The Culture War Across the River....

Thankfully, whenever I need to escape this lovely but bizarre city, New Jersey's about ten minutes away. Cheap booze, cheap gas, mini-malls to your heart's delight.

All that said, this news came as a bit of a surprise.

New Jersey could become the second state to legalize gay marriage in a case that will reach the State Supreme Court this week, focusing debate in the battle that many advocates call the civil rights struggle of the 21st century.

Half of the states in the country have moved to ban gay nuptials since the Massachusetts high court's landmark decision in late 2003. But New Jersey has been among a few states that instead have chosen to extend new rights to same-sex couples.

Gay-rights advocates are seeking to build upon a limited domestic-partnership law that the Legislature enacted two years ago by securing full marriage benefits from a liberal-leaning court that once cited the Boy Scouts for discrimination.

"New Jersey is a unique state nationally when it comes to this issue," said David Buckel, marriage project director for the gay civil-rights group Lambda Legal, who will argue the case Wednesday. "That became very clear with a governor's race in which candidates on both sides opposed an amendment to the state constitution that would limit marriage to a man and a woman."

OK, time to import the out-of-state protestors on both sides....

-30-