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Spiritual Company Newsletter
By Steffan Vanel • Astrologer • Tarot Reader
Author of: The Astrological Karma of the USA
And: Charles & Diana: The Inside Story:
An Astrological-Karmic ViewDear Friends and Clients,
The Astrological Sarah Palin • An American Idol
I've been meaning to share some of the details I've seen in Sarah Palin's chart for some time, but have been too busy and couldn't get it together until today.
Today is September 11th. By 'accident' I decided to come out to Astoria, Oregon on the Pacific Coast for a couple of days. On the way here I realized that the last time I visited Astoria was seven years ago and this is where I was when I first heard the news of the September 11 attacks. So there is an added intensity to the atmosphere as I write this.
In looking at Sarah Palin, many of you know that I often speak and have written about psychological/cultural issues involving women and men, especially American women and men, as in the chapter in my book: America and Sex, Birth, and Death.
Considering the phenomenon of Sarah Palin definitely begs for such a discussion. What I would say, however, was covered pretty well in my recent article: The Astrological Hillary Clinton & A Plea to American Women, and I suggest readers to refer to that discussion.
I do sometimes try to imagine how women in the other nations of the world feel in contemplating the United States potentially being led by a woman who feels that being likened to a pit-bull with lipstick is a positive aspiration.
Of course one of the problems with American women is American Men. Another quote I heard is: 'Sarah Palin is the Republican Male's ultimate dream, she's beautiful and she kills things.'
It did seem that, with McCain/Obama/Biden, we weren't going to be launched into the 'culture wars' of the Bush election cycles. Now it seems there is 'no such luck.'
Of course with Uranus being the planet of surprise, moving into opposition to Saturn, the planet of convention, this year, McCain had to put a little Uranian surprise on his ticket, just as Obama had to put a little Saturn (i.e.Biden) on his. Now which Saturn/Uranus ticket will win? Or what other Uranian surprises await us? This Saturn/Uranus tension doesn't peak until Election Day.
Well let us look at the Astrological Karma of Sarah Palin.
Barack Obama is a Leo who thinks he is an Aquarius. Sarah Palin is an Aquarius who thinks she is a Leo. Interesting reverse polarity.
Guess who else 'thinks' they're a Leo? George W. Bush. Yes they both Sarah Palin and George W. Bush have Leo rising. Hilarion says that Leo rising gives a self-image of oneself that has Leo qualities, with a certain, pride, arrogance, or superiority. It is actually given to someone, however, because in previous lives they have had difficulty feeling good about themselves. It is actually something to help boost them up.
So, Sarah Palin is not as as strong as she looks. People with Leo rising are always a bit scary to me, because they are basically 'faking it.'
Now someone who has the Sun in Aquarius is someone who has brought groups of people together and encouraged a quality of love and brotherhood among them in previous lives. This definitely gives Sarah Palin the ability to appeal to the crowd. Right now Neptune, the planet of self-sacrifice, compassion and glamour is conjuncting her Sun in Aquarius. It was exact to the minute on the day of her nomination acceptance speech at the Republican Convention.
Liz Greene's book 'The Astrological Neptune' is a great read on the inspirational and potentially deceptive and destructive manifestations of Neptunian glamour, which I will reference a bit later in this article.
Nonetheless, this idolized Aquarian star on the world stage has Neptune to thank for her messianic appeal to a large swath of the American public right now. Neptune, however, has a very painful, dangerous potential, and it is Neptune which is experiencing the most critical tension in Sarah Palin's Birthchart.
Myself, I have tended to idolize the sign of Aquarius, the sign of brotherhood, even knowing the psychological downside of Aquarius, which I will share shortly.
Enigmas often arise however. For example, Dick Cheney is an Aquarius. With Cheney, however, I've stated that Dick Cheney really does have a quality of group consciousness and brotherhood and togetherness—for everyone who makes over $500,000 a year. At that level they're all brothers!
His Sun in Aquarius is square to Pluto, so there is an underworld, Darth Vader component to his group consciousness, like a collective society of torturers.
In addition to being an Aquarius, Sarah Palin was born in the Sixties and therefore her ruling planet, Uranus is conjunct Pluto, as it was in that era. In her case it appears in her First House of self-image, hence the Uranian freedom from the opinions of others, and a willingness to serve as a means of transformation in the lives of others are a strong part of her personality.
She also has Jupiter in Aries, which makes you think you can do anything, in the Ninth House of Philosophy, religion, belief system, in positive aspect to her Sun in Aquarius, hence her enthusiastic idealism and moral courage.
Sarah Palin has not only the Sun in Aquarius, however, but also Saturn, Mars, Moon and Mercury in Aquarius. 50% of her planets are in Aquarius. That's a lot of Aquarius. Some of these placements enhance the airy intelligence and humanitarian qualities of Aquarius. But here are some quotes from Hilarion relevant to the other aspects of these Aquarian planets:
Sun in Aquarius: The Aquarian tends often to seek to approach the ideal he holds within him, and this can lead to a shoving away of the exclusive closeness that marriage implies or a tendency to try to include too many within the circle of acquaintances or friends. The partner then thinks the Aquarian is too strung-out in his associations. The lesson for the Aquarian is to try to live in the world as it is, and to compromise the ideal brotherhood concept for the sake of becoming close to at least one or two other individuals.
Saturn in Aquarius: there is a definite tendency for this placement to coincide with an over-emphasis on the mental side of life, often to the exclusion of the emotional interchange with others. This is the greatest problem for the placement, and those especially who have Saturn afflicted here will have to undergo emotional difficulties and affectional losses in order to be brought to see the importance of developing and demonstrating affectional impulses.
Moon in Aquarius: there tends to be taken from the early home situation a trait of self-control at the emotional level, a dislike of emotional display or extremes…The test here is to realize that true affectional interchange is not contrary to the preservation of individuality and independence.
Mercury in Aquarius: The afflicted Aquarian trait of affectional coolness will also be present to some extent.
My own comment about Aquarians is: Aquarians are like this: 'I love you…but don't take it personally.'
With all of that Aquarian energy I am sure that Sarah Palin is capable of being the 'Ice Queen.' She does have Venus in Aries, which is a warm, potentially impulsive emotional nature.
Sarah has her Sun conjunct Mars, which, in itself, is going to make her rather feisty. They are both square, in tension with, her Neptune in the Fourth House, the house of home, family and childhood. These difficult aspects are the greatest sources of tension in her Astrological make-up and are a very revealing factor in her behavior and motivations.
Your may remember in my last article, about Barack Obama, I went into a lengthy discussion about his having his Sun square, in tension with, Neptune, and how that involved some illusion, confusion, delusion and martyrdom in his relationship with his father. I mentioned, also how any difficult aspect with Neptune will create a need to deal with the victim/victimizer program. Here is a reprint of that discussion:
The victim/victimizer program is a situation where you feel that, if you don't want to be a victim, you have to be a victimizer. And, if you don't want to be a victimizer, then you have to be a victim. And there is no way out, except one. That is the positive side of the planet Neptune, unconditional love, for yourself and for others, total forgiveness, for yourself and for others, and spiritual faith, trust and surrender, to where there are no victims or victimizers, but just all of us frightened little girls and boys doing the best that we can.
Now I don't know what the circumstances or scenarios were which would reflect such a difficultly aspected Neptune in Sarah Palin's house of childhood experience, but there had to have been some painful Neptunian victimhood, or delusion going on.
I would suspect that, as a young girl, Sarah was that Neptune, living a bit in her own dream world, and the aggressive Mars, and mentally cold and detached Aquarius Sun was going on outside of her. At a certain age, however, usually in teenage years, she would have experienced what I technically call an FTS, F__kThat S__t, and she would become the aggressive, emotionally detached Sarah 'Barracuda' (her nickname from high school basketball days), marrying by elopement, making someone else be the victim/martyr in the home, at that time I suspect one or both parents.
Now Sarah Palin may have thought that she was done with Neptune/victimhood and could just go off into her Aquarian service to the world (two of her Aquarian planets are in the house of work and service to the world). But that Neptune victim or Martyr in the home didn't go away.
There is the obvious situation of her daughter's pregnancy, unsuccessfully hidden from public view, and her impending marriage to the father, who stated on his myspace profile that he never wanted to have children. There are also reports of her son having problems with drugs like oxycontin (Neptune rules drugs, alcohol, and ironically the oil industry) before he entered the military.
And now we have her Down syndrome child Trig whose breast milk emerges when his mother is forced to put down her blackberry.Sarah has said publicly that her family has the same problems as most families. And there is something very Aquarian in this, a group sharing with the populace of their shared humanity. But knowing what I know by looking at this chart, I sense this cool Aquarian detachedness. And the Neptunian victims of this are living in Sarah Palin's House of home and family.
This capacity for deception and victimization, however, is an on-going theme in Sarah Palin's life. I received an email forwarded to me written by a woman from Sarah Palin's hometown of Wasilla, Alaska, which is full of these victim/victimizer themes. Here are a few quotes:
It is astonishing and almost scary how well she can keep a secret. She
kept her most recent pregnancy a secret from her children and parents for seven months.She's not very tolerant of divergent opinions or open to outside ideas
or compromise. As Mayor, she fought ideas that weren't generated by her or her staff. Ideas weren't evaluated on their merits, but on the
basis of who proposed them.While Sarah was Mayor of Wasilla she tried to fire our highly respected City Librarian because the Librarian refused to consider removing from the library some books that Sarah wanted removed. City residents rallied to the defense of the City Librarian and against Palin's attempt at out-and-out censorship, so Palin backed down and withdrew her termination letter. People who fought her attempt to oust the Librarian are on her enemies list to this day.
She has bitten the hand of every person who extended theirs to her in
help. The City Council person who personally escorted her around town introducing her to voters when she first ran for Wasilla City Council became one of her first targets when she was later elected Mayor. She abruptly fired her loyal City Administrator; even people who didn't like the guy were stunned by this ruthlessness.Fear of retribution has kept all of these people from saying anything
publicly about her.Around Wasilla there are people who went to high school with Sarah. They call her 'Sarah Barracuda' because of her unbridled ambition and predatory ruthlessness. Before she became so powerful, very ugly stories circulated around town about shenanigans she pulled to be made point guard on the high school basketball team. When Sarah's mother-in-law, a highly respected member of the community and experienced manager, ran for Mayor, Sarah refused to endorse her.
Why am I writing this?
I am just a housewife. I don't have a job she can bump me out
of. I don't belong to any organization that she can hurt. But, I am no
fool; she is immensely popular here, and it is likely that this will
cost me somehow in the future: that's life.She has hated me since back in 1996, when I was one of the 100
or so people who rallied to support the City Librarian against Sarah's
attempt at censorship.I looked around and realized that everybody else was afraid to
say anything because they were somehow vulnerable.There are additional quotes from this source which belie the truth to Sarah Palin's claims to being a political maverick or fiscal conservative, and explain the real keys to her popularity in Alaska. A large factor being her ability to tune in to the Alaskan collective feeling of being victimized by their own corrupt government.
To read this letter you can do a Google search with some of the above quotes. This woman has given permission to email the letter to friends on an email list but does not want it posted on a website as there are a 'lot of kooks out there.' So I will refrain from posting her name in this article.
This recurring Neptunian victim/victimizer program, along with an arrogant Leo Rising panache and cold Aquarian calculation seems to be a recurring theme in Sarah Palin's life, whether firing officials in the employ of her town of Wasilla because they supported her opponent, or trying to victimize her ex-brother-in-law State Trooper by trying to have him fired, because she thought he was victimizing her sister, and the list goes on for those who care to investigate.
This behavior does beg the question: Why would these apparent defects in Sarah Palin's character be so unrecognized by those who adore her?
After harping for months about Barack Obama's lack of experience, people across the nation, excited by Sarah Palin say, in regard to her relative lack of experience things like: 'She's smart, she can learn on the job.' Or: 'Experience can be a negative thing when you want to change things.'
One factor is that there is a large segment of the American population which is quite addicted to the victim/victimizer program, and Sarah Palin's arrogance and vindictive character feeds and boosts that program in the Republican electorate.
But with Sarah Palin, there is definitely a very woozy Neptunian flavor to the fascination with her. Here are some of Liz Greene's comments I mentioned earlier that I would share as part of this discussion:
Neptunians are often extremely glamorous to those of their own epoch. This tells us nothing about their real identity, their values, the degree of personal integrity they possess, or their motives, opinions, and beliefs. They are gifted at tuning in to what the world needs them to be, and mirroring it in precisely the way a small baby mirrors the unspoken needs and expectations of the mother. These collective needs change according to the era, but there will always be people who have the capacity to personify them. Sometimes this magical Neptunian gift is combined with real and even awesome talent. Sometimes it is like the story of the Emperor's clothes. Neptune is not an indicator of talent in the birth chart, but rather a statement of the power to arouse others' dreams. We, the dreamers, deeply touched because our own Neptune's are vibrating in sympathy, do not care to know what is behind the glamorous image of our idols; nor do we apply the same discrimination as we might to other, less dazzling public figures. (End quote)
George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Sarah Palin all have Sun square Neptune. They all have a certain glamour. Barack Obama for our side (or my side), Bush and Palin for theirs. They all have had to deal with the victim/victimizer program. Personally, I think that Obama has dealt with his to a large degree, and has developed some deep Neptunian qualities of true compassion and caring. Bush and Palin are both vehicles for Republican, Karl Rove style victimization, with false Leo Rising arrogance. The thought of Sarah Palin being a heartbeat away from the Presidency is quite scary.
Postscript: After writing this newsletter I picked a Tarot card, as I did earlier for the other candidates, asking how Sarah Palin would be feeling on the day after the election. It was The Prince of Swords, the same card I got for Mike Huckabee. I guess a likely reaction for Evangelical candidates.
Here is the interpretation for the Prince of Swords:
The Prince of Swords is the lower, personality aspect of the sign Aquarius. He is very intelligent and mentally active, but based on a certain fear or insecurity, being caught up in 'mental gymnastics.' He is in a chariot being pulled by three leaping children, so the chariot is very easy to move, but it doesn't go in any definite direction except by accident. He is rather mentally scattered.
I still think the Democrats are going to win. Let's hope.
Blessings,
Steffan VanelThis newsletter is given free of charge. If you would like to have a private Astrology and/or Tarot reading with me please go to readings page to see the various readings I offer.
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