What Astrologers Said About the US Election
If you listen to Sally and Christina Talk Astrology, my monthly podcast, you will know that I picked Joe Biden to win and we agreed that there would be delays and recounts.
This was a pretty straightforward bit of astrology, since Donald Trump had such bad transits, and the election took place on a Mercury station and during a Mars Retrograde. Last time a US election took place on a Mercury Rx, we had hanging chads. I thought it would be touch and go for a bit, because Biden’s transits are only really good in a few weeks time. Trump, on the other hand, has the super-powerful Capricorn stellium — Pluto, Jupiter, Saturn, Pallas — opposite his Venus-Saturn conjunction in Cancer. That looked unwinnable to me. Plus, Trump has Mars Rising, so as a Marsy person, he doesn’t do well when the red planet retrogrades.
In fact, I was so confident of Biden’s win that I felt quite relaxed about the whole thing as soon as it looked like no cheating was taking place. That would have been the fly in the minestrone.
There is still trouble ahead, of course, with Mars about to turn direct in mid-November, and these eclipses too, but I hope the battles will be in court rather than on the street. Evidence of skullduggery may yet emerge, but not in Trump’s favour — the other way.
Other astrologers were divided pretty much 50/50 — as usual. Mark Cullen, over at Skyscript, compiled an exhaustive list of who said what — although he did not include podcasts!
But I’d like to highlight my colleagues Smiljana Gavrancic, Peg O’Donnell (who persuaded me to take another look since I was too anxious about this election at first to peek between my fingers at a chart), Capricorn Research, Liz Hathway (who makes an important point about the progressed US chart) and Victor Olliver. All picked Biden for the win using different but quite simple methods.
Having looked at Mark Cullen’s list on Skyscript it would appear that those who did not make things too complicated were nearer to the mark. The aspects/ transits to the nodes appeared to stand out in many an approach. Scientists do not always agree and neither do mundane astrologers apparently.
Nope. It’s like being a doctor. It’s diagnostic.But I do think that simpler is better.
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Thank you for this post and for the link to the list. I follow your posts on FB and come here to read in greater detail posts of interest.
The results as described in the list of astrologers who published a prediction prior to the election seems to produce a quandary for me. Out of 109 astrologers who made a prediction, 57 said Trump would win. 52 predicted Biden would win. A you point out, about 50/50 in terms of results (arithmetical mean = 54.5). Which suggests it to be about as effective in predicting the outcome as would happen if we tossed a coin. My question is how to make sense of that understanding of the lack of effectiveness? In medicine and in other fields 50/50 outcome would be judged a rather ineffective outcome. Does this suggest a new theoretical framework needs to be developed, or the absence of sufficient data for the technique to accurately predict an outcome? What are your thoughts about this?
Thank you,
Kelly
I agree. It is a poor outcome. Unacceptable really. I don’t want to dis my fellow astrologers, since I’ve gotten it wrong on occasion too, and I like an astrologer with the chutzpah to make a prediction. A few astrologers do have a political axe to grind, so we can discount those, but many did not.
IMHO using straightforward transits and not overcomplicating things is easily the best method. One astrologer who got it right simply looked at Saturn-Jupiter conjunctions and noted that there’s been a regime change every time.
When it’s too close to call, you may have to start pulling in other methods, but that’s when predictions start to go wrong. A few years ago, I looked at a UK election and couldn’t see any clear winner — except Nicola Sturgeon in Scotland. It turned out David Cameron, who won, was out of office within the year, so for him winning turned out to be losing! Sturgeon, of course, is still in charge in Scotland. The current UK Prime Minister is another case like that: winning has not turned out to be what he expected, which is exactly what the astrology suggested. The right question at his election would have been: will there be a swing to the right?
Astrology is about intuition, and trusting your intuition is something we all need to learn and return to. I think good diagnosticians have great intuition too.
For me, it can be tricky when I have a strong emotional investment in a result. That’s when I have learned to be wary. Although, this time it was clear enough.
Astrology is good at answering questions like: what’s this election going to be like? And less good at answering: who will win? I think astrologers sometimes ask the wrong question, and make things too binary, and then overcomplicate it! I’ve noticed that those relying on old techniques — with important exceptions such as Deborah Houlding — often seem to get sucked into the technique and forget to look at the situation in real life, too.
So in sum, I think we need to keep it clean and simple, admit to ourselves when we can’t read it, trust intuition and be really thoughtful about how we frame questions.
“Astrology is about intuition, and trusting your intuition is something we all need to learn and return to. I think good diagnosticians have great intuition too.
For me, it can be tricky when I have a strong emotional investment in a result. That’s when I have learned to be wary. Although, this time it was clear enough.”
I’ve found this too. You have to have some subjectivity in decision-making – it’s impossible to make decisions based purely on logic. There will always be factors pointing in one direction and other factors against – so you have to weight those up. But too much emotional investment results in a reading based on confirmation bias.
Going back to the original question of whether it’s lack of data, or needing a better theoretical framework – I’m reminded the I-Ching states not to ask yes/no questions but to ask questions about how will things change. So maybe astrologers need to ask better questions like “What will happen to Donald Trump in this election?” rather than “Who will win?” ? I suppose that’s horary to an extent.
I need to reread “The Moment of Astrology”. It was a tough read first time around.
It is a lugubrious read. I think he’s a Capricorn, but worth it.
I agree about the questions. The Yes/No may be a waste of astrological space… you might as well toss a coin!
I recommend Geoffrey Cornelius” The Moment of Astrology, which is really about horary, but he discusses intuition and astrology brilliantly.
Thank you so much for your insights about this.
As a professional intuitive for nearly 40 years I agree with you regarding the power of the subjective, the blind spots, and personal preferences can have on the very complex processes by which intuitive insight is gained.
Well my intuition would instantly see that there is contact between Saturn and Mercury – and its tight – with Saturn representing deception, and Ceres concerning contracts is not far away, but of course this is an unpopular view among astrologers that Saturn represents what it does as described. All the same look at the results.