Town Hall

Gov. Corbett was repeatedly interrupted by protesters representing a variety of interests during a town-hall meeting Wednesday night at the Philadelphia Museum of Art organized by a conservative talk-radio host. WPHT's Dom Giordano ended the event a half-hour earlier than its planned 90 minutes when it became clear that Corbett could not answer questions without being shouted at inside the Van Pelt Auditorium. Police removed more than 10 people from the meeting. At one point, protesters interrupted the program for seven minutes.

HOWELL, N.J. - Gov. Christie kicked off a new round of town-hall meetings Wednesday by urging the Legislature to pass the ethics-overhaul package he proposed two years ago. Christie discussed his policy priorities and took questions in a packed gym during a meeting that lasted more than 90 minutes in this Monmouth County township. The ethics changes include prohibiting public employees from holding multiple jobs. The Republican governor cited North Bergen Mayor Nicholas Sacco, who also is a Democratic state senator and assistant superintendent of schools.

Gov. Christie's aggressive approach to public education and unions may garner more attention, but his fight over affordable housing could become the true epic battle of the Republican's first term. After losing skirmishes with the courts and Legislature on the issue, Christie now has targeted towns, demanding that most of them immediately turn over a total of $141.2 million left in their affordable-housing trust funds. As is his style, Christie wants to up-end the entire system of subsidized housing for the poor, and he is unsympathetic to complainers.

Democrats won't deliver on their vow to give residents a tax cut in January if the state can afford it, Gov. Christie predicted Wednesday, but he didn't say whether he would sign the budget they delivered. The Republican governor was campaigning for a second day for his signature budget item: the first phase of a 10 percent tax cut. Christie told a town hall audience in Mahwah, Bergen County, that Democrats who would defer the tax cut - including Senate Budget Committee Chairman Paul Sarlo (D., Bergen)

Gov. Christie, who has doubled the frequency of his town hall meetings as the days ticktock down to the deadline for signing the state budget, brought his fabled road show to the heart of Camden County on Tuesday. The Republican governor is now crisscrossing the state for these events twice a week, as opposed to once a week earlier in the year, and except for fielding softball questions from the audience about issues related to small business, autism, and solar power, Christie hammered away at one theme in Haddonfield's Central Middle School gym Tuesday: Taxes need to be cut, and Assembly Democrats will be to blame if that doesn't happen.

PISCATAWAY, N.J. — A subdued and sparsely-attended town hall meeting with Gov. Christie in this Middlesex County township Wednesday had one noteworthy bit: several anti-Christie electronic traffic signs, set up by town workers at the behest of the Democratic mayor in apparent violation of state regulation. If you paused long enough as the words scrolled through, the signs read: "Welcome to P-Way Governor ... Please return ... 3.4 mil. in energy money back to taxpayers. " Another sign on the way out of the church where the event was held read: "Come back soon Gov. with energy money in hand.

BORDENTOWN - Asked Monday if he regretted calling a Rutgers-Camden law student and former Navy SEAL an "idiot" during an argument at a town-hall meeting last week, Gov. Christie's answer was a typical Gov. Christie answer: "No. " "He acted like an idiot, he is an idiot," Christie told reporters Monday at Bordentown Regional High School, where he was visiting to talk about his education policies. "Just because he's a Navy SEAL doesn't give him any reason to be a jerk," he added.

Figures flow from Jennifer Cavallaro's memory as she recounts her futile crusade for an extra million bucks for her son's school district in Gloucester County. Nine: That's how many Gov. Christie town hall meetings the 35-year-old mother of two attended. She always arrived five hours early to ensure a front-row seat, and the governor called on her to speak eight times.   Fifty: That's how many supporters joined her at the Hammonton town hall last March, when Christie himself encouraged Cavallaro to push for legislation to supplement funding for the Swedesboro-Woolwich School District, which spends only half as much per pupil as the state average.

DENVILLE, N.J. - The crowd was familiar and friendly, and Gov. Christie seemed to soak up the energy. Speaking in a charter school's packed gymnasium, the governor bragged that he had Democrats fighting with him not over spending money, but over cutting spending. "To have Democrats arguing with me about which taxes to cut, I feel like I have died and gone to heaven," the governor said at his town hall at Morris County School of Technology in his home county. He noted that despite cutting education money, test scores in the state remained high overall.

WASHINGTON - President Obama is trying to rebuild the American economy, one job at a time - literally. The president asked an online town hall questioner Monday to send him her husband's resume, insisting he wanted to look into why the man remained out of work despite his background as a semiconductor engineer. "I meant what I said, if you send me your husband's resume, I'd be interested in finding out exactly what's happening right there," Obama told the questioner, Jennifer Wedel of Fort Worth, Texas.