Before we begin, let's define what we are talking about. It might help to clarify our thinking. Basically, a CGC means that four planets have taken up positions at each of the celestial cardinal point (0, 90, 180, 270 degrees). In more concrete terms, Mars is in Libra, Uranus in Aries, Pluto in Capricorn, and Jupiter in Cancer. Those four signs are the astrological equivalent of North, South, East, and West, or the Cardinal points. I see little benefit in going into all the meanings and interpretations of the planets and the signs. You are welcome to go research all that for yourself.
Suffice it to say that Grand Crosses, and particularly Cardinal Grand Crosses, are generally considered omens of bad things, since the forces represented by the signs and planets oppose each other and cancel out. Thus, efforts get frustrated, communications run afoul and everything generally gets screwed up. Put an eclipse on either side of the CGC peak, and well...you get the point.
For most of my life, I've put little or no stock in astrology. Having been indoctrinated into Socratic Materialism, I scoffed at the ability of balls of rock and gas swirling around in a soup of astrologisms (constellations) to affect anything in or about my life. Like many people, I figured that most of the clap-trap out there that occasionally aligned with actual events was due in large part to the general and non-committal language of "predictions".
In the past decade or so, I have been migrating to a much more Platonic weltanschauung. This is due in large part to my studies of hyperdimensional and quantum physics. It turns out that unseen and non-sensical forces can have profound affect on the thing we commonly call 'reality'.
Here's the way it works:
We all know that what we say and do ripples into the world and causes changes in 'reality'. Even at the macro scale, we talk about the 'butterfly effect' and similar ideas, where small actions can snowball into large events.
Now imagine the ripple effect, only in the fabric of space-time, or the aether, as they used to call it. All these massive planets swirling around and spinning is causing more or less constant ripples in the very fabric of the Universe, and the trillions upon trillions of bodies in the Universe are all radiating ripples into the medium.
If you've ever played with sound and liquids, then you know about standing waves. You can create and 'freeze' patterns in liquids using the vibrations of sound. The patterns are as unique and intricate as a fingerprint and change according to the frequency of the sound and the type of liquid being vibrated. The more sources of vibration you have, the more complex the patterns of standing waves. These patterns can be thought of as templates.
Even in complex and seemingly random events, patterns tend to emerge. The interactions of isolated random events tend to create unified patterns on a macro scale. This has been observed even at the micro and quantum scales, as well.
Thus, it makes sense that the background stars tend to form certain patterns that change based on Earth's position in its orbit. When we are over in Leo's part of the sky, the vibrations will be different than when we are in Scorpio's. Those background patterns are further influenced by the local planets and how their vibrations resonate with the background sky. One can imagine a sort of 'standard' template generated by cosmic vibrations, with various perturbations caused by local phenomena. In effect, we live in an ever-changing soup of vibrational templates, but even in the choas, patterns emerge.
When folks like Richard Hoagland or Joseph Farrell talk about hyperdimensional physics and astrology being a degraded remnant of ancient advanced science, one can start to appreciate a much more interesting and interconnected Universe than the mainstream Newtonian vacuum called "space".
In this way, though I shy away from the New-Agey rubbish, I can appreciate a scientific basis for the theory that the positions and interactions of the Universe around us can manifest in various ways in our 'reality'. Perhaps it's a general disposition to certain emotions, or that complex mass human interactions can start to form patterns in the chaotic soup we call life. Over vast amounts of time, with meticulous record-keeping, we might even be able to catalog a predisposition for certain events to occur around certain alignments. It is even conceivable that these predispositions have been cataloged over millions of years, if the alternative historians are correct. And potentially, there are secret societies that preserve those ancient catalogs, which have been corrupted in our 'outsider' society to become astrology.
So, all that being said, suppose a group of secret society members had knowledge that global financial, political and social upheavals occured around Cardinal Grand Crosses. Suppose they then manipulated things in order to take advantage of the chaos and profit. Further suppose that to make their plan work, the majority of humanity had to be in a state of fear and/or suffering. Would proof of that knowledge and effort look like today's headlines?
One ray of hope is that, as mentioned before, certain alignments only set up a predisposition towards certain mass actions and reactions. This implies the corelary that certain mass actions can reverse and even benefit from what some would call 'negative' alignments. Indeed, we find in astrology that Cardinal Grand Crosses can be very negative events...unless we as a group approach this time with a positive attitude and a willingness to be introspective. In the latter case, a CGC can be a time of great advancement in spiritual and physical well-being.
In this scenario, the forces that try to control humanity and feed on it would be setting up a season of fear through war and financial collapse, in order to profit from their secret knowledge of ancient science. However, we humans can counter their efforts and even thrive and defeat the bastards by maintaining positive attitudes, not buying into the fear-mongering, and looking within ourselves for our inner strengths.
Even if all this is complete rubbish, can it hurt to try a little kindness and meditation? Who knows? It might even work without astrological alignments.
If the astrological certainty around CGCs is massive change on both the individual and mass social levels, and that the event is neither inherently good nor bad, then it is all a matter of frame of mind to steer the outcome. From our scientific, though Platonic point of view, positive vibrations added to the standing waves/template created by the CGC would create a mass disposition towards good for all, whereas fear vibrations would dispose the world to destruction and slavery.
All the more reason to turn off the TeeVee.