YOU KNOW WHEN you start reading an article and you bump into such a big howler that you stop reading it because the mistake is sort of disqualifying for the rest of the piece, it makes everything suspect or at least that it doesn't matter anymore?

Well, this just happened to me with this piece about Europe's sad state of affairs. The author says:

There were a few policemen in Barcelona, but you get the impression they were there mostly to keep the Catalan separatists in line.

Too bad the police power is exercised in Barcelona not by Madrid's central government —anti-separatist conservatives—, but by the Mossos d'Esquadra, ruled by the Catalan regional, pro-separatist, government that is making a major push for independence. That, or the local police of Barcelona, which is basically traffic and also ruled by pro-Catalan separatist mayor until one month ago and, since the latest election, by a left-wing mayor who doesn't have separation in her agenda but is not against it.