Wolf's Stupid Question

Wolf Blitzer (who is rapidly approaching the most useless person on tv status) asked the Dem candidates last night which was more important, human rights or national security. The Candidates answers were all over the place, but the bigs basically came down on the side of security (so much for seriousness in taking the Oath if they win!)

deaniac83 at dKos responds forcefully to this bullshit. He sums it up well:

It is because the most powerful weapon in our national security arsenal is not the nuclear bomb, it is the ideal that is America. The Soviet Union collapsed because behind the iron curtain, people wanted to be like us. In the aftermath of World War II, a victorious United States insisted upon adhering to human rights for even its prisoners of war, and turned them over to international law. And a generation of people everywhere bowed in respect for the beacon of freedom. We intervened in Kosovo during the 1990's to stop a genocide, and a decade later, the people of there gave President Clinton a hero's welcome.

The establishment of free and democratic nations that respect human rights and the rule of law are not simply the most effective security strategy for the United States; it is indeed the only thing that can result in a more secure America and a more secure world. Security and freedom and human rights are not conflicting values. Only those with an interest in undermining freedom would argue that they are.