Today’s Links: November 8, 2011

OPINION

RICHARD EPSTEIN: “Three Cheers For Income Inequality
“As recent polling data reveals, the American public is driven by two irreconcilable emotions. The first is a deep distrust of government, which has driven the approval rate for Congress below ten percent. The second is a strong egalitarian impulse that directs its fury to the top one percent of income earners. Thus the same people who want government to get out of their lives also want government to increase taxes on the rich and corporations.  They cannot have it both ways.”

MARIO VARGAS LLOSA: “Literature and the Search for Liberty
“The blessings of freedom and the perils of its opposite can be seen the world over. It is why I have so passionately adhered to advancing the idea of individual freedom in my work. ”

ROGER PARLOFF: “Uncle Sam’s New Crusade Against Banks
“As if the banks didn’t have enough problems. Uncle Sam is now suing 18 of the country’s largest banks for selling $200 billion in toxic mortgage-backed securities to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Columbia Law School professor Jack Coffee termed the action ‘the most aggressive attempt by federal authorities to litigate financial claims since the S&L crisis of the 1980s.'”

NEWS

NANNY STATE – U.S. Judge Blocks Graphic Cigarette Warnings
“A federal judge blocked a U.S. rule requiring tobacco companies to display graphic images on cigarette packs, such as a man exhaling cigarette smoke through a hole in his throat.”

OIL – Obama to Expand Drilling Off Alaska, In Gulf
“The Obama administration cautiously offered up more areas in the Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska’s coast to oil and gas drilling Tuesday, but didn’t go far enough to satisfy Republicans pushing to greatly expand drilling as way to create jobs and wean the country off foreign oil.”