Dick
Cheney's Shooting Accident
The Nature
of Accidents
Vice
President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a hunting companion
at 5:50 PM on February 11, three days before Valentine's
Day.
Accidents
are not intentional—that’s why they are called
accidents—but they often arise out of our unconscious
interactions with the moment. For example, mental distractions
and multi-tasking while driving cause car accidents, but
they are also indicative of an overloaded psyche unable
to just be in the moment.
I’m
sure many of us can recall minor personal accidents which
occurred because we were upset, tired, annoyed, angry, or
just feeling so Neptune-wonderful that we failed to notice
that big crack in the sidewalk. In looking at horoscopes
for Vice President Dick Cheney and the time of his now-famous
hunting accident, we can discover not only clear planetary
accident patterns but also hints as to the hidden psycho-emotional
causes of the accident.
Hunting,
Accidents, and the 1st House
According
to Renaissance astrologer William Lilly, hunting and accidents
are both 1st house matters. Did the 1st house—the
cusp of which is called the Ascendant— somehow play
a role in the affair of Vice President Dick Cheney’s
hunting accident? The horoscope for the time of the hunting
accident has a Leo Ascendant, ruled by the Sun. Cheney himself
has a Virgo Ascendant, ruled by Mercury. His chart-ruling
Mercury was conjoined by the transiting Sun, the ruler of
the hunting accident horoscope, at the exact moment of the
accident (see a bi-wheel chart below).
Thus, the 1st house rulers of both horoscopes—one
for the time of the hunting accident and the other for Dick
Cheney’s birth—were conjunct within a degree.
In
addition, Lilly claims that hunters (or, in the gender-biased
nomenclature of the 17th Century, “huntsmen”—although there was a female
ambassador in Cheney’s small hunting party) are ruled
by the Moon. Lunar tables have been shown to correspond
with optimal times for hunting and fishing. Poetically,
there is a lunar quality to the hunt wherein a tide
of hunters ebbs and flows in relation to the prey. Also,
hunting was originally not for sport but for food provision,
and feeding one’s stomach is a lunar thing. There
was a near-full Moon rising during the waning twilight minutes
of Cheney’s quail hunt.
Venus,
Mars, and the Hunt
Although
some would take issue with hunting being called a sport,
sports are a 5th house matter. At the time of
the hunting accident, Venus was approaching a return to
the degree of Cheney’s natal Venus in the 5th
house of sports. His Venus return became exact on Feb.
21, a little more than a week after the accident. The Venus
return signifies social activities, affections, personal
popularity, and love.
Venus
also happens to be the ruler of Cheney’s Midheaven. As
Cheney misfired his gun in the fields outside of McAllen,
Texas, Mars by transit was exactly on Cheney’s Midheaven,
symbolizing a sudden jolt to his reputation. According to
another famous 17th Century astrologer, John
Partridge, Mars also rules wounds to the face and head—which
is where many of the gun pellets struck shooting victim
Harry Whittington.
The Sun,
the Moon, and Dick Cheney
Vice
President Cheney has Leo, the sign of the leader, on the
cusp of his 12th house. The 12th house
is where we operate behind the scenes. This is perfectly
descriptive of how Cheney has forged his political career,
through behind-the-scenes leadership.
At
the time of the shooting accident, the Moon was in Leo,
which in addition to leadership is also the sign of romance
and sport. The Moon was travelling through Cheney’s
12th house and exactly opposing his Sun.
We need to keep in mind that the Moon travels through about
one degree of the zodiac every two hours, so unlike the
other planets it was not in the same position during the
whole day of Cheney’s quail hunt. This indicates a
mounting discord within Cheney, a conflict borne of the
events of the day or the situation or his companions. This
might be something as simple as his not having had a successful
hunt—in fact, this was one reason given for his trying
to shoot quail so late in the day.
It
is also worth noting that the Sun rules Leo, the sign the
Moon was in, suggesting that the conflict had reached some
intensity within Cheney at the time of the opposition. Anytime
we have a transiting Moon opposite our own Sun, we are likely
to have some inner-outer conflict going on at the time—work
vs. home, play vs. homework, identity vs. needs, conscious
vs. subconscious, etc. The transiting Moon had gone into
Cheney’s 12th house at about the time the
hunt started. We might therefore surmise that the internal
conflict was a) somehow related to the hunting activity
and b) private. Something was happening with Cheney behind
the scenes of the hunting expedition.
Cheney’s
own natal Moon is in the 7th house and rules
the 11th. He has built his career around political
(11th house) relationships (7th house).
The Moon on the evening of February 12 opposed Cheney's
Sun from the 12th house. Perhaps he wanted to
get away from politics, through the recreation of hunting.
Or maybe he was keeping something hidden from political
view. This conflicting preoccupation may have
been the reason why he misfired his weapon, accidentally
shot one of his hunting partners, and waited fourteen hours
before publicly divulging it.
See
also: Political
Astrology Forecast: President Bush in 2006; Capricorn
Karl Rove, Political Architect; Political
Relationship Astrology: George Bush and John McCain
