Little did I know

Little did I know…

When I wrote about the opposition being quiet over this moon (August 12, 2007), I was hesitant to say “silenced” which is implied by Mercury’s square to the MC while very close to the Sun, especially with Mars in Gemini (Mercury’s domain) being ruler of the MC.

So what happened?

In Ypsilanti’s Heritage Festival, the parade is a who’s who of community movers and shakers, a “big day out” for the folks who make up the heart and soul of the city.

In Ypsi’s political landscape, there is a group known as Stop City Income Tax (SCIT) who is a bunch of citizens who are sick to the teeth of the way the city has been run.

This group, like many others, applied for a position in the parade. They were granted that position on August 9th by the co-chair of the committee running the parade. SCIT received their place and their confirmation in writing.

On August 15th, under this new moon, SCIT received a phone call from the Heritage Festival Committee saying that they couldn’t appear in the parade after all, this is, of course, after they had spent $750.00 gearing up for the parade.

The strong implication about town is that City officials leaned on the Committee to have the SCIT folks banned.

In effect, the City silenced their opposition by having them banned from the parade.

As I said in the blog, the “silence” is short lived, and it is my firm belief that this will make the SCIT cause stronger in the long term.

Of course, the lack of a parade presence is not enough to actually silence these folks.

Next time, when it looks like “silenced” maybe I’ll say it instead of the safer, more passive “quiet”.

UPDATE: This move by the Heritage Festival Committee gave SCIT coverage in both the Ann Arbor News and the Detroit Free Press, and they marched in the parade anyway.

The attempt to silence these folks backfired in a big way.

And perhaps that's the true strength of the square between Mercury (which is obscured by the Sun and therefore powerless) and the MC. I doubt that I could have called it this way ahead of time, but it is fascinating to watch it play out.

Take Care

Rod