Dick Cheney’s Dark Side is Showing

(Washington Post article, November 7 2005)

The birthchart of Dick Cheney shows an individual who possesses the potential to do great things. His chart contains a highly unusual number of aspects between planets that have powerful implications for an individual. There’s a T-square, a Grand Trine, a Kite, a Yod, and a Mystic Rectangle–an unprecedented number of aspect formations in my experience. What does all this mean?

Mr. Cheney is an Aquarian, ruled by Uranus. Uranus is the idealist, the Utopian thinker. The god Uranus, fearing his overthrow by his children, ate them one by one when they were born. The dark side of Uranus is the willingness to sacrifice the individual for the sake of the ideal society.

Cheney’s chart shows Saturn conjunct Jupiter in Taurus – the voice of doubt (Saturn) conjunct the voice of confidence (Jupiter) in the sign of stability. A keyword for Taurus is perseverance; like the bull, Taurus never waivers in its slow but steady march toward security. Saturn and Jupiter are both square to Cheney’s Sun, showing a difficult combination of narcissism (Jupiter/Sun) with an insecure nature (Saturn/Sun). Virgo is rising in his chart, indicating a man who is serious about his work and tends to shun the spotlight.

Cheney is not a romantic man; with Venus in Capricorn he is very practical about matters of the heart. Perhaps this is why his wife is writing lesbian fiction, but that’s another story… His Sagittarian Mars gives him a longing for freedom and adventure and is square to his Moon, indicating someone with a strong temper and irritable nature.

That moon is in Pisces, a difficult place for an Aquarian. Aquarius is dry and airy – idealistic, detached, rational. Pisces is watery and longs for connection. His moon is the only water in his chart, showing us that he does not deal well with emotions, and is opposite Neptune which is associated with Pisces. This is a “double whammy” signifying that the Moon and Neptune are inextricably combined in his chart, and that this emotional sensitivity is one aspect of his personality that he is here to develop. Perhaps Cheney was speaking to himself when he said “America has been in too many wars for any of our wishes, but not a one of them was won by being sensitive,” I suspect that Cheney’s sensitivity is an aspect of himself that he has felt he had to conquer over the years. Perhaps this is the demon that led him to the dark side.

The Yod, Kite and Mystic Rectangle are known to be configurations that signify an individual with a significant role to play in human life. The fact that Cheney has all three as well as other, more common aspects shows that he is a Chosen One, rather like Anakin Skywalker who was lured to the dark side in order to take a shortcut on the road to real power. Life has a habit of equalizing imbalance, and Cheney’s turn to the dark side has taken a toll on his health. When Cheney was 27 he went to Washington as a congressional aide, and went to work with Donald Rumsfeld at 28 during his Saturn Return. At age 36 he had his first heart attack when transiting Chiron (the wounded healer) aspected his natal Saturn/Sun square (the Sun rules the heart). In 1988, at age 47, Cheney underwent quadruple bypass surgery when transiting Pluto (god of death and transformation) aspected his natal Saturn/Sun. Still he did not get the hint, and he became Secretary of Defense in 1989, and shortly thereafter participated in misleading the public by stating that Iraqi troops are massing on the Saudi border. Satellite photos showed no such troops, but the Saudi King allows US troops to enter Saudi Arabia. Shortly thereafter Cheney becomes involved with Halliburton, and Osama bin Laden begins his mission against the US. (Biographical info from CBC the Fifth Estate.)
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It’s easy to see how Cheney has been instrumental in the fall of the American republic. His chart demonstrates a person with exceptional gifts and power, and also shows how, like Anakin Skywalker, power can be corrupted.