The following contains excerpts and paraphrases from 

"Reason" by Robert Reich  

America has a moral obligation to give every one of its children a good education and decent health care.

It's morally wrong that millions of Americans who work full-time don't earn enough to keep their families out of poverty.

It's morally unacceptable to give giant tax cuts to the rich while cutting social programs for the poor and working classes.

Corporate executives who steal money from their investors and employees are morally culpable.

It's immoral to kill over 100,000 Iraqis and send over a thousand young Americans to their deaths for a cause that is undefined in a war that was unnecessary.

Patriotism...a special concern about the well-being of other Americans, but not necessarily to the exclusion of others around the world, and not at their expense.  Our unique strength as a culture has always been our pluralism, diversity, and tolerance.  America's uniqueness is found not in our bravado but in our ideals.  America was invented as an aspiration - "conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."

Security is the by-product of strong alliances with allies who share our basic values, of international cooperation backed by military strength when necessary, and of America's moral leadership in the world.  We need a tough global standard for preventing distribution (by theft, sale, or other means) across any national border of nuclear devices or material, or of biological or chemical weapons capable of mass destruction.

America's efforts to relieve human suffering and spread prosperity around the globe serve our national interest.  They also increase our legitimacy as a world leader. 

The struggle against global terrorism is less like a war against a hostile foreign nation than a continuing international police action against global criminals.  We should:

• work with other nations, and through international organizations, to block dangerous weapons and their components from moving across borders,
• seek a global system for sharing intelligence and infiltrating terrorist networks,
• treat captured troops as prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions or as criminals under criminal law,
• try to reduce global poverty, disease, hunger and hopelessness, the soil in which terrorist hatreds take seed.

The goal is not to remain the world's superpower; it is for all of us to have secure and prosperous lives.  If the price of remaining the only superpower entails sacrificing our security and prosperity, it is not worth the candle.