Golden’s Chief of Staff, Jerry Kassar, thumps chest over 30-29 NYS Senate vote defeating the proposed NYS Dream Fund
Golden and most NYS Senate Republicans formally at odds with Catholic Church — Cardinal Dolan called for Tax Credit–Dream Act compromise — Golden, and NYS Senate Co-leaders Skelos and Klein all specifically rejected Cardinal Dolan’s proposal
Jerry Kassar is one gift that just keeps on giving. In this week’s “Common Sense” column, Kassar linked the apparent ‘unified” GOP opposition to the Dream Act in New York with a defense of the horse and carriage trade in Manhattan (See “Common Sense: No DREAM Act” by Jerry Kassar, 3/25/14, Home Reporter/Spectator
[http://www.homereporternews.com/news/government/common-sense-no-dream-act/article_b3b85f54-b455-11e3-9350-001a4bcf887a.html]). His column also made special mention of Conservative party-supported Simcha Felder’s joining with the unanimous GOP members of the Senate. Kassar’s coverage is fundamentally dishonest and an attempt to use the Dream Act issue as a racist and ethnically-based wedge issue.
After that vote, won in the state senate by the GOP and IDC Democrats, Cardinal Timothy Dolan made a proposal to include the Dream Act provisions in the state budget coupled with an education tax credit for private schools that had been supported by the GOP. Cardinal Dolan was quickly rebuffed by Marty Golden and the NYS Senate leadership last week. See “Republicans sour on Dolan’s Dream Act compromise” by Jimmy Vielkind, 3/27/14,
[http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/albany/2014/03/8542770/republicans-sour-dolans-dream-act-compromise]). In rejecting the cardinal’s idea, Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos and Brooklyn State Senator Marty Golden said that “the two items should stand separately and be judged on their merits....”
New York’s Cardinal obviously supports both proposals and will be working to get them both passed. Golden’s brainy staff has fed their boss a poison pill — the paleo-conservative biased position advocated by Kassar not only puts Golden and his allies on the wrong side of history (a version of the Dream Act will soon pass the NYS Senate with a few GOP votes), it puts Golden and his supporters at odds with the Catholic Church (Not only Cardinal Dolan, but the entire New York Catholic Conference).
So are we supposed to support whatever the Catholic Conference says?
ReplyDeleteCertainly not !
ReplyDeleteNonetheless, for the reasons stated above, the Kassar-Golden position on the NYS DREAM Act will not help him in his district, it will hurt.
Many conservative Republicans around the country are supporting state initiatives similar to the NYS DREAM Act... and even in New York there are several GOP State Senators that are near to a vote in favor of the New York act if it is tweaked a bit.
In addition, Golden's out of hand rejection of Cardinal Dolan's proposal also puts Golden's "announced support" for tax credits for parents of children in private and religious schools into doubt.