California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is asking for feedback via Twitter on various bills including including AB 2567, which would designate May 22 Harvey Milk Day.

The bill encourages schools and other educational institutions to recognize Harvey Milk on that date through appropriate commemorative exercises. The bill however does not pressure educators to indoctrinate children into the “homosexual lifestyle,” nor does it teach cross-dressing or same-sex attraction, despite what others would have you believe.

Last year Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoed a similar measure, saying that Milk’s commemoration should be restricted to San Francisco only and not state wide. Recently however President Barack Obama awarded Harvey Milk with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, a national honor, which certainly ups the stakes.

If you would like to encourage Gov. Schwarzenegger to pass the AB 2567, feel free to send the tweet below, courtesy of Change.org:

@Schwarzenegger: Sign the Harvey Milk Day bill! He gave his life, the least you can do is give him a day. #p2 #LGBT

The California Assembly held a hearing today on resolution ARJ 15 which urges Congress and the President to pass the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA), which would allow gays and lesbians to sponsor their foreign-born partners, providing a legal path to citizenship. The bill, authored Assembly Member Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles), in part says:

This resolution urges Congress to support the removal of legal barriers to immigration that affect permanent same-sex partners in binational relationships. Specifically, the resolution calls on Congress either to include the Reuniting Families Act, which incorporates the Uniting American Families Act, in comprehensive immigration reform, or to pass the Uniting American Families Act on its own as stand-alone legislation. In support of the measure, the author writes:

The federal Uniting American Families Act (UAFA) would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to add same-sex “permanent partners” to the list of family members that a U.S. citizen or legal resident could sponsor for immigration.

Since current law does not allow gay and lesbian Americans and permanent residents to sponsor their foreign-born partners for legal residency, they cannot access the family immigration system for green cards and immigrant visas. Because of this inequity, thousands of lesbian and gay bi-national couples are kept apart, torn apart, or forced to stay together illegally, with one partner living in constant fear of deportation.

ARJ 15 is co-sponsored by Equality California (EQCA) and Asian Americans for Civil Rights and Equality (AACRE). Melanie Nathan, human rights attorney, Amos Lim, co-founder of Out4Immigration, Gina Caprio who is unable to sponsor her British partner, and representatives from EQCA and AACRE will be providing testimony.

The bill is opposed by Capital Resource Family Impact, which believes UAFA undermines the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

The Human Rights Watch issued a report today condemning the violence committed against the LGBT community in Iraq, where it is suspected that hundreds have been murdered since 2004 as a part of a “social cleansing” campaign. From the Washington Post:

Although the scope of the problem remains unclear, hundreds of gay men may have been killed this year in predominantly Shiite Muslim areas, the report’s authors said, basing their conclusion on interviews with gay Iraqi men, hospital officials and an unnamed United Nations official in Baghdad.

“The government has done absolutely nothing to respond,” said Scott Long, director of the gay rights program at Human Rights Watch. “So far there has been pretty much a stone wall.”

Homosexuality was tacitly accepted during the last years of Saddam Hussein’s rule, but Iraqis have long viewed it as taboo and shameful.

Iraq’s human rights minister, Wijdan Salim, has expressed concern about the reported slayings, but few other government officials have addressed the issue publicly or indicated that they are disturbed by the reports.

CNN ran the following segment on the report.

Yes. You read it right. Dr. Thio Li-ann, a law professor from the National University of Singapore, who has been invited to teach a “Human Rights in Asia” course at New York University in the fall, doesn’t believe human rights extend to gays and lesbians. While serving in Parliament in 2007, Dr. Li-ann gave an empassioned speech advocating for the continued criminalization of homosexuality, which she called “a gross indecency.” She went on to say “You cannot make a human wrong a human right,” “Diversity is not a license for perversity,” and compared in intimate act between men to “shoving a straw up your nose to drink.” Watch the speech below:

Since NYU extended Dr. Li-ann the invitation, many students and faculty members have expressed outrage that she will be on campus teaching in the fall. In a comprehensive 18 point diatribe Dr. Li-ann responded to her critics, complaining of the abuse she has received since accepting the invitation. In the lengthy letter, Dr. Li-ann objects that her moral opposition to homosexuality has been characterized as “bigoted, ignorance or hatred,” and finds it “ironical” that those who claim to be oppressed are in fact the oppressors. Li-ann also said that most homosexuals in Singapore “lead quiet lives which is what most of us want.”

Let’s hope that when Dr. Li-ann arrives in New York, she gets the “proper” welcome she deserves. And no, I’m not being ironical.