It is a little strange not having the election to push against. I find myself doing odd things like taking the whole weekend off, or sleeping at night. My apartment is finally clean and my laundry is done. Friends who were staying for weeks, sleeping in my living room, have moved onto London.

Having a modicum of order around me feels good. This does not, however, appear to be the case in the world. I can see how easy it might be to say, well, my life is okay. That's enough; I'll forget about all that. But I know this is not a good feeling. This is exactly the response that leads to despair, because despair is about pushing away pain or struggle, holding it down, and pretending it's not there. That is a very unstable state of mind.

I don't find it so easy to slither away. Even on the best day, I'm going to write a horoscope column, and for example, go through this thought process that has me thinking about everyone else, sign by sign: Scorpio. That means Mars; Mars crossed the Moon's south node this weekend. What was that about? How did it feel and what is the range of potential response to that aspect? Old rule, the south node will take the pressure off of a difficult transit. That suggests we can look at the positive side of Mars, for most people. Mars is in Scorpio for the first time in two years, which is going to be either empowering, or stirring things up. Which is the case? And so on.

This is a good moment to review the recent phase three of "bonus eclipses" that just passed by, in the form of four planetary occultations and the Scorpio New Moon. I had predicted repeatedly that the second week of November would be a very interesting week, and of course when I say something like that, expectation is raised and we might expect Neil Young to walk on the Moon or the Titanic to float up from the depths.

In retrospect, it was predictable without astrology that there would be a surge of post-election news, for two reasons: one, the election was clogging up all the news desks; two, an incumbent administration always waits for an election to pass before doing something like the raid on Falluja, which happened to be one of the dominant stories of the past week. Can you imagine what it must have been like to be on the ground in Iraq, either as a soldier or a civilian, thinking: the president of the United States is waiting for the election to happen; then we might die, or lose our children?

This unusually bloody battle in a war where "major combat operations" are over, which 40-year veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas has said is totally unjustified, has basically destroyed the city. Falluja has been described as a hold-out for the "insurgency" -- that is, a place where the Iraquis -- who did nothing to us to provoke our attack -- were fighting back in defense of their homeland against the invaders. The U.S. amassed 15,000 troops to take the place. We know that double the usual number of American casualties are reported and we will never know the number of Iraqi casualties, civilian or otherwise. When you hear American commanders use words like "clean out," remember to substitute "kill."

The battle of Falluja happened entirely under the influences of these occultations.

In attempting to feel into the sensations of those who might support this battle, I am reminded of a little A Course in Miracleism: Only the guilty can attack.

Also, Yasser Arafat died. He was the long-time, one and only leader of the Palestinian people, and he died under the exact influence of Moon occult Mars in the 30th degree of Libra, an event that makes me want to sit with wise old Arab astrologers and discuss the significance of its symbolism. Were astrologers involved in the decision to disconnect the life support machines? Did that even happen? Arafat was certainly an edgy character and this astrology happened "on the edge."

It was incredibly apropos as well. As he was being buried at his compound in Ramallah, we were under the exact influence of the extreme waning Scorpio Moon conjunct Sun conjunct Hylonome, a new planet associated with grief processes.

While it may take some time to see the effects of Arafat's death (and, coincidentally, the sixty day mourning period required under Muslim law coincides with one day with the 60 day Mercury shadow, storm, retrograde, storm, shadow cycle that ends around Jan. 10) this is a major rearrangement of power in the Middle East, which is the center of the world stage, per prophesies of every shape, color and stripe.

The disappointment of this astrology was that there was no apparent shift in the situation regarding the stolen election, but news has slowly started to percolate around the Internet. The facts are coming in from Ohio and other states. But this does not have the satisfaction of a big blow-up, headlines that scream, ELECTION RIP-OFF! and so on. Even if there were an obvious way to "prove" that the election were stolen, do you think the papers would say something? Or do they, too, strive to be vindicated for letting Bush steal it last time?

I love the logic. Steal a piano and you're forgiven for stealing that violin four years ago.

Dick Cheney spent some time in the hospital, complaining of shortness of breath. With his health condition (four heart attacks beginning at age 37, quad bypass survivor, pacemaker user, artificially supported artery), doctors would be normally advising that the most psychologically strenuous activity such a patient should be engaging in is golf. Dick, I think you should take it easy. Your horses up in Wyoming miss you.

There's more to the picture than meets the eye. Let's keep at least one of them open and watching. That's why God gave us two.

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