Friday Bite 6 February 2026

Groundhog Day

“There is a special place in hell for those who took part, for those who kept quiet and for those who tried to conceal it [Epstein sex-trafficking/paedophilia ring].” Prime Minister Donald Trusk, 5 February.

“I really don’t have the words to describe, my love, gratitude for your generosity and kindness…I am at your service. Just marry me.” Sarah York in an email to Jeffrey Epstein, January 2010

SHORTLY AFTER I posted last week’s Bite, the US Justice Department released 3.5 million pages of the “Epstein Files”. These included 2,000 videos, and hundreds of thousands of emails and images. One week later, as their contents are slowly revealed, the shockwaves continue to gather momentum.

 If we thought we had seen everything there was to see about Andrew Mountbatten Windsor’s disgraceful behaviour, even worse was to come, not least an FBI presentation (2025) in which he was named as a participant in group sex on Jeffrey Epstein’s plane. Wife Sarah found herself embedded even more deeply in the manure through her effulgent emails to the financier in 2010, which belied her protestations of last September that the only reason she maintained a cordial relationship with Epstein was her fear that he would carry out his threat to destroy the York family. In reality, she not only clearly adored him but was indebted to him for the financial support he gave her, arguably to the tune of hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Earlier this week, her charity, Sarah’s Trust, was closed “for the foreseeable future” and on Monday, the removal vans were parked outside Royal Lodge, the former prince having slipped into the night some time over the weekend.

In this last tranche of files, we discovered that Britain’s royal family wasn’t the only one caught in Epstein’s web. Norway’s Crown Princess Mette Marie exchanged many emails with the financier over the years and had stayed at his Palm Beach home. She also reportedly received $20,000 from him… Princess Sofia of Sweden did not escape exposure in the recent despatch either: emails revealing that she had met with Epstein on several occasions before her marriage to Prince Carl Philip.

While the Swedish Crown may be in no danger of toppling due to Princess Sofia’s association with Epstein, the Royal House of Glücksburg is in deep trouble. Not only does Mette Marie’s link to a global sex-trafficking scandal tarnish the image of the Norwegian monarchy, but this week the trial opened of her son of a previous marriage, Marius Borg Holby, who is charged with rape, repeated abuse, threats and drug abuse.

Bad timing is an understatement.

The House of Glücksburg came into being in 1905 when Norway and Sweden dissolved their union. That same year, Haakon Mangus VII became the first king of independent Norway. Thus, both Norway and the royal house share a similar astrological destiny.

Do we need to look much further than Uranus’s current position on the Midheaven of Norway’s chart for an explanation as to why the monarchy is wobbling on its axis and questions are being raised over Mette Marie’s future as Queen of Norway. The Crown Princess has already lost at least one of her patronages, and the media is warning that public trust in the monarchy is waning.

Not only is Uranus on the Midheaven but conjoined to Mercury, the ruler of Norway’s chart, and on 17 February there will be a solar eclipse at 28 degrees of Aquarius, close to the nation’s natal Saturn and squaring the Midheaven and transiting Uranus. And if that wasn’t enough, Pluto is squaring Norway’s natal Venus (ruler of the Midheaven) and fast approaching, by opposition, Norway’s natal Moon at 6 degrees Leo.

Clearly, I don’t expect the monarchy to fall in the next couple of weeks, but I do think the royal family is going to have to make some difficult decisions in order to preserve its position. In the same way that Queen Elizabeth was forced to take extreme measures to preserve the British Crown in the aftermath of her Annus Horribilis (1992) Norway’s monarchy must perform radical changes to regain the trust and respect of its people.

The Midheaven of a nation’s chart points to the leadership of the country, whether in the sense of a monarchy and/or the government, so Norway as an entity is experiencing turbulence. In recent weeks, not only has prime minister Jonas Gahr Store had to deal with a truculent President Trump complaining about his failure to win the Nobel Peace Prize and threatening all manner of unpleasantness in consequence, but growing concerns over the safety and sovereignty of the Arctic region is reanimating the argument as to whether Norway should become a member of the European Union. Finland and Sweden joined the EU in the past eighteen months, and, given the aforementioned Pluto and Uranus transits, such an eventuality for Norway is far from out of the question.

While the list of famous names entangled in Epstein’s evil empire, or at least mentioned en passent, grows by the day resulting in condemnation and ignominy and loss of position and power, the one name that has appeared 38,000 times in the documents has garnered little attention and suffered no consequences whatsoever. Trump, Melania Trump and the Mar-a-Lago Club are indeed mentioned 38,000 times, but, as The Guardian newspaper pointed out, “the constitutional lines of accountability to control a president seem to have long gone, while the public seem inured to Trump’s moral flaws.”

The British establishment, on the other hand, are not inured to the “moral flaws” or the criminal actions of Epstein whisperer, Peter Mandelson, formerly known as “The Prince of Darkness”.

Mandelson’s fall from grace in the past seven days has been meteoric, although it is not the first time he has had to resign from office. In 1998 he resigned for receiving a loan of £373,000 from a ministerial colleague, which he failed to declare, and in 2001 he resigned over allegations of misconduct related to a passport application. In September last year, he was sacked from his role as ambassador to the United States over his association with Epstein. However, the release last Friday of further emails and photographs from the Epstein files has eclipsed all that went before, not least the evidence that he had given market-sensitive information to Epstein when he was Business Secretary. By Monday, Mandelson had resigned from the Labour party and taken leave of absence from the House of Lords. And by Tuesday, the Metropolitan Police had launched a criminal investigation into allegations of misconduct in public office.

Always a controversial figure, loved and hated in equal measure, there is almost certainly no comeback from these revelations. He may even spend time in prison. Sadly, or not so sadly given your opinion of the prime minister, it is not just Mandelson’s future that is on the line but Sir Keir Starmer’s political survival. The prime minister’s time in office is rapidly reaching an end.

Unfortunately, we do not have a time of birth for Peter Mandelson and must make do with a sunrise chart, but there are some features which are not dependent on an accurate horoscope that are worthy of note. Mandelson was born during the Saturn-Neptune conjunction in Libra, so the repetition of this conjunction at this point of time is of no mean significance.  As I have mentioned before, while Saturn and Neptune have been in transit in Pisces, there have been many celebrities and leaders who have fallen from grace and been made to atone for their sins, and this theme is also redolent in the Saturn-Neptune conjunction. What is also fascinating is that Jeffrey Epstein was born on the Saturn-Neptune conjunction in Libra too.

Other points of relevance are the inconjuncts to Mandelson’s Sun-Neptune-Saturn conjunction from transiting Uranus, on the one hand, and the Saturn-Neptune conjunction on the other. In this Yod configuration, we have a perfect rendition of the suddenness and unexpectedness of the events that have led to his downfall. That transiting Pluto is nowhere to be seen in terms of connections to his natal planets is noticeable and suggests that the angles of the chart may be on or near three degrees of the fixed signs (Taurus, Scorpio, Aquarius and Leo).

As the Saturn-Neptune conjunction draws ever closer to exactitude, we are acquiring more and more understanding of its meaning in terms of global developments and our personal lives. Out there, we may see chaos and confusion and we may worry about what will replace the boundaries that once kept us safe and secure, but we are also witnessing the process of accountability. Maybe at this point in time, merely a handful of elites are being forced to face their “crimes”, but this is just the beginning. And some of those who believe they have removed every shred of evidence that could link them to Epstein’s ring of evil, may discover that they have not…

And yes, it was Groundhog Day on Monday.

Friday Bite 30 January 2026

The Sense of an Ending

 “An individual approached US Border Patrol officers with a 9 mm semi-automatic handgun” Kristi Noem, 24 January

“… I may have gotten some information wrong.” Kristi Noem, 28 January

“When we first entered the streets, there was hope that we could do something, and that Israel and the U.S. would help us… Now there is just death—so many dead.” “M”, Iran protester who did not want to be named:  Cora Engelbrecht New Yorker 29 January.

ANOTHER WEEK ANOTHER crisis. Hopefully, we are not becoming inured to daily doses of shock and awe because this trend is not going away any day soon. Sunday’s full moon is likely to bring more than one global situation to a head, with a potential strike on Iran being top of the list of possibilities.

First though, the key events of the past seven days that stand testament to the astrology of the times.

As if the fatal shooting of one American citizen exerting her right to protest and free speech wasn’t enough to urge the Trump administration to change its tactics in regard to the purge on “illegal and criminal aliens” in Minneapolis, on Saturday, a second American citizen was shot and killed by ICE agents on the streets of the city. Alex Pretti, a thirty-seven-year-old American intensive care nurse for the Department of Veterans Affairs was shot multiple times, despite the gun he was legally permitted to carry having already been removed by one of the agents. The response by the administration was immediate; Kristy Noem (Homeland Security Secretary) declared Pretti was “brandishing” a gun and had “arrived at the scene to inflict maximum damage on individuals and kill law enforcement…” and posts by the President, JD Vance and Stephen Miller followed in quick succession describing Pretti as a “domestic terrorist” and a “would-be assassin”.

After nationwide condemnation, Trump and the administration rowed back on their initial statements, Noem conceding that she may have “gotten some information wrong.” And by Tuesday, Border patrol commander, Gregory Bovino – he of the army great-coat beloved by the Nazis – had been transferred to the Mexican border and replaced by Tom Hoffman, the border tsar. And on Wednesday, two ICE agents involved in the fatal shooting were placed on administrative leave.

Governor Tim Walz who had been goaded into bringing the State National Guard onto the streets did so, but put them to better use handing out doughnuts and hot chocolate to observers and protesters. In so doing, he may have averted an even bigger crisis whereby the president would have invoked the Insurrection Act.

At first glance, there’s not a lot to see in the above chart for the moment Alex Pretti was fatally shot. The prevailing line-up of personal planets and Pluto in Aquarius is seen here in the twelfth house of shadows and secrets, and the ruler, Neptune, is conjunct Saturn in the first house sextiling Uranus. But those factors tell a story. The actions of the ICE agents were clouded in confusion – is that a gun or a phone? – and it remained for videos taken by onlookers to see that, contrary to the narrative adopted by the administration, Pretti was not brandishing a gun, and that he was already on the ground when he was shot. And while trigger-happy Uranus was trining Mars and Pluto and sextiling Saturn and Neptune, whatever the harmony of the angular relationships, you’re still dealing with a combustible group of planets.  Plus, the nodal axis was flanking the Ascendant, giving a nod to the eclipses of last September and those to come in February and March.

I looked at this line-up of planets in last week’s bite. Then, Mars was in Capricorn and the remaining personal planets in Aquarius; now there is a full complement of personal planets in Aquarius, conjoining Pluto. And by last Tuesday/Wednesday, Mars was exactly conjunct Pluto, so arguably, we are in an even more potentially transformational period.

Which brings us on to that “armada” of US aircraft carriers and warships now positioned in the Arabian Sea, and within range of Iran. Plus, at least a dozen F-15E attack planes have joined a fleet of jet fighters at an air base in Jordan – where they were last June in readiness for “Operation Midnight Hammer”.

Weeks before the United States attacked Venezuela and kidnapped former president Maduro and his wife, there was a build up of American warships in the Caribbean. During that time, negotiations were apparently taking place offering Maduro a “safe-passage” out of Venezuela, which he refused to accept. So, it isn’t difficult to see a parallel with the Iran situation. Ostensibly, the Trump administration is using threat-of-force to get the Iranian government to come to an agreement over ending its nuclear programme and its killing of its citizens.

Since it is highly unlikely that the mullahs will agree to anything of the kind, plus the promise the American President made to the Iranian people to come to their rescue, Trump is left with only one option. To attack. And the more surgical that attack can be, the better for the Iranian people and the rest of us.

It wouldn’t surprise me in the least to find US/Israeli fighter jets attacking strategic sites in Iran in the early hours of Sunday morning. Thirteen degrees of Leo-Aquarius is within one degree of Iran’s Sun (in the chart of Khomeini’s return to Iran) and conjoining the Ascendant (in the chart of the Islamic Republic). The full moon, set from the perspective of Tehran, places Uranus on the Descendant, which is symbolic of a surprise attack by an “open enemy”. And even if Sunday does not turn out to be D-day, the full moon, which presides over the end of chapters, has a two-week timeline until the solar eclipse of 17 February.

Also in the full moon mix are the “peace talks” still ongoing between Russia, Ukraine and the United States. That they are continuing is a good sign, although it is hard to believe that Putin will give up his demands over the Donbas. All wars eventually end, and maybe each time that prospect is dangled in front of us, the end draws nearer.

And, for now, I think that’s the best we can hope for.