Randi Rhodes and Other Bitter Tastes

I glanced at an article about Air America broadcaster Randi Rhodes. This week she was suspended indefinitely for making inappropriate remarks, on stage, about two prominent females, Senator Hillary Clinton and Geraldine Ferraro, at an event sanctioned as a fundraiser for Senator Barack Obama's presidential campaign (see here). I found the information a bit of a yawn initially. After all, it's becoming de rigeur for so called "progressive liberals" to denigrate the two women in question. How "progressive" is it, though, to use gutter language? The group of political left-leaners in the USA who label themselves "progressives", to this onlooker seem like the exact opposite, it's a misnomer if ever I saw one!


I wasn't too intrigued by Ms Rhodes' lack of vocabulary and good taste until I saw her date of birth. 28 January 1959, Brooklyn, NY. She's younger than me, by a stretch, but her birthday is the day after my own. I had hoped that an intelligent Aquarius Sun might display rather more class and evidence of grey matter than this woman appears able to do.

I can immediately think of three other January Aquarians who are less than classy these days - Dick Cheney, Keith Olbermann and Bill Maher, but even they would, I think, stop short of calling Senator Clinton or Ms Ferraro "fucking whores" while on stage.

Aquarius does have the reputation of being a rebel, a radical, a maverick, of course. How this emerges in each individual varies a lot.

Here's a 12noon version of Randi Rhodes' natal chart, I wasn't able to find a time of birth for her.



The first thing I noticed was Saturn at 2 Capricorn. Transiting Pluto is currently one degree away from her natal Saturn at 1 Capricorn. (Saturn in Capricorn is classic hard-nosed Saturn in its own sign. Pluto a powerful and potentially nasty and transformational influence). Add to this the fact that Ms Rhodes' natal Pluto is at 3 Virgo and transiting Saturn is at 2 Virgo, and we have a double whammy of Saturn/Pluto clashes. Nasty, and it doubtless has something to do with current events.

Other notable aspects in this natal chart are an opposition (180*) between Aquarius Sun and ruler of Aquarius, Uranus, in Leo. It's a tense aspect and I'm not sure of its meaning when a sign and its ruler are involved. Even more significant, an out of sign fixed Grand Cross involving 24 Taurus/26 Aquarius/28 Scorpio and 3 Virgo - which is 4 degrees from 28 Leo) planets involved are Mars, Venus, Jupiter, and Pluto (out of sign because Pluto is in early Virgo rather than late Leo). Even if the Grand Cross isn't tight enough square aspects (90*) remain between Jupiter, Venus and Mars - so there's plenty of aggravation and challenge here.

The term Grand Cross refers to "a chart where there are two sets of planets in opposition at right angles to each other." (When the aspects are drawn in the configuration looks like a square with a cross inside it.) "This is an aspect representing very difficult energy; it often denotes frustration, anger, stress, and intensity. However, this aspect also helps with self-growth and endurance."

Coincidentally ascerbic comedian and chat show host Bill Maher and TV talking head Keith Olbermann (both mentioned in the second paragraph, above) have Grand Crosses in their natal charts too - see Bill Maher's natal chart at Astrodatabank (here), and Keith Olbermann's is in an earlier blogpost of mine (here).

So - three January Aquarian Suns all with Grand Cross configurations in their natal charts, all given to ascerbic commentary, which, if unchecked can descend from ascerbic to downright offensive. Coincidence? I think not.