Medusa, the snake-haired gorgon, turned men to stone just by looking at them. Some say she was enraged by her violation by the sea god.The only person to escape her fatal gaze was the hero Perseus, who used her reflection in his shield to aim the blow that cut off her head, which he then whipped into a leather bag. He gave his prize to the goddess of strategy, his mentor Pallas Athena. She still has the head of Medusa on her shield.
One of the most important fixed stars is known also as Medusa's head, Algol. This is a star of death, destruction, rage – and decapitation. Algol is associated with angry women.
I don't normally pay that much attention to fixed stars but this week Algol has been drawn to my attention for two reasons. The first is a client who's progressed New Moon hits Algol now, and the second is Michael WolfStar's NewScope which looks at the upcoming Full Moon that conjuncts Algol at 26° Taurus.
In a New York police station two days ago, a chambermaid picked the head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss Kahn out of the police line up – and according to one report "looked him right in the eye". I wonder if he felt himself turn to stone.
Traditionally, Algol is associated with beheading, death by strangulation. Yes, the IMF has just been decapitated in time for the Full Moon.
This is very bad for Europe. Why? Because we are up to our ears in debt to the IMF, so having a European head of the organisation was quite helpful really. Also it makes us look old, corrupt and out of date.
And the astrology. Well, the European Union Moon (in an exact opposition to Mars-Pluto in Scorpio) is at 24° Taurus, so this Full Moon is only two degrees away from that intense tension between power (Mars-Pluto) and the people (Moon). One person bound to benefit from this whole mess is France's answer to Sarah Palin, Marine Le Pen of the far right. Unfortunately, she is both smart and articulate.
Perhaps we'll finally be able to get rid of the cohort of man-tanned creeps (Sarkozy, Strauss Kahn, Berlusconi), who make Euro-politics into a parlour game for the super-rich. Our own Tony Blair left while the going was good, of course. How like him.
