If you get this column emailed automatically, you get the “early edition,” when I click publish. Invariably, I then realize I’ve misspelled something . . . “piqued” when I meant “peaked” . . . and in redoing it I realize I could have better said something else, so I tinker . . . and then maybe I boldface parts of an except to help guide a busy reader’s eye . . . and then I click update, so at least those who come here manually get the better version. I don’t resend the email because I can’t figure out how; and because even if I could, I wouldn’t want to clutter your inbox. (In an emergency, if I’ve REALLY screwed it up, I would re-post altogether; but that’s different.) In case you ever want to forward a post, the online version will always be the better one. As yesterday’s — renamed “Fundamental Premises” — was.
(Overnight, I even figured out how to insert the photo — in case you’ve never seen what can be done with bathroom tissue and an exhaust grate at one a.m. on Barcelona’s Gran Via in the drizzle.)
BARCELONA
Chip Ellis: “I highly recommend that you use the PocketGuide App for iPhone. I used it last year when in Barcelona (other cities also available). Download next time you have WiFi service. PocketGuide gives you walking tours of the city as if you are in a museum with a headset. The GPS feature always knows where you are and describes buildings and sites as you approach. It also has a public transportation map feature to get you where you need to go. The GPS worked on my phone even though I had no Verizon international data or phone service. I had no data or phone charges.”
MARRIAGE
Jeff: “You wrote: ‘This is the ultimate conservative position: why should the government interfere with your freedom to marry the person you love?’ The ultimate libertarian position (which is what I think you meant to offer) is that government shouldn’t have anything whatsoever to do with a religious issue like marriage.”
☞ Not quite. Civil marriage is not a religious issue. No religious blessing is required or involved. Just go down to the taxpayer-funded courthouse and get hitched, with all the mundane secular government-granted and enforced rights and responsibilities that entails. Lots of atheists marry without having in any way to hide their atheism.
But I do see that “conservative” can be defined I more than one way – I chose conservative as in wanting a “small government” that doesn’t try to tell you how to live your life.
