Secret Sun Picture Parade: Pieces of Eight

Strange Skies, Filled with Portent Hues

Top Story on CNN: Galaxy may be full of 'Earths,' alien life

As NASA prepares to hunt for Earth-like planets in our corner of the Milky Way galaxy, there's new buzz that "Star Trek's" vision of a universe full of life may not be that far-fetched.

 

Benjamin Button and the Babylon Gate, pt. I

Oh look, isn't this timely? The Iraqi National Museum has reopened, the day after the Oscars.

The Iraq Museum, which has stood at its present location since 1966, last year completed the renovation of its Islamic and Assyrian halls, thanks to a one-million-euro (1.1 million dollar) donation and technical help from Italy.

(Slum)Dog Star, the Reborn Sun and the Scarlet Women

Beam me up, Horus.

I'm getting a damn laptop. I had the brilliant idea to live-blog the Oscars even though my TV and my computer are in separate parts of the house. Well, even so it was a blast for all involved and I got some much-needed exercise.

 

 

Sexy Shapeshifting Socialites in Space

 

Well, we've seen a lot of Martin Landau (John the Baptist, X-Files, Ed Wood) recently, and we've also seen an avalanche of space-based stories in the press. So, naturally, that got me thinking about Space: 1999, a British Star Trek knockoff which Landau starred in with fellow Mission: Impossible alum Barbara Bain.*

AstroGnostic: "The Cosmic Fetus Collective"

Secret societies? Shape-shifting aliens? Post-humanism? Secret societies of shape-shifting post-human aliens? These memes might be news to the mainstream, but not to old school funnybook geeks like myself. 

Seen From Space: Flying Phalli

The Skylon flying vibrator Spaceplane

Reaction Engines Ltd. is yet another of the constellation of corporations popping up seemingly out of nowhere and producing science fiction spacecraft. 

Secret Societies, Symbionese Soldiers and Sexy Socialites

USNews & World Report whips up some fresh Masonic recruitment propaganda under the dodge of a "Mysteries of History" collectors edition. Ostensibly, it's a look at secret societies throughout history, but the Freemasons get the lion's share of the page-count (and the front and back cover, as well).

T & A-liens

Continuing the magazine meme, I stumbled on a site that I'm not sure if I didn't hallucinate into existence, a la The Lathe of Heaven.

SpongeBob Goes Masonic for the 17th

OK, I give up. Pyramids, Masons, All-Seeing Eyes on frickin' Spongebob. 

Brand new episode, premiering tonight. The 17th. 

 

Celebrating the 17th

Don't you think the blue and gold chairs go well with the rug?

Today is February 17th and today Barack Obama will be in Denver signing the "Stimulus Package" into law. He's chosen a very strange venue to do so:

The bill-signing, an unusual event outside of Washington, will be Tuesday at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science in City Park... "This is like a dream," said George Sparks, director of the museum." - Denver Post

 

The Powerful Secret Society No One Ever Thinks About

Want to see a who's-who list of the most powerful people in American history? Check out the list of members in the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity. Five out of the past six Presidents are either PBK initiates or sons of one (including Obama). 

 And yes, PBK is a very high step in the Masonic pyramid, far above the Freemies. 

Seen from Space: Slouching Towards Disclosure?

Honestly, what are to make of The Times of London - arguably the most prestigious newspaper in the world - running a headline like this: "Aliens 'may be living among us' undetected by science." Which one of you said "conditioning process?"

Earth Akhet Addendum: Plan (the) Nine from Outer Space

From the all-time classic, Plan 9 from Outer Space- a UFO (actually a hubcap) zooms by the old Mocambo nightclub on the Sunset Strip. Who's the headliner? Eartha Kitt. What are the odds? 

Hathor Watch: Rihanna Rocks Out

Fascinating- not only is Rihanna encased in an illuminated pyramid for this superior rock arrangement of "Umbrella" she's also dressed as Isis. Not the obvious Egyptian version, but the veiled Isis who conquered the Roman Empire. 

Note how she descends to stage level, much like an Elizabethan deux ex machina.

A Friday the 13th Scenario

 

  Is it just me or does it seem as if there is a massive and well-coordinated propaganda war being waged on the entire global banking system? Even The New York Times is calling the biggest banks "Dead Men Walking," and Arianna Huffington is screaming that the banks are "zombies" that should be "killed off." 

And we just saw the nation's top bankers getting called in for a spanking in Congress. 

Yahooccultism: Dark Sun Rising

Interesting timing on this particular story, considering the event in question isn't even due to occur for another two years. Interesting that it appears following a suspicious murder/suicide in LA (with a possible Masonic subplot), and the 22 killed in the continuing anarchy in Mexico.

Obam the Hawk, Earth Akhet...and David Bowie?

The previous post was getting too huge but there is still so much to explore here. The walls are crumbling, people, and the hidden architecture is being revealed. It's staggering, even to an old symbol junkie like myself. I'm wondering if I'll ever get any work done if this keeps up.

Let's start with a Eartha Kitt/David Bowie reference:

The memory of Eartha's biography Thursday's Child provided David Bowie a title for his lead single and opening track of Hours. As Bowie revealed in VH1 Storytellers, "When I was about 14, Eartha Kitt and D. H. Lawrence were some of my favorite bedtime reading." The title was also a song that was sung by Eartha.

First of all, I think the "Hours" title was a typo that didn't get caught at the CD plant. Try this:

That's better. Now, let's take a look at the cover of Horus Hours. I flipped it because it seemed that was a printing mistake, too:

Now, this is bugging me; where have we seen that all-male recreation of La Pieta before?

Oh, right. That's it. Now, we've been looking at astro-Gnosticism lately. It's worth noting that Bowie's first film role was as an alien in the astro-Gnostic cult film The Man Who Fell to Earth and that his ex-wife Angela also claims that Bowie himself is an alien. She may be right. Journalist Rob Leggatt wrote of the making of that film:

"Tabloid rumours of rock star weirdness emerged almost as soon as the six-week New Mexico shoot began. Bowie it was said, spent his spare time locked in a trailer scouring his library of 1,500 mystical books, consorting both with then wife Angie and heiress Sabrina Guinness and listening to 'Young Americans' played backward on a special turntable which made the recording sound like a Tibetan chant. 

The film's New Mexico location, a hot spot for UFO activity, fuelled the madness. 'You could look up into the sky,' remembers the film's writer Paul Mayersburg, 'and see strange things every day.' Bowie, still a year away from his extended detox in Berlin, claimed several sightings."

In 1995, Bowie said of the 70s cocaine/occult years, "My overriding interest was in cabbala and Crowleyism. That whole dark and rather fearsome never-world of the wrong side of the brain. ... More recently, I've been interested in the Gnostics."

I

 bet. The back cover of Horus Hours could very well be a representation of the tripartite demiurge Yaldaboath that we looked at in the recent Star Trek post. Remember one of his three identities was Samael, "god of the blind." 

 The snake reminds us that Orphite Gnostics believed that the serpent in the garden of Eden (who is never identified) was actually Christ, come to free Adam and Eve from Yaldaboath. We looked at that myth when Kirby incorporated it into a kiddie comic called Devil Dinosaur.

Alexandria- what a fascinating name

Bowie is also married to the supermodel Iman, who was born in Somalia, home of the Sirius Star pirates. She also played an androgynous, shape-shifting alien in one of the Star Trek films. 

Speaking of models turned actress, Bowie sang the title song to the film Cat People, which starred Nastassja Kinski as a literal cat-woman. Synchs galore- Kinski married an Egyptian filmmaker named Ibrahim Moussa before shacking up with Quincy Jones,with whom she has a daughter named Kenya (and where does the Obama family come from?). "Cat People" was also sung by Tina Turner, another singer with a troubled history like Kitt.

Kinski and Jones

Following Cat People, Bowie starred with Ka-Hathor-Ein Deneuve in The Hunger, an Egyptian/extraterrestrial/bisexual/vampire love story written by alien contactee Whitley Strieber. Deneuve's character in The Hunger was named Miriam, which comes from Meresamun meaning "Beloved of Amun..."

...which is also the name of the Ancient Egyptian diva appearing in an exhibit at the University of Chicago, where Barack Obama taught law (and just a stone's throw from where the Obamas lived in Hyde Park).

Eartha Kitt with husband Bill McDonald and daughter

Back to Eartha Kitt, there's a planned biopic in the works. Who's been tapped for the lead...?

...the ravishing Miss Beyonce Knowles (no relation- Beyonce also performed with Tina Turner at last year's Grammies).

Now that she’s portrayed Etta James in the upcoming film, Cadillac Records, Beyonce has set her sights on another legend: Eartha Kitt. ABC News reports that Beyonce will star as the legendary singer-actress most known for her role as Catwoman. Two years ago, Eartha Kitt approved of Beyonce portraying her, and told PageSix.com it’s about time she get her own movie saying, “My life has been so damned interesting.”- TVOne

Oddly, Eartha Kitt was mentioned appropos of nothing in a recent news story concerning a feud between Beyonce and Etta James over Obama's inaugural festivities. Which I suppose brings it all full circle. Only this stuff never, ever ends. Egyptian aliens, shape-shifters, chimeras, interracial romances; all denoting duality, hybridization. Why do we tell ourselves these stories? 

 UPDATE: Andre from Alien Project reminds us that Beyonce has taken on an alter-persona in Sasha Fierce, following in the footsteps of Bowie with Ziggy, Aladdin Sane, etc.

Beyonce explains "I have someone else that takes over when it's time for me to work and when I'm on stage, this alter ego that I've created that kind of protects me and who I really am."

Hmm, kind of sounds like a walk-in. It just occurred to me that all actors are essentially dissociative personalities, probably most pop stars as well. Which explains a lot. 

UPDATE II: Wow, I should pay more attention to the pop scene. Actually, I shouldn't. But although I knew she was rocking the Witchblade meme in "Single Ladies," I hadn't realized that Beyonce was rocking the androgyny meme as well.  

UPDATE III: What an interesting graphic that the New York Times is using to symbolize Obama's first 100 days. 

 UPDATE IV: Yacarete points us to Iman's appearance in this old Jacko vid (though that's not Nefertiti). Note the cats at the beginning. 

UPDATE V: Ed reminds us that Beyonce was "Foxy Cleopatra" in Austin Powers: Goldmember. 

UPDATE VI: Here's some true blue Synchronicty for you- I just tracked down the video for Bowie's "Thursday's Child" and it was uploaded by a user in Poitiers, France. The vid does a sort of mopey variation on the Harpo mirror routine from Duck Soup that David Duchovny and Michael McKean recreated in the "Dreamland" two-parter on The X-Files. 

Which reminds me, Mimi Rogers was in the first Austin Powers film.

"Obam the Hawk"

Holy Smokes, Secret Sun readers are sharp! Check out this catch from PJ:

The Mark of the Hawk (1957) The man called Obam (Sidney Poitier) struggles with the increasingly hostile forces facing each other in a colonial African country. The African natives want their land and lives back from the British colonists.

 

Phallic Phireworks

Ah, subtlety. Reader Davidly alerts us to this HuffPost headline on the "Stimulus Package" deal. Deep background on fireworks and obelisks here. More HuffPost symbolism here. Kenneth Anger could not be reached for comment. 

AstroGnostic: Star Trek and the Alien Archons

As Star Trek makes its grand re-entry into the forefront of pop culture this year, it's a good time to take a look at the Gnostic themes in the franchise's long history, in particular the astro-Gnostic themes. It seems clear that this meme was hard-wired into the concept from the very beginning, and I'm certainly not the first to say so.

A Very Sirius Presidency: Stations of the Gus

Yesterday, Barack Obama traveled to the state Gus Grissom was born to sell his economic stimulus package to the public, 13 days after the 42nd anniversary of the astronaut's death. 

Today's stop? The state where Gus Grissom died. Just a coincidence, surely. 

Seen From Space: Big Week in Space News

Pretty much a puff-piece on SpaceX, but interesting timing nonetheless. Number of alien worlds quantified

Intelligent civilisations are out there and there could be thousands of them, according to an Edinburgh scientist. The discovery of more than 330 planets outside our solar system in recent years has helped refine the number of life forms that are likely to exist. The current research estimates that there are at least 361 intelligent civilisations in our Galaxy and possibly as many as 38,000.

 

Pyramids vs. Aliens

We looked at this film in relation to the Super Bowl ad and the monsters' appearance in the bizarre shapeshifting-reptile ad for Sobe. Well, surprise, surprise- the poster for Monsters vs. Aliens features the Transamerica Pyramid, that weird synthesis of pyramid and obelisk in San Francisco. 

17, Again. And Again.

Gee, it almost looks like someone wants to implant the 17 meme into the kiddie set's collective unconscious. Disney star Zac Efron is tapped to do the job in 17 Again, which looks like any number of Twilight Zone episodes I was just thinking about. 

Barack Obama and the Masonic Martyr: Real Life

OK, so the first episode of the Obama Era for Life (the previous episode aired 12/17/08) deals with a martyred astronaut named "Bull" Ellis who just happens to be tight with the President of the United States (a fact of which we are reminded of throughout the episode).

Huh. I guess that's what they call a coincidence, no?

The Messiah Who Fell to Earth

 

Jim Caviezel goes from the titular lead in Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ to playing an atheist alien named Kainan (Cain, Canaan, Canis) who falls to Earth in an astonishingly phallic spaceship in Outlander. Fascinating career move, and rife with strange symbolic parallels.

 

Space/Gods: The Pyramid of Apollo

As we seen in regards to the Orion 17 mission, the 17 enigma extends all the way to the Moon. Mankind's first direct contact with an extraterrestrial body happened with the Apollo 11 lunar landing at 20:17 UT. And the last contact we had with the Moon was with the Apollo 17 mission (which orbited the Moon for 17 hours). 

Super Ba'al XLIII Update: Running the Numbers

There are so many details swirling around us, so much data, so much symbolism that it gets to be overwhelming. We previously looked at the Templar-Vatican symbolism in the Super Bowl, but I overlooked the fact Kurt Warner's (the losing QB) jersey number is 13. (read "For Warner, Jersey No. 13 Is Emblem of Spirituality"). 

Star Dogs and Sun Gods

Man, they're continuing to work the Obama/Dogstar link. Of course, you have the usual manufactured controversy to ensure everyone pays attention.

 

Gary McKinnon, Cause Célèbre

Forget Mumia Abu Jamal, a new age needs a new celebrity martyr. And in this alien-haunted age, UFO hacker Gary McKinnon has become the hot new cause among the British cogniscenti. Part of it may certainly be the lingering chafe marks among the Brits from eight years of neocon bullying, but it feels like there's a subtle whisper of a paradigm shift underneath all of the shouting. 

Super Bowl Shape-Shifters

 

 I thought they looked familiar- this Sobe ad with the shape-shifting reptilians features characters from the upcoming DreamWorks film, Monsters vs Aliens.

 

Egypt, Egypt Everywhere

Hot on the heels of news of the Louvre's upcoming "Gates of Heaven" exhibition comes this new exhibit of Egyptian wall paintings. Apropos of nothing, The Times name-dropped Lara Croft in its recent article on the show...

Super Bowl XLWhatever Semiotics

Two stars, and vaguely familiar stripes...

Well, today's the day of the "Big Game." The Pittsburgh Steelers will face off against the Arizona Cardinals in Tampa. The game will be aired on NBC, the "Peacock Network."* I find it especially interesting that the game is on NBC this year, since last Sunday they aired the excruciating TV mini-series adaptation of Raymond Khoury's The Last Templar, which starred New Jersey's own Mira Sorvino (who won an Ausur® for Mighty Aphrodite).

Maybe this is part three of the story.