This diary is a preliminary attempt to specify a general conviction of mine that the way forward in the Middle and North Africa region (MENA) is through cooperation between the “democratic” secular movements and the Moderate Islamist movements (Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, Tunisia’s Ennahda Party, and Hamas in occupied Palestine), and that this understanding is something U.S. progressives should support.

The title refers to one possible element of the specification. Given that the idea of a two-state solution, meaning Israel and a secular Palestine has become a mere fantasy that no longer has a realistic possibility of implementation, perhaps Fatah and Hamas can finally realize that it is vital for them to settle their differences, and come to an understanding on international issues to struggle for, of which one element might be a new two-state proposal.

Speculation over why GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney originally excluded reporters from his Jerusalem King David Hotel fundraiser is perhaps beside the point. Nobody in the American press is going to center a story around the event upon the fact that this hotel was the scene of an awful act of terrorism, perpetrated upon the British in July, 1946.

Fatster’s news roundup from May 14, with links to stories on Europe, Scott Walker, Jamie Dimon, ICE, Cuba, Bahrain, Juan Cole, coal’s decline, health care, fishing, Mexican drug war, and more.

So for the last few days, I’m sure most folks here have seen all the various Beltway Village Idiots pundits and politicians going on about how President Obama’s Birth Control Rule “infringes” on Catholic religious freedom. Today, we had the spectacle of the House Oversight Committee holding a hearing based on this claim, with of course, a member of the USCCB US Pedophile Enablers leading the way.

It would be really great if the Administration spent more time on folks who’ve lied us into war or ordered torture. Instead they seem to be focusing on the folks who are calling them out for those failures. There is something seriously wrong with that.

One of the first stories to replace the killings in Tucson and the national response as the lead story in the New York Times has been upheaval in Tunisia, a country I suspect most Americans could find only with assistance from Google Maps. But there’s a painful connection to the common topic of how societies struggle to bring change against what they consider unjust, repressive regimes.

The report of the Afghanistan Study Group makes arguments that stand a good chance of moving the Washington debate towards ending the war.

The effects of the recession (and a decade of Norquist-inspired bathtub shrinking) really are forcing us to cut education, which we may see as a national security issue. That’s something the federal government could prevent. It’s high time we invested in our base-level national competency before yet another set of military toys.