappling with detail, strong mental focus, and a retentive memory.

This type of Clintonian parsing of the issues brought more of Hillary’s negatives into play, driving down her “honest and trustworthy” numbers, always a weak spot for her with the public. Then in mid March she was caught in a dilly of a whopper with her Bosnian sniper fire story. As Hillary told the tale on March 17, "I certainly do remember that trip to Bosnia. ... I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base." Other versions told previously on the campaign trail included a corkscrew landing at the airport to avoid stinger missiles, but it was all so much fantasy, a tall tale made all the more incomprehensible by Hillary’s inclusion of the correct, uneventful version in her 2003 biography, “Living History.” In fact, ABC News had archival footage of the First Lady’s Tuzla visit (which she, or someone on her staff, must have known would be the case), which directly contradicted every element of her campaign trail version of the event—there was no sniper fire, no rush for the Humvees, no cancelled reception. In the ABC footage, Hillary is seen walking calmly to receive the floral offerings of an 8-year-old girl, daughter Chelsea and entertainer Sinbad by her side, pausing to chat cordially with military and government representatives before leisurely entering an unarmored vehicle.

The genesis of this is again undoubtedly Black Hole Mercury. When she made the March 17 comments, Mercury at 3 Pisces was trine her Sun and tightly squared the Black Hole at 4 Sagittarius, evoking the self-favorable alternate realty revisionism; and when the ABC News footage was released a week later on March 24, Mercury had moved to 13 Pisces, inconjunct a controversy-provoking Maser and her natal Mars/Pluto conjunction at 14 Leo. It’s difficult to say whether this was an outright lie from Hillary; Black Hole Mercury is as adept at self-deception as it is at deceiving others, and it’s just possible that over the years, and hard pressed for any possible biographical rationale for her fitness as Commander in Chief, however weak, the incident genuinely morphed into the more dramatic version in Hillary’s mind. But in any case, her claim that she “misspoke” is disingenuous, and thoroughly Clintonian. If she’d been under sniper fire in Sarajevo and said Tuzla, that’s misspeaking; if she was never under sniper fire anywhere, that’s lying, or at best, severe self-deception.

But in other respects, the timing of that gaffe was fortunate. The March 17 date fell well after the March 4 “Mini Super Tuesday,” where Hillary had scored victories in Rhode Island, Ohio and Texas (although the final tally of the Lone Star State’s bizarre hybrid “prima-caucus” actually gave Obama a slight edge in delegates) and well before the next primary in Pennsylvania on April 22. The Sun at 14 Pisces for that March 4 battle had highlighted that same Mars/Pluto pairing for Clinton, reigniting her fighting spirit after 12 straight losses to Obama in February. Mercury at 16 Aquarius also lent assistance from its perch atop a media-friendly Pulsar in opposition to Mars/Pluto.

It was a different story on March 11 with Obama’s 61%-37% sweep of Mississippi. The Sun at 21 Pisces was trine her Mercury but inconjunct Saturn at 21 Leo, both aspects exact, bringing out a natal square between the two and deflating her support. At 25 Aquarius, Mercury, the voting/decision-making process itself, exactly conjoined a Quasar and was exactly opposed Obama’s 25 Leo Uranus and exactly semi-sextile his 25 Capricorn Saturn, also exactly trine Clinton’s natal Uranus at 25 Gemini.

The first eruption of the Jeremiah Wright controversy came just as Hillary’s Bosnia story heated up, with Obama giving his speech on race in Philadelphia March 18, the day after Hillary’s remarks. This was followed by the revelation of Obama’s comments at a closed fundraiser in San Francisco on April 6, wherein he concluded that rural voters, long forgotten and failed by successive administrations of both parties (including, significantly, the Clinton Administration), had become “bitter” and in response voted not on economic issues or self interest, but on “guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment.” Hillary capitalized brilliantly on both controversies, and in Pennsylvania, she was in her demographic element, with a closed primary state dominated by older, white, working class voters, with women more than half the electorate. The Black Hole Sun’s native ability to morph into whatever persona best fits the bill was beginning to gain traction for her, and this daughter of privilege was able to parlay childhood outings to her grandfather’s Scranton hunting cabin into a “local girl” advantage.

While Obama drew record crowds of 35,000 in urban Philadelphia, but hurled gutter balls at a bowling alley in Altoona, commiserating with locals on the high price of arugula, both Clintons pursued a whistle stop strategy of energizing rural and small town constituencies, “front porch” gatherings of mere hundreds which nevertheless drew welcome support. Hillary tossed back shots of Crown Royal whiskey with her brew, chowed down on diner fare, and explained that blue collar embrace of faith and firearms was not based in bitterness, but rather in a rich cultural heritage which she shared. In a miracle of Black Hole transmogrification, in a matter of weeks Hillary had transformed herself from policy wonk to populist. She even went so far as to accede to, and seemingly enjoy, an interview with Pittsburgh media magnate Richard Mellon Scaife, one of the principal authors of what she in the ‘90s had styled “the vast right wing conspiracy” to destroy her and her husband, a man whose papers had accused her of the murder of White House counsel and close personal friend Vince Foster. Unfazed by this history, she smilingly accepted his endorsement.

The results were predictable—Clinton took Pennsylvania by nearly ten points on April 22, on a day with the Sun at 2 Taurus exactly opposing her natal Sun, and squaring Obama’s natal Mercury at 1 Leo. Jupiter had now moved to 21 Capricorn, in exact sextile to her natal Mercury, inflating her vote total, and exactly inconjunct her natal Saturn at 21 Leo, encouraging her presidential aspirations. What Mississippi’s Sun had taken away, Pennsylvania’s Jupiter gave back.

When Obama first attempted to derail the Jeremiah Wright controversy with his speech on race, he had denounced his former pastor’s opinions and rhetoric, but not the man himself. Wright repaid this forbearance with a fire-breathing media tour the weekend of April 25, reiterating his divisive stances on racial relations and foreign policy in America in appearances as diverse as PBS’ “Bill Moyers’ Journal” and the National Press Club. The renewed controversy required a sterner, less nuanced, response, which Obama duly gave on April 29, making a definitive break with Wright: “I cannot prevent him from making these remarks," but "when I say I find these comments appalling, I mean it. It contradicts what I'm about and who I am.... It is completely opposed to what I stand for and where I want to take this country.” This deflation of the issue coincided with a pair of Clinton over-reaches, which identified her with her GOP rival John McCain, and allowed Obama to capitalize on his theme of ousting from Washington, not just the Republicans, but politics as usual.

Both over-reaches involved policy positions, one foreign, one domestic. Both were likely urged by that overly optimistic Jupiter clouding her usually pragmatic Mercury square Saturn judgment. In their final pre-Pennsylvania debate on April 16, Hillary had laid out a policy of “massive retaliation” against Iran should they launch an attack on Israel, and then continued with the staggering, but largely ignored, suggestion that this umbrella of protection should be extended to possible Iranian targets of aggression throughout the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia and Dubai, out-hawking uber-hawk McCain. She followed this up in an April 29 appearance on ABC’s “Good Morning America” where she threatened, “I want the Iranians to know that if I'm the president, we will attack Iran [in the event of their attack on Israel]. ... [W]e would be able to totally obliterate them.”

Eyes began to roll, and heads to wag, and Obama’s response to this in his May 4 interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” struck just the right note: “It's not the language we need right now, and I think it's language reflective of George Bush. ... We have had a foreign policy of bluster and saber-rattling and tough talk, and in the meantime have made a series of strategic decisions that have actually strengthened Iran. ... But it is important that we use language that sends a signal to the world community that we're shifting from the sort of cowboy diplomacy, or lack of diplomacy, that we've seen out of George Bush. And this kind of language is not helpful.”

The domestic policy fracas ensued over a proposed suspension of the Federal gas tax, mooted for the peak driving period of June to September, with gas prices rising towards $4 per gallon. McCain made the suggestion first, in a desperate gesture to appear concerned and involved with the economic problems of average Americans. Hillary’s “me-too-ism” was not long in coming, but included an added populist gimmick in replacing the lost revenue by a windfall profits tax on oil companies. As a proposal it was cynical and disingenuous at best, as the removal of 18.4 cents in federal tax per gallon would net the average driver a savings of $35 over the three-month period, and in any case, so close to the time it would become effective, there was no chance of passing the legislation, nor of having it signed into law by Bush. But it was a Hail Mary pander of just the sort the Clinton campaign thought would resonate with blue collar voters, and Hillary played it to the hilt.

Obama struck back with a reasoned response, avoiding the “me too” pitfall and instead pointing out the unfeasibility of the plan, as well as the loss to the economy not only of the revenue itself, which is dedicated to infrastructure repair, but also the loss of jobs for construction workers hired for these projects. Obama was able to splice Clinton and McCain as two old school politicians willing to say or do anything to garner votes.

As May 6th’s North Carolina and Indiana primaries approached, polls fluctuated wildly, with first one candidate then another seeing commanding leads, then evaporating support. The punditry was predictably hedging its bets, but when the dust cleared that Tuesday night, Obama had emerged the clear winner, with substantial margins in North Carolina and a cliffhanging loss in Indiana, with just a few thousand votes separating the candidates. The Sun at 16 Taurus was exactly conjunct a Black Hole, squared Clinton’s Mars/Pluto union at 14 Leo and exactly opposed her 16 Scorpio Venus; Mercury at 5 Gemini exactly opposed a Black Hole and closely squared Obama’s 6 Virgo Black Hole Pluto.

That Sun/Black Hole opposed Clinton’s Venus led to further financial disclosures in the aftermath of the voting: as in the previous January, Clinton had once again loaned her campaign the funds to continue the competition. Additional disbursements of $5 million on April 11, $1 million on May 1, and $450,000 on May 5 brought the grand total of loans to a staggering $11.5 million (a full tenth of both Clintons combined $109 million income since 2000; another 10% went to charity). Black Hole Venus can provide huge income, but also vast expenditure. Early in the campaign, Hillary’s natal Venus/Black Hole opposition had attracted huge amounts of capital, but even from the first, Obama had kept pace or exceeded her quarterly take (his Venus at 1 Cancer is exactly square the supermassive Black Hole at 1 Libra, a deep space heavy-hitter holding more than 100 galaxies in its thrall). In the first quarter of 2007, almost two years before the general election, Clinton had garnered $26 million to Obama’s $25 million, and the numbers just went up from there, but in the aftermath of her unexpected Iowa defeat and February’s decisive losses, Obama’s financial support had grown, and Clinton’s dwindled. By early April Obama’s war chest contained some $42 million, with a few hundred thousand in debts, while Clinton had less than $10 million, with almost $9 million of that sum owed. Each of these loan dates showed further Black Hole activation of Venus, at 5 Aries on 11 April, squared the 5 Capricorn Black Hole; at 0 Taurus on 1 May, opposed the Black Hole at 29 Libra; and at 5 Taurus on May 5, conjunct a Quasar and trine the 5 Capricorn Black Hole. As often with Black Hole Venus finances, it was easy come, easy go.

On May 13 Clinton slaughtered Obama in West Virginia by the largest victory margin of any of the contests, sweeping the state 67%-26%. The Sun at 22 Taurus that day was in exact trine to Jupiter, still at its retrograde station degree of 22 Capricorn. The Sun was also within the event horizon of the Black Hole at 24 Taurus and formed a T-Square with Hillary’s natal Mercury and Saturn. In her victory speech, Hillary once again touted the results as a turning point, stating, “I am more determined than ever to carry on this campaign until everyone has had a chance to have their voices heard... This race isn't over yet.... The bottom line is this—the White House is won in the swing states and I am winning the swing states.” But by the following day’s evening news, her big win had been stomped on by an even bigger story—John Edwards had finally gotten off the fence and endorsed Barack Obama.

On May 20th, Clinton again shellacked Obama in Kentucky, with a 65%-30% victory in a safely Republican state (which, according to the earlier Clinton metrics, shouldn’t count in a Democratic race anyway), and vowed to fight on until the party had a nominee, “whoever she may be.” Obama came back in Oregon that same day with a 16-point win, a state in which he drew a record crowd of 80,000 in an open air rally the previous weekend. With this victory, Obama garnered a majority of the elected delegates (unless, of course, you use the Clinton campaign’s revised numbers, which include the officially discounted Florida and Michigan delegates). The Sun at 29 Taurus was conjunct a Maser, opposed a Quasar, and squared a Black Hole, forming a Galactic T-Square which becomes a loose Grand Cross with the inclusion of Obama’s natal Uranus at 25 Leo; Mercury at 19 Gemini was exactly opposed a Black Hole.

A final factor to be considered in the primary season is asteroids. Fortuitously, there is an asteroid “Hillary,” named for the conqueror of Everest, but just as applicable to Senator Clinton (family tradition states that Hillary Rodham was also named for the explorer, but in fact his history-making ascent did not occur until six years after her birth).

For most of the primary season, asteroid Hillary has been traveling with a companion—Atropos, named for the eldest of the three Fates, the Cutter, who severs the thread of life at death. Atropos’ alternate sobriquet is “the Inevitable,” and that may go far to explaining why the Clinton campaign has been so slow to see the writing on the wall. Hillary’s air of inevitability was convincingly shattered by her third place finish on January 3rd in Iowa, with asteroids Hillary and Atropos exactly conjunct on a news- and media-evoking Pulsar at 26 Capricorn, within orb of Mercury at 22 Capricorn and exactly trine asteroid Karma at 26 Taurus, but her supporters never got that memo. By Tsunami Tuesday on February 5, the pair made a triple threat with Chiron at 15 Aquarius, conjoined another Pulsar and the Sun at 16 Aquarius, retrograde Mercury still in orb at 18, with Hillary exactly semisquare Pluto at 0 Capricorn. She and Obama split the day, but what followed was a full month of constant loss.

On Mini Super Tuesday, March 4, Hillary the candidate won three of four, monoliths Texas and Ohio included, and Hillary the asteroid was now just a degree ahead of Atropos; at 1 Pisces it opposed Saturn at 4 Virgo, sextile Pluto still at 0 Capricorn, and was exactly semisquare Jupiter at 16 Capricorn. Hillary was also combined with Vesta at 7 Pisces, seemingly rekindling the flame of her candidacy. For the Bosnian story debacle on March 17, Hillary and Atropos were still a degree apart, at 7 and 8 Pisces, with Mercury once again entering the fray from 3 Pisces, but the most stunning aspect was an exact opposition from Hillary to asteroid Memoria at 8 Virgo, itself conjunct a pair of Black Holes at 7 and 9 Virgo, evoking the parallel universe memory of the sniper fire that wasn’t. The Pennsylvania primary victory on April 22 was the last occasion on which Hillary and Atropos linked arms, now four degrees apart, at 29 and 25 Pisces respectively, with Hillary conjoined the Black Hole at 28 Pisces and in square to both Pluto at 1 Capricorn retrograde and asteroid Karma at 27 Gemini; Vesta remained conjunct at 1 Aries.

How long will Hillary continue the fight? Her asteroid will square the early Virgo Democratic Convention Sun from early Gemini that last week of August, and is then traveling with asteroid Kassandra, which at 8 Gemini will conjoin a controversy-provoking Maser at 7 Gemini—will Hillary play the role of ignored prophet at the Convention, forecasting doom for the party in November should Obama gain the nomination?

If Hillary manages to pull this thing off, and become the Democratic nominee, on Election Day, 4 November, 2008 the asteroid auguries are not favorable. Asteroid Hillary that day will be retrograde at 7 Gemini, exactly conjunct the volatile Maser and squared a 7 Virgo Black Hole, and traveling with Trans-Neptunian Object Chaos at 10 Gemini, all opposed the Black Hole at 10 Sagittarius and asteroid Pandora, unleashing a parallel universe full of troubles. Not to be outdone, asteroids Monica and Requiem at 19 Scorpio conjoin transit Mars and her natal Mercury at 21 Scorpio, evocative of the Clinton baggage she carries with her, encouraging voters to recall and reflect on the consequences of Bill in the White House for another eight years, and perhaps sounding the death-knell for the Clinton legacy.

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