THE WEEK THAT WAS

Still playing out: several sites carried casting suggestions for what is an inevitable outcome of the Petraeus Affair and attendant misdemeanors: a movie. Suggestions for "King David": Daniel Craig or Nicholas Cage. Ms Broadwell, Ms Kelley (interchangeable brunettes): Marisa Tomei and Sandra Bullock. General Allen: Bruce Willis. Mrs Holly Petraeus: Judi Dench.

Twinkies, a "delicacy" to which I was introduced briefly by my husband eager to display the dubious delights of his US childhood to a newly arrived Brit - are no more. Texas-based Hostess, makers of Twinkies, and other, equally dubious delights, is reported to be shutting up shop. The shut-down will put 18,500 workers at 33 bakeries and 565 distribution centers out of work. The company blames a bakers' strike. Cynical others (myself included) suspect the following 4-point plan:

1.Ensure company will soon be on the rocks.
2.Force a strike by threatening a variety of unacceptable changes to worker conditions
3.At a moment politically ripe (Democrat returns to White House) file Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings
4.Blame union.

Without a union, Walmart staff are once again cranking up action in readiness for a huge walk-out on Black Friday - the day after Thanksgiving.
More power to them !

In today's Huffington Post: Walmart's Internal Compensation Documents Reveal Systematic Limit On Advancement.

AND an excellent post at Cannonfire What to do about Walmart

A CEO, John C. Metz, who owns numerous franchises - most in the restaurant business in Florida - best nationally-known being several Denny's diners has decided to
levy a 5% surcharge on his menu items, tell customers it is to cover the increased costs of the Affordable Care Act aka Obamacare. Not a hanging offence and understandable in one way, if a rather excessive amount. But then he also intends to decrease many of his his employees' hours, so as to avoid having to provide health care cover and pay those costs for which he is charging his customers.

"If I leave the prices the same, but say on the menu that there is a 5 percent surcharge for Obamacare, customers have two choices. They can either pay it and tip 15 or 20 percent, or if they really feel so inclined, they can reduce the amount of tip they give to the server, who is the primary beneficiary of Obamacare," Metz told The Huffington Post. "Although it may sound terrible that I'm doing this, it's the only alternative. I've got to pass the cost on to the consumer."

Metz is the franchisor of Hurricane Grill & Wings, which has 48 locations, five of which are corporate owned, and president and owner of RREMC Restaurants, which runs approximately 40 Denny's and several Dairy Queen locations. He planned to use the 5 percent surcharge tactic in all his restaurants starting in January 2014, when Obamacare is fully implemented.

Interesting comment under the HuffPo article:

I have no problem with these right wing fools pushing this BS. This has the potential to push us in two directions. One is of course a push towards a single payer (health care)system, a system that will be much better for the vast majority of our country. The other less obvious one is a push towards working class solidarity that could really lead to the fundamental changes we need to see in our entire economic system. Perhaps even a push to replace the current capital driven system with a worker owned and worker driven system. Look if we get rid of these non-producers at the top of these organizations, people who earn their living off of doing nothing other than exploiting the sweat and effort of others and put the producers (i.e. the employees) in charge then we can get rid of this exploitation cost and put that money in the pockets of the working people of this country, people who will be much more concerned about social outcomes than these current financiers that care only about how much money lines their pockets

Another One Bit the Dust

Recent resignation of CIA Director David Petraeus, a four-star general who led U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq and was, in some circles, thought to be a potential candidate for president, came as quite a surprise. An extra-marital affair with his biographer brought the toppling of this, the latest in a long line of power-merchants who, while wielding power over lives and deaths of The Great Unwashed of the world, seem unable to wield power over their own desires. These individuals may have dubiously valuable talents and skills the rest of us lack, but they are also prey to the same weaknesses. However weak in one department the General has been, I'd have expected him to have exerted a wee bit of restraint when it came to conducting e-mail correspondence with his lover. Ye gods! He was in charge of the CIA - didn't he realise how dangerous leaving an e-mail trail might prove to be? Even if we abandon all hope of these power-hungry bozos possessing some level of integrity, we might still reasonably expect them to possess the power of good judgment. Petraeus earns nothing better than a D minus in this regard!

Most bloggers and commentary on line indicate suspicion of "something else" going on here. It's easy to think up several theories to match circumstances and timing of his resignation - but whatever else is or might be involved here - it wouldn't have been able to happen had he not been conducting an extra-marital affair.

I wrote about Gen. Petraeus in May: USA's Man on Horseback ? In that post, from his natal chart (set for 12 noon as no time of birth is known) I deduced this - was I mistaken?

A quick note about the man himself: well-integrated, nicely balanced personality; as far as I can tell he's no megalomaniac, though Scorpio Sun indicates a passionate and determined individual. There are several planetary configurations, one standing out clearly for me is known by astrologers as a Mystic Rectangle (though not mystic, just evidence of fine integration). This links Sun/Mars/Jupiter/Uranus in a configuration involving harmonious trines and sextiles together with 2 balancing oppositions. Planets involved relate to self(Sun), energy/dynamism/war (Mars), philosophy/expansion/excess (Jupiter), and rebellion/revolt/change (Uranus).

If I now had to identify a possible astrological culprit in light of the current situation - the element in this chart capable of leading such a man off the straight and narrow, I'd point to Scorpio Sun opposite Jupiter in Taurus. I Googled the name of the female said to have been involved, his biographer Paula Broadwell - Wikipedia has her birth date as 9 November 1972. Hmmmm....2 Sun Scorpio characters, he with Jupiter opposing his Sun from Taurus. Recipe for a rumble? I'll abstain from delving into her chart because she's really not (yet) a public figure.

Jupiter planet of excess was in Taurus natally for Petraeus, the sign is ruled by Venus, planet of love. Jupiter is usually thought the most benign of planets. I've questioned this before. From my 2009 post Jupiter the Jovial Juggernaut:

No doubt Jupiter's huge size, when compared with sizes of the innermost planets, seemed to signify excess, generosity, exaggeration, and all manner of things springing therefrom, such as travel far & wide, and publication - sending out information to the masses.

Some regularity has been discerned in the distances between planets in our solar system. Bode's Law is a rule devised centuries ago by astronomers to demonstrate the regularity, it's a rough rule but an interesting one. If Mercury is 4 units of distance from the Sun, the Venus is 4+3, the Earth 4+6, Mars 4+12. Then there's a gap - Jupiter is 4+48, and Saturn more roughly 4+96. That huge gap between Mars and Jupiter, breaking a pattern, and leaving a gap where otherwise another planet might have been expected to form, is thought to have remained empty because Jupiter's gravity prevented another planet from forming in that area. Another theory is that several smaller planets were formed and they collided with one another; or that a single planet was formed but was then destroyed by Jupiter's greater gravitational field.

Bearing these theories in mind, it's odd that Jupiter hasn't gathered a rather more negative reputation in astrology. Astrologers were quick to attribute eccentricity and the unexpected to Uranus because of its eccentric orbit, so why not attribute something like ruthlessness, eradication, a tendency to bully, and/or destruction to that juggernaut of a planet: Jupiter? I know there's no answer to that, but thought I'd ask anyway.

Any other thoughts?

USA's Man on Horseback?

I've no idea how I came to land on a 7 May post at Ian Welsh's eponymous blog, but having done so was immediately drawn in by the subject matter and a thread of 70+ very good comments. Post heading: Will a man on horseback come to rule America?"

Early on, among the comments, Mr Welsh explains that "man on horseback", here relates to a “heroic right wing figure, usually military."

"The archetypical man on horseback was Napoleon. The man on horseback promises to cut through all the bullshit, to make things work again. Mussolini is another one – make the trains run on time. When people get tired of a society that doesn’t work, they will turn to a strong man (or someone they think is strong), to just make society work again."

For the USA such a situation could easily come to pass, sooner or later - later rather than sooner I think, in the absence of dire catastrophe. It's a vision of the future I'd prefer not to entertain, but then, men on horses could, occasionally, be of a different ilk. Real life examples of genuinely benign men on horseback have been few and far between, mythical or fictional ones are easier to come by.

Among comments the name of General David Petraeus, current Director of the CIA, is mentioned more than once as a possible "man on horseback" for the USA. Does he have the astro-credentials for such a position? Without a time of birth for him it's not possible to calculate an exact natal chart, but here's a 12 noon version for 7 November 1952 when he was born, in Cornwall-on-the-Hudson, NY.






A quick note about the man himself: well-integrated, nicely balanced personality; as far as I can tell he's no megalomaniac, though Scorpio Sun indicates a passionate and determined individual. There are several planetary configurations, one standing out clearly for me is known by astrologers as a Mystic Rectangle (though not mystic, just evidence of fine integration). This links Sun/Mars/Jupiter/Uranus in a configuration involving harmonious trines and sextiles together with 2 balancing oppositions. Planets involved relate to self(Sun), energy/dynamism/war (Mars), philosophy/expansion/excess (Jupiter), and rebellion/revolt/change (Uranus).

Now, here's General Petraeus's chart in centre of a bi-wheel with the USA birthchart - the version I use - in the outside ring, (chart for the day the die was cast for the birth of the USA, 2 July 1776.)



Petraeus's Uranus (unexpected change) is, at 18 Cancer, within orb to be considered conjunct the USA's Sun at 11 Cancer.

At noon the natal moons are opposing one another across Cancer-Capricorn....cardinal signs, his Moon likely conjunct Uranus, US Moon conjunct Pluto.

His Venus in Sagittarius is opposed by US Mars in Gemini.

Although there are astrological links here, I am not confident that it all amounts to a hill of beans. But it is another interesting theory upon which to keep a wary eye.