Author Pico Iyer finds "globalism-lite" in the airport lounge:

All the cultures of the world are here, but they're all translated into placeless ciphers of a kind; we sit before screens, drift off, plug into our machines and feel as if we've entered the global space of a Haruki Murakami novel, a food court, a minimalist white-on-white Nowhere Hotel.

This globalism-lite is what we find around us often, especially in places like L.A.; it's cooler, sleeker, more diverse than the world we grew up in, but it's not clear that it sustains us deep down. We can access Beijing in a millisecond, fly to Bangalore tomorrow -- and yet we find, when we get to either place, that they don't look so different from Ventura Boulevard or Monterey Park.

Columnist Gregory Rodriguez explains the border fence as a shrine to American insecurity. Authoer Maureen Ogle remembers the happy day 70 75* years ago when beer returned to the U.S.

The editorial board wants Ramon C. Cortines to return to LAUSD, this time in the No. 2 management position. The board also continutes its editorial series on water, and says it's time Californians let development follow water, not the other way around:

Even as our state continues to grow, sprawl can no longer be our birthright. Hydrologically remote regions cannot depend on new sources of imported water for human needs, much less for verdant lawns.

Readers respond to an article about the ties between Mormons and Muslims. Palm Desert's Sunny Kreis Collins writes, "it can only be a good thing that any two philosophies, however disparate, can come together peacefully and find commonality and mutual respect."

*Thanks to reader M. Bouffant for the correction.