Last summer - in the heated election campaign between Barack Obama and John McCain - Ted Kennedy gave one of his most memorable speeches at the Democratic Convention in Denver on August 25, 2008 .

He died one year to the day, on August 25, 2009. 

Click here for the video of the speech.

Remember when Obama's grandmother (the woman who raised him) died the night before the election in November 2008? I remember thinking: Obama's going to win now, because she is on the other side pulling for him. (Click here for my newsletter from that time.)    

I am hoping that Ted Kennedy 'on the other side' - and the goodwill that his death has generated here - will do the same for the healthcare reform we are struggling to birth now in America.    

Ted himself said that healthcare was "the cause of his life." Will he will help now - in some magical supernatural way - that he couldn't before? Will his passing dampen the furious anger at town halls and calm down the nearly violent and hysterical debate?    

I hope his passing (in his own words at the August 2008 speech) will "break the old gridlock, and guarantee that every American - north, south, east, west, young, old - will have decent, quality healthcare as a fundamental right and not a priviledge."    

OR have we lost an essential ingredient in finding common ground? Saturn (conservatism) is opposite Uranus (liberalism) in the sky right now, at the time of his death. These two planets are in fact approaching their third exact face-off on September 15th.    

Kennedy somehow was both - Saturn (the esteemed statesman) and Uranus (the lightning rod for change, pushing humanity forward toward greater freedom and equality for the people). And he was also well-known for working successfully with both sides of the polarity.    

Is he the last bridge of reason (and effectiveness) between those two extremes?    

Time will tell.

As an interesting aside, check out this blog post - from a political (i.e. definitely not astrological) website - which I have excerpted below:    

September 15th: D-Day for Healthcare

 http://tinyurl.com/ng7m4b

Ignore all the posturing and pushing and posing of this hot August recess. If you're interested in health-care reform, get out your red pen and circle this date: September 15. That's likely to be the crucial day in determining the course of the battle.    

 It's been an auspicious day in years past. On September 15, 1812, Napoleon marched on Moscow. On September 15, 1835, Charles Darwin landed at the Galapagos Islands. On September 15, 1959, Khrushchev arrived in America, and on that day two years later Hurricane Carla arrived on the Texas Gulf Coast.    

And just last year, September 15, 2008, Barack Obama and John McCain were essentially tied in the Gallup Poll (47 to 45 in favor of Obama), Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy, and McCain said, "The fundamentals of the economy are strong." That one day changed the course of the rest of the presidential campaign.    

It may be that September 15, 2009, shapes the course of the rest of the health-care fight as well. Because that is the deadline Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) has set for his Finance Committee to come to an agreement on a bipartisan health-overhaul bill.    

Perhaps instead the bipartisan effort will yield nothing-or reforms so tepid as to be nearly useless. In that case Democrats will be forced to go it alone, possibly using the budget reconciliation process, with its lower, 50-vote hurdle, to pass large portions of reform, and then fighting a GOP filibuster on the parts that can't be dealt with in reconciliation.    

Either way, we will know on September 15.

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Hmmmm September 15th - what IS going on in the sky that day?? hmmmm (scratches head) ... OH YAH! NOW I remember! Saturn opposite Uranus! The same combination that occurred on Election Day November 4, 2008! hmmmm ... INTERESTING!