Sex in the Palin and Biden debate

Ahhhhhh...It's 7 am in Delhi and I'm watching the Vice Presidential debate between Sen. Joe Biden and Gov. Sarah Palin on NDTV.

And I just can't believe the words 'poverty' and 'women' --despite the bankrupt grinning of Palin --are never uttered.

Oh and I heard from my mom that tickets for the debate were going for $1,000!

So people had to pay for a load of nothing. That money could have very well gone into a much-needed anti- bullshit-in-the-world fund.

But let me explain why I'm so cranky and why I think poverty and women are the issues of our time Right Now!

Yesterday --I walked from my newspaper job to my guest house --that's a walk from a dust-bin corner to Beverly Hills. On the walk, I saw the gruel of a city that still can't provide water clean enough to brush your teeth with.

I walked over puddles of mud covered with God knows what kind of virus-carrying bugs.

I walked over feces tracked in grounded gutters, urine showered rock hills, children as skinny as dolls, and mothers whose eyes always looked worried.

There were men everywhere. Men rule everything in India.

No matter what you've heard about the strong Indian female --and there are many, and yes, they have good jobs where they start the show. (Like the top editor at my paper Soma who is the Nefertiti of looking you in the eye --and being like-- Tell Me Something I Don't Know)

But for the rest of India -- women are stamped out of mainstream markets and public spaces where they are safe.

Yeah, I know that's not much different that the U.S. But in Delhi, a woman can' t walk alone without the fear of being pulled to a side rode and raped on a road bend.

Knowing this and watching Palin's post-feminist stance on everyththing pisses me off!

And then Palin had the nerve to sing the praises of Biden's wife, a school teacher of 30 years by saying that "Her reward is in Heaven."

Tell that to the women here I've seen whose slice of freedom in heaven will come too soon.

--Malena