Senator Obama, speaking before a Denver Democratic National Convention crowd last night that was smaller than the one he attracted in Germany, promised to “restore our moral standing.” In the excerpts that were released in advance of his speech, he didn’t specify what he meant, but it was in a section of the address that focused on national security and foreign policy.

It was a phrase that speaks volumes about how out of touch he is with the American mainstream. Most Americans, we think, believe their country already has a high moral standing in the world, one that doesn’t need any restoring.

After all, the war in Iraq that Mr. Obama has opposed from the beginning was one that was fought to liberate the country from a dangerous dictator and to allow freedom and democracy and the rule of law to take root. Under the Bush administration, America has spent billions to fight AIDS and other diseases in Africa, so that Mr. Bush was greeted with adulation when he visited that continent. It’s America that is siding with Georgia against Russia, with Israel against Iran and Syria, with South Korea against the North Korean Communists, with Afghanistan against the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

No one is saying that America is perfect or that the Bush administration’s foreign policy has been flawless in either its conception or its execution. But the notion that America no longer occupies the moral high ground in the world comes straight out of the hard-left, anti-Israel, Bush-hating playbook of Human Rights Watch, whose director, Kenneth Roth, marked the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks with a statement referring to Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, and “secret CIA prisons” and claiming that America had suffered a “loss of the moral high ground” in the battle against the terrorists.

America may sometimes err. But it corrects its mistakes. Its moral standing is stronger now than it has ever been. There’s nothing wrong with pointing out ways America can be better. It’s part of the American way. But if Mr. Obama feels the need to deride America as a rationale for getting himself elected, a lot of Americans are going to decide they’d rather have someone in the Oval Office who is more upbeat about America’s greatness. What country, one wonders, does Mr. Obama think has a higher moral standing than America right now? France? Germany? Indonesia? Kenya? Switzerland? It was a false note from a politician who is at a juncture at which he can’t afford to make many more mistakes.