The Meaning of the Moon
2003 Moon Cycle Reports:
Virgo (August)
Leo (July)
Cancer (July)
Gemini (June)
Taurus (May)
Aries (April)
Pisces (March)
Aquarius (Feb)
Capricorn (Jan)
Sagittarius (Dec)
2003 Moon Cycle Reports:
Virgo (August)
Leo (July)
Cancer (July)
Gemini (June)
Taurus (May)
Aries (April)
Pisces (March)
Aquarius (Feb)
Capricorn (Jan)
Sagittarius (Dec)
2002 Moon Reports:
December
November
October
September
August
July
June
April-May
March
February
January
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M A Y A ' S L I B R A / S C O R P I O M O O N R E P O R T The Libra moon cycle began with the Libra New Moon on September 25, and the Scorpio cycle began with the Scorpio New Moon on October 25. These are the two major relationship cycles, and October and November were all about balance and power in connections. Libra is about equality and fairness in relationships. Scorpio is about deep merging, and working with one another’s resources. They both motivate personal engagement with others. Saturn is traveling in Cancer, the family sign, and during much of this time it opposed Churn in Capricorn, bringing new dimensions to social roles. I, for instance, experienced quality visiting with all of my children, and their families. This included traveling to Santa Cruz, CA, Mexico City, and Seward, Alaska, firmly fixing my growing role as matriarch. Sagittarius, the sign of travel, is strong now, and it is the sign on my fifth house of children. Iraq is descending into chaos. There were several centers of activity which manifested strongly during both months. The Iraq theater of war was one of those. (Libra is also the sign of war and peace.) Conflict steadily increased as the days moved on, not surprising when each side continually attacks the other side. During the Scorpio cycle, as Pluto conjoined Venus, and Mars opposed Jupiter, the U.S. began a program of dropping 2,000-lb. bombs on Iraqi neighborhoods, and later in the month began razing neighborhoods with tanks and bulldozers. No one knows the number of Iraqi casualties. Reporters’ estimates range from 10,000 to 50,000. "We’re creating terrorists faster than we can destroy them," said Stephen Zunes. (During the past two years, U.S. military and intelligence forces have been training with the Israelis.) Conflicts with other nations are being created in the Mideast. Turkey threatened to invade Iraq if the U.S. didn’t get the Kurds out of the mountains. (Kurdistan IS mountainous.) Italian troops and installations are being attacked because they are supporting the U.S. Europe and Russia are peeved with the U.S. go-it-alone attitude, and are not cooperating with the autocratic U.S. U.S. casualties are not negligible. A U.S. military hospital in Germany reports over 7,000 wounded U.S. soldiers admitted. GW has forbidden photos of caskets and funerals, and has not attended one funeral. He has also discontinued awarding the Purple Heart, in order to obscure the number of wounded soldiers. The soldiers have long waits for medical care, and have to pay for every extra. Those who want to return to the U.S. for their leaves have to pay for their own airfare. Having those veterans in the U.S. is dangerous for the government, for here they can talk face-to-face with dear ones about their conditions in Iraq. There are reports of soldiers who have tried to speak of circumstances in e-mails home being punished. Bush, in the meantime, announced millions for additional military cemeteries; very cheering. Many families in the U.S. are uniting to expose the treatment of U.S. soldiers by their government. And again, we learn that the military is punishing soldiers whose families speak out. Living conditions within Iraq are far more difficult than they were under sanctions. Electricity, water, and sewage are functioning very poorly. People are unemployed and underpaid. Saddam’s strict labor laws remain in effect, and they include no organizing of workers. Iraqi people say that it’s been eight months now, and even though they’re glad to have Saddam gone, life remains much more difficult than it was. The U.S. has taken full charge of Iraq and all of its governance and resources. They will not allow the UN or others to help, (except with money), and it is only the U.S. who is giving out contracts for development. (Halliburton has by far the bulk of them.) The U.S. says that 100% of Iraq can be sold to foreign contractors, and it has already passed laws favorable to corporations, such as a 15% limit on corporate taxes. Some say that at the present rate, Iraq will be lost due to the greed of Cheney, Bush and friends. It is true that the greatest opposition to the U.S. is being generated by the corporate takeover. There may not be security, power, and water, but the U.S. has speedily set Iraq Inc. on its way. Most Iraqis have a yearning to govern themselves and to reconstruct their country, and want U.S. troops out NOW. They are an intelligent, capable, well-educated people. No one is happy with the status quo, probably not even the Bush Administration, certainly not in regard to public opinion re the coming election. Cheney is in trouble. Bush is in trouble. Watch out for a distracting scenario. The U.S. Congress voted to give Bush $87 billion for the Iraq war. What little accountability was asked for by Congress has now been gutted by Wolfowitz. $66 billion of the total is to support the U.S. military in Iraq. Someone figured out that comes to $4.4 million for each soldier deployed over there. A U.S. attack on Syria appears imminent. In the Middle East, the U.S. is also working up to an attack on Syria. The anti-Syria propaganda campaign has moved into full gear, and is very similar to the U.S. media buildup against Iraq. An attack could come very soon, for transiting Pluto will oppose Syria’s Jupiter in Gemini on January 1, 2004. In 2005, Pluto squares Syria’s Virgo Sun. The U.S. is doing this because Syria has historically remained independent. Also, the bulk of Syria’s trade is with the European Union, and Syria has a plan to increase cooperation with the EU and with Mediterranean neighbors. This orientation angers U.S. corporations and banks. Syria offered the U.S. special help in intelligence after 9-11, but on the other hand, it voted against the March Iraqi attack by the U.S. On November 11, after the Lunar Eclipse, the U.S. Congress passed the Syria Accountability Act, which imposes very tough economic sanctions on Syria. Israel persists in occupation. Palestine persists in surviving. Israel continues to step up attacks on Palestine, as its occupation proceeds apace. At the same time, the idea of peace strengthens. Four ex-security chiefs in Israel said that the present situation was totally untenable and very dangerous, and that peace was necessary. A large contingent of Israeli pilots have refused to fly bombing sorties over Palestine. And experienced negotiators on both sides met on their own, in Geneva, to hammer out a peace agreement which gives both sides concessions. Ariel Sharon announced immediately that Israel would not even discuss the agreement. Finally, the monstrous wall around the West Bank which is under construction by Israel is receiving international attention. The wall takes a large percentage of good Palestinian farmland, expropriates dozens of Palestinian water wells, and shuts Palestinian farmers off from their land. The Israelis bulldoze farms, homes and villages to make room for the wall. When finished, it will effectively annex more than 50% of the West Bank into Israel. The average width of the barrier is 180 feet. It includes an electric fence that monitors nearby movement, as well as barbed wire fences, a deep trench, and another fence. There are very few doors in the fence, so that getting to their lands on the other side takes hours for Palestinians—if they are even allowed through the Israeli checkpoints. WTO protests escalate. During these two months there were many protests against WTO policies in the Western Hemisphere. Instead of prosperity, these policies are bringing impoverishment, draining money and resources away, and undermining local farmers, businesses, and governments. Bolivia showed a major success as the people supported massive strikes which brought down the WTO-oriented president, and brought control of their natural gas back to Bolivia. In Miami, the U.S. trade delegation had a second major setback. Following up on their victory in Cancun in September, activists and government leaders from major Latin American countries scuttled the talks in Miami which were supposed to create a NAFTA on steroids for the western hemisphere. NAFTA has proved disastrous to farmers and workers in both Mexico and the United States—but a bonanza to U.S. corporations. Workers speak up in the U.S. Ceres, who relates to work in general and to the food chain in particular, continues its months-long association with the U.S. Mercury. Grocery store workers at three large southern California chains struck, and remain on strike. Health benefits are the major bargaining point. Grocery store workers in some stores in the Bay Area have also struck. Walmart, the largest employer in the U.S., has several suits and complaints filed against them in the courts. They are notorious for bad labor practices, including gender discrimination, and cheating workers on time/money issues. Media reform has become an issue. Since the Federal Communication Commission decision in June allowing much greater media merging, there have been discussions in every venue, from the halls of Congress, to the meetings of activists, about media reform. This has been a hot topic during these two months. Democrats vie for a presidential nomination. And last but not least, the Democrats have been taking their Presidential-hopeful show on the road. Gen. Wesley Clark has joined the fray. Demos are speaking out with much criticism of Bush’s policies, and giving the Democratic Party some backbone. However, the only candidate who addresses the roots of both the Iraq problem, and the U.S. economic problems is Dennis Kucinich, who does not have the media’s blessing. At this point, Scorpio Howard Dean, governor of Vermont, seems to lead the pack. He has courage, honesty, and does not seem to be heavily invested in the corporate-ruled establishment. Climate balance is changing rapidly. On September 25, the day of the Libra New Moon, we heard that the largest ice shelf in Antarctica split in half, for the first time in 3000 years. Is the balance changing? Scientists have announced that there is no doubt about humankind’s activities being a major cause of global warming. Russia just pulled out of the Kyoto Treaty. Around this same time we read of the huge jump in heating of the hot basins in Yellowstone Park. A hot bulge has been measured under Yellowstone Lake in the Rockies. Yellowstone Lake is a big mountain lake and has always been very cold. Now it has warmed so quickly that it is full of dead fish. Scientists say that there could be a huge volcanic eruption in Yellowstone. I’ve noticed planetary power lines through the Rockies for months, but have assumed it was the workings of the U.S. weapons and strategic factories and centers there. It is likely that those Pluto lines show hot magma building up in the earth. The heat was also on in southern California, which was ravaged with fires. Every year, during September and October, California is a huge tinderbox. Later, during water sign Scorpio time, Los Angeles suffered floods. Rebalancing is a Libran theme. Lady Justice is Libran. With the Libra New Moon, Supreme Court Justice Kennedy said, in regard to the prison system in the U.S., "Our resources are misspent, our punishment too severe, our sentences too long." Politics was a fertile field during this time. In California, Democrat Gray Davis (Capricorn) was recalled as governor, and Republican Arnold Schwartzenegger (Leo) was elected governor. He appointed Donna Arduin as his Finance Officer, a job she held in Florida, where her assignment was to make Jeb Bush look good. GW Bush himself was invited on a rare state visit to Britain. This visit had been planned months ago as a victory celebration, but coming now, with the mess in Iraq, and the heat on Prime Minister Tony Blair for lying and for supporting Bush, it was embarrassing. Protests against Bush were massive, and he was sealed off from real connections with legislators or with people. Apparently the visits with the royal family were very tense. Bush suddenly showed up for an hour with the troops in Iraq on Thanksgiving. The papers featured him holding aloft a turkey (symbolic?) which those in the know said was plastic (also symbolic). The Republicans (read Karl Rove) are going after state control. Besides the coup of the governorship in California, state legislatures in both Colorado and Texas were illegally redistricted to give Republicans sure districts. In Washington, CIA agent Valerie Plame was outed by the White House (likely Rove again) in revenge for her husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, speaking out about the Administration’s prior knowledge of the fraudulence of the story that Iraq bought Uranium from Nigeria. Wilson knew that story because he had been asked by Cheney’s office to investigate, did so, and reported that the "letter" of "evidence" was fraudulent. (Still, knowing that, Colin Powell displayed it before the UN as "evidence", and Bush referred to it in his State of the Union address.) Mike Leavitt, lobbyist for energy companies, was appointed chief of EPA. The Democrats did have some success. They filibustered, and blocked the ratifications of three very right-wing judges to federal judgeships. Each of them has demonstrated heavy policy-making from the bench, and said they intended to continue this mode of justice. Democrats, with some Republican help, also blocked the huge omnibus energy bill. Senator John McCain called it, "The No Lobbyist Left Behind bill." However, it will come up again in 2004. On Wall Street, there were big scandals re mutual funds. The U.S.’s Guantanamo Prison on the island of Cuba has been in for criticism from many sources, including the Red Cross, for inhumane conditions, and for breaking international law. Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, held its first human rights conference. And China sent out its first space launch. The European Union is busy creating a constitution. They are also putting together an informal group to discuss social problems, as well as creating a European defense establishment. The government of Pres. Fox of Mexico is in trouble, largely due to the disastrous effects of NAFTA on the Mexican economy. Not only farmers and workers are adversely affected, but the business sector is also suffering from the effects of NAFTA’s opening of the Mexican economy to the depredations of U.S. corporations. |
