Two articles I read this morning stayed with me the entire day.
The first was this uplifting ( sarcasm) headline “India at bottom in man-woman equality index: World Economic Forum” in the Times of India. India ranked a shameful 114 out of 134 developing countries , indexed in terms of man-woman equality. The gender gap is increasing – not the least because of an estimated 25 Million ” missing women ” in India.Missing because of female foeticide or abortion. On the list , India ranks behind Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka in South Asia! Meanwhile, “Incredible India” woos foreign tourists with exotic shots of spices, dancers and masks. Malls sprout unrestricted in Indian metros.`Disposable incomes in the cities are up and Bollywood is celebrated at the Oscars. Sonia Gandhi is defacto Prime Minister. Welcome to the madness that is India!

The second was when I saw NOW’s press release on the much vaunted , so -called historical health care reform bill. The Dems agreed to the “Stupak amendment” which if incorporated in the final version that passes through the senate will:

* Prevent women receiving tax subsidies from using their own money to purchase private insurance that covers abortion;
* Prevent women participating in the public health insurance exchange, administered by private insurance companies, from using 100 percent of their own money to purchase private insurance that covers abortion;
* Prevent low-income women from accessing abortion entirely, in many cases.

In other words our democratically elected government has just thrown women under the bus in an all out attempt to get healthcare reform passed. What the Stupak amendment does is what the conservatives have wanted all along : reducing access to abortion almost completely , especially for low income women – those who need it the most. The amendment effectively will result in no coverage of any kind for abortion. Our female speaker of the house has just sold all of us out. Meanwhile, we celebrate “hope”, “change” and unbelievable Nobel Prize and the fact that this country is a beacon of liberty in an increasingly fundamentalist world. Welcome to the madness that is America!

Two democracies : one developing , the other developed.

One constituency that no one gives a shit cares about.

There is an old Chinese proverb that “Women hold up half the sky”. I don’t know about that – I’ll settle for dignity on earth.

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