Impeachment

Yes, I’m going on the record here.  I think the end of Trump’s presidency is coming.  I think this impeachment will grow some teeth.  And unless he dies of a heart attack first, there’s a good chance he’ll be the first president removed from office this way.  And as for whether that starts a civil war - well, the last civil war never really ended, so that’s not much of a threat.  

I’ve just been looking over Richard Nixon’s transits in 1974, looking for similarities.  And there are plenty of them.  Saturn was making a lot of hard aspects to Nixon’s natal chart that year, shutting off his options, one by one.  And the aspects to Trump’s chart look very much like that, with things getting dicier in December, and Pluto delivering some telling blows in January.     

I remember Watergate.  I had a small child at the time, so I wasn’t particularly focused on politics.  I just remember feeling some surprise at the way things inexorably developed, ending with the president’s resignation.  I was already pretty cynical about the whole political machine at that point, assuming it would all coming crashing down in armed revolution pretty soon.  But Nixon’s removal from power was satisfying, and even tempered some of my cynicism.    

And now the same mechanism is shifting into place.  There are so many parallels.  One is that Nixon was an unpleasant guy, with all the ranting and cussing, and it seems like dealing with Trump is equally taxing.  When everybody around you wishes you were gone, I have to think that the universe eventually listens.      

One difference between them is that Nixon was smarter and not as lucky.  His natal chart features a Mercury/Mars/Jupiter conjunction, which got him up to the pinnacle of success (in his terms), and then all three planets oppose Pluto, which represents the Stranger Within.  This spells paranoia.  He projected his demons outwards, and then very effectively squashed them, but conjuring enemies can get out of hand quickly.

Looking at Trump’s chart, I don’t see anywhere the same level of paranoia.  Trump’s dislike is focused on anyone who withholds anything from him - mainly adulation, approval, money, and probably originally candy.  He’s just a spoiled brat with a very minimal attention span.  But he has a lucky sun/Jupiter trine, which often wafts him unhurt over danger zones.

During the rest of October, there are two hard aspects affecting Trump:  a Uranus/Neptune inconjunct and a Neptune/Jupiter inconjunct.  These are irritating, and they indicate repetitive aggravations rather than major change at this point.  It may become impossible to hide certain sensitive financial documents, and other secrets will slowly begin to coalesce into something that threatens his money and prestige.     

Around the third week in October, Trump may (probably accidentally) win back some public approval when Jupiter conjuncts his moon.  Maybe he’ll figure out a scam, something that allows a vast number of people to feel happy.  As a showman, this is his main skill.  But by the end of the month, Jupiter is opposing his sun and inconjunct his Saturn, and the pinch is beginning.  He’ll feel it in his ego.   

For all of us, October begins with three planets in Libra, focusing on law, order, and justice.  Pluto goes direct early in the month, and this brings many of our demons into consciousness.  All of us have fears, desires and ambitions that we don’t want to face, and we project them out into the world.  Trump is definitely one of those demons, created by all of us, bigger in the media than he really is as a human being. 

This impeachment inquiry will require a lot of people to come to terms with the meaning of Trump.  Some folks see him as a strong man who’s on their side against the scary non-white people. Some see him as a distillation of the worst traits of white people.  Some folks see him as a harmless buffoon.  Some see him as a route to lots of conservative judges who will turn women into non-stop baby-making machines.  Some like him being a bad boy, and enjoy insults and outrages.  Some just want to belong.  Some see him as the devil, some as their personal Elvis. 

Because he’s so mercurial, very few haven’t felt queasy at some point about something he’s said or done.  And so October will be a month to ponder this, as Pluto goes direct, and Mercury, Venus and the sun all move into Scorpio.  People will go down a little deeper than they usually do, perhaps connecting more viscerally with the fears that Trump fosters.  Some people experience these fears as a need for Trump to run roughshod over our political system, while others experience them as a dread of the damage he can do. 

Scorpio’s energy tends to be intensely emotional but very private, with a lot happening in the shadows.  But for each of the planets going through Scorpio, the first aspect will be an opposition to Uranus, planet of sudden change.   Uranus brings that intense inner energy outwards, by contradicting it, confronting it, and threatening to destroy old patterns and attachments.  

So through the month, as corruption becomes public, there will be times when the people explode into rebellion.  Protests will be large and noisy.  This will happen in many areas, all over the world.  But here in the US, in the political arena, public outrage is the key to Trump’s conviction.  It’s the only way to bring the Senate around, although this will probably take a few months.     

Change will be a sharp rallying cry in October.  Activists like Greta Thunberg and many others will use this energy to amplify their voices – to delineate the evils done in our name, and to clarify the alternate roads available for us.  We need to be brave enough to risk change, in order to survive.  We actually need to look our demons in the eye, to call their names, and to understand why we created them.    

And when the jack-o-lanterns glow at the end of the month, we may be better acquainted with our own unhinged hungers.  And maybe, down there in the limitless caves of the human psyche, we can find an older, deeper magic – something that will free us from our allegiance to these demons.  Here in the US, impeachment is just one step towards that freedom.