Trump and the Astrology of “Alternate Realities”

Because this article uses Trump’s astrology to foreground his unusual relationship with truth, I will appear to be taking a political stance in this post. However, my intention here is simply to give an astrologer’s opinion on how to use Trump’s birth chart to understand him in the current political context. My comments are not anti-Republican or politically partisan; I simply believe that Trump doesn’t feel constrained by the truth, and that he has recently been generally unrestrained in his behavior, as anyone could read from his astrology without even knowing his party affiliation.

 

Prediction Recap: How My Last Article Played Out

I normally begin each new post with a review of how the predictions from the prior post played out. However, this time, that review is going to be fairly lengthy, so readers with limited time or interest should consider just skipping to the section titled, “The Main Attraction” below.

In my last blog post, I said that Trump would exhibit “unbridled, aggressive and anomalous behavior…especially May 23-29,” and I also said, “Trump will have a hard time stopping himself from making a big mess of whatever he’s doing for the rest of May.” I was further concerned that Trump’s astrology might express as military action again. I will take a moment now to describe how the astrology I was seeing panned out.

As I said in my Facebook update on May 23^rd, I had written my May 17^th article (expressing my concern that Trump’s astrology of “brazen aggression” might express militarily in late May), before I learned that Trump would be going abroad (which he did on May 18^th), and before I knew that he would be releasing his proposed budget that same week. I called this “good news,” because travel abroad and budget-cutting were two areas in which Trump’s Rahu-Mars astrology could play out in May without involving military initiatives, which it almost did (a controversial US led airstrike in Syria did tragically kill over 40 children on May 25^th, but I believe that these casualties still were smaller in scale than we might have seen if Trump had been in the US at that time).

Being abroad is a typical expression of Rahu’s influence, and thus can diffuse some of the impulsiveness that Rahu imparts. It’s sort of like how we don’t drink as much when we are already pretty hydrated. The wildness and unrestrained energy of Rahu perfectly matches the expansiveness and surreal experience that comes with visiting places that differ greatly from our ordinary home environment. Meanwhile, the fact that Trump was pitching a battle against terrorism in every country he visited was a solid expression of Mars’ martial influence, but one that did not have any immediately destructive effect. So, this time, Trump inadvertently “surfed” his Rahu-Mars astrology in a way that was not as militarily aggressive as last time (in April, when he dropped the “Mother of All Bombs” in Syria and faced off with Kim Jong-un)

That said, Trump still did some pretty unrestrained, anomalous, and aggressive things as the month of May came to a close. So, I don’t mean to say that Trump’s Rahu-Mars astrology wasn’t front-and-center then, just as we expected it to be. By June 1, Trump had:

1) unloaded a shockingly heavy-handed and bizarrely miscalculated budget (May 23^rd), which slashes programs to aid the poor, elderly and disabled. This was an area of “unbridled aggression” where Trump also clearly “made a big mess,” just as his astrology foretold.

2) tongue-lashed and alienated America’s NATO allies and deliberately did not affirm “Article 5,” which pledges mutual defense among allies (another example of Trump’s “unbridled aggression,” and an awkward mess).

3) rejected the Paris climate accord, which had been signed by every country in the world except Syria and Nicaragua (arguably a huge mess), and

4) physically shoved the Prime Minister of Montenegro (another example of Trump’s “unbridled aggression,” but not particularly messy).

Trump’s proposed budget, as much as it strangely bungles its own math and is unbelievable to both sides of the aisle, will not in itself hurt anyone. Congress will completely revise it, particularly as the budget turns out to contain a $2 trillion elementary math error (yes, elementary, and yes, trillion), which decorated Harvard economist Larry Summers called “the most egregious accounting error in a Presidential budget in the nearly 40 years I have been tracking them” (.i.e. a big mess). Still, the budget’s proposed cuts to the poor and elderly were an expression of the brutality of Mars’ influence on Trump in May. Even Republican politicians called Trump’s budget cuts “cruel.” Top congress members have used phrases like, “unimaginable cruelty,” “manifestly cruel,” and “breathtakingly cruel,” to describe this budget proposal. That’s Mars talk (with a Rahu twist).

Trump’s budget also reflect the skewing influence of Rahu as well. In fact, the budget was so preposterous that Larry Summers felt compelled to say, “Past a certain point, exaggeration and hype become dishonesty and deception. In economic policy, as in almost everything else, the Trump Administration is way past that point…Trump’s budget is simply ludicrous.” Other experts have called the budget both “wildly optimistic” and “bizarre.” Terms like, “exaggeration,” “deception,” “wildly optimistic,” and “bizarre” are commonly associated with Rahu-driven behavior.

In keeping with the strangeness of Rahu, it was highly anomalous that Trump unveiled his budget while he was out of the country, since it is well known that a president has to lobby for his proposed budget, especially when it reaches as far as this one does.  Meanwhile, the budget’s proposed 10% increase in military spending (nearly an additional half trillion dollars), and its categorical savaging of virtually every domestic welfare or aid program (except Medicare, which Trump was advised against touching), are right in keeping with the aggressive and brutal energy of Mars that was mentioned in my last forecast.

I also said in my last post that Trump would, “do more things like firing more staff, issuing threatening ultimatums, changing storylines, venting on Twitter, etc.” Without going into great detail, I can mention that Trump did issue threats and ultimatums to America’s NATO allies in Europe (e.g. threatening to cut off Germany’s auto imports) on his trip at the end of May, he did change his storyline about global warming then also
(admitting that human activity was causing climate change), several of his key staffers “resigned” or were fired by the end of the month (or in early June), and he bizarrely tweeted a gibberish word “covfefe,” around midnight May 30. So, going abroad didn’t overturn Trump’s May astrology.

 

The Main Attraction: Trump’s Birth Chart

Now, I want to get to the main objective of this blog post: to provide an astrological peek into Trump’s nature, in order to offer a framework for understanding what is happening on the political stage right now.

To reiterate, this post will appear on its face to be more politicized than anything I’ve posted so far. But, we are in the midst of a very historic political moment, involving an individual whose astrology can shed much light on what is actually happening. So, I have decided to do my best to convey the relevant astrological facts, despite the likelihood that they will be construed as politically slanted by some readers. In other words, what I have to say is not flattering to Trump, but my motivation for speaking up is not political.

Trump’s Key Drivers: Mars, Plus the Nodes’ Influence on Trump’s Luminaries

Essentially, what I wish to do in this article is outline the roles of the nodes and Mars in Trump’s birth chart, since these roles are factoring centrally in Trump’s current behavior. Having these roles in view has helped me see through the thicket around Trump more clearly, so I hope it will provide my readers with the same clarity.

Mars: Will Power, Plain and Simple

Trump’s Mars is almost exactly on his ascendant degree, indicating his strong identity with the qualities of Mars. Those qualities essentially fall under the broad umbrella of “willpower,” but include attributes like drive, strength, pushiness, courage, dominance, ambition, self-confidence, and aggression. Because of the instability provided by the nodes, as I will outline next, Trump has undoubtedly come to rely on the strength of his Mars for achieving his goals in life.

So, when you see Trump attacking others, dominating situations, or obstinately pushing for his agenda, you’re just witnessing his Mars in action. This week, as transiting Mars conjuncts his Mercury, we should see a somewhat magnified exhibition of Trumps Mars qualities at play. I’m not sure if Trump will fire special counsel Mueller as a result, but he will be sorely tempted to do so either way. In any case, he will certainly exhibit strong martial qualities by June 20^th or so (even though he generally does anyway, and has largely done so since April as well).

Alternate Realities and the Nodes: A Glimpse Into Trump’s Own Perspective.

Being born within a few hours of a total solar eclipse (when the nodes conjunct the luminaries), Trump is dominated by the influence of Rahu and Ketu on his sun and moon. As I have said in an earlier post, the nodes Rahu and Ketu are eclipse points, and thus serve as portals to subtler realms of consciousness (we fall asleep through Ketu and wake up through Rahu). Trump’s natal Ketu is within 1° of his moon, and Trump’s natal Rahu is within 3° of his sun. The moon is how we see and interact with the world (socially, and in terms of our overall outward perspective), while the sun is our sense of self (particularly for people like Trump, whose rising sign is Leo, which is ruled by the Sun).

Since the luminaries are largely what animate us, those rare “eclipse babies” whose luminaries are highly influenced by the nodes often grow up to be adults who seem to live in an alternate reality or “fantasy world” (depending on whether there are any countervailing factors). Trump is one of these people, and what is being showcased before the world right now is the alternate reality that he lives in.

For clarity, here is a list of words that characterize Rahu:

Bizarre, bold, inventive, surreal, boastful, overconfident, cutting-edge, wild, anomalous, pioneering, rebellious, strange, dreamy, cloudy, shady, unrealistic, ungrounded, untethered, unrestrained, overreaching, otherworldly, outlandish,paranoid, unconventional…

And, here is a list of words that characterize Rahu’s counterpart, Ketu:

Sensitive, surreal, defensive, weird, fearful, dreamy, insightful, otherworldly, vacant, deep, inconsolable, discontent, suspicious, paranoid, transcendent…

Now imagine a breakfast cereal made up of all those words.

That would be Trump’s breakfast of choice every day.

Trump is animated by at least some of the words listed above at all times. To a certain extent, his extreme, outlandish and unconventional nature has helped him in life, but it is not helping him much right now. In fact, it is causing him (and others) great trouble and pain at the moment.

Alternate Realities and the Truth

Trump doesn’t have the same relationship to the truth that other people do. As someone who lives his worldly life from an alternate reality, Trump simply does not feel constrained by the limits imposed from the truth of the mundane world. In fact, due to his privileged birth into extreme wealth, Trump has been able to bend the mundane world to his will, thus cementing his notion that everything, including the truth, is flexible.

This, of course, doesn’t mean that the truth actually has bent for Trump along with the rest of the world. Nevertheless, having rarely been corrected or held accountable for violating the truth, Trump has probably developed the view that truth can be bent to his will, like everything else. The section title, “When Reality Calls,” from my last post, was intended to foreshadow that this summer will be Trump’s “day of reckoning” with truth.

Maybe a real estate developer can routinely eschew the truth, but a US president can’t (at least not for long). The inflexible influence of Saturn over the next four months will be to hold Trump accountable for his transgressions, both publicly and to himself. It is in a sense a “perfect storm” that the influence of transiting Rahu these last few months (and into August) has been to exacerbate Trump’s tendency to prefer an alternate reality to the mundane reality that most of the rest of the world embraces. Trump has in a sense been set up for a fall by his own astrology.

I don’t know if we can fault Trump for having developed a misunderstanding of the inviolability of truth in the first place, but I think we can say that such a misunderstanding should be extremely problematic and worrisome coming from the White House. For one thing, Trump seems inclined to overestimate his understanding and skills in certain areas that are key to the president’s office. Trump’s view that climate change was a Chinese hoax, for instance, was apparently based on thin enough evidence that just a few discussions with knowledgeable European dignitaries could change his perspective dramatically. According to UN ambassador Nikki Haley, “President Trump believes the climate is changing, and he believes pollutants are part of the equation” now (even though he still withdrew from the Paris climate accord). This suggests that he was willing to deem the whole of climate change science as “a hoax” without doing any deep inquiry himself.

On another occasion, Trump called NATO “obsolete,” even though he decided later that NATO (which had not changed in the interim) was “not obsolete anymore.” Meanwhile, key Republican political figures are saying things like, “He’s coming to grips with the reality of the world,” and “he’s learned the issues are quite a bit more complicated than he thought.”

Alternatives to Genuine Knowledge

To my mind, this reveals a dangerous, cavalier overconfidence in Trump that enables the US president to fancy himself an informed authority on subjects he knows very little about. My aim here is not to denigrate Trump, but rather to point out that Trump’s alternate reality provides him with a world in which he can assume that he has mastered things that he has not even remotely mastered. The problem is that this is getting him (and America) into trouble lately, and it will continue to do so until such time as Trump’s worldview more closely resembles the real world (or until he is out of office).

Meanwhile, Trump’s chart compels him to surround himself with people who won’t challenge his alternate reality. Again, it’s as if Trump believes that, if he just tries hard enough, reality will align itself with his worldview. Take, for instance, the morning after Trump tweeted, “covfefe,” in a half-finished message on Twitter. Instead of simply admitting that Trump had fallen asleep mid-tweet, the White House staff went so far as to claim to reporters, “The president and a small group of people know exactly what he meant.” This shows the extent to which Trump’s circle is willing to disregard the truth to please their boss. Remember, this is the very same staff that coined the term, “alternative facts,” just as Trump came into office. As I see it, alternative facts are evidence of belief in an alternative reality.

Outside Corroboration Of Trump’s Astrological Makeup

And, it’s not just astrology that testifies to Trump’s “loose relationship with the facts,” as Trump’s own testimony in his lawsuit against a Trump biographer revealed that Trump had lied publicly on 30 different occasions about various subjects. Trump also lied under oath in that lawsuit (bringing the total to 31), revealing his independence from the truth.

So, when you see Trump speaking and tweeting these days, just remember that he is coming from an alternate reality, one that seems to accommodate alternative facts and attempts to bend the truth to his worldview. Whether Trump really just innocently misunderstands how the truth works, or whether he has more nefarious motivations, is something I cannot determine. However, I can say that Trump’s own astrology is sufficient evidence for believing that much of what he has and will say nowadays is not the truth.

As I said in an earlier post, “June marks the beginning of Trump’s difficult summer.” Here we are in June, and it is indeed the beginning of a very difficult summer for Trump. Hopefully, no matter what happens, the truth will prevail.

 

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