By Milky Way Maid

Mercury is quite a troublemaker this week. First, Mercury conjuncts Mars on Sunday night. This is great for making impassioned speeches in debates, but also produces the most unfortunate cutting remarks and flaming rows. Practice biting your tongue. Mercury is conjunct Neptune early Thursday; this can lead to very fuzzy and wishful thinking so make sure you pay attention to traffic on the commute in to work. (Neptune can lead to accidents, wrong turns, getting lost, etc.) It is also capable of producing insights into larger spiritual or philosophical matters, but please stay grounded in your everyday transactions.

Venus can be problematic too because it goes retrograde on Friday at 15 degrees Aries. Make sure you have a cash supply and have made up with your mate. Commodities ruled by Venus include sugar, cattle, copper, banks, the dollar, art and jewelry, and I think butter. The degrees of the stations are not mutation degrees nor critical degrees, (but it is a world degree so it does not look as if these points will cause drastic price swings. Maybe something will occur regarding government support prices, trade, or something like that. Venus' core meaning is VALUE; what do you value? That is the question.

Readers can follow not only their Sun sign horoscope but also the sign of their Ascendant for further clues to how your week will develop.

ARIES - March 20-April 19 – Venus goes stationary retrograde in your sign on Friday. See above notes. Venus is at the midpoint between Jupiter-Juno in Aquarius and Pallas Athena in Gemini; sorry I am not a specialist with midpoints but you will be the fulcrum between the clubs you belong to and the local papers announcing meetings and events. Perhaps you gain the job of recording secretary or promotions officer. I wonder how you manage to juggle your calendar with all the club meetings and dinners with friends.

TAURUS - April 20-May 20 – The week starts with the Moon in Taurus till very early Tuesday. A sextile from the Moon to Sun in Pisces favors dinner with friends Sunday. Take care not to overdo anything that evening, tho. Monday morning you are raring to get to work and can get a lot done (doublecheck your instructions), tho you peter out before quitting time; have a decent lunch to keep your energy up. You'll wind up grabbing some sugary junk otherwise. Monday will be an exhausting day due to several squares so be well prepared. Wed. or Thurs. you benefit from a conference with a woman counselor or advisor.

GEMINI - May 21-June 20 – The Moon is in Gemini from very early Tuesday till Thursday morn. You will probably be delighted with your tax refund. Career and relations with the boss could be a challenge tho so be prepared with progress reports and soothing words for ruffled feathers. Wednesday is full of both challenges and ease. You and a woman friend enjoy a moment before work; perhaps a jog or a coffee together? The work day agenda is full so expect to keep your shoulder to the wheel. Fortunately your energies are up to the task. Ask for a good joke in the afternoon; a square to Uranus can tickle your funny bone, and I bet you have fun retelling it that night.

CANCER - June 21-July 22 – The Moon is in Cancer from Thursday morning till Saturday morning. Take care not to say anything you would not repeat, or you might kill a relationship that means a lot to you. Make a decision to seek counseling together rather than throw away years of memories. Friday's sextile to Saturn favors getting lots of work done, also consulting with seniors. Friday evening it's OK to knock off work and relax with a comedy or the TV, or go out dancing. You may be affected by the Venus station in Aries, in your solar tenth house of career, so brace yourself for the worst but hope for the best.

LEO - July 23-Aug. 22 – The Moon is in Leo from Saturday morning thru the weekend. The Moon is inconjunct Pluto Saturday, a creative aspect. You might have fun converting found items into art or some other use. Leo is one of the more creative signs, and BTW loves children too, so you might adapt something into a play set or a sandbox for the youngsters. The Venus station affects your ninth house of higher education; it is possible that a tuition fees could change or course offerings get trimmed. If you have publishing projects, this period is better suited to writing or revising rather than sales or getting approvals.

VIRGO - Aug. 23-Sept. 22 – Saturn in your sign is getting a lengthy workout, with the inconjunction to all those planets in Aquarius: Jupiter, Juno, Mars, Mercury, Chiron, Neptune. Whew. The latter planets are past the exact aspect so the pressure should ease; however, you are probably the disciplinarian and referee and teacher to many people who just want you to let them be 'free'. Perhaps some of your charges might be ready to take greater responsibility in return for a bit of leeway. Offer makeup points for extra papers, projects, etc. A child may get use of the car on Sat. night if he does the grocery shopping, for example.

LIBRA - Sept. 23-Oct. 22 – All those planets in Aquarius are trining your natal planets, but gosh, I can't imagine how you decide what to do first. Your solar fifth house is overflowing with Jupiter, Juno, Mars, Mercury, Chiron, Neptune, plus a trine to Pallas in Gemini. The fifth house rules children, creative and artistic pursuits, speculation (stock market, gambling), and pleasures/entertainment. Probably all of those are very active right now, with Pallas in the solar ninth house helping you get published or noticed on the national stage. You were getting a moderately helpful boost from Venus sextiling Aquarius, but now she is stationing; use some time in seclusion to good effect.

SCORPIO - Oct. 23-Nov. 21 – Your co-ruler Mars is conjunct Mercury on Sunday night; take care to drop the sarcasm especially at home, with family members. Venus stations in your solar sixth house of health and job; brace yourself for cutbacks at work but hope for the best. Pluto is solidly in your third house now; cultivate influential neighbors, siblings, relatives that you can trade services with. BTW Ceres is in your solar eleventh house of friends (and clubs) thru July; sounds great for having dinner with friends on a regular basis – just bring the home-baked bread or wine.

SAGITTARIUS - Nov. 22-Dec. 21 – Your solar third house is really busy with the many planets in Aquarius; Jupiter receives a trine from Pallas in Gemini, too. Pallas in your opposite sign signifies that a spouse or partner is a capable career person and knows how the system works; let him or her take the reins to manage things for the best possible outcome. Venus will station in your fifth house of children and speculation (such as the stock market); perhaps a child will decide you are not their favorite person but you know how that goes.

CAPRICORN - Dec. 22-Jan. 19 – The Moon makes challenging aspects to Pluto transiting your sign on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday; perhaps you are frustrated by a seeming loss of control over situations. Cie la vie, as they say; learn to roll with the punches and adapt your game plan as needed. Call on contacts who are Virgo and Pisces. The Virgo may be someone in the legal, publishing, or education field, whereas the Pisces may be a relative or neighbor. Both have some insights and soothing dinners to offer.

AQUARIUS - Jan. 20-Feb. 17 – Mercury is conjunct Mars in your sign Sunday night; measure your words or even better, count ten before saying anything. This past January and February must have seemed like you were inside a mixing bowl. Everyone is coming to you for something, expecting that you have resources and answers. Maybe so, maybe not. But you will need to have a good receptionist-type person to screen calls and ration your time. Venus stations in your solar third house, not an angular house fortunately but it could bring nagging problems with neighbors or siblings. Stay cool as always and perhaps you could chat with a child about it, one who has tabs on the facts.

PISCES - Feb. 18-March 19 – The Sun will square Pallas in Gemini in your solar fourth house of home and family; this brings challenges as you try to disentangle your house from the mortgage crisis; perhaps a family member is in better shape to buy it from you and let you lease it back. The Sun will also sextile Vesta in Taurus; you might find it helpful to journal about your feelings and experiences to help you process all that is going on around you.

Green “Comet of Cooperation” Lulin in Sign of Libra; How PERFECT is That?

How intriguing a year this is. A green comet is discovered and is brightening into an international superstar. Lulin is in the sign Libra, and appropriately enough it is dubbed the “comet of cooperation” because it was discovered in a cooperative effort between China and Taiwan. Stars are frequently colored, but I am not familiar with any other colored comets. What is the significance of this green comet passing thru Libra?

Green: Money. Ecology. Spring. Life. All of them apply when trying to assess the meaning of this comet and its course thru the sky.

The spot in the sky where it was placed was very close to the star Zubenelgenubi, whose Arabic name translates as “the price to be paid”, a karmic or societal price. (The Scales were formerly thought to be part of the constellation Scorpio, with the claws turned into the balances of Libra. Zubenelgenubi's companion star in the other claw is Zubeneschamali, the dharmic side of the equation. Together they mete out justice, represented by the Scales held by statues of Justice everywhere.)

According to Nick Anthony Fiorenza, “The theme suggested by Zubeneschamali is to create a new path that frees up / balances the karmic pattern of the past (discussed above with the Zubenelgenubi alignments). Karma (Zubenelgenubi) is not something to perpetuate, it simply indicates past scenarios, patterns or situations established from previous experience. Dharma (Zubeneschamali), Karma's counterpart, is how we resolve or balance those established patterns or life scenarios by creating new experience--to create equipoise. Hence the meaning of Libra's scale or balance; and as the Chelae of the Scorpion--indicating soul growth through the balance of incarnate experience, or otherwise stay perpetually entrapped in the claws of incarnate experience.” (from one of his webpages at http://www.lunarplanner.com/HCpages/Pluto-Ixion-Quaoar-synod.html)

So my opinion is that the current economic crisis is the direct result of the fact that we let shakers and movers of Wall Street dictate how much or little oversight they would accept from government. Companies had begun chiseling fees from customers, and if some were assessed in error, so what; no one was around to force them to refund the unjust charges. Companies became ravening wolves, gobbling up resources, slashing American jobs, outsourcing as much work as possible, all in quest of ever rising profits. Buying up another company often meant raping the environment in order to generate revenues to pay off the leveraged debt (created by the buyout). Execs found ways to move revenues, real or faked, into their own golden parachute funds and outrageous bonuses.

What kind of economy can support that kind of economic rape for long? None.

Hence the arrival of a messenger signaling that the time has come for “the price that must be paid”. All those outrageous news items about bonuses, corporate retreats at luxury spas, company jets, and on and on, were to bring to the forefront the need for a re-ordered society.

I am not saying we have to kill all the execs and filthy rich. But I am saying that we are receiving a message to live in a more sustainable fashion, closer to our mother earth.

I do not have a crystal ball with which to see any details on what life in such a society might actually look like, but it is clear we have to accept changes to our lifestyle.

Included are a couple illustrations. The star-map showing the comet Lulin in Libra is from http://emsnews2.wordpress.com/2009/02/08/green-comets-in-libra-global-warming/. Credit goes to Elaine Meinel Supkis. It shows the view south on Feb. 6, 2009, with Virgo lying down, Spica at her apparent butt, her arms and head off to the right. The comet Lulin is indicated at the point of a triangle where Zubenelgenubi is its point. Scorpius is in the lower left.

The other illustration is another version of the skymap, with the outlines of Libra's Balance shown. It is an old illustration based on a 10th century Persian source, al-Sufi. It shows the two balances, the upper one has Zubeneschamali as its main star. The lower one has Zubenelgenubi, the name highlighted in reverse, as its main star. The constellations Ophiuchus (uper left), Virgo (upper right), Scorpius (lower left) and Hydra (lower right) help orient the reader.

By Milky Way Maid

The New Moon happens to fall on Mardi Gras this year. The Sun and Moon conjoin at 6 degrees Pisces at 8:35 pm Eastern Time, with Neptune close by. Actually the series of contacts is: Moon conjunct Neptune Monday night; New Moon Tuesday evening; Moon conjunct Uranus and opposite Saturn on Wednesday.

Neptune is idealistic, while the Uranus-Saturn opposition is the change/stability continuum -- a continuum that We the People voted on when it was exact last November. The public is not pleased by recent evidence that it is politics as usual in Washington; that is not what they voted for. People may rise up and shout not only Yes We Can, but You Are Changing Too If We Have to Drag You Kicking and Screaming. Politicians beware; expect an avalanche of phone calls to the White House and Congressional switchboards.

Readers can follow not only their Sun sign horoscope but also the sign of their Ascendant for further clues to how your week will develop.

ARIES - March 20-April 19 – The Moon is in Aries from Thursday afternoon till Saturday night. Mercury sextiles Venus in your sign on Tuesday; this favors sales and shopping, as you will find a fair price. The Moon in Aries squares Pluto on Thursday evening; this favors heavy-duty research and also sorting out what to keep or dump. Your eye is keener and your judgment steady, like a gardener pruning a tree or grapevine to increase the next harvest. Friday is productive with the Moon-Venus conjunction sextiling Jupiter in Aries; those in artistic fields, including hairdressers, may progress to another level. Your idea of relaxing tonight involves friendly rivalry (touch football or darts?) (Mercury-Mars).

TAURUS - April 20-May 20 – The New Moon energizes your solar eleventh house of friends, and formal and informal groups. Perhaps you join a group based on sharing skills and information so that everyone benefits. The Mercury-Jupiter conjunction on Monday may signal some positive moves in your career; sign up for a class or put out resumes.

GEMINI - May 21-June 20 - The New Moon energizes your solar tenth house of career. It may be a challenging situation like so many who are getting laid off or their hours cut, but you are flexible enough to see new opportunities to make a few bucks on the side. The Mercury-Jupiter conjunction on Monday may spur action on college plans or legal issues; call back the registrar or lawyer to find out the latest moves.

CANCER - June 21-July 22 - The New Moon energizes your solar ninth house of law, higher education, publishing and religion. Check up on your college applications, call your lawyer or agent; keep the channels of communication open because chance remarks may open up some new tips. The Mercury-Jupiter conjunction on Monday may bring news in eighth house matters like insurance or estate settlement.

LEO - July 23-Aug. 22 - The New Moon energizes your solar eighth house of generational issues like estates and heredity. Check your mom's drawers to see if dad left her another life insurance policy somewhere. Perhaps you will enjoy browsing old family photos and deciding who your kids most take after; scan the pictures onto a CD or an online family album. The Mercury-Jupiter conjunction on Monday may mean you meet a terrific new significant other, or enjoy a book club together.

VIRGO - Aug. 23-Sept. 22 – Ceres in Virgo gets a creative aspect from the Moon on Sunday morn; maybe creating a new omelette for family members gets your juices going, or sketching out the victory garden plans. BTW Mom probably won't feel like cooking supper on Tuesday. The New Moon energizes your solar seventh house of partnerships and marriage. Plan to spend quality time with your loved one; look for a marriage enrichment seminar for long-term returns on a modest investment.

LIBRA - Sept. 23-Oct. 22 - The New Moon energizes your solar sixth house of health and work/labor issues. You like the idea that fairness rules all human relations, even those that are inherently unequal. Perhaps you can volunteer some time to local community groups. There is always a chance that your own health may need attention; surely you didn't let your routine get out of balance, did you?

SCORPIO - Oct. 23-Nov. 21 – The Mercury-Jupiter conjunction in your fourth house of home may signal a real steal of a deal, or beginning a great new class in what realty is all about. The New Moon energizes your solar fifth house of arts and speculation. Artists may find a new source of inspiration just before the New Moon due to a lunar contact with Neptune. You might also find some bargains too cheap to pass up on the stock market.

SAGITTARIUS - Nov. 22-Dec. 21 - The New Moon energizes your solar fourth house of home and family. Sag is not known for hanging around the homestead but you might find some kindred soul among relatives, odd as it seems to you. The Mercury-Jupiter conjunction on Monday may bring a chance meeting with a relative or neighbor that is a real boon.

CAPRICORN - Dec. 22-Jan. 19 – Pluto in Capricorn is sextiled by the Moon on Tuesday; ask followup questions and conduct further research on pressing issues. The New Moon energizes your solar third house of neighbors, relatives and communications. Chance conversations over the back fence or at the local grocery can open up new contacts. Send out flyers or newsletters with special offers for informational lectures.

AQUARIUS - Jan. 20-Feb. 17 – The Moon is in Aquarius from the previous Saturday till Tuesday morning. On Sunday the Moon joins Mercury and Jupiter, (also Mars later in the day) which should incidentally boost sales of all kinds. Engage in sales, college studies or testing, write or lecture, or take to the stage. On Monday the Moon conjoins Neptune while Mercury conjoins Jupiter; you could misplace your keys but grasp a broader ideal, and talk inspirationally about it. (Neptune is also good for dance, enjoying films and arts, photography, and dreams; try checking out dreams.ca for info on how to incubate a dream. Mercury in your sign sextiles Venus on Wednesday; this also favors sales or at least pitching a presentation.

PISCES - Feb. 18-March 19 – The Moon is in Pisces from Tuesday morning till Thursday afternoon. The Moon sextiles Pluto about midday Tuesday; this favors research so hit the library, or relax with a good mystery novel. Later that day, the Moon joins the Sun in a Mardi Gras New Moon; this one affects you personally. You could feel pulled in opposite directions between change and staying the course, but try to find a way to adjust without costing too much. Some change is inevitable so take control early.

Getting graphic helps financial astrologers see the larger economic patterns

by Milky Way Maid

While I do not specialize in financial astrology, I do like to look at the overall big picture indicators of an up or down market. I finally pulled out the graphic charts I had made for 2007 and 2008, and was excited to see that some major celestial events correlated to a downturn in the economy. I was more surprised to see that the recession may have started as far back as September 2007.

First, take a look at the graphic chart for 2007. You see that the transit lines for Venus, Mercury, Sun and Saturn all cross about mid-August 2007; they are at 26-29 degrees Leo; note also that Venus is retrograde at this point, and did not go direct till Sept. 8 at 16 degrees Leo. Also the Sun, Mercury, Jupiter and Pluto crossed lines about Dec. 11, 2007, at 28-29 degrees Sagittarius.

Bear with me a bit longer as we take a look at the 2008 graphic chart. It is not very unusual when Sun, Mercury and Venus cross paths, as they do June 7-8, 2008. Mars and Saturn cross in July, and then Saturn, Venus and Mercury in mid-August. The most significant event was of course in mid-September, when the stock market crashed. What astrological event happened then? Mars crashed the Venus-Mercury party with the bad news from Saturn.

Later in the year, Sun-Mercury and Mars converged at the end of November, around Thanksgiving and what should have been the kickoff for another holiday shopping season. There was no joy in Vendorville, with only Wal-Mart and Amazon claiming successful holiday sales reports.

Sharp convergences like these produce definite effects in economic indicators such as the stock market. Whether they mark highs or lows in the market depends on other factors. One factor is whether Venus is 'ahead of' or 'behind' the Sun. Venus is ahead of the Sun when moving from the Inferior Conjunction to the Superior Conjunction. Venus is behind the Sun when moving from the Superior to the Inferior Conjunction. Another factor is crossing the nodes of the Moon. This is a subject for another article, tho.

Let's go back to basic rulerships. In economics, the Sun is the vitality of the economy, gold, and a standard of value.

Mercury is traders and speculators, those who move quickly in and out of the market – and also the data that traders crunch to find opportunities. Mercury is paper money, transportation and some machinery.

Venus is investors, those who prefer to buy and hold, those who look for good value and a fair exchange. Venus also rules sugar, copper, cattle, art, jewelry, and the dollar.

Mars is debt, loans, fees and taxes. Mars represents anyone who takes a cut of your transaction: the broker, the person whose table space you rented, the loan officer, the IRS, the bank that charges interest on your loan, the credit card company that charges interest on your balance, and interest rates themselves. Mars is also the pure speculator who shorts stocks, buys distressed merchandise at auction and in general profits on the hard luck of others. He drives the hard bargain and wants something thrown in for free “just to get rid of it”. Mars also rules metals like iron and steel.

So when Mars joined up with the main trading planets in September, 2008, especially after the negative prior conjunction with so-villain Saturn, the stock market finally decided there was heck to pay for the mortgage fiasco, a fiasco that had been brewing for a couple years but which was ignored or minimized or bundled and resold till nothing more could be done.

I kept hearing from others that their mutual funds were down in their January 2008 reports. So finally I started checking around to see if there were any indicators of trouble sometime in the fall of 2007. I found a couple items.

First, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) released a report dated Feb. 28, 2008 on the fourth quarter of 2007. (You can read this article at www.BEA.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/2008/gdp407p.htm). It said:

The deceleration in real GDP growth in the fourth quarter primarily reflected a downturn in inventory investment and decelerations in exports, in PCE, and in federal government spending that were partly offset by a downturn in imports.
Final sales of computers contributed 0.16 percentage point to the fourth-quarter growth in real GDP after contributing 0.28 percentage point to the third-quarter growth. Motor vehicle output subtracted 0.85 percentage point from the fourth-quarter growth in real GDP after contributing 0.36 percentage point to the third-quarter growth.

Then, Peter G. Miller wrote an article for FHAloanPros.com in April 2008 in which he states: “According to the latest data available from Standard and Poors/Case-Shiller, home prices fell 5.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2007 and were down 8.9 percent from a year earlier — the largest declines in the 20-year history of that series.”

An article on Money Morning website dates March 27, 2008, “Fourth Quarter GDP Unrevised; Flat First Quarter Expected” includes this quote: '"The credit crunch and rising inflation teamed to put the economy flat on its back in the final three months of 2007," IDEAglobal economist Joseph Brusuelas told Thomson Financial News.'

And lastly, astrologer Randall Ashbourne wrote an item titled, A Dow Theory Bear Signal (sorry I lost the exact date but sometime in the fall of 2007). In that piece he points out a bear sell signal of new lower lows in both the Dow Industrials and in the Dow Transports. In other words there was a dissonance between the amount of goods being produced and the amount of goods being transported (delivered) to retail outlets. In his words: “And again the logic is simple … the trains and trucks aren’t moving as much stuff as the factories are apparently still producing.”
So all these indicators – Dow industrials and transports, home prices, computer sales, slowing exports, all were giving us bad news by the end of 2007.

We could talk all day about technical analysis and the fine points of all these sector indicators. But the main point of this article is that the turns in the market were being signaled by the patterns in the sky made by the transiting trading planets – Sun, Venus, Mercury, (plus Mars). These patterns are what financial astrologer Barbara Koval called “the Serpent in the Sky” -- the graph of the above planets as they travel through the signs.

Hold on to this article because I will refer back to it in future articles. You might want to bookmark it or print it out so you can look at the graphic charts – or try running some graphic charts of your own.

PS -- Graphic charts can generated using the Solar Fire software. NOT selling anything, I just forgot to mention this when I posted the article.

SOURCES of Financial Data/Reports:
Fourth Quarter Report, BEA (Bureau of Economic Analysis) report, BEA.gov, released Feb. 28, 2008, www.BEA.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/2008/gdp407p.htm

Miller, Peter G., “Housing Downturn: Is The End In Sight?,” FHA Loan Pros, April 17, 2008, http://www.fhaloanpros.com/2008/04/housing-downturn-is-the-end-in-sight/

Sweney, Mark, “Ad budgets cut amid fears of downturn, says Bellwether Report,” Guardian, Jan. 14, 2008. http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/jan/14/advertising.marketingandpr

Yousfi, Jennifer, “Fourth Quarter GDP Unrevised; Flat First Quarter Expected,” Money Morning, March 27, 2008, http://www.moneymorning.com/2008/03/27/fourth-quarter-gdp-unrevised-flat-first-quarter-expected/