By Len Wallick

Today the Sun enters the sign of Sagittarius. Mercury, which has been in Sagittarius for two weeks, crosses the point where it will station direct once its December retrograde ends. The Moon in Gemini wants to talk about it, but making sense of it all just yet might be too much to expect. These subjects will be the focus of our Monday astrology.

It might be fair to begin by asking if there is any focus to be had at all. Yesterday’s Full Moon took place in the last degree of Taurus, opposing the Sun in the last degree of Scorpio. The anaretic or last degree of a sign, for the luminaries especially, is a territory that carries a sense of accumulation and culmination, the release of which is felt upon crossing the cusp.

The Full Moon has very much the same interpretation regardless of its axis. It is generally recognized as the climax of Luna’s monthly cycle and has all the dynamic that one would expect of an opposition between the two brightest objects in the sky. So, we had something of a perfect Sunday storm. Both luminaries in the last degree of their respective sign, opposed to each other at the same time. There was only one problem, the nature of the accompanying anticipation was not clear to most, if any. In addition, what most surely must have in some way precipitated yesterday with the Moon and then today with the Sun changing signs has not found expression for many. That may have something to do with a conjunction in late Aquarius.

Neptune and Chiron are the remnants of a stellium that goes back several years. They have what could be called a history. Neptune is challenging at best. If it expresses as confusion and delusion, the result is frustration. Chiron on the other hand, can see the forest and the tree, but, as antidotes go, it verges on the emetic. In reluctance and necessity the best-known centaur and outermost gas giant have formed a perfect storm of their own, publicly expressed as private tension. Unlike that of the luminaries, however, this storm has seemed to be without end.

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Today’s Oracle takes us to the Scorpio monthly of Sept. 1, 1999

As an astrologer, one of the most common life questions I work with my clients on is how to bring their creative talents into line with their professional activities; in other words, how to make money doing what they love. This is frequently viewed as a kind of incidental issue in life that deserves some attention, or a long-term, ‘best-case scenario’ goal. I’d propose that, for you, it represents the most fundamental evolutionary struggle, particularly at this moment, when you are feeling so much of who and what you are, and so much potential at the same time. The question, as I see it, really boils down to: Do you have a right to BE who you are, and, being who you are, do you have a right to survive on the planet? Sweethearts, this ain’t a career issue.

(The Daily Oracle is a random selection from one of 10,000 Eric Francis horoscopes. New horoscopes by Eric are published weekly plus twice a month in Planet Waves Astrology News and Planet Waves Light. The Oracle itself is a divination tool available to subscribers to either of these services.)

From the Sun-Sentinel

If you don’t want to pass through an airport scanner that allows security agents to see an image of your naked body or to undergo the alternative, a thorough manual search, you may have to find another way to travel this holiday season.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is warning that any would-be commercial airline passenger who enters an airport checkpoint and then refuses to undergo the method of inspection designated by TSA will not be allowed to fly and also will not be permitted to simply leave the airport.

That person will have to remain on the premises to be questioned by the TSA and possibly by local law enforcement. Anyone refusing faces fines up to $11,000 and possible arrest.

Editor’s Note: If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article tells you how to use the spread. You can visit Sarah’s website here. –efc

By Sarah Taylor

I think I’m going to have to employ my son, Noah, as my official ‘Weekend Tarot Reading Card-Puller’. He obviously has a certain knack. Today, when he saw me shuffling the deck in preparation for writing this article, he asked me if he could choose the card, so I fanned the pack in front of him, and he pulled The Moon. On the day that we have a Full Moon. Perfect.

The Moon from the Rider-Waite Smith Tarot deck. The Moon is the eighteenth card of the tarot's major arcana.

There is a certain ‘slipperiness’ to The Moon. It is as if the world that it portrays, and the mood that emanates from that, are off kilter — somewhat awry — which I find entirely in keeping with what the card symbolises.

Picture yourself in an unpopulated, rural landscape on a night when the Moon is full in a cloudless sky. Perhaps you’ve been in just that situation, in which case you will know what I mean when I say that the light that the Moon emits is deceptive. Contrasted with those nights when the Moon is absent, a Full Moon can seem unusually bright. The landscape stands out in relief. Trees and rocks throw shadows. The light catches the back of a passing owl or mouse.

When I am in the heart of the South African bushveld far away from towns that throw their light into the sky, a Full Moon is exciting because I am able to experience my surroundings in a different light, so to speak. Things look unfamiliar, and the lines between objects are more fluid than they are in daylight. Ask me to get up and walk off into the long grass as I would do during the day, however, and that sense of wonder is replaced with wariness and some trepidation.

And that’s the thing with a Full Moon: you can see things you wouldn’t ordinarily see most nights, but it’s not what you would see during the day either. Much of the world is still cast into shadow… and in fact the contrast between what is light and what isn’t adds a certain confusion rather than a clarity.

The Moon — the eighteenth card of the major arcana — is concerned with that space in the psyche where things are not immediately discernible; where reality segues into another, less concrete, dimension; and where fear can lurk in the shadows. The ‘true’ light of the Sun (and The Sun card) doesn’t exist here, because with The Moon, the light is reflected. The source of the light is hidden from view, while the Moon takes it and projects it. So the light we are seeing is at one remove from source. That doesn’t mean that it isn’t real. What it does mean is that our perceptions are more easily influenced by other factors.

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Today’s Oracle takes us to the Pisces weekly of Feb. 8, 2008

Your ruling planet Neptune has been transiting your 12th solar house, Aquarius, for a decade. Neptune is difficult to discern in any event; the 12th is nearly impossible to perceive through normal consciousness. This transit has therefore served to veil some of your highest goals, your greatest achievements and your deepest needs. But now many other planets and a solar eclipse in this angle of your chart are calling your attention to something about you right now. This something may seem unusual, difficult to grasp or not entirely appropriate. At the same time, what’s being revealed is a quality that is inherently you, in the best sense. You cannot go against your true nature, but you cannot affirm or act on your true nature if you don’t know what it is. The ideas you have now, the choices you make and the dreams you dream are revealing precisely that. This moment is not a passing phase, but a threshold to another reality.

(The Daily Oracle is a random selection from one of 10,000 Eric Francis horoscopes. New horoscopes by Eric are published weekly plus twice a month in Planet Waves Astrology News and Planet Waves Light. The Oracle itself is a divination tool available to subscribers to either of these services.)

By Judith Gayle | Political Waves

If you believe everything you read, the Republicans are in charge of the country and the Democrats are yesterday’s news. George Bush the Younger, schlepping his book of revisionist history around the country, seems to think that brother Jeb should be in the running for the 2012 election. Given the line-up of potential candidates — Christocrat Mike Huckabee, carefully-coiffed Mormon businessman Mitt Romney, aging political hack Newt Gingrich and syntax-challenged Sarah Palin, who says she’ll run if no one else will — Jeb seems rational, sensible, in short, almost normal. That’s where it gets really scary, citizen! When a member of the Bush dynasty seems to provide the only sane Republican alternative, and the GOP itself is caught in a storm of in-fighting between the most ideologically radical of its members and its corporate contingent, the party seems to risk complete meltdown.

"When you look at what will last," says Doris Kearns Goodwin, "Obama has more notches on the presidential belt." White House Photo by Pete Souza.

It’s likely that the Baggers will shift the GOP farther to the right, and with our Blue Dogs reduced by half, this will further polarize our lawmakers. That means trouble for all of us, of course. A lame duck Congress hobbled by the specter of coming personnel changes is already giving us a taste of the future. Literally hundreds of waiting bills, passed by the House, are being sniffed at by a newly radicalized Senate, noses turned up. Obstruction is more blatant by the day. Women’s equality took a hit this week as the Paycheck Fairness Act only garnered 58 of the needed 60 votes to bypass a Republican filibuster threat. It will now pass into the void where bills go to die, given the intent of the conservatives.

How do I know? Consider the enormity of Jon Kyl, Republican from Arizona, derailing the new START nuclear arms control treaty with Russia by denying it a vote in this session. This is a non-controversial bi-partisan treaty to downsize our nuclear footprint by reducing arsenals. It’s supported by all sane people including Kissinger and Colin Powell. Its failure would have serious national security ramifications, especially given our ongoing nuclear concerns about Iran. None of this moves Senator Kyle as he stage-manages another attempt to render Obama unable to govern. According to Adam Serwer at the Washington Post:

It’s not like Kyl doesn’t understand the implications here. Last year, when he was criticizing the administration for dragging their feet on renewing START, he fretted on the Senate floor that “[f]or the first time in 15 years, an extensive set of verification, notification, elimination and other confidence-building measures will expire.” Now that the administration has a plan for extending those measures, he’s about to let them expire.

Republican leaders have been willing to entertain the notion, common among their base, that the president himself is an existential threat to the country, leaving little room for cooperation. Voting on START means making a choice between indulging the reflexive hatred of their base or acting in the U.S.’s basic national security interests.

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