At the Edge of the Stage

Now we know who to thank for helping two young reporters take down the second most evil American presidency of our lifetimes.

His name is Mark Felt: Leo Sun, Pisces Moon, and born the year of the Ox -- cautious, steadfast, determined. He was mentor to the young Bob Woodward, then-recently graduated from Yale and discharged from the Navy, at a time when his life lacked any apparent direction. As Woodward found his calling as a reporter, Felt made his way up the ranks of the FBI. The two remained friends. Eventually, Felt took the number two post at the agency -- effectively running the organization, since the number one guy was a political hack installed by Nixon after the infamous J. Edgar Hoover died in May 1972.

About six weeks after Hoover's death, on June 17, 1972, the Watergate break-in happened: five men were arrested for bugging the Democratic National Headquarters on behalf of "Creep," The Committee to Re-Elect the President -- that is, the Nixon campaign.

Woodward, who initially covered the break-in story as a city-beat reporter, called up his mentor and friend, who was willing to help. But for many obvious reasons, Felt needed the relationship to be kept secret, so it continued underground, in a parking garage, actually. And so it happened that one of the highest-ranking law enforcement officials in the country became the secret source who helped two 27-year-old journalists untangle the astonishing web of lies that was Watergate.

While used as the namesake for everything from Travelgate to Contragate to Cookiegate, precious few people today understand Watergate and what it meant to the United States. Basically, we live in a country where the president, no matter who, is considered a saint. This is part of the sweet naive quality of many Americans, and it's part of a denial trip, but it's also pretty thickheaded of us. Watergate was a knock on the head; a warning. It was a reminder that absolute power still corrupts absolutely.

And it was a message to the power establishment that a few people with courage and a printing press can take on the dark side and win.

That's a deeply important message for our times.

If you have not been properly introduced to Watergate, you will, I assure you, have a lot of fun watching All The President's Men, the film of the book based on Woodward and Carl Bernstein's coverage of the scandal in the Washington Post. You will, I hope, be inspired by a reminder of a time when a newspaper had the sense of mission to trust its own reporters, forget the advertisers, and tell the truth.

That Mark Felt's identity remained a secret for three decades is amazing. Some people knew, of course. One of Carl Bernstein's kids is said to have revealed the name at summer camp. People speculated about Felt in books. Journalists made inquiries to him. A civil rights lawyer I worked for knew who it was. But neither the media community, nor the government community, nor the public, had any confirmation or even real evidence. Most of us had never heard of Mark Felt until this week.

So, why now? Why does this information emerge now?

Felt, now 91, told The New York Times this week that he came forward (in a Vanity Fair article by John D. O'Connor) because he needed the money. It's extremely impressive that he waited this long. I also don't believe him. I don't think he wanted to take this secret to his grave, and in truth, it really helps that he is here in person to show his face, and confirm the veracity that he is who he is. And he deserves our thanks.

But there were cosmic triggers involved in this revelation, and there are a couple yet to come. The first is a long-term aspect that stretches all through the spring, which I've written about before: the Chiron-Nessus conjunction. This looked more than interesting and, in Aquarius, looked like it carried a lot of power to the people punch. Somewhere back in my coverage of the Bush inauguration, I recall saying it would come as quite a shock to the administration.

This development counts. And it will have repercussions.

A more local, immediate development was the Mars-Moon occultation in Pisces earlier in the week -- that is, the Moon making an exact eclipse to Mars. This aspect, as it repeats, has come with some interesting developments in recent years, including the alleged suicide death of David Kelly, the British weapons expert who said the British government had "sexed up" its intelligence about Hussein's alleged WMDs. Then there was another one on the day Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected governor of California. Though it did not get much press, Arnie mysteriously becoming governor was part of a complex situation involving the Enron scandal and its involvement in the California energy crisis of 2000.

And then we had a Moon-Mars occultation close to eclipses of the Sun and Moon in October 2004 (right before the election), as well as an occultation of Mars by the Moon in early November right after the election. This aspect follows scandals around like a detective, no, like an investigative reporter.

So by the time of this week's event, I was basically waiting to see what would pop out of the cosmic box.

This week's Moon-Mars occultation occurred right in the mix of a Mars-Pluto-Venus-Pallas Athene grand square (four planets in a cross) that was exact the morning of May 31. In this mix, we had Pluto energy, which is the shadow material that pushes the human race forward in its soul evolution; with Mars coming in for an exact square to Pluto, forcing an issue or situation to develop; Venus in Gemini kept the intelligence level to a maximum, and included the side of the media (Gemini) capable of expressing values (Venus); and last and certainly not least, we had involvement of Pallas Athene, a slow-moving asteroid directly involved with government, politics and law: that, and a true friend to the people.

Then -- with a great big popping sound -- came the latest occultation of Mars by the Moon. These all functioned as one simultaneous event on May 31, the day Deep Throat's identity was revealed. Do you love it?

Once we had the guy, we had his astrology.

I could say much about Felt's natal chart, and I began a discussion of it Thursday on Jonathan Cainer's site under the Q & A section. But what his chart comes down to, when you take away all the personality, the bells and the whistles, is that he has Pluto in the first degree of Cancer. Think of all the impact of Pluto, itself capable of affecting millions, changing society, toppling the World Trade Center, or forcing us to get our lives together.

Then, add that to the first degree of a cardinal sign: in this case, Cancer. This placement is a reference to the Aries Point, the first degree of Aries, which is the beginning of the entire zodiac. The first degree of Aries is 90 degrees from the first degree of Cancer; the two are directly connected.

Events involving the Aries Point, or people with it prominent in their charts, have impact. Their lives can affect many people. They have a connection to the public and the public has a connection to them. This is the degree of the zodiac bearing the message, "The personal is political." By extension, the first degree of any of the cardinal signs -- Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn, the degrees the Sun crosses on the first day of any new season -- have a similar feeling and effect. In recent years, the Aries Point axis has been popping up as particularly influential.

It was directly involved in the Sept. 11 situation, which we now know is complex and deeply scandalous. This continued as the story developed over the years, including its demented morph into the Iraq war. And in a fairly strange twist, the Aries Point was directly involved in the Asian tsunami, which came at a Full Moon in the early degrees of Cancer and Capricorn.

Deep Throat has the Aries Point armed with a nuclear warhead -- Pluto -- which, because he was a trained counter-spy and a very effective law enforcement officer, he knew how to use judiciously. It helped that his Cancer Pluto opposed a lot of old Dick Nixon's planets in Capricorn and the last degree of Sagittarius. It helped that Deep Throat was coming up for his Pluto-square-Pluto transit at the time of Watergate (at that point in history, Pluto-square-Pluto happened much later in life than it does for us today, which is due to Pluto's elliptical orbit).

But most of all, it helped that Mark Felt has a conscience. And, whatever may have helped him, he demonstrated that one person with some power and a soul, and who is faithful to his relationships, and trusts people, including young people, can do a lot of good for the world.

At this point, I propose a moment of reflecting on the future. We are entering an Aries Point moment the like of which we have not seen since 2001.

First, as I write, Venus is newly arrived in the first degree of Cancer. Then, Mars itself crosses the Aries Point on June 11.

Then, overnight June 21 to 22, there is a Full Moon with the Sun in its exact solstice position -- the first degree of Cancer, with the Moon in the first degree of Capricorn. This is a direct reference to the monstrous total eclipse of the Sun on the Cancer solstice in 2001 that ushered in the "post 9-11 world." And it's a more intense repeat of the astrology of the tsunami, which was a Full Moon across the same axis of the zodiac -- but this time it's a lot more focused.

The Capricorn Full Moon is followed about one month later by Saturn entering Leo, and immediately opposing Chiron in Aquarius. This is the fourth or so repeat of this aspect and the first one across Leo-Aquarius. Think of the symbolism; the regal one (Saturn in Leo) meets the people (Chiron in Aquarius). This series of oppositions itself represents a critical historical process where Saturn, the power structure, is being reshaped by Chiron, a healing influence and populist force for progress.

Cousins, it's gonna be an interesting summer, and it starts sooner than you think. My take is that June 22 represents events that are a peak moment in the 21st Century So Far.

Here is the Vanity Fair piece on Deep Throat:

http://vanityfair.com/commentary/content/articles/050530roco02

Here is some background on the Aries Point. There's tons more in the Cainer Q/A archives.

http://planetwaves.net/astrology/libram87.html

A Political Wave

Jude, moderator of our Political Waves list, posted Bob Woodward's account of his relationship with Mark Felt. Her introduction is worth reprinting here. Jude writes:

I can only imagine that Bob Woodward wrote this article hundreds of times in his mind over the last thirty years, snatches of it intruding in his dreams and moments of reflection. Imagine a thirty-year secret of this magnitude -- one that led to the loss of America's innocence as regards its political leaders and the shattering of its White House mythology.

I know we're all concerned about the ease with which George Bush has captured our nation's mentality, and lower emotional nature. Think if there hadn't been a Bob Woodward or a Mark Felt, how many more of us would be on this bandwagon, oblivious to the covert "back room deal" and naively trusting of presidential power ... and because I believe that there is Design in the Universe, and even the affairs of so small a planet as this Earth, that disillusionment that was given us at their hands has prepared us for this moment, this crisis, the political upheaval that we face today.

Coming to us at this point in history, this revelation is a gift of remembrance -- of a time when the average citizen still believed he had a voice, when the media had guts, when the nation took notice, when the turning cogs of internal corruption finally fell in on itself and brought down the machine of state.

Thirty years later, in a presidency fully as paranoid and secretive as Nixon's, we find ourselves served by this echo. Oh-so-slowly, the smoke is clearing on Bush's bonfire of the vanities -- and this incident is a welcome wind from the past.

Here is Woodward's article:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Political_Waves/message/3513

Happy Birthday, Gemini!

Reading over someone's shoulder on a recent flight from Amsterdam to Newark, I saw mention in a mainstream article about how emotional intelligence is a prerequisite for leadership. That's a good thing to remember now, particularly given that your ambition may be functioning quite automatically, while your emotional intelligence needs to be something you access manually.

Whatever the past year has delivered, the results have arrived, and now you've got many options open. Or to put it even more simply, you've got options, period. But the act of guiding your life through choices, and by extension, the lives of the people near you through the impact you have on them, is something that will take leadership. This will mean listening to your feelings while not getting swamped in them. It will mean working within your limits at the same time you honor them.

And it will mean being aware of your resources and putting them to work, one of which is your capacity to not only think clearly but to feel your own needs and your own values, and act on them according to what you know is right. This is easier than we think, but in a world where we're influenced by everyone else's values, sometimes with enormous force, we do need to be extremely conscious of who we are and what we hold as important. It is a fine line to tread, listening to others while at the same time doing what you think is right.

Or rather, what you know is right. It may have nothing to do with what anyone else thinks. You may meet active resistance, or more to the point, resistance form internal influences you have been carrying for years and are still working to overcome. But you can do it; you stand in a rare moment of clarity, of self-awareness and of the drive for the freedom to exist with permission only from yourself.

I doubt that you'll ever be someone who sees yourself as truly equal to the world around you. I doubt you will ever minimize the impact of key partners, lovers or individuals who seem to hold such a strong place in your life. But now, and perhaps for a long time, you have the option to stand as if you are equal, as if your views matter and as if your own intelligence is subject to inner affirmation before it is subject to your own doubts. Practice at this and you'll get better at it.

This does not negate relationship; rather, it requires that a new kind of relationship become a habit you live by.

Aries (March 20-April 19)
Expressing your ideas in language remains not only the best therapy but also the most productive use of your energy. You have quite a bit of that at the moment and if you lapse in your commitment to how important your creative process is to your well-being, you may find yourself making more enemies than friends. You could just as well put the enormous leverage of your soul into making the world a better place, and filling it with the expressions of your heartfelt compassion for people, or your visions of beauty. The line between love and fear is not exactly thin, but it does come down to a choice.

Taurus (April 19-May 20)
As you've recently discovered, compassion is a more informative state of being than suspicion. You've done an excellent job shifting your perception of yourself from being a victim of people seemingly more powerful than yourself, to seeing yourself as one who can help any situation by offering the simple gift of caring. Events that come to pass in the next few days will have dramatic results around the Full Moon on June 22. Take care that you bring as much love into every situation as you can, as by doing so you're planting the seeds of a more secure future for everyone.

Gemini (May 20-June 21)
All that could prevent you from maintaining such an unusually strong position is not noticing that you're there. Another would be allowing petty resentments to build to a point where they no longer seem reasonable. If you handle the small matters of your life, you will likely see how easy it will be for you to take mastery over the larger ones. This odd thing called fate has been working for you very well these days, but it's not really fate at all; rather, your current life is not just evidence that decisions matter; it's evidence that in truth, little else does.

Cancer (June 21-July 22)
If recent years of your life have brought you one gift, it's that you've become a more stable person, rather than someone given to moods and whims of emotion. You've earned this privilege by crawling out, at long last, from under the rock that so many people call life. The entire problem with depression is that it affects many people without them even knowing it, and then the vibe has a way of spreading. It takes so many forms it's difficult to see that they all have something in common. But in truth, it's a state of mind that's easiest to see from the outside, which is where I trust you find yourself today: because there is healing in the air and in your soul, and at the moment, there is a blessing on your head.

Leo (July 22-Aug. 23)
Whatever has been going on in your life lately, the reasoning behind it is suddenly becoming a lot more transparent. There is nothing random about the path of your life, even though it's had its erratic or unpredictable moments lately. You can now see the extent to which other people, both friends and colleagues, are poised to be far more helpful than you may have imagined, and you may also be noticing how eager they are to go along with your strange or creative plans. Whatever you are scheming, it has the power to benefit everyone. But you have a good track record, so you don't need to do any sell jobs.

Virgo (Aug. 23-Sep. 22)
A professional opportunity seems to have arisen out of the blue sky. Actually, though, this one has quite a long history and I am sure you have pages of notes on the issue. Think back to about two months ago, the last time this scenario is likely to have arisen. Read them over and make sure you've looked at the issue three or four different ways. As long as you're willing to make decisions, there's a real chance for a positive change now. Meanwhile, I suggest you beware of any ideas like 'relationships conflict with work'. It would seem that your desire to engage others in a real discussion is good for your whole life story.

Libra (Sep. 22-Oct. 23)
You can see now that allowing yourself freedom of thought and expression has its virtues. Major virtues. Not just for you but for a lot of people who are depending on you to be the one with the clue. That is correct. It only helps that at the moment you really can see both sides of a certain issue, and it helps a lot more that you know exactly which side you're leaning to. You don't need to tell anyone what to think, but you might want to make sure you do exactly what you know is right, because it actually is.

Scorpio (Oct. 23-Nov. 22)
Beware of any power play you might be inclined to pull off. I hope this advice is not coming too late; and if you've been involved in some rough play with anyone you care about, or value, or whose trust you need, then take a moment and apologize or at least offer some conciliation. You've been under a lot of pressure and I would hazard a guess that where certain emotional situations are concerned, you may not really understand exactly how you feel. Communication remains the key to both peace of mind and peace in your world.

Sagittarius (Nov. 22-Dec. 22)
If any relationship situation seems to be calling for a sacrifice of some kind, forget it. It's not true. You have plenty to give, and you will benefit from giving it. But whoever is on the receiving end will receive a gift far more important than you can imagine. You also have very little you actually need right now -- your own requirements are quite well taken care of. So keep the focus on others, and see if you can get them to talk about what they're afraid to ask for, particularly from you. No matter what the appearance -- there is something genuinely important you'll learn, and you can in fact respond.

Capricorn (Dec. 22-Jan. 20)
Remember, you are always selling yourself. But it helps if you're subtle about it. For once, your efforts and talent are not going unnoticed. The fact that people don't speak up is more about them than it is about you. So you may need to be your own most vocal advocate of your contributions. Keep your presentation simple and enter any discussion with the idea that people will be receptive; if you can do that, the chances are they will treat you with the respect you deserve. This is not just astrology that affects you on the work front; it has quite a bit of involvement with what's going on at home, too.

Aquarius (Jan. 20-Feb. 19)
Most people run for cover when they are seized by a creative revelation, or even when one comes knocking on their inner door. It's way too threatening to the status quo, or there may be the typical insecurity about how 'it's not such a good idea' or 'I'm not up to it'. Please get over these typically lame responses to human brilliance and while you're at it, give the status quo a shake. Whatever you've got going, it's hot, and deserves your attention, and both you and it, whatever it is, will benefit from that attention now. This looks like a daring idea of some kind; get it going, please.

Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20)
You're headed for a significant revelation about what you are doing, where you're doing it, and who you're doing it with. Continue to pay close attention to how physical space feels. Pay attention to how your creative energy flows, and what you create, depending on where you are and who you're with. You do need solid data -- though in the end, I think you'll be making a decision of some kind based on nothing other than how you feel on the most intuitive level; it's like the truth will just come to you, and it will work for you. And if it does, it's only because you've asked for it, and you've decided to trust that it's the thing you want the most.

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