Seeing this story, I had to have a look at the astrology and as always it checks out. The popular 39 year old German Defence minister (above) Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg (born 5/12/71 – Munich – no birth-time), or to give him his full name Karl Theodor Maria Nikolaus Johann Jacob Philipp Franz Joseph Sylvester Freiherr von und zu Guttenberg (I kid you not) has resigned after it was found that half his 475 page university doctorate had been copied form other sources, word for word. Guttenberg or Baron Cut-and-Paste, Zu Copyberg or Zu Googleberg as the German media have playfully nicknamed him, was becoming a leading candidate for Chancellor in the future; alas this scandal has ruined his ambitions. He has also quite rightly been stripped of his PhD.
The Baron has a Sagittarius Sun conjunct Jupiter which for all intense purposes is a lucky aspect square Mars in Pisces. Normally this would be an all-action, adventuring, placement going out and doing things on a physical level, but Pisces is more dreamy, non-combative and deceptive here, so his beliefs, philosophy and education is where he would take risks, to his cost. He has a security motivated, patriotic Moon in Cancer and the other stand-out aspect for me is a wedge pattern, sextile and trine aspects onto an opposition. We have Saturn in communicative Gemini, opposite Neptune also in Sagittarius the sign of education. Saturn in Gemini raises doubts in the head about how intelligent you really are and often the consequence is for you to work even harder to compensate for this. However this Saturn is opposite Neptune which encourages you to take the easy route out. The easy route out for the Baron, supported by that Mars in Pisces was to cheat in his studies. Remember that wedge, Saturn opposition Neptune trine and sextile onto Pluto in Libra. Here is the Achilles heel in his deception, the self-destruct button waiting to be pushed. Uranus also squares his Sun/Jupiter conjunction too, although fortunate (in a hereditary sense), Guttenberg is accident prone too. Right now that Pluto (destruct button) is being opposed by transiting Uranus (unexpected events). Transiting Uranus also squares his natal Mercury (bad news). Transiting Mercury squares natal Sun and conjuncts that deceptive Mars highlighting what he had done; transiting Sun squares it’s own position.Transiting Saturn sits on that natal Uranus sextile his Sun/Jupiter, hard lessons to be learned from this revelation. There is more I could say, but you get the picture; the Baron’s political ambitions are now effectively toast.
Chancellor Angele Merkel also loses out of this situation too. She stuck by Guttenberg when the story broke in the German press, as three state elections were on the horizon. Looking at her transit chart, transiting Saturn is a couple of degrees from exactly being conjunct to her Midheaven, so right now her public standing is taking a bit of a battering and she is receiving criticism. Expect the forthcoming election results to go against her and her coalition government.
