Proponents of marriage equality have a simple message for Gov. Chris Christie: Sign the bill. The state Senate voted Monday to legalize same-sex marriage in New Jersey by a 24-16 margin and the Assembly is expected to follow suit Thursday. That literally will put the issue on Gov. Christie’s desk this week. The governor has promised a veto—something couples like Louise Walpin and Marsha Shapiro of Monmouth Junction believe shows a failure of leadership. “What I’d like to say to him is that it is very sad that Gov. Christie is choosing to use his power to deprive people of the very same civil …

Benny Horowitz says he grew up at the Court Tavern. Horowitz, a Bridgewater product and drummer for Gaslight Anthem, attended his first show at the legendary New Brunswick night spot in 1994 when he was just 15--an all-ages show featuring the band Resurrection--and immediately fell in love with the place. "At that time," he told me via phone from Nashville, where he is recording with the band, "there were a few places in New Brunswick, the Court being one. "Once you went down into that basement, you were steeped in it. The allure of it was really cool as a kid." Over the years, Horowitz, who …

When Lowe’s home improvement chain bowed to pressure from a Florida conservative group last week and pulled ads from the television show All-American Muslim, it endorsed one of the more pernicious stereotypes in our culture—that Muslim is synonymous with terrorist. The controversy began last week when the Florida Family Association, a small activist organization, called for a boycott because the show distorts “the Islamic agenda’s clear and present danger to American liberties and traditional values” (The New York Times). Letters and emails to sponsors followed and Lowe’s—and later Kayak, a …

We have about 11 months before the 2012 elections, but New Jersey congressional candidates already have raised about $6.7 million in campaign funds—and that does not take into account the $10.3 million U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez has raised for the same election cycle. That’s more than half a million per congressional district in a state in which only a few seats can seriously be considered to be in play. It also doesn’t account for the millions likely to be spent by outside groups and corporations on the campaign—thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which treated money …

Hurricane Irene has left local emergency food supplies low–at a time when food pantries and soup kitchens already were stretched thin. Local food agencies like Elijah’s Promise in New Brunswick, The Aldersgate Crisis Room here in East Brunswick and and others need our help to help our neighbors make it from day to day and week to week. This weekend, the Mayor David Stahl's Dining for a Cause helped put a dent in some of the need. Patch will be working with local food pantries and soup kitchens in the coming months to raise their profiles in the community and enlist community support for their…

There are two ways you can look at the news that New Brunswick’s unemployment rate is lower than other New Jersey cities. You can, as some business owners and officials say, point to the city’s business climate and say the city knows what it takes to attract businesses. Or, you can acknowledge that the job mix in the city is the kind that has been less susceptible to the vicissitudes of the current economic malaise. Both views are accurate and good news for city taxpayers and residents, because it means that New Brunswick is weathering the current storm better than most while continuing its …

MTV used to be relevant. The network, which launched 30 years ago today with the apt “Video Killed the Radio Star,” helped usher in changes in the way visual arts were produced while also breaking cultural barriers in the music business. I remember watching it shortly after it launched here in Central Jersey – South Brunswick did not get cable until 1982 or 1983, so MTV was already established by the time we watched it for the first time in my eventual wife's living room in Kendall Park. We went out of our way to watch it back then. It was new and we were seeing videos from bands that were …