Bishop Joseph Bvumbwe, head of the Malawi Council of Churches, says the leaders gathered Wednesday in the southern town of Mangochi to discuss homosexuality as an issue “most Malawians do not understand.”

Blantyre magistrate Nyakwawa Usiwa-Usiwa is scheduled to deliver a verdict Monday on Steven Monjeza, 26, and Tiwonge Chimbalanga, 20, arrested and jailed since Dec. 26 after holding a public engagement ceremony.

Homosexuality is illegal in most sub-Saharan African countries. The arrests have outraged human rights groups and Western donors in Malawi, one of Africa’s poorest nations.

Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, who fought marriage equality in Parliament five years ago, ordered sections of the immigration guide removed.

His order erased sections of the guide that discussed when homosexuality was decriminalized, that discrimination based on sexual orientation is illegal and that same-sex marriage has been legal since 2005.

The guide was last updated in 1995.

Davis is best known as the supplier of escorts for former Gov. Eliot Spitzer.

Taking aim at Albany, she said at a press conference she is “the only candidate who is not part of the corrupt and dysfunctional system of New York state politics.”

“I’ve created jobs and made payroll,” Davis said according to the New York Examiner.  “I also built a multi-million dollar international business from scratch. This alone makes me more qualified than the career politicians who are seeking the governorship.”

Davis, according to her Web site, graduated high school at age 15. She holds a bachelor’s degree in business and a masters in psychology.

“She took her finance background and applied it to the world’s oldest profession to build an empire that made over $5 million per year,” the bio on her site states.

Davis needs to collect 15,000 signatures to get her name on the ballot. Roger Stone, her campaign manager, told the Examiner she plans to use her network of “prostitutes, strippers, pot smokers and gay rights advocates” to gather at least 45,000 signatures.

In a memo outlining the parameters of the upcoming study, Gates says that “given the political dimension of this issue” that it is important to, in his words, “shield our men and women in uniform and their families from those aspects of this debate.”

The internal assessment is the first of its kind since 1993, when Congress passed a law banning gay service members from acknowledging that they are gay and the Pentagon adopted its “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy based on that law.

Gates says he wants to ensure changes in the policy won’t hurt military effectiveness.

On Feb. 3, a group of students sat down at center court holding rainbow flags and signs asking for acceptance on campus. Early last year, a plan that would have included LGBT housing for students was dropped.

Ironically, after the LGBT students sat down on the court, the band began playing “Hot Stuff,” a Donna Summer hit that was made popular in gay-dominated disco clubs in the 1970s.

John Carroll student Elizabeth Zunica told a local television station, “It’s more than just changing a policy, but creating an atmosphere in which people feel supported and feel protected and feel welcomed and tolerated and accepted.”

In October 2008, the school’s faculty union voted “very, very strongly” to urge to school to change the nondiscrimination policy to include gays, lesbians and bisexuals. Currently, the policy covers gender, race and religion only.

Andy Trares told Cleveland.com, “We know what our goal is and we’re not going to stop until we achieve that goal. A community standards statement is not acceptable. While we, of course, want an open and welcoming community on campus, we also need tangible things and things that are concrete, and this nondiscrimination policy is one of those things.”

Last week, during the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., President Barack Obama called the legislation, the Anti-Homosexuality Bill of 2009, extreme and odious.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the keynote speaker at the breakfast, also denounced the legislation, as well as other hateful or violent acts said to be taken in the name of religion or to protect religious values.

Clinton said. “Religion, cloaked in naked power lust, is used to justify horrific violence, attacks on homes, markets, schools, volleyball games, churches, mosques, synagogues, temples. From Iraq to Pakistan and Afghanistan to Nigeria and the Middle East, religion is used as a club to deny the human rights of girls and women … and to discriminate, even advocate the execution of gays and lesbians.”

Later, the secretary said, “We are standing up for gays and lesbians who deserve to be treated as full human beings. And we are also making it clear to countries and leaders that these are priorities of the United States. …And I recently called President Museveni, whom I have known through the prayer breakfast, and expressed the strongest concerns about a law being considered in the parliament of Uganda.”

Obama and Clinton chose to speak about the Uganda legislation at the prayer breakfast because of organizers’ ties to a secretive, powerful evangelical network known as The Family. The author of the Uganda legislation, MP David Bahati, is said to be an associate of The Family. The same is said of Uganda President Yoweri Museveni.

If you are familiar with the anti-gay Christian right campaigns in the United States and you read Bahati’s bill, you’ll see the connection. You might even wonder if the Traditional Values Coalition PR guru is on Bahati’s payroll.

Until last week, I had read only summaries of the Uganda legislation, which conveyed enough information for me to assess that Bahati was proposing an assault on human rights and the persecution of LGBT people.

But to read the carefully constructed language in this call to kill those who love or desire someone of the same-sex is to be frightened.

The stated principle of the legislation: “To establish a comprehensive consolidated legislation to protect the traditional family by prohibiting (i) any form of sexual relations between persons of the same sex; and (ii) the promotion or recognition of such sexual relations in public institutions and other places through or with the support of any Government entity in Uganda or any non governmental organization inside or outside the country.

“This bill aims at strengthening the nation’s capacity to deal with emerging internal and external threats to the traditional heterosexual family.”

The legislation states that same-sex attraction is not innate, that strengthening the law criminalizing homosexuality is necessary to protect “the children and youths of Uganda who are made vulnerable to sexual abuse and deviation as a result of cultural changes” and that marriage is “only between a man and a woman.”

The bill defines “the offense of homosexuality,” which includes touching another person “with the intention of committing the act of homosexuality.” Such consensual activity can be punished by life in prison.

The bill defines “aggravated homosexuality,” which includes a person living with HIV engaging in consensual same-sex sexual activity or a “serial offender.” “A person who commits the offense of aggravated homosexuality shall be liable on conviction to suffer death,” the bills states.

A person who attempts “to commit the offense of homosexuality” could be imprisoned for seven years and a person who attempts “to commit aggravated homosexuality” could be imprisoned for life.

The legislation would shield “victims” — the carrot for people to tell on one another.

The legislation also contains a big stick — those with knowledge of someone practicing homosexuality who do not come forward could be jailed.

The legislation also would outlaw the “promotion of homosexuality,” which is participating in “production, procuring, marketing, broadcasting, disseminating, publishing pornographic materials for purposes of promoting homosexuality.”

Sharing information from 365gay.com in Uganda might become a crime that carries a prison sentence. Certainly the legislation would prohibit a news organization such as 365gay.com from operating, and it would also prohibit LGBT civil rights groups and HIV/AIDS organizations from operating.

A bill that frightens me, so far away.

Imagine the fear in Uganda.

• From the land of What???? Really???  Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah came out on Thursday and said he was against discrimination and maybe even DADT. Jump to Thursday when he clarified his position to his local paper even more by saying that he “certainly do(es) not support repealing this policy.”  It seems that his flip flop can all be blamed on activist groups.

Senator Orrin Hatch

• Salacious news: Top Male Model Arrested. What’s the big deal you ask? Nick Snider was arrested for disorderly conduct due to being intoxicated. That’s not the salacious part.

This Prada fashion model, named the fifth most successful male model in 2008 by Forbes magazine, was also arrested for offering the arresting officer sexual favors to release him without charges in ARKANSAS! Come on Nick, know your audience.

Nick Snider

• Sarah Silverman is my hero! Not only is she the non-pc, edgy comedian of my dreams, but she is staying committed to her 2007 promise not to get married until her gay brothers and sisters can tie the knot.

The Advocate has her interview including why she is annoyed at liberals who support gay rights and STILL get married. And she has a new season of  “The Sarah Silverman Program“ premiering on Logo February 9th.

Sarah Silverman

• And finally, I know this maybe old news to some of you, but I still have a big heart on for those tasty bites of comedy, Literal Videos. Taking old videos and changing the audio tracks to comment on what is literally happening on the screen is, in short, brilliant. Check out my favorite so far, “Total Eclipse of the Heart”!

There is debate over gay rights in this conservative country, sparked by the trial of a gay couple charged with unnatural acts and gross indecency, felonies for which they could be imprisoned for up to 14 years.

In an interview Tuesday, police spokesman Dave Chingwalu said the man arrested Saturday will be charged with conduct likely to cause a breach of peace, a misdemeanor that could be punished with a fine of up to 5,000 kwacha (about $35) or up to three months in jail.

Chingwalu said Peter Sawali, who was jailed pending further investigations, was found with stacks of expertly and expensively printed posters displaying such messages as: “gay rights are human rights!”

“We are still investigating because we believe there is a chain of people who were working with Mr. Sawali,” Chingwalu said.

“We cannot rule out international sponsors because of the quality and the quantity of the posters,” he said. “They might even have been produced outside.”

Malawi’s government has been criticized by international groups for the prosecution of Steven Monjeza, 26, and Tiwonge Chimbalanga, 20, jailed since their arrest Dec. 27, the day they celebrated their engagement with a party that drew crowds of curious onlookers in this conservative southern African country. Hearings in the trial also have attracted crowds. The next hearing in their case is Friday.

A group of Malawian human rights activists recently formed the Center for the Development of People to fight for the rights of homosexuals and other minorities. The group says studies show that because of homophobic legislation, gays and lesbians are driven underground making them hard to reach with information that could protect them from AIDS.

Another group, Broad Coalition, has distributed leaflets, posters and pictures promoting gay rights – but keeps the names of its members secret.

Mauya Msuku, the couple’s lawyer, said the laws under which Monjeza and Chimbalanga were charged were archaic and unconstitutional.

“The penal code criminalizes homosexuality or same-sex marriages but under the Bill of Rights in the new Constitution it is clearly stated that no one should be discriminated against on the basis of – among other things – sexual orientation,” he said.

Msuku has asked the country’s chief justice for a constitutional review. Malawi’s government has been unapologetic.

In Africa, only South Africa has legalized same-sex marriage, and in South Africa the gap between the liberal constitution and societal attitudes can be wide. Uganda will soon debate a proposed law that would impose the death penalty on some gays, though Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni has told colleagues he believes the bill is too harsh and a Cabinet minister has called – so far unsuccessfully – for the bill to be scrapped.

Obama was responding to a question during a town hall meeting Thursday in Tampa, Fla.. He noted a bill is pending that would extend to domestic partners of federal employees benefits such as granting Social Security survivor payments and allowing hospital visitation.

Obama said: “My hope is we can get it done.”

Obama has acted administratively to extend some benefits to federal employees with same-sex partners. He has called for a repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, which bars federal recognition of gay unions and the granting of benefits.

Mosbacher died after a yearlong battle with pancreatic cancer, family spokesman Jim McGrath.

The Texan was a powerful Republican fundraiser who served at the top echelons of Bush’s presidential campaigns and most recently served as a general campaign chairman for 2008 GOP presidential nominee John McCain.

As commerce secretary, Mosbacher helped lay the foundation for the North American Free Trade Agreement.

But what many did not know is that Mosbacher also walked a “delicate line” between the GOP’s right wing views on gays and his own personal views, which were shaped when his daughter Diane, known as Dee, came out as a lesbian.

Said the Washington Post:

At the Republican National Convention [in 1992], conservative television pundit Pat Buchanan declared “cultural war” on homosexuals and delegates waved placards reading “Family Rights Forever/Gay Rights Never.”

In support of his daughter, Mr. Mosbacher agreed to meet with gay leaders, reportedly making the Bush administration the first to be briefed on gay issues.The party’s evangelical right pilloried Mr. Mosbacher. His daughter told The Post, “Dad said … he didn’t know what else family values is if it’s not supporting your kids and who they are.”

Mosbacher was born in Mount Vernon, N.Y. and grew up in White Plains. He graduated from the Choate School and earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration from Washington and Lee University in 1947.

The following year, he moved to Houston and built a highly successful oil and gas company that would have interests in U.S. and international markets. Bush described Mosbacher as “an honorable and a first-rate businessman, and perhaps the shrewdest dealmaker I ever knew.”

Mosbacher got into politics in the early 1960s, working as a fundraiser for various Republican candidates in southeast Texas and also managing then Vice President Richard Nixon’s 1968 presidential campaign in Harris County, which includes Houston.

Mosbacher was chief fundraiser of Bush’s 1988 presidential campaign, and after Bush’s victory, was appointed commerce secretary. He was the main official responsible for promoting NAFTA, which was later signed into law during the Clinton administration.

In 1995, Mosbacher supported efforts to eliminate the Commerce Department, saying it was no longer necessary and a “prime example of how the federal bureaucracy has gotten too big and too expensive.”

In his political career, Mosbacher managed the national fundraising operations of five different GOP presidential campaigns – from Gerald Ford in 1976 to McCain.

Former U.S. Secretary of State James Baker worked with Mosbacher on several campaigns and in Bush’s cabinet and was a friend.

“He always provided candor, intelligence, and a special sense of joy for life that was Texas-sized in its grandness,” Baker said in a statement. “My wife Susan and I are saddened by his death. We have lost a special friend, and our prayers are with his family.”

Mosbacher was also an accomplished sailor, amassing numerous titles in New York and Texas. He was involved in charitable projects, helping start the Odyssey Academy Charter School in Galveston and supporting the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, said Bush, who borrowed a phrase from his 1989 inaugural address in describing Mosbacher as “a true Point of Light.”

Mosbacher was married four times, including to Georgette Mosbacher, a flashy socialite and cosmetics entrepreneur whose animated personality and red hair made her a popular subject of gossip columnists when the couple was in Washington, D.C. The couple divorced in 1998.