And Iran, Iran so far away

The hot election race in Iran has a lot of fascinating angles -- Ahmedinejad's blog vs. Mousavi's Facebook, the rural vs. urban split, figuring out how much true change the mullahs will allow -- but the subterranean campaign over women's rights is maybe the most important.

I'm no expert on Iran, but the contradictions are intense. The world's only major theocracy is also one of its biggest democracies, and 70% of the population is under 30. Ultra-conservative in some ways, it's also internet-savvy and highly educated. 60% of university students are women, but only 15% of employees.

I read a heartbreaking story somewhere about the power of one simple symbol: leading challenger Mousavi holds his wife's hand in public. Amazingly, that has been taboo and even illegal until recently. The quote that got to me was a woman voter hoping that this simple act might lead to more affection in marriages generally.

Not that Mousavi's wife, Zahra Rahnavard, is any kind of shy wallflower. She's a leading academic, former university chancellor, former adviser to previous president Khatami, and accomplished painter. She told the BBC that she views politics as art, and saw her her (daring) choice of veil - "a black chador with a flowery scarf peaking from beneath it - as a beautiful composition."

It's strange to imagine how repressed Iranian public discourse must be; women are arrested if they don't wear a veil, or if their dresses and coats aren't long enough, and even Rahnavard doesn't dare criticize the wearing of veils. Beauty salons are one of the few places where women can remove their long coats and veils and speak freely. But that simple act of holding hands has become a rallying cry of opposition to Ahmadeinejad's conservatism, featured on Mousavi's campaign posters.

And on the last day of public campaigning, Mousavi supporters pointedly formed a 20 kilometer chain -- holding hands.