Issue Position: Upholding America's Values in Our Foreign Policy

Issue Position

Issue Position: Upholding America's Values in Our Foreign Policy

Millions of people all around the globe have looked to the United States for leadership in an often uncertain world. The United States stands for the values on which our nation was founded: government of, by, and for the people; freedom of speech and conscience; opportunity for all; the rule of law; a strong system of property rights, transparency and a free press; and the principle that basic human rights are inalienable.

In order to keep our country safe and to ensure that our soldiers are accorded humane treatment by our adversaries, I believe that we must follow the laws and treaties to which we have bound ourselves, including the Geneva Conventions, in our treatment of foreign detainees. I have helped lead the fight in Congress to pass legislation banning the use of torture in interrogations, and ending secret detentions beyond the reach of the International Committee of the Red Cross. The principles we demand of others, we must also demand of ourselves. I am also working to close the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, which has come to represent the antithesis of American values.

As the son of a Foreign Service officer, I have seen firsthand the suffering caused by poverty, conflict, and corruption. America must lead the world's efforts to seek lasting, meaningful changes that will help stabilize troubled regions, safeguard human rights, and promote peace.

The U.S. should devote a full-time Mideast envoy dedicated to resolving the longstanding conflict between Israel and Palestine, which must commit to a common future as peaceful neighbors. The United States shares a special relationship with Israel, based both on our national interests and our common values, and both peoples have been touched by tragedy. The Arab community must also be engaged in this process, as it has an integral role and a vital interest in a long-term, viable peace.

I am committed to pursuing strategies that will hasten an end to the humanitarian tragedy in Sudan, where mass murder and pervasive human suffering continue unabated. I also will fight to increase funding to combat HIV/AIDS, a pandemic estimated to claim the lives of one quarter of the population of Sub-Saharan Africa over the next decade, and other infectious diseases in Africa and around the world. As the world faces a global food crisis, America must promote sustainable development and stable governance, and reevaluate subsidies to large and wealthy agricultural corporations that distort prices in the developing world and at home. And we must work to build an international accord on the urgent threat of global warming, so that America and the rest of the world are ready to confront this growing challenge.

It is time for the United States to reclaim its place as a leader of the world, a beacon of hope, a defender of human rights, and a promoter of international law, peace and prosperity. We would do well to follow the advice of America's legendary diplomat, George F. Kennan, when he said that "the greatest service this country could render to the rest of the world would be to put its own house in order and to make of American civilization an example of decency, humanity, and societal success from which others could derive whatever they might find useful to their own purposes."

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