Rubin said State Department officials are trying to combat this attitude by speaking throughout the country to make the public aware about the effect of foreign affairs on American interests.
This is an area, he said, in which greater cooperation between the press and the government is needed.
Rubin also fielded questions about America's mistaken bombing of the Chinese embassy in Kosovo and a supposed chemical weapons factory in Khartoum.
In an interview after the speech, Rubin said such issues tend to elicit passion from an audience. What people seem to enjoy most, he said, is pointing out to him where the government has gone wrong.
As far as his own relationship with the press, Rubin assured the audience that he would never knowingly lie to reporters.
The lecture was co-sponsored by the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy and the Belfer Center for Science and International Relations.