President Obama in his speech this morning reminded Americans that America, prior to Bush, did not torture. Obama said that America was the country that opposed torture and that closed down torture camps and established a rule of law. “That is who we are,” he said.

“That is who we are.” We are a nation that does not torture. That seems a good starting point. How could we forget something so important? Obama says that under Bush we were guided by emotion, “fear,” rather than guided by good judgment, “foresight.”

Jesse Ventura makes his points about waterboarding very convincingly. He says waterboarding is against the law, period, and if America is to be a nation that upholds its laws, then those who waterboarded and those who ordered the waterboarding should be held responsible for their breaking of the law.

Huffington Post this morning has an interesting article, “Why Israelis Trust Obama More Than Bibi Netanyahu,” written by the campaign director of a group called Avaaz, Paul Hilder.

The article emphasizes the urgency of working for peace and cites this article: “King Abdullah of Jordan’s ultimatum: peace now or it’s war next year”

Azaaz was founded in part by Moveon.org. Its web-site says it is a “new global web movement with a simple democratic mission: to close the gap between he world we have, and the world most people everywhere want.” The web-site explains that “Avaaz” means “Voice” in many languages.

The Huffington Post article reports that Azaaz has created a short video (see below) urging Obama to push for mid-east peace and that it is raising funds to buy air time to show the video on American TV.

Azaaz says, “Israelis and Palestinians are crying out for someone to change the game. Yet if Middle East peace is a US interest, it is US citizens who will need to stand up and be counted, and US politicians and policymakers who will need to steel their nerves, to engage all the parties — and, finally, to lead.”