Pressures of local politics cause State Senator Golden to go soft on the terrorist threat in our midst — a squishy Golden becomes a pouting weak sister in his support for NYPD’s anti-terrorist intelligence and surveillance operation

While campaigning among Muslims, State Senator Martin Golden looks like he has stabbed cops and his most loyal supporters in the back  ---  reversing himself and withdrawing his prior public support of a key component of the police department’s counter-terrorism efforts, which included infiltrating and eavesdropping on Muslim places of worship and other possible gathering places for radical Islamist terrorists

The intensifying coverage of State Senator Martin Golden is giving the informed and discerning public a different picture of the long-time Republi-Con incumbent than the one we're used to or the one that many say they "know and love" ---  more and more Republicans and other conservative minded supporters are asking the white haired state senator over and over --- "Marty, what's the story?"  An interesting recent case in point is Golden’s shifting stance on what some critics had described as an intrusive  police department program of maintaining surveillance over Muslims around and inside their places of worship.

State Senator Golden is thought to be a reliable supporter of the NYPD generally, and its anti-terrorist, homeland security and intelligence operations in particular. However, it now looks like the hard-campaigning efforts of Andrew Gounardes, the routinely liberal Democratic candidate now running against Golden, have succeeded in putting a wedge between Golden and one of the NYPD’s programs that Golden formerly actively supported.

Here’s the proof of State Senator Golden’s apparent reversal on the NYPD’s anti-terrorist program of surveillance at mosques and other gathering places for Muslims according to some recent coverage in blogs and local newspapers:  “Critics claim incumbent flip-flopping on cops watching mosques” by Will Bredderman in The Brooklyn Paper on October 24, 2012 ; “Golden NYPD Letter Contradicts Statement On Mosque Spying” posted by Joe Teutonico on The Bay Ridge Odyssey on October 24, 2012; with earlier coverage by  Shadi Bushra’s and Elaine Mao’s, “Sen. Golden Comes Out Against Counterterrorism Surveillance of Mosques at Arab-American Candidate’s Forum,” posted by BrooklynCampaign.com Staff [in District 22] on October 11, 2012.

The gist of that reportage is that Golden flip-flopped on this very critical issue of national and local security, as follows.  Sometime in October, 2011, Golden joined in a letter to NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly, which had been put together by Assemblyman Dov Hikind and signed with other officials. That  letter said, in part: “We admire you for going to precisely the source of the problem. The NYPD has wisely embraced the cold reality that heinous acts of terrorism have been, and will continue to be, attempted or committed by radical Muslims .…”   However, at a candidate’s forum sponsored by the Arab-American Association of New York, Golden apparently changed his tune by saying, “Anybody that would spy on any religious institution is absolutely wrong,  I do not stand by anybody who would do that.” Golden continued, “If [Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly] has [done that], he should apologize — but it hasn’t been proven that he has.”

Taking the microphone shortly  after Golden had spoken, Andrew Gounardes, Golden’s Democratic Party opponent, said that despite Golden’s  response opposition to spying on religious institutions to the gathering largely made up of Muslims, in the past Golden had sent a letter to Commissioner Kelly “praising him” for exactly those kinds of efforts. Gounardes then said that while he was glad Golden had eventually changed his position, the voters gathered there should know that Golden had not always been on their side of the issue of intrusive police surveillance of Muslims in and outside of New York City.

Since Golden made his remarks at the forum hosted by the Arab American Association of New York, Golden’s campaign manager Jeffrey Kraus has stated Golden’s recent answer at the candidate forum was completely consistent with the joint letter Golden had sent along with Dov Hikind
to Commissioner Kelly.  Kraus said, “Our opponent’s claim that we are changing our position is just plain fantasy....”   Krause continued that if  “probable cause leads NYPD to a house of worship, then they have a responsibility to protect Americans.” Nonetheless, according to Joe Teutonico posting on The Bay Ridge Odyssey,  the letter to Police Commisioner Kelly, made no reference to probable cause, – which, is a legal standard for justifying specific police searches and seizures. Teutonico also pointed out that the letter to Kelly had also been signed by some other politicians as well as Assemblyman Dov Hikind and State Senator Golden.

Bottom line, in a effort to pander to a specific ethnic audience, Martin Golden has again flip-flopped on a position of especial concern to a broad swath of Golden’s long-time conservative Republican supporters (just like on 2nd Amendment gun issues). Unlike the relative narrow reach of Golden’s other flip-flops; his apparent recent switch on the issue of the NYPD's "intrusive surveillance" of potential terrorists is one with an actual life and death importance to all of State Senator Golden’s constituents. All of that is irrespective of any general constitutional or libertarian concerns that may of us might hold on the one hand and/or issues of specific ethnic and religious bigotry and discrimination felt by particular citizens and groups on the other.

If Golden gets this squishy when pressed by an otherwise routinely packaged  Democratic opponent like Andrew Gounardes, how far left might Golden shift on other key issues for conservatives and Republicans if somebody like Gounardes were to be able to run a well-targeted and well-financed campaign against Golden?  If only to keep Golden’s spine solid on important conservative issues, there must be a real candidate to the right of State Senator Golden on the ballot throughout any of his future campaigns for re-election; that should be  as the Conservative Party Candidate or on some other righteous conservative line that might be available.  That is, all assuming Martin Golden might decide to ever run again.