Vedic Horoscope of USA - Do Countries have Karma?

Since my last article on Donald Trump I have had a lot of emails asking me to make a prediction about who will win the elections for the President of the United States. To attempt to make such a prediction would require the verified birth times of all the other Presidential candidates and unfortunately that is not publicly available, as per Astrodatabank.

Perhaps, even more important is that we look at the Karma of the United States. In Sanskrit this is called Samhita or connected Karma, and represents events that we experience globally, nationally, and in the groups we associate with. This can override or change our personal karma.

How do we read the karma of a nation state?

In Jyotish (Vedic Astrology) every moment of time contains a unique destiny. This applies not just to an individual's birth time but also to that of any new beginning, such as a business partnership, marriage, construction project, a long journey as well as the birth of a nation state.

Mahurta is the Jyotish art and science of  choosing an auspicious date and a precise time for new beginnings. It is a thousands of year old tradition, dating as far back as the Rig Veda, and is still practiced extensively in India today.  The primary reason most Indians consult a Jyotishi is to select a good Mahurta for marriage.

Midnight's Child - Birth chart of India - August 15, 1947, 12:00 Am, New Delhi, India

To give you an in idea of how seriously Indians consider having an auspicious Mahurta.  let's start by looking at how India got its birth time. When August 15 1947, was first proposed as the official date for India's independence from British rule, there was collective opposition by the Vedic Astrologers, as they considered this to be a very“unfortunate & unholy” date. However, Lord Mountbatten, the British Viceroy to India at the time, was locked into this date.

The Astrologers proposed a compromise that they be allowed to choose India's time of birth as the Midnight hour between Aug 14 and 15 to mitigate some of the negative effects. At that time the Moon would  be in the most favorable Pushya Nakshatra of spiritual knowledge, morality and integrity. This time also gives India a Taurus Ascendant, which is a fixed earth sign favored for building a strong foundations for new  endeavors and  material prosperity.  More importantly, they considered the 48 minute window of the  "Abhijeet Muhurta", which is believed to give favorable results even if the day is not auspicious, and stipulated that the transfer of power be conducted between 11:51 and 12:39 am and all the speeches be finished by Midnight. Both the British authorities and the new Indian leaders complied to their wishes and the official business of the transfer of power took place in the middle of the night.

 Birth chart of the United States - July 4, 1776, 18:30 pm, Philadelphia, PA
 

For the United States most Vedic Astrologers use July 4, 1776, in Philadelphia, PA, as the date and place of birth. However, there is some dispute about the time. I am using the most accepted time 18:30 pm, as researched by the esteemed Vedic Astrologer, James Kelleher.  At that time, the Moon was inShatabisha Nakshatra, signifying a very independent, autonomous, innovative and forward looking temperament for the nation. The Ascendant was Sagittarius, the sign of expansion, opportunity, prosperity, high aspiration and humanitarianism. Sagittarius is a Jupiter ruled sign which succeeds through Jupiter's hope, faith and irrepressible optimism, often seen by more mature planets like Saturnas naivete. Above all it gives strong convictions and values worth fighting for, but not necessarily the ability to consider other's values, tradition or beliefs. 

The 120 year planetary periods or cycles of the Vimshottarri dasha, which shows how planets exert their influence with different levels of strength at different times of our lives, applies to a country also.  Based on the date and time given above, the United States started out its life in Rahu Dasha (main period), Rahu Bhukti (sub period) as the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence from Great Britain and its King. (India started out its life in Saturn dash, Saturn Bhukti and Sade Sati, with some very difficult years, as the country was partitioned in three pieces - East and West Pakistan and India ).

September 28, 2015 - Rahu Dasha, Rahu Bhukti
 

On September 28, 2015, the United States has once again cycled back to Rahu Dasha Rahu bhukti (third Rahu dasha since the birth of the nation).  Rahu Dasha is eighteen years long and usually described as a roller coaster ride of massive change and innovation. Rahu is the out-cast, radical, or the revolutionary of the planetary cabinet. His "out of the box" attitude helps to shake things up and break traditions (for good or ill). The founding fathers audacity  to break free of Britain and the declaration that "all men are created equal" was very bold and radical thinking at the time, reflecting the positive outcome of Rahu's "uncivilized behavior". It is not surprising or unexpected that the very beginning of the 18 year Rahu Dasha for the USA correlates with the unexpected rise of Donald Trump, the most extreme and rough edged, uncivilized Presidential candidate in history who is "shaking up" the Republican party and the nation.

Rahu Dasha also activates Ketu in the horoscope (opposite sign) which means that polarization and the danger of falling into extremes heightens in this periods, especially in the first two years. The two Presidential candidates, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump, who are attracting huge crowds and excitement, are both projecting the far left and far right of the disfranchised American public (Rahu/Ketu). The pacifist versus the militarist, the flashy and the simple, the ego/self and the collective, the hyper civilized and one who has abandoned all civil behavior. 
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With Rahu's placement in the very lunar, maternal/feminine water sign of Cancer, the most significant polarization that Rahu  has brought forth since his dasha started in September 2015, is contrast of the masculine (solar/ Mars, Sun) and feminine (lunar/ Moon, Venus) energy. Not only do we have our first opportunity to elect a female President, but by last count 76 percent of women have a very unfavorable view of Mr. Trump. So who is voting for this guy, you do the maths? If you look at my analysis of Donald Trump's horoscope you will see that he is completely out of touch with his feminine planets. 

Rahu is  the planet of innovation. so we could expect exceptional leaps in technological breakthroughs in the next two decades. Artificial intelligence, space travel, and going "where no man has gone before" (Star Trek reference) are all characteristics of Rahu. If you are an investor looking for technologies to back my best bet would be in the water related areas. These will bring most innovations and biggest payoffs, as preserving our water, oceans and rivers will become a necessity. Rahu is also placed in the eighth house of unexpected events that are out of our control. Extreme water related events, sea levels rising, and weather patterns of drought and floods could also be predicted.

War and Peace are both possible, for a superpower like the USA, no matter the Dasha, but generally speaking the  type of peace that Rahu likes is mutual assured destruction and the type of war he likes is all out. Finally, Rahu also relates to outcasts, immigrants, and foreigners, so expect the issues related to immigration to also take front stage in the coming years, as it did in at the beginning of the birth of our nation. 

Let us look at some of the highlights of the past Dashas of the United States since the Second World War. As you will see, every period comes with different challenges and opportunities for growth.

Saturn Dasha - 9/27/1929 - 1948 - Saturn is a planet of austerity and contraction, caution and preservation, His Dasha started with the Wall Street crash of 1929, followed by a decade long great depression. Second World War was also fought in Saturn Dasha. The New Deal, the Social Security Act, Fair Labor Standards Act, under Roosevelt, are all Saturn based safety net programs that were enacted during this period.

Mercury Dasha - 9/26/1948 - 1965 - Mercury is the planet of commerce, business, communication, and media. This was an eraknown as the Golden Age of Capitalism and it also brought the influence of the mass media in our lives for the first time, as prosperity resulting from the postwar economic boom made it possible for radios and televisions to became household items.
 

Ketu Dasha - 9/27/1965-72 -  Ketu is  the planet of renunciation, philosophy, spirituality and withdrawal/escape from material life, and it brought us the counter culture of the hippy generation that rejected middle class values and pushed boundaries with experimentation with drugs, sex and rock and roll ( Rahu dives deeper into the material world and Ketu withdraws, but both are rule breakers).
 

Venus dasha 9/27/1972 - 1992- Venus is the planet of materiality, pleasure, comfort, diplomacy, peace, music, art and in her dasha the Hippies give way to the Yuppies. The Vietnam war finally ended, as did the cold war with the fall of the Soviet Union without engaging in war. Indeed in this period, US was not directly engaged in any war until the Gulf war at the very end of Venus dasha in 1991-1992.
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Sun dasha - 9/27/1992 - 1998 - Sun is the most powerful planet in the US chart, as ruler of the 9th house of good fortune. Solar Bill Clinton (Leo Ascendant ) became President, US economy boomed, with the advent of the dot com era.
 

Moon dasha -  9/ 30 1998-2008 - The Moon in the U.S. chart is the ruler of the8th house which brings upheaval, change and catastrophic events we cannot control that change us forever. The dot-com bubble ended by 2000 and the events of September 11, 2001 changed our society for ever. They brought forth the "emotional" (lunar) response by the public and a very emotionally charged President Bush(Cancer Ascendant) , to push an unnecessary and unproductive war without reason, planning or calculation.

Mars dasha 9/27/2008 - 9/2015 -  Mars is an uncompromising planet that draws the line with "my way or the highway" kind of attitude. Obama, a Capricorn Ascendant with Jupiter on the Ascendant, first  elected in his Jupiter dasha came in with such hope, faith and optimism for "reaching across the aisle". However, his Presidency started with the banking crises of 2008, and the US government has been paralyzed due to lack of compromise (Venus) the past eight years. Mars is not very favorably placed in the chart for business and partnerships in the seventh house. Many astrologers believe this is also why the United States is perpetually involved in one war or another. Gun sales soared to record levels after Obama's election and Mars paved the way emboldening the extremist for the rise of Donald Trump, a candidate with Mars on his Ascendant.
 

Final Words

Before you start packing your bags to move to Canada, remember that every planetary energy is a teaching tool, and a potential doorway to freedom and liberation from that which binds us to our limited physical self. Rahu's lack of moderation speeds up our spiritual evolution by taking us out of our comfort zone. In other words, his reckless actions can sometimes bring the type of change in societies that would have taken centuries. Finally never forget that Rahu and Ketu play the most important role in our spiritual development - when we lose our body (Rahu) and our head (Ketu), this is what the Eastern mystics called Enlightenment.