Uranus goes retrograde on Friday 13th (!) July and Mercury joins it going backwards on Sunday 15th. This will bring a new stage of development in world affairs and a return of many issues that we thought unresolved. Uranus in particular makes its first retrograde after the initial exact square with Pluto, which rumbles until 2015.
The Mercury retrograde phase that lasts until 8th August is a sticky one. Of three Mercury retros in a year, we get one long, one medium and one short, in duration and degrees of retrogradation. The slowest-moving Mercury Rx tends to be the most noticeable, and this time the planet of communication goes back only eleven degrees over twenty-four days. Given that it is also in a stubborn, fixed sign, we will see communication not so much slow down as grind to a halt... just in time for the Olympics.
So much lore and superstition surrounds retro Mercury that it's worth pointing a few issues out. Unlike the recent retrograde Venus, for example, which happens every nineteen months, Mercury goes backwards three times every year, for approximately three weeks at a time. And its 'shadow', the two-to-three week phase before and after it crosses its station, means the whole retro phase encompasses up to ten weeks. Multiply this by three and we see Mercury is in its retrograde arc for over half the year.
So it is unrealistic to put life too much on hold for the sake of Mercury retro voodoo.
And yet! In terms of world events, we do see surprising about-turns, changes of heart and full-circle experiences. People in public life get sacked soon after receiving a ringing endorsement from their boss. Or some other superstar stages a comeback in a role where they swore they would never be seen dead. Unexpected information comes to light, the full story leaks out and inconsistencies are called to account. There is an almost invariable twist in the tale.
In this light, it will be very interesting to see what happens with the latest bank interest-rigging scandal. I suspect more dodgy practice stories will emerge, bringing in banksters other than Barclay's, plus we will find out more on the extent of the collusion of politicians. I don't expect Diamond Bob to be reinstated (yet), but we may discover that he hasn't been the worst culprit. There will be a new outlook on the whole matter.
To clarify: Mercury is the short-term, localized catalyst in the longer context of Uranus-Pluto square. Banksters have lived practically above the law for decades, if not centuries, and it is only now with a rise in world consciousness that collective outrage has reached critical mass.
The same goes for 'press ethics' and the Leveson inquiry. Who said and who knew what, when, and how much did they reveal. Arrests, censure, loose ends
Uranus goes retro this week and remains so for the rest of the year. Still, it stays within a degree of its square to Pluto until mid-October, in an aspect which has already made its presence felt. In a previous post, I pointed out that 9-10 degrees cardinal is significant, inasmuch as many countries and institutions 'born' on January 1st have their Suns at this point.
The UK is one such entity and we see huge constitutional issues arising. House of Lord's reform (an elected second chamber), Scottish independence, and the disestablishment of the Church of England are all changes I expect to see. So, nothing major... All of this in the context of a double-dip recession which calls up comparisons with the 1930s. Which incidentally, saw the last Uranus-Pluto square.
This is a generation-defining scenario, where rebellious new Uranian energy clashes with the power-wielding Plutocracy. The internet is slowly killing high-street retail, royalties, and the whole notion of artist or creator ownership. Kids grow up learning that any downloadable media is free. Governments cannot control secrets, or indeed populations, in the era of email and social networking.
Still, something will have to happen about the creeping intrusion of digital technology. Everything can, and is, instantly recorded on handheld devices. Even celebrities long used to basking in the public eye are growing uncomfortable at having mini-movie cameras thrust at them continually. They no longer own their own image, whatever lingering mystique they had is totally shattered, and the tenuous line between public and private doesn't exist anymore. The Plutonian taboo of personal space is being destroyed by Uranian libertarian technology.
