Giving Thanks to Veterans and Victory

Giving Thanks to Veterans and Victory

“The New England Historic Genealogical Society traced the family trees of the three major presidential candidates. US presidential hopeful Barack Obama is a distant relative not only of President George W Bush but also of wartime British prime minister Winston Churchill, according to US researchers.” - ABC News, March 26th, 2008

“We do not want war. We have done everything within our power to reach a peaceful solution. Even though the international community refuses to understand our rightful aims, we are willing to take strong and determined measures to release an oppressed nation from the shackles of tyranny and to remove the threat that is aimed against us. History will show that justice followed the success of our arms.”
- Adolf Hitler, Before the outbreak of World War II

“You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word. It is Victory. Victory at all costs. Victory in spite of all terrors. Victory, however long and hard the road may be, for without victory there is no survival.”
- Winston Churchill, Before, During and After World War II

The placement of my natal Mercury is quite curious. Mercury is the planet that influences one’s style of speech, the manner in which one communicates and an individual’s overall thought processes in general. At the time of my birth, Mercury was in retrograde motion, or looking to what has passed, in the sign that considers the past a very potent force, Cancer. However, simultaneously (or dualisticly?) my Mercury was placed in the Aquarian or 11th house, a house where ONLY the future matters. I’ve learned over time to just politely nod whenever a student or beginning astrologer will be analyzing my chart and state most assuredly: “With that Mercury in Cancer you must be QUITE the history buff.”

For me, having a sense of history is imperative if there is any hope for a future for myself, my country, or the world at large.

Unfortunately, most Americans’ idea of history stretches as far back as September 11th, 2001. Anything before that is all mashed together, kind of like that experimental stuffing you swore you’d perfect next year when the Sun was in Sagittarius and Thanksgiving had arrived yet again. But for now, the solidified goop that has hacked off chunks from the American Revolution, World War II (but definitely NOT World War I !!) is tossed in the back of that cold and mostly dark area of your rational mind which stores historical fact and significance, much like a frayed Tupperware container with a scribbled label placed on top which reads: “Old stuff no one cares about”.

Most Americans (and Brits for that matter) are not aware of the realization that if it weren’t for predominantly one factor, we’d all be speaking German with a required semi- knowledge of either Italian Propaganda Verbs or Militant Japanese Commands.

That one factor being a Sagittarian named Winston Churchill.

Therefore, how karmicly and historically significant is the fact that our current Commander and Chief of the Free World shares shreds of DNA with not only his predecessor but also from a son of Jupiter who literally changed the course of history as all of us know it today.

Doris Kearns Goodwin, THE voice of American history in her Pulitzer Prize winning account of FDR and Eleanor Roosevelt’s lives during the Second World War, “No Ordinary Time” states that in May of 1940, the fate of the Western World was for the most part lost to the never stopping jaws of Nazi aggression. This grim state of affairs was altered by only the most miraculous of minute margins. The Allies were able to recover from the reeling confusion of the Third Reich’s fast approaching tsunami of well equipped and well trained military due to a few key blunders stemming from Hitler’s foolish pride. Blunders, which in turn translated to last minute luck along with multiple lightning speed actions by the British troops at Dunkirk.

Last minute luck and multiple lightning speed actions, by the way, are the 2 main staples of how a Sagittarian functions in life and jump starts their inborn sense of random but overall Jupiterian good fortune to work at maximum potential to not only save them from the flames of annihilation but to have the laurels of victory land in their lucky laps!

“I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else.”
- Winston Churchill, Sagittarian

It was after this “miracle at Dunkirk” that Churchill would transform the “happy go lucky”/”it’s all good, dude” laidback attitude of his natural Sagittarian self into the solitary voice of optimism, faith and futuristic hope for the fighters of Fascist oppression. Through his rousing speeches of Jupiterian fire, Winston Churchill would be the only beacon of light the British people would see as they clamored for their lives in the blinding darkness during the Nazi Blitzkrieg in the summer of 1940.

Ms. Goodwin’s text emphasizes the influence Churchill’s optimistic words had on the entire world when he delivered his first speeches after Dunkirk, which in every way reflect his inherent Sagittarian viewpoint:

“Churchill’s rousing words bestowed a mythical meaning on Dunkirk that would live in the hearts of Englishmen for generations to come. “So hypnotic was the force of his words,” British philosopher (a Sagittarian occupation) Isaiah Berlin has written, “so strong his FAITH (a domain of Sagittarius’ 9th house) , that by the sheer intensity of his eloquence he bound his spell upon (the British people) until it seemed to them that he was indeed speaking what was IN their hearts and minds.” If they possessed the courage (a trait belonging to fire signs at large) and determination he perpetually saw in them, it was because he had helped to create it by the INTENSITY OF HIS BELIEF (trait of the evolved Sagittarian) in their qualities. “They conceived a new idea of themselves. They went forward into battle transformed by his words.”
- “No Ordinary Time”, page 63

Even when most of London was smoldering from the flames of the Blitzkrieg bombs the Nazis dropped relentlessly night after night that July and many English wanted to immediately capitulate to surrender, Churchill did not falter to constantly inspire his people to not only hope for victory but to envision themselves (or in other words to tap into his Jupiterian gift of foresight) in a future where they had defeated the Nazis. Being the action oriented fire sign that he was, Churchill brought this vision of a victorious future home by constantly waving a “V” with his fingers whenever he was in public until the end of the war – how interesting that Churchill’s physical act to reinforce his fiery Sagittarian optimism is the image used today when discussing the genetic thread that lies between the President of our recent past, George Bush and the President of our unfolding future, Barack Obama.

They say history repeats itself. The clouds of change may not be darkening by a force as threatening and deadly as Nazi Fascism BUT Americans as a whole are not nearly as gung ho with American pride as they used to be as of late. The world view at large has been tinged with intrepidation and fear by a global economy brought close the brink of peril on numerous recent occasions. Add to that, the simultaneous presence of other “Hope Killers”: Tsunamis that rock the Earth off of its axis, an ever growing awareness of terrorism on the world’s stage, natural disasters made more effusive and deadly by global warming, and antibiotic resistant- pandemic viruses to name a few.

As my Cancerian 11th house Mercury sees it, survival of this planet depends on every individual, and not just the world’s leaders, to get seriously Sagittarian in only the most positive sense of the word by embracing an evolved Sagittarian philosophy of hope best said by Sir Winston himself, when he implored the Free World to:

“NEVER, EVER GIVE UP!”

Dedicated to the memory of my uncle, Edward Naylor, Sagittarian & Medalled World War II Military Hero