“I follow a set of principles…. And that’s what I base my votes on,” Michigan Rep. Justin Amash told The New York Times. Big business has no more interest in the Constitution than does Barack Obama. In fact the local and national Chambers of Commerce were against Justin Amash before his victorious Michigan primary run on Tuesday.

Here my friend David Boaz, executive vice president of the Cato Institute, writes about the age-old clash between politically minded businessman and free-market libertarians.

David quotes one pork-minded lobbyist as saying, “We’re not going to let ‘liberty Republicans’ throw business out of the Republican Party.”

It is just this type of Export-Import Bank-supporting Republican who has turned the Republican party into an amalgamation not a whole lot better for America than the Marxist/Progressive crowd that flies the flag of the Democrats.

At the moment, we are stuck with basically a two-party system. The entrenched politicians have succeeded in locking the country into an A or B choice between the Marxist/Progressives and the grubbing big-business/neocon-based Republicans.

Americans have The Club for Growth, the National Taxpayers Union, FreedomWorks, Pat Buchanan, a small group of Washington politicians like Rand Paul and, of course, the Cato Institute for guidance, but it is an uphill battle against the self-serving, virtually tenured group of political parasites hunkered down in Washington.

Americans supporting a constitutionally based Federal Republic form of government must work with their state governors against Washington encroachment. Texas Governor Rick Perry has been in the forefront of such an effort. The Swiss model of a weak central government, neutrality, and a national militia is a model that works. Most Swiss on the street have no idea who the president of Switzerland is. America’s original Articles of Confederation argued this Swiss approach. And neither the Articles nor the Constitution support a standing army as we have in America today.

Small government, anti-interventionist Americans are going to have to take over the Republican party from the George Bush, Karl Rove, John McCain, Mitt Romney Republicans supported by and promoted by the likes of The American Enterprise Institute, The Council on Foreign Relations and the (hardly read) Weekly Standard.

Dick and I visit Portland, Maine, several times a year, often on our Harleys. It’s a convenient stop on our way to Camden, Blue Hills, Bar Harbor, or St. Andrew, NB. Portland is also a true “foodie” destination, with a number of remarkable restaurants that are as diverse as they are excellent. We wouldn’t miss Fore Street or Eventide Oyster Co. or Hugo’s or Duck Fat. Breakfast at The Front Room is a must after a waterfront walk to Munjoy Hill.

Portland is a great city, for a day or so. But even after a short visit, you’ll be aware of something odd, something out of kilter. Despite its claim as “Vacationland,” Maine abounds in problems. There is costal Maine with its rugged beauty and then the rest of Maine, much of it remote and poor—Appalachian-like. Read here from Jay Nordlinger his observations on Maine in general and Portland specifically.

There are a couple of divisions in Maine. One of them is “Portland and everywhere else.” There’s Portland, anchored in the southwest, and then the entire rest of the state.

You might enjoy this: I ask a young woman in Portland whether she has ever been to Bethel (which is 70 miles away). She answers, “No, I don’t really go up to Maine.” Then she catches herself (because Portland is in Maine, right?): “I mean, to northern Maine.”

In truth, Bethel is in the southwestern part of the state — but I know just what the young lady means: Virtually no one lives above the 50-yard line of Maine. Up there be caribou and the like.

So, you have Portland-and-the-rest. You also have coastal versus inland. Coastal Maine tends to be prosperous and postcard-worthy: “Vacationland,” as the state’s nickname has it. (Maine has two nicknames, actually. The other is “The Pine Tree State.”) Inland Maine is grittier, more Appalachian.

Maine has always been a poor state, to one degree or another. It has high levels of welfare dependence. It has also been a booze-soaked state, always. Why’s that?

As one of my Maine friends says, “We’re remote, cold, and dark.” And that adds up to alcohol — as in Russia, Finland, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, etc.

So, Maine has never been free of problems. But the old ones have intensified and new ones have arisen to bedevil the state.

Debbie Young, Editor-in-Chief
Richardcyoung.com

In his seminal new book, To Make and Keep Peace Among Ourselves and with All Nations  reviewed by Donald D. Devine, Angelo M. Codevilla harks back to the Regan era: “Reagan committed fewer troops than any recent president other than Jimmy Carter and negotiated with the Soviet Union in a way that led to the end of the Cold War in peace, without firing a shot.”

Devine writes that Codevilla believes, “None of the major foreign policy schools get it…. Liberal internationalism denies that nations can be bullies when we understand them better and teach them to be good democrats.”

Codevella’s thinking on John Quincy Adams: “… the first and paramount duty of the government is to maintain peace amidst all the convulsions of foreign wars, and to enter the lists as parties to no cause other than our own.” Summarizing Adam’s thinking, Mr. Devine writes, “If war was required by a vital national interest, the goal was to return to peace as soon as possible… This remained U.S. national policy right up to the 20^th century and the rise of philosophical progressivism in both parties.”

According to Mr. Devine, Mr. Codevilla believes that the goal domestically and internationally is peace, and that is achieved by being strong and minding only our business and not that of others.

If you want to know what is wrong with our country, just read the following article from Cato Institute about the math, deception, and incompetence of America’s Social Security program. Why is not every American rising up and contacting his or her elected congressman and demanding fiscal sanity from our government?

Read here from Jagadeesh Gokhale, a senior fellow at Cato, the disheartening projection of our Social Security program. “A consistent and sizable worsening in Social Security’s finances during the last decade means that we now face a bigger economic challenge in sustaining a modicum of economic security for today’s and future generations of retirees, survivors, dependents and individuals with disabilities.” Cry for our children and grandchildren, thanks to us sound-asleep Americans.

The Social Security Trustees’ report was released in late July, and it shows the program’s finances to have worsened compared to last year — an unsurprising outcome since Congress has not enacted any changes to improve the program’s solvency.

A consistent and sizable worsening in Social Security’s finances during the last decade means that we now face a bigger economic challenge in sustaining a modicum of economic security for today’s and future generations of retirees, survivors, dependents and individuals with disabilities.

The Trustees’ latest report shows that the entire Old Age, Survivors’ and Disability Insurance (OASDI) program accrued an additional $1.8 trillion of unfunded obligations in present value during 2013 when future financial shortfalls are projected without any time limit.

Over just the next 75 years — a calculation that understates the system’s present valued funding shortfall — it increased by $1 trillion.

The OASDI trust funds’ claims on future Treasury tax receipts, however, increased by just $32 billion.

This comparison shows in terms of today’s dollars how exceptionally rapidly Social Security’s funding shortfall is growing over time.

Debbie Young, Editor-in-Chief
Richardcyoung.com

Michael Scheuer, a 20-plus-year veteran of the CIA, headed the agency’s bin Laden unit, managed its covert-action operation and authored its rendition program. Scheuer spent his career developing strategies to keep America safe. Read here excerpts from  Marching Toward Hell:

Here are some Scheuer insights aimed at putting America on a course to minding our own business and withdrawing from the misguided course of hegemony set by the neocon/interventionists.

Only the federal government can lead the Manhattan Project-like effort that is required to release the United States from energy dependence on governments who are our enemies, who cannot control their own territory and ensure reliable energy production and export, or who be tempted to disrupt our economy for religious reasons, such as, respectfully Venezuela, Nigeria, and Saudi Arabia.

In the conduct of foreign policy, the degree of energy-efficiency America attains will be the degree to which it can begin to aggressively disengage from the problems, hatreds, and wars of the Muslim world in which it has a stake only as long as U.S. energy supplies are insecure. Put it bluntly, as progress is made toward U.S. energy self-suffciency, it will become obvious that there is no U.S. national interest in the Arabian Peninsula that is worth the life of a single U.S. Marine.

The activities that Washington undertakes to facilitate the success of its current foreign policies in the Muslim world succeed only in digging a deeper hole for the United States.

It is a common belief in many Muslim countries that U.S. financial, military, political, and diplomatic aid ensures that tyrannies remain in power.

If there is one hard-and-fast-rule in U.S. national security, it should be that U.S. leaders must never adopt policies that tend to bring other peoples’ conflicts, especially religious wars, inside the United States.