Today’s Links: October 28, 2011

OPINION

TIMOTHY B. LEE: “FreeBieber Campaign is Not Afraid of Justin Bieber or His Lawyers”
“In 2007, a 12-year-old Justin Bieber began recording videos of himself singing covers of popular songs and uploading them to YouTube. A copyright reform organization called Fight for the Future created a website called FreeBieber.org to highlight the danger that a pending anti-streaming bill could make the creation of such videos a felony. The 17-year-old Justin Bieber, now an international superstar, apparently doesn’t appreciate the unauthorized campaign. So he (apparently) had his lawyers send out a cease-and-desist order.”

JOHN PODHORETZ: “A College Loan Scam”
“According to the invaluable Web site finaid.org, the average graduate of a four-year college in the United States now leaves school saddled with $27,000 in debt. The reforms the president announced to the national student-loan system in front of an audience of screaming college kids in Denver on Wednesday won’t actually do very much to help them — and will do nothing to help people out of college now and coping with their indebtedness.”

LARRY KUDLOW: “No Armageddon Yet, But No Victory Yet Either”
“The world economy has once again dodged Armageddon. The European Union finally forged a Greek bond deal, and a rescue fund big enough to ring-fence banks and sovereign debt, in order to avoid a catastrophic, Lehman-like contagion event. At the same time, the U.S. economy moved away from the threat of recession with a third-quarter real GDP report of 2.5 percent.”

NEWS

TECHNOLOGY – Connect America Fund: FCC Unveils Rules for Rural Broadband Fund
“Federal regulators have unveiled a plan for overhauling the $8 billion fund that subsidizes phone service in rural areas and for the poor. It redirects the money toward broadband expansion.”

IMMIGRATION – State Sen. Scott Beason Responds to DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano on Immigration Policy
“A key architect of Alabama’s immigration law said this morning that U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano’s policyagainst helping the state enforce it will not diminish the law’s effectiveness. State Sen. Scott Beason, R-Gardendale, said the law was intended to push illegal immigrants out of Alabama, not necessarily deport them from the United States, which is a function of the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency that Napolitano oversees.”