It wasn’t a stellar interview. Michael Posner appeared on the Colbert Report last week and, as Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, he might have been better prepared for Colbert’s first question.
Colbert’s question: What do these three things (democracy, human rights and labor) have to do with one another?
Posner’s answer: They are very much related. Human rights is the way in which people have a democratic experience. People need to speak publicly and to participate in the political process. They need to be able to organize themselves.
The blue box may have just swallowed a couple of the others if it’s all about the political process. I wonder if our foreign policy makes more sense if you start with this impoverished understanding of human rights. My very next thought was that Academy alumni could do better than that. What do you make of these three components of the Secretary of State’s title? How should officeholders think about each component as well as the connection between them?
The interview begins at 14:30 if you click the link above. Don’t miss Colbert’s effort to make a distinction between human rights and American rights. Apparently American rights are best understood as purchasing power. He supports his position by asking, “at what point do human rights in these other countries get in the way of my ability to buy two dozen tube socks for $1.29?”
Colbert often cuts to the quick and it’s interesting to see when the interviewee realizes it… and when they don’t. I’d put Posner in that second category.
