[Peace] in the rhetoric of values, what are our values?

[Joe Futrelle]

The complexity of the geopolitical reality is difficult to articulate
against the rhetoric of American values vs. faceless evil -- the
current "moral" rationalization for war.  So we also need a moral
argument.

Here's what I propose: the values we ought to defend are those
expressed in the U.N. universal declaration of human rights, a
document the U.S. has signed.  The appropriate response to war crimes
such as those of this Tuesday is to bring war criminals to justice in
an international tribunal, where they will have due process.  That is
the civilized response to crime.  Every human being, even a war
criminal, has the right to this due process.  And every human being
has the right not to be placed in harm's way by a military campaign
against someone else.

I haven't re-read the declaration recently so I'm not sure it contains
these statements.  But it would help the anti-war cause if we could
point to this document that the U.S. has signed as a kind of moral
authority for the pacifist position.

Plus we could continue to call for the trial of all war criminals --
Pinochet, Kissinger, the lot of them.  It deflects the discussion from
"terrorism" -- a code word for Muslim terrorism -- towards all crimes
against humanity.

--
Joe Futrelle