Burchill, Fallowell (and others) in my new Lifesurfing tome

Such a joy to be back among you, especially given the egregious state of blogging these days. I can but do my best, permitting you a glimpse of Arcati's ancient soul which bubbles with spite and acuity and long memory, though I dress it all up in a sage's garb and vocabulary of daunting endowment.

Yes, I shall be publishing a naked Prince Harry artwork - by a former mayor (only the best on Arcati). But before that exciting controversy, I wish to do what we all do these days - and offer you my ass.

Step forward Lifesurfing: Your Horoscope Forecast Guide 2015. You know the drill. Monthly forecasts of uncanny precision. It's rather early to be thinking of next year; I know that. There are, however, other things to read in my gorgeous tome as you while away the rest of 2014 in anticipation of 2015.

This year I have included a number of in-depth astro-profiles of certain people I find intriguing and entrancing. Julie Burchill, for instance. Yes, I have peered into her horoscopic bowels and found...well, why spoil it? I have included non-astro personal insights and revelations which can only add flesh to the planetary bones of Britain's most revered media opinionist. Duncan Fallowell, too, has been conscripted: the temperature of his heart is a question of some longevity - whip out your thermostats with Madame as we watch the mercury shoot up (or down).

I could go on...but I know you have things to do, such as peruse the latest porn uploads. So I shan't try your patience. I'll try it later.

FREE sample read: E-Book. For classier acts there's always the Paperback.

Will US strike Syria? I look at the astrology

A number of you have emailed me about the astrology of the US/Syria situation. Will the US attack? Astrology is not about inevitabilities but trends and likelihoods. So here’s my analysis in plain English – with footnotes for fellow astrologers.

In the week of September 9, the US Congress will be asked to back President Obama’s proposed military action against Syria. I have chosen September 9th for this forecast because this marks the first day of the US government’s debate. I looked at three natal-transits charts: Syria’s, the US’s and Obama’s. All three charts suggest a likelihood of US military action against Syria.

Syria (1 January 1944, midnight, Damascus)

On the 9^th, violent and disruptive energies are present.[1] Actions decided on between September 9 and 11[2] will have the quality of violence with a transformative effect – whether this happens days or weeks or months later. The action is aimed squarely at the governing power[3]. At the same time, there is a major indication that power is exerted over the governing authority in some shape or form – and this indicator remains valid to October 29[4]: it therefore may be the case that Syria is subjected to external attack by a foreign state – this is one of a number of possible scenarios. The Syrian government is nonetheless confident, even smug – this could be because of perceived successes or misjudgement – or a miscalculation.[5]

US (4 July 1776, 5:10 pm, Philadelphia)

On and around the 9^th, the US chart reflects an instinct to act on high principle[6]. There’s a sense of ‘social duty’ and of public/media debate involving government.[7] And there’s a high likelihood of a decision to take military action.[8] The focus of this action is another country (or ‘abroad’).[9] From September 16, the risk of military action increases.[10] However the legality or constitutional justification appears confused.[11] If the congressional debate is not finalised before September 13 (Friday), there’s a chance the US will decide against war.[12] So, Obama is less likely to win support the later in the week a congressional decision is made.

Obama (4 August 1961, 7:24 pm, Honolulu)
On or around the 9^th, Obama is under tremendous strain and possible criticism. Actions can be thwarted or questioned – some sort of deception cannot be ruled out.[13] But by the next week, the 16^th onwards, Obama appears to be in much more energised form – the planets support a war-like identity in this time.[14] The weekend of September 14-15 also could be crucial for decisions related to military action.[15]

For Obama the challenge is to make real a principle or ‘dream’.[16] At worst, there is likely to be confusion between fact and fantasy and the challenge to make clear what is murky or concealed. At best, law and clarity can be applied to an area of chaos – the area identified as foreign by house position.[17] However, the triggering of a chaotic indicator in the chart is an unfortunate development, suggesting a debilitating period ahead for Obama, especially if he’s acting on misinformation or against government wishes.[18]

What can't be ruled out is that Obama launches a military strike against Syria without Congress' approval.

---

[1] Tr Mars conjunct natal Pluto in Leo in 10^th

[2] Above conjunction in orb

[3] 10^th house

[4] Tr Pluto conjunct natal Sun in Capricorn in 3^rd

[5] Tr Jupiter conjunct natal MC in 10^th

[6] Tr Mars in Leo on natal True Node in Leo

[7] Tr Mercury conjunct Midheaven

[8] Tr Mars sextile natal Uranus

[9] Natal Uranus on descendant

[10] Tr Mars ingresses 9^th house (Equal House)

[11] Tr Saturn inconjunct natal Uranus

[12] Tr Sun conjunct Neptune in 10^th (Sept 14-16)

[13] Tr Mars square natal Neptune

[14] Tr Mars conjunct Sun

[15] Tr Sun conjunct natal Mars

[16] Tr Saturn conjunct Neptune in 9^th

[17] 9^th

[18] Natal Neptune in 9^th

Gregory Martin: The Beatles, my father and the Jesus & Mary Magdalene love show

Astrologer Gregory Martin

Sir George Martin was known as the 'fifth Beatle', the man who produced many of the super-band's classic albums.

So it's fascinating to learn that his eldest son, writer/producer Gregory Martin, has practised astrology for over 25 years. And in a new podcast on Cosmo astrologer Jessica Adams' The Astrology Show he discusses the professional, creative and astrological relationship between his father (a Capricorn) and Sir Paul McCartney (Gemini), the strongest of all the Beatles bonds, says Gregory. 

Recently, Gregory launched new website Astroaria.com. I'm intrigued to learn of his plan to make a stage show and movie about the 'extraordinary love between Jesus and Mary Magdalene'. He himself claims to have received spiritual or psychic information from the other-worldly source he calls 'The Magdalene'.

He writes: 'I was shown in visions and sounds, thoughts, images and feelings how this production would change the world and be remembered for all time, the beauty, energy, power, and truth of this great untold love story, capturing and enthralling the hearts and minds of millions.'

The podcast also features my horoscopes for October 2012 - all free. Go here.

The Lady magazine and its (first?) astrologer

This week I make my debut in The Lady as its (first?) astrologer. My weekly horoscope column is terse and prescriptive and will (probably) improve your life. It is accompanied by my feature on why astrology is not rubbish - an idea suggested by editor and Virgo Rachel Johnson.

If there's one thing I've learned in the past few weeks on Twitter about the doubters, sceptics and preachy knockers of astrology (such as Prof Brian Cox, the very touchy Piscean who cannot bear criticism) is that complete ignorance of the subject in no way hinders blinkered ridicule. Science has sired a generation that just 'knows' things without research in the same way priests of old heard voices.

I hope you find my column entertaining and true. For a flavour of the magazine, click here The Lady. The digital edition sets you back £1. The print copy £2.

Anthony Burgess, the Tarot and his inner Madame Arcati

Anthony Burgess and his palm

Given the supernatural flavour of the festive season - Christ's cot, the Pope and Shrek meld into a methane-fuelled hallucination - it is with some delight I learn today that the late Anthony Burgess, author of A Clockwork Orange, was something of a Madame Arcati himself.

Not only a student of the divinatory arts, such as astrology and the Tarot, he also wrote a short story back in the early 60s called Chance Would Be a Fine Thing which was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in October. I am deeply bitter I missed this. Someone will suffer. We now have to wait till 2013 before it's published in a collection of newly discovered work.

We can thank the scholar squirrel Dr Andrew Biswell, director of the International Anthony Burgess Foundation, for unearthing this work. In a Telegraph report Dr Biswell says: “[Burgess] had a strong interest in horoscopes, tarot cards and predictive dreams. In the second volume of his autobiography he even claimed to have predicted the assassination of President Kennedy in 1963.”

The celebrated Tarot reader Mary K Greer recounts: "[Burgess] is known to have read cards at a village fete in the 1950s disguised as ‘Professor Sosostris the famous clairvoyant.'"

Professor Sosostris - has a ring to it.

Old Moore's Almanack 2011: More political sex scandals - and a royal wedding?

Is the Cosmic Deity a Tory?

This I ask myself as I leaf through the newly published 2011 edition of Old Moore's Almanack, the astrological annual that's been going since 1697. Foreseeing the reintroduction of "life-values that have been largely missing for 20 years," (ie, since Maggie Thatch was booted out), traditionalist stargazer "Dr Francis Moore" writes approvingly of "discipline, self-discipline, respect and responsibility" in Pluto's wake as it hot tracks its bulldozer through debt mountains via puppets George Osborne, Vince Vable and co.

If I didn't know better, I'd imagine Tory spinner Andy Coulson had dictated Old Moore's diatribe. But let's not be unpleasant. What else does OM predict for the coming year?

Writing at the start of 2010, and presumably before the coalition was slicked together, OM wonders aloud whether another general election will be called in 2011. Sounds as if the government will be riven by subterfuge and plots - foreign to Westminster as we know. July '11 is particularly horrid with "scandals involving individual ministers and illicit affairs". One can only hope there will be a sufficient number of elected LibDems left to go around.

The story of the LibDem whose epic sexual escapades kept the local coppers busy in earlier times has yet to hit the headlines. I'm saying nothing, for the sake of national unity. And the story of the ex-party leader who extra-maritally fucked a famous author in Brighton is also Arcati-classified.

Prince William is unlikely to contribute to bunting sales with a wedding before 2011 - indeed, Kate Middleton sounds like a right madam and is unlikely to tie the knot if the future king doesn't build a domestic shrine to her first. You go, girlfriend! Listen to those Loose Women tarts. Still, OM thinks there could be a royal wedding next summer, "at which the Queen will be a happy and conspicuous participant."

This will come as some relief to those who recall her demeanour at the Charles/Camilla registry job. She did everything but break wind, audibly. Happily, HM is not due to do a Dignitas on us and could very well out-live David Cameron's smug smiles.

Piers Morgan is warned of "over-exposure" in the media next year. Surely not. For loads of other predictions, Old Moore's Almanack 2011 is on sale at £2.50. And visit Old Moore's website.

Tut! David Cameron fails to buy up his internet domain names!

Sparklingly on-trend our new Prime Minister may like us to think he is - so it is distressing to discover that David Cameron has failed to buy up his .com domain name. The result of this oversight is that http://www.davidcameron.com/ - which at first glance looks like a Cameron blog - is now in the hands of a non-fan of the PM, one Reza Sorbati (of north London).

The opening two lines of the site's most recent post are representative of the hostile tone: "Ashcroft and Clegg help Cameron hobble to power. The electorate get a LibCon Coalition which is jeered into Downing Street on a sad day for democracy."

Nor can I be certain that davidcameron.co.uk is owned by the PM. The site claims to be a "gateway to sites on the Internet for [sic] david cameron!" But it appears to be a gateway to unrelated sites, such as those for cheap international calls or a new political party called... New Party. Davidcameronprimeminister.co.uk, too, is just another gateway.

It's astonishing that our Old Etonian leader ignored the internet while flourishing his fountain pen over self-tributes to his savviness and YouTube-ness. You'd think an online reputational presence de rigueur these days. I'd have expected at least his Tory spin doctor Andy Coulson to have mopped up the domain names for his boss, y'know, just in case. But perhaps this confirmed workplace bully and somewhat absent former editor of the News of the World was distracted by all those Guardian pieces calling for his resignation.

Still, Nick Clegg is not much better. Nickclegg.net is owned by ... Joker.com.

10 Downing St News: 'Tuesday night's the earliest, folks!'

Sunday Times astrologer Shelley von Strunckel tweets: "Oh, before I go, according to the stars, Downing St-wise, nothing will be settled until after 10:30 Tuesday evening. Just so you know."

Mark McGowan's 10,000 prostrations to David Cameron

Mark McGowan plans to prostrate himself 10,000 times in front of a "large photographic image of Conservative leader David Cameron on (election day) May 6th, 2010, opposite number 10 Downing Street."

He explains: "The prostrations can be seen as a sign of reverence to a noble man, David Cameron, the man who can lead this country out of the problems we are in. It should take me about two-and-a-half days to complete, I will start at 10am on Thursday 6th May and finish on Saturday 8th May, by which time this country will see a new leader. Gordon Brown, the Labour party and champagne socialism is over."

So, over to champagne Toryism instead. Except of course you can't get into Downing St these days without an invitation and the police won't allow him to loiter about outside for long. I just hope Mark doesn't end up with sciatica.

A 'bullying' Prime Minister, but what of Andy Coulson?

Tory leader David Cameron calls for an inquiry into Gordon Brown's "bullying" conduct towards his staff with the suggestion he's unfit for high office. Quite right. But what a pity Cameron didn't call for an inquiry into - and has not publicly addressed once - the bullying conduct of someone very close to himself, the Tory media boss Andy Coulson. Last year, the former editor's bullying of a sports reporter cost the News of the World £800,000 before costs - a record award for workplace bullying.

Sadly The Times, which laudably publishes a leader today on the bullying claims against the PM - labelling bullies "weak" - was not moved to comment on Coulson's offence at the time.

Come to think of it, why hasn't the National Bullying Helpline - which has confirmed Number 10 staff concerns about the PM - made an issue of Coulson? Questions, questions. Rhetorical.

Astrologers foresee a Tory victory - well, many of them do

Russell Grant: Tory win slim, Parliament well hung possibly

Diddums! The media Tory Boys are all depressed!

This loose amalgam of early middleaged, Oxbridge, cock-cunting, right-wing cat lovers - mainly subsidised by the Telegraph/Spectator club, with a blog thrown in to cover the winter gas bills - despairs at Gordon Brown's apparent resurgence in the polls and David Cameron's failure to impress. Why did anyone think that Old Etonian Cameron would ever mean much to scatterbrain Generation Google? His narrow aristocratic face alone looks bereft of 18th Century wig and gilded carved pine portrait frame - I hear a strain of Bach on harpsichord as I write - not a happy thought when there's news of National Health cuts to impart to porno'd-out plebs.

While the secular political pundits nonetheless expect Tory Boy to squeak into Number 10 in May, hobbled by a hung Parliament, what do the astrologers foresee? Your intrepid Madame - a trainee astrologer herself - had a perusal. To preserve your interest I have minimised the astro-jargon: just know there's a Saturn+Pluto (boo!)-Uranus+Jupiter (hooray!) tussle going on in the heavens.

Let's start with Russell Grant -"Will Labour retain power?" he asked himself at the Telegraph last year. "It is more likely to be a very narrow Conservative majority or a hung parliament."

"Quite definitively ... Labour will not win the next election," concludes the Brown-supporting Astrotabletalk. The site's astrologer Dharmaruci predicts in par 1 "it may be a hung Parliament." By par 11 however he's foreseeing "the Tories will probably win outright, rather than there being a hung Parliament." Ah, yes.

The august Marjorie Orr wrote of Gordon Brown in 2008: "He looks unlikely to emulate Tony Blair's three terms since his career and home life will go into major transformation gear in 2010. He's likely then or the following year to change career direction totally." So that's a Tory victory.

The Sun's Mystic Meg foresees a narrow Tory win - neatly echoing the current view of its owner Rupert Murdoch.

It's not all bad news for Gord. The unfortunately named The Daze thinks: "In 2010 Pluto starts to make a conjunction with Brown's natal MC, his progressed Moon is full in 2011 and in 2012 Neptune is conjunct his natal Sun. I wonder if these powerful astrological aspects do indeed suggest that Gordon Brown is with us in his high office for quite a few years to come." NB: for 2008, The Daze has Gordon misnamed George.

Astrology for the 21st Century foresees a likely Tory victory despite an astrologically low opinion of Cameron: "Leo-Libra mix is inclined to the self-satisfied, smug, and saccharine," it writes. "I don't see much good coming of him attaining power."

The Mail's Jonathan Cainer - rumoured to make over £1m pa from his phonelines - wrote of Brown in June last year, "Right now, his luck is on the wane, but while he won't bounce back to full popularity, his luck may just help him cling to office a bit longer, if he weathers these next few days." However, it was Cainer that predicted that Hillary Clinton would win the US election and that the global economic situation wouldn't be as bad as people expected.

New York's Caroline Simon (who predicted the economic crisis) of astrology website Blue Moon is doubtful of a Cameron premiership: "He can be too dependent on others’ approval and opinions to make his own decisions,” she adjudges. What else might Dave do in the event of a thrashing at the polls? "[He] could become adept at sculpture, pottery, carpentry or stained glass."

Even so, the majority view among astrologers is that Cameron will be the next PM by a slim margin. But the heavens do not exult.

Blair's downfall foreseen?

Reading Robert Harris’ vivid and splendid new novel Imperium re-ignites my interest in Ancient Roman history and the Sybil – the prophetesses who read for the empire. How I wish we had their like today, as opposed to the legion of henna-haired "channellers" and their rip-off psychic phonelines milking the vulnerable at £1.50 a minute (most credit cards welcome).
The nearest contemporary Britain can claim to the Sybil is the cheapo annual Old Moore’s Almanack and its horrible Flash Gordon monochrome graphics. Yet it's this I turn to occasionally during national or international dramas, in the hope of alighting on an instructive astrological prediction, if only to requisition it in the shaping of a dinner party opinion that may make me look perceptive if not psychic in hindsight.
So I open up the edition for 2007 and turn to the month of July, for it is then that Tony Blair promises to step down having resigned in May prior to a leadership election. And I am intrigued to read the following:

“The Sun and Moon are on the Midheaven at London pointing to somewhat greater popularity for the government. Radical changes both in policy and personnel are possible, and will be carried out very smoothly.”

A “smooth and orderly transition” even? Can it be possible that the Pluto-diminished heavens had already pronounced death on Blair’s premiership, as far back as sometime before September 2005 when Dr Francis Moore drew up his horoscopes?
We shall see.
Of course there’s no indication whether we're actually due a new PM in July or whether he will be Gordon Brown. Yet is there a clue for August? National celebrations are foreseen as “old-fashioned values are reasserted” with more and more people getting married – perhaps the now ex-Chancellor will have introduced more tax incentives to get hitched. The Gord has never much cared for Tony’s social liberalism, so you never know ….
Still, whoever takes over whenever, it’s predicted that by November the government will be embroiled in “scandals at the highest level”, so plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.