Mitt Romney: Imitation of Life

Romney: Sun in Pisces (the mirror) Gemini Rising....

Mitt Romney is the son of two truly remarkable people: his mother Lenore – clever, beautiful, a trained actress and a candidate for the senate when women did not do that, and his father George – an immigrant who pulled himself up from living on welfare to running a car company, to governor of Michigan and finally to a top job in the Nixon administration.

There's a fascinating clip of Romney Sr on youtube in which he explains why he changed his mind about the Vietnam War and decided it was wrong. He says he read up on it. Even in the 1960s it took guts for a politician to change his mind in public like that. Clearly, he thought through issues for himself. This was a man of integrity, and with the confidence and self-belief to think through ideas from scratch for himself. George, with the passionate support of Lenore (who was plagued by illness throughout her life), was a liberal, free-thinking Republican committed to the public good. Needless to say, in the 1960s he championed civil rights, was against the war and at the same time supported key libertarian Republican values. Obviously, he and Nixon loathed each other.

So from that pedigree, how did we end up with Mitt? Described by colleagues as lacking any "moral compass". In interviews, he appears to have no principles at all. Inside that handsome head, there seems to be little going on except perhaps a huge hungering for more...

Let's look at Mitt's chart.

Because he has Gemini rising, the ruler is Mercury in Pisces retrograde. How very strange and intriguing for such a successful man.

Mercury in Pisces is not just in detriment but in fall – traditionally a terrible position. What's more it's retrograde. You would expect there to have been some kind of trouble with early education or maybe some difficulty with speaking. I've seen this kind of thing in charts of people who didn't speak for a while as children, or who had to learn a foreign language very young, or who somehow failed to be heard. This is often a problem for Pisces Sun anyway. I wonder if he felt listened to as a child. He was clearly cosseted by that is not the same thing. This position also fits with the stream of gaffes we hear coming from Romney's mouth.

But the upside of Mercury in Pisces is an interesting mind – not linear but visual – inclined to abstraction, imagination. You see this in the charts of many, many musicians and actors. With this chart, Romney could well have made a success in movies.

So we see a combination of Gemini, the trickster, the talker, the reporter, on the ascendant and dreaming, scheming Pisces. This can be a marvellously creative energy. In fact I have a friend who's a poet with a chart similar to this. But it can also show someone who has problems telling the truth, partly because for him truth is relative. Some commentators have noted that Romney seems to think that if he says something it must be true. This shows a massive level of self-belief, of faith. Pisces Sun can have that level of self-belief. One of it's rulers is Jupiter, the planet of faith, and Neptune, the planet of illusion.

You can see Mitt Romney's self-belief in his strongly placed Moon conjunct Jupiter in Scorpio right on an angle. Moon-Jupiter gives an unquestioning, easy faith – and Romney's is at a lovely, supportive angle to his Sun. He really believes in himself. The Moon represents the mother, too. Lenore must have adored him, pampered him, built him up, loomed even larger in his life than most mothers. She was a Scorpio Sun.

Brother Scott, Lenore and Mitt in 1964. She's so chic.

So mother and son must have been very close with that Sun-Moon compatibility.
Scorpio Moon is fixed, loyal, steadfast, unforgiving. Combined with Jupiter, you can see Romney's adherence to the narrow Mormon faith.  His faith must give Romney real inner steel. 

One final thought about the Moon-Jupiter is that it can sometimes come across as a big child, especially in Romney's case when you combine it with Gemini Rising. He comes across as an overgrown Richie Rich in some interviews.

Jupiter ruling his Pisces Sun strengthens the trine between the lights – Moon and Sun. This again emphasises his self-belief, and likely the strength he got from his upbringing. Romney is doubly lucky, though, look at the lucky planets in his chart! Both Jupiter and Venus are on angles.

The goddess of love and ladies and wealth dominates his chart., casting a golden glow over the whole thing from her position at the highest point. When you see that the closest aspect to Venus is from romantic Neptune, you can understand this is from Vanity Fair:

[His son Taggart says] “We were not allowed to say anything negative about my mother, talk back to her, do anything that would not be respectful of her.” From the beginning, Mitt had put Ann on a pedestal and kept her there. “When they were dating,” Tagg said, “he felt like she was way better than him and he was really lucky to have this catch. He really genuinely still feels that way.” 

Some are favoured by the gods. Romney has been blessed with wealth, good looks and the love of a good woman – all in the purview of Venus. With the support of Neptune, this is exaggerated. Some astrologers, see Neptune as a higher octave of Venus. Neptune in aspect does seem to have a kind of emphasising effect on Venus, making her subtly more extreme.

Being chosen by Venus can have it's downside.
Aubrtey Beardsle: Venus and Tannhauser.

Venus in Aquarius. That's a good political placement, especially along with the 11th house Sun. It could show a love of the people, altruism. And it is on the angle that rules Romney's most public persona and career.

Venus in Aquarius is often pretty androgynous. It suggests someone friendly, a man who likes independent, unusual women. That does not describe Mrs Romney, but it certainly describes Lenore.

Venus in Aquarius is also a bit of a gender bender. So it's interesting that one of the nastiest stories about Romney involves him assaulting a fellow student in high school for being gay. I wonder how Romney feels about his own inner Liberace? With the planet of masculinity Mars in tender Pisces, he must at heart feel less than butch. His famous arrogance may have been a cover for feelings of inadequacy. When he was a teen-ager he obviously hated his inner Liberace so much he had to project his self-disgust outward onto someone else. Scorpio Moon has a reputation for cruelty, of course.

The really disturbing thing about the anecdote (fact-checked by The Washington Post no less) is that everyone else involved remembered it well and still felt ashamed all these years later, whereas Romney tried to laugh it off, claiming not to recall it.

In fact, I expect he has an excellent memory with Pisces Sun and Scorpio Moon. Romney's book is called No Apology.

Venus in Aquarius is also someone who is comfortable with being different, just as Romney must alway be as a Mormon in the corridors of power. However, that Venus has some seriously strange aspects zapping it. It's OK for him to be different, but not for anyone else. First of all it's opposed by Saturn and Pluto. In fact it's exactly on the midpoint of that opposition, so it's as if Venus is right in the crosshairs of a gun.

Saturn-Pluto is a pretty harsh combination of planets – oppressive, violent, ambitious, driven. Those two are like a nexus of driving dark energy on the IC. What is really motivating Romney? And what was his relationship with his ambitious, powerful father really like?

There is something Oedipal about the energy of this chart. Romney's father was a remarkable man – and he must have worked very, very hard to get where he did. I wonder how much time he really spent with his youngest son.

 It seems to me that Romney's doing it for Mom (Moon and Venus) – her failed campaign for the senate in 1970 may have made an impression – and to beat Dad (Saturn-Pluto).

Romney Senior had a major stellium in the Cardinal water sign, Cancer. So we have Lenore with her Sun in fixed water in Scorpio, and Mitt with Sun in mutable Pisces. The generations move through water, from self-starting Cancer to mass-consciousness Pisces. That's very simple astrology, often the best kind.

Romney's life is in the image of his parents' life. Like them, he married his childhood sweetheart, went into business, went into politics. Gemini is the mimic, Pisces is the mirror. But somewhere in all those multiple reflections of life, the integrity of George and Lenore Romney got lost.

Maybe when Venus showers you with so many blessings, you start to believe you're entitled to them. Venus brings vanity.

Mitt Romney

All politicians seek power for a variety of motives, some personal and some altruistic. Mitt Romney is no exception. Despite some of his crasser statements (and the Saturn-Pluto conjunction), he's not simply motivated by lust for power. I think he believes he's right and could do good (Venus in Aquarius, Pisces Sun in the 11th, Moon-Jupiter on the Desc, near the 6th). The problem is he's ungrounded. It's all theory and no practicality.

He had not planets in Earth. What's more his earth houses are empty and his angles are in Air and Fire. He lacks grounding. He's all air and water. This speaks of his lack of experience of real life. He's lived in a bubble of wealth and privilege that has prevented him from using his potentially powerful imagination to empathise with people outside his tribe.

Tin Man

He is a tribal politician. He's looking for that earthy grounding through politics. Unfortunately, his 
tribe is tiny – very rich people and Mormons.

The other striking feature is the low Fire count – only Saturn and Pluto. I wonder what his tempter is like. His is really a cold chart, because these are impersonal planets.. I note that Ann Romney's chart is very fiery - a solar stellium in Aries plus Sagittarius Moon. She does his fire for him, that intuitive connection to people. However, no politician will ever be popular without the ability to do that himself.

I hope for Mitt Romney's sake he loses this election. It would do him no good at all to carry on getting everything he ever wanted. Maybe the current crucifixion he's experiencing (how very Piscean) will help him rethink some of his core beliefs, and refocus his life in more truly altruistic public service. Up until now, serving America seems to have equalled serving Mitt in Romney's mind.
(He said that instead of doing national service his sons helped him with his election campaign.)

For the rest of us, one of the lessons the tale of Mitt can teach is about parenting, after all the Romneys were intelligent, hard-working and meant well.

Don't spoil your children or they might end up as vapid as Mitt.