If you were expecting some kind of sun sign nonsense, forget about it. This is real astrology for the real world, not some mystical mumbo-jumbo psycho-babble word salad. If it's real astrology for yourself that you want, you can get it by phone or in print. And if you need help deciphering the astrological glyphs in the graphics accompanying this article, see Astroglyphs: Astrological Symbols Guide. Please note: this forecast is expressed in terms of Universal Time (UT, aka GMT). Location for all mundane charts is set for the Great Pyramid at Giza; the choice being strictly arbitrary in any case. Also please be aware that, while I never change a forecast once it's published, I do post errata to acknowledge typographical errors and the like.

PLEASE NOTE: This month’s forecast incorporates elements of (and refers to) the complete version of my 2019 World Forecast Highlights (34 8-1/2 x 11" illustrated pages); focused, amplified and elaborated with details for the month as appropriate. The full version of my 2019 World Forecast Highlights is available in hard copy by mail ($75) or as a PDF document by email ($50). Orders may be phoned in toll-free anywhere in North America to 800-527-8761, and charged to any major credit or debit card. Orders may also be placed direct from your own PayPal account page to rnolle@astropro.com – or by using the AstroPro PayPal order page.

"Your hand can seize today, but not tomorrow; and thoughts of your tomorrow are nothing but desire."
-- Omar Khayyam
 

The Skinny

There aren’t a multitude of major celestial configurations this month, but what’s out there is a pretty concentrated barrage of heavyweight stuff. First and foremost, there’s the historic Jupiter-Neptune square on the 16th at 18°43’ Sagittarius-Pisces; which is basically in effect all month long, being within two degrees of exact quadrature throughout June. This is triggered by T-Squares from the Sun (June 9-10) and Venus (June 23-34), as well as the Neptune retrograde station at 18°43’ Pisces on the 21st. (Neptune remains with a degree of its station point all month long.) If, like President Trump, you were born with significant points or planets around these degrees, this is a time for as much clarity and caution as you can muster.

And then there’s the Mars-Saturn opposition on the 14th at 18°57’ Cancer-Capricorn; within two degrees of exact from the 12th through the 17th. Chiming in on the 20th is the 22° 27’ Cancer-Capricorn Mars-Pluto opposition (within two degrees of exact from the 17th through 23rd). The new and full moon both play into all this, as does the onset of the year’s second Mercury Max cycle. June, to put it mildly, is no ordinary month . . .

The Jupiter-Neptune Waning Square

The last Roman Emperor sat on the throne in Constantinople back in the year 549, the last time a Saturn-Pluto conjunction in the third decanate of Capricorn and a Jupiter-Neptune waning square from Sagittarius to Pisces followed in the wake of the Great Justinian’s T-Square by thirteen years. Until now. If you’ve been following along in the full version of my World Forecast Highlights since 2005 (most recently pp. 5-10 in the 2019 edition), you know that we’ve been living in an historic watershed since 2006, when the Great T-Square (Jupiter in Scorpio squaring Saturn in Leo and Neptune in Aquarius) reappeared for the first time in nearly 1,500 years.

It took me years of research and hundreds of pages to describe what this combination of configurations means, so I’ll refer you to the above mentioned reports for a more complete picture. For now, suffice it to say we’re living through the dawning of a new historical era, a new world order.

This isn’t something you’ll see in the headlines, precisely because it’s an historical process rather than the news of the day. After all, the last appearance of this configuration was accompanied by the collapse of the Roman Empire, ushering in what came to be called the Dark Ages. But nobody knew at the time that the Dark Ages had begun. The term only appeared hundreds of years later, when it was introduced in the early 14th Century by the Italian scholar Petrarch. We’re already in a new Dark Ages. We just don’t know it yet.

Several of the key transition points in the process that began in 2006 have already happened. Two of the more important ones are in play this year, and one makes an exact alignment this month: the waning Jupiter-Neptune square. This is a “three-peat” alignment that has already made one exact pass this year (on January 13), and will make the final one in the series on September 21.

As I wrote in the full version of my 2019 World Forecast Highlights (pp. 6-7), "This alignment bespeaks a crisis of faith: truths are no longer public property, recognized and valued by the people at large. It’s a process of fragmentation; disintegration described 100 years ago by Yeats in The Second Coming:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity"

In the full version of my 2017 World Forecast Highlights, I pointed out that there’s more to this than the return of Justinian’s T-Square – as rare as that is. It’s part of an unfolding pattern that stretches from 2006 right into the present day, and beyond:

"This isn’t just one single configuration of major planets. It’s a whole sequence of major planet patterns that unfolds from that one big one, like a train of cars being pulled by a locomotive. For example, the 2016-2017 Libra-Aries Jupiter-Uranus opposition had its analog in the 594 opposition in the wake of Justinian’s T-Square. I told you what to expect from the 2016-2017 Jupiter-Uranus alignment, based on its parallels to the same opposition in 1934: a heyday of 'national socialism, from Stalin in the USSR to Hitler in Germany, Franco in Spain and Mussolini in Italy, to FDR in the US. From Hitler’s Reichstag fire to Stalin’s Great Purge and Mussolini’s racial purity laws, to Roosevelt’s New Deal, 1933 was a turning point in the tide of fascism – all under the aegis of the Jupiter-Uranus opposition, in combination with the 1932-1934 Uranus-Pluto square. That’s right: the combined Uranus-Pluto square and Jupiter-Uranus opposition that accompanied the 1930s has been with us from 2011 on into 2017. And we wonder why anarchy, populism, nihilism, racism and fascism have reared their ugly heads again, with an intensity not seen in generations?'

Take a look around the world at all the nationalist and fascist political movements that have arisen during this period. If you can’t see that US President Donald Trump is the very archetype of “anarchy, populism, nihilism, racism and fascism,” you have been duped. Unfortunately, the state of the American educational system and the structure of the Electoral College combined to enable the election of a candidate whom no one familiar with pre-World War II history on the one hand, and the history of Donald Trump over the last four decades on the other, could possibly vote for in good conscience. Make no mistake: if you didn’t know his track record as a liar, fraud, grifter and rabble rouser, it can only be that you were paying attention to Celebrity Apprentice when you should have been reading history and the news.

I won’t even attempt to justify this astrologically, because it’s self-evident to any well informed American citizen – which excludes nearly everyone who has been brainwashed by Fox News, internet scam sites like InfoWars, and the Trump Organization. Don’t believe me? Google is your friend: look up Trump and the KKK, Trump lawsuits and bankruptcies, who actually wrote The Art of the Deal, Truther, Birther and the Central Park jogger case – just to scratch the surface. The man is not the success he pretends to be. He’s a megalomaniac, a compulsive liar; an idiot savant whose only genius is self-aggrandizement. There’s a reason the people who know him best – his fellow New Yorkers – voted resoundingly against him in the 2016 elections. They know him best. As Fran Lebowitz, one of those fellow New Yorkers put it: "You do not know anyone as stupid as Donald Trump. He’s a poor person’s idea of a rich person." I’m sorry if this hurts your feelings – and sorrier still for what this man has done to the world.

I have been asked many times how this disaster will end, and when. While the rise of fascism and anarchy was a major theme in a very long term astrological cycle, the demise of Trump fits a pattern unique to American history over the relatively short span of some 150 years. As I wrote in my 2018 World Forecast Highlights (published in 2017), "Mr. Trump is surrounded by danger, which threatens not only him but also the world at large – particularly during the Mars Max cycles of 2018 and 2020, if he manages to stay in office that long. I don’t expect he will . . . In the current highly polarized political atmosphere, half the US population (at least) are hoping that Mr. Trump’s removal from office is imminent. Not so fast!"

As described on page 10 in the full version of my 2018 World Forecast Highlights, "President Nixon’s resignation occurred on August 9, 1974 – some two years and two months after the break-in at the Democratic Party headquarters in the Watergate Hotel. (And that was with the Democrats controlling Congress.) . . . Realpolitik suggests a couple of alternative outcomes. The quicker one is that the GOP power structure turns on the President, and turns him out via the 25th Amendment. The slower hinges on the Democratic Party regaining a majority in the House of Representatives in the 2018 mid-term election – which would put us on a timeline not unlike the Nixon-Watergate scenario." By that reckoning, a Trump ouster would be due not before mid-March 2019. Notice that the Jupiter-Neptune square in January (14° 22’) in the mutable signs (Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius and Pisces) makes a T-Square tying into the President’s natal tenth house Sun-Uranus and its opposition to his fourth house (lunar eclipse) Moon This is also in effect for the June and September appearances of the Jupiter-Neptune square."

Apart from the Jupiter-Neptune square to his natal full moon eclipse – suggesting the public and the GOP lose confidence in him, there’s also the Saturn-Pluto conjunction opposing his natal Saturn: authority comes down hard fits this transit very well, particularly during the close approaches of April-June and December 2019. An external event such as a political removal from office is only one of the possibilities, of course. Internal factors such as health cannot be ruled out: he is obviously not a robust physical specimen. Apart from the Jupiter-Neptune square to his natal full moon eclipse – suggesting the public and the GOP lose confidence in him, there’s also the Saturn-Pluto conjunction opposing his natal Saturn: authority comes down hard fits this transit very well, particularly during the close approaches of April-June and December 2019. An external event such as a political removal from office is only one of the possibilities, of course. Internal factors such as health cannot be ruled out: he is obviously not a robust physical specimen.

Impeachment is the first step in removing a President from office in the United States. Treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors are the grounds for impeachment specified in Article II, Section 4 of the US Constitution. In effect, impeachment is an indictment; which is to say the filing of formal charges. This is done by means of a majority vote in the House of Representatives.

Just as indictment is followed in the judicial system by a trial, so is impeachment. The Senate is the jury in this case, and it takes a two-thirds vote to convict the President in this venue. Not once in all of US history has a Presidential impeachment been followed up by a conviction in the Senate.

Each and every one of the three impeachment crises the US has faced –Johnson in 1868, Nixon in 1974 and Clinton in 1998 – has been anchored in eclipses. This time around, Donald Trump’s downfall began in the wake of the February 11, 2017 lunar eclipse on his natal Mars, with Saturn opposing his natal Sun.

All things considered, I suspect that Mr. Trump ends up leaving office by some means other than impeachment in the House followed by conviction in the Senate. If ill health isn’t the cause of his exit, then he’s likely to follow a Nixonian path – resigning as part of a deal to avoid certain impeachment and conviction, in return for a pardon for himself and his adult children."

As I said, this is one for history rather than for the breaking news of the day. It won’t happen this month, let alone on the exact day of this month’s Jupiter-Neptune square. But June will bring further revelations of Presidential incompetence, misconduct, misfeasance and malfeasance that will shake the blind faith of even his most brainwashed followers. Confidence in the global financial system will also be shaken: expect a continued overall decline in major equity markets - with some wild gyrations along the way. These developments will serve to hasten the President’s day of reckoning. June 9-10, 16-21 and 23-24 are among the critical dates in this month-long process, when lies, fraud, deception (including self-deception) and conspiracy will rear their ugly head. Trust no one. Remember: the global economic downturn heralded by Pluto’s southward equatorial crossing last year and this year’s Saturn-Pluto conjunction is just around the corner.

Of course, Trump is by no means the only one whose birth chart is targeted by the Jupiter-Neptune square in the 19th degree of Sagittarius-Pisces. If you’re among those of us whose chart features any emphasis around 19° of the mutable signs (Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius and Pisces), then you too should be on the alert. (Check your chart, and protect yourself as best you can.)

Mercury Max

Like SuperMoon, which I introduced and defined 40 years ago, planetary Max cycles are astronomical functions astrologically applied. Also likeSuperMoon, Max cycles incorporate orbital interactions between Earth and other celestial bodies, such that they are in greater than usual proximity and prominence. Mercury Max is the most frequent of these cycles, happening three times a year on average. The second one of 2019 begins this month.

Being closest to the Sun, Mercury darts between Earth and Sun more than any other planet; several times a year in fact, including the infamous Mercury retrogrades of astrological legend. While most astrologers pay a fair amount of attention to Mercury's retrograde, few realize that it's only a part of the more fundamental Max phase in the orbital interaction between Mercury and Earth, as they both orbit around the Sun.

The Mercury Max phase begins when the little Sun-grazer reaches its maximum elongation east of the Sun, during its evening star phase. This happens when Mercury has come 'round to the same side of the Sun as Planet Earth, and is relatively near us. The little planet is then pulling up to pass Earth on the inside track, as it were; catching up to us from behind and then passing between us and the Sun. Just as it catches up with us, Mercury passes directly between Earth and the Sun. This is Mercury's inferior conjunction with the Sun. After the inferior conjunction, Mercury continues pulling ahead of us until it reaches its greatest elongation west of the Sun (in its morning star phase), at which point the little planet is headed toward the far side of our parent star. Between these two extremes, the greatest east and west elongations, comes the fabled Mercury retrograde period of astrological lore. (See accompanying table.)

2019 MERCURY MAX CYCLES

Max-E	S-Rx	Cnj. SUN	S-D	Max-W
FEB 27, 2019	MAR 5, 2019	MAR 15, 2019	MAR 28, 2019	APR 11, 2019
JUN 23, 2019	JUL 7, 2019	JUL 21, 2019	AUG 1, 2019	AUG 9, 2019
OCT 20, 2019	OCT 31, 2019	NOV 11, 2019	NOV 20, 2019	NOV 28, 2019

Max-E = Mercury (Evening Star) Max. Elongation East of Sun (Max begins)
S-Rx = Retrograde Station (Retrograde GBegins)
Cnj. SU = Inferior Conjunction with Sun
S-D = Direct Station (Retrograde Ends)
Max-W = Mercury (Morning Star) Max. Elongation West of Sun (Max ends)

It’s worth noting that, with the inferior planets (those inside Earth’s orbit; namely Mercury and Venus), the closest approach to Earth coincides with the inferior (retrograde) conjunction with the Sun. With the superior planets (those outside Earth’s orbit), the closest approach to Earth coincides with the planet’s (retrograde) solar opposition. Clearly astrological doctrine regarding planetary retrogrades is completely unthinking. Rather than being weakened or debilitated in some way, a retrograde planet is in fact bigger and brighter in our sky, and closer to our home planet. Not unlike a SuperMoon, in that respect . . .

What I have termed the Mercury Max cycle is simply a way of putting the Earth-Sun-Mercury relationship into a perspective that reflects real-sky, observational astronomy; the dynamics of our solar system as seen from our terrestrial perch – which is what astrology was, back in the time when it was astronomy. Look up in the sky over the indicated periods, and you will see the phenomena described above. Astronomical software and references provide the greatest eastern and western elongations of Mercury (and Venus, for that matter), but astrological software and references do not. One is a real sky perspective, the other is something less – and that is what astrologers have settled for over the course of time. Instead of peering into an ephemeris (book of planetary positions), I advocate a more natural “eyes to the skies” approach; which is exactly how real astrology began millennia ago.

The Mercury Max cycle, incidentally, is a genuine astronomically based replacement for the silly, irrelevant and arbitrary astrological doctrine of Mercury’s "shadow" and "storm" periods. Forget that tripe, which has no basis in reality at all! (For details and examples, see pp. 13-19 in the full version of my 2019 World Forecast Highlights.)

The second Mercury Max cycle this year runs from June 27 to August 9, and peaks with the July 21 inferior Sun-Mercury conjunction. Throughout this period, and most notably within plus or minus three days of the five critical moments in the cycle – see the 2019 Mercury Max table - geomagnetic storms disrupt our home planet. Get ready: the curtain is rising on a comedy of errors and a whirlwind of activity.

Dumping Gigawatts of extra solar energy into Earth’s magnetosphere, atmosphere and crust not only amplifies the potential for stronger and more frequent storms and seismic disturbances, but electrical disturbances as well. All of these geomagnetic disturbances essentially grow out of solar storms of one kind of another; be they X-Ray storms, coronal holes, Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), plasma arcs, etc. Blasting charged particles out into the solar system – tending to be directed toward our home planet throughout the whole June 23-August 9 Mercury Max cycle, these high energy solar disturbances coincide with strong geomagnetic storms here on Earth (Kp 5 and up). These in turn amplify the potential for outages in electrical networks (e.g. power and communications) and the human nervous system. Think scrambled circuits, and you’ve got a pretty good handle on Mercury Max. And if you were born with important features in the range of 24° Cancer to 4° Leo – where the entire Mercury Max takes place this time around – then you may be more susceptible than most to these kinds of disruptions. Check your chart!

Storms & Seismicity

June will rank high on the geophysical turbulence scale, thanks to the combination of the Jupiter-Neptune square, Mars oppositions to Saturn and Pluto, Mercury Max, and the normal new and full moon factors. June 1-6 (the new moon and north lunar declination peak), 14-20 (the full moon and south lunar declination extreme) and June 25-July 9 (the solar eclipse and lunar north declination peak) look like the greatest concentrations of frequency and intensity, when it comes to extreme tides, powerful storms and moderate to severe seismicity (M5+ quakes and notable volcanic eruptions). Granted, July and August look even more portentous, with their eclipses and SuperMoons. But we deal with what’s before us.

Acknowledgments

All mundane astrological charts as well as eclipse and astro-locality maps are set for the Universal Time (UT) of the event, and calculated and produced using Esoteric Technologies’ Solar Fire Gold Version 7.0.8. Charts are set for the location of the Great Pyramid - a purely arbitrary choice, since location is irrelevant to these charts. Unless sotherwise noted, sky map images are screen captures from the Pocket Universe or Star Rover apps for iPhone, or produced by Starry Night for Windows; storm tracks are screen captures from The Weather Channel app for iPhone; and earthquake maps are screen captures from the QuakeFeed or QuakeWatch apps for iPhone. Any market images are screen captures from the default iPhone Stocks app, unless otherwise noted. Weather images and storm tracks are screen captures from the Weather Channel app for iPhone.

SPECIAL FEATURE: This month's birthdays of the famous and infamous (with astrological birth charts)

Richard Nolle, Certified Professional Astrologer consultations/orders (AmEx/Discover/MasterCard/Visa) 800-527-8761 data/message 480-753-6251 - email rnolle@astropro.com Box 26599 - Tempe, AZ 85285-6599 - USA www.astropro.com