Some Americans don't see us as having basic obligations to our fellow citizens.

BBC: What happened to America's community spirit?

We believe that when nations fail to meet these basic obligations -- when peace is threatened or international law is undermined -- that we cannot stand idly by.

WHITEHOUSE: Honoring Ronald H. Brown

And those who believe government has a responsibility to meet these urgent challenges have a great stake in bringing our deficits under control -- because if we don't, we won't be able to meet our most basic obligations to one another.

WHITEHOUSE: Encouraging Long-Term Fiscal Responsibility and Reform

People should have the possibility to pay their taxes, to pay their obligations to others, to offer the basic goods to their family so they can feel that they live with self-respect and dignity.

CNN: Austerity drives up suicide rate in debt-ridden Greece

But then, the advice I was giving about how that should be done and the need for the coalition to take very seriously its Geneva Convention obligations to keep order, to keep basic humanitarian services running, and to keep civil administration running, and get the UN in to create a new Iraqi political and interim authority, that was all being ignored.

BBC: Clare Short: "We were duped"