Early Coverage in New York Observer first to tell the tale of today's Jamie Kemmerer rally in front of Golden’s Bay Ridge Manor

Teachout has teach-in and pitches Wu during Kemmerer’s Rally at the site of the Golden family business

Hard left of this year’s Democratic spectrum showed up at the lion’s den to slam GOP and Conservative Party incumbent State Senator Marty Golden   —   Posters and diagrams looked more like a seminar than a political rally

One of this bloggger’s favorite city-wide political writers, who happened to have graduated from the local Brooklyn papers, got the jump on the competition by quickly getting his copy up on the electronic page.  According to Will Bredderman, “Standing just a few feet from the Bay Ridge Manor, Mr. Golden’s family catering hall,  [Zephyr]  Teachout and [Tim] Wu reiterated Mr. Kemmerer’s long-running attacks on the GOP incumbent–who has channeled thousands of dollars into the business by regularly hosting campaign events there. ***   ‘I’m speaking out against Marty Golden as one of the worst examples of the old boys club and the broken system that is governing our state,’ said Ms. Teachout. ‘What he is doing here is, his company, his family business has received over half a million dollars from campaign funds and state funds. And you don’t need to be a genius to recognize there’s something wrong with that. That we have a system that allows a state senator to instead of serving the people of Bay Ridge to be serving his own business and his own interest.’ ***   Ms. Teachout noted that Mr. Golden has also used his government office’s website and mailers to promote events at the catering hall.... ( See “Teachout and Wu Endorse Golden Rival Kemmerer” by Will Bredderman, 10/08/14, NY Observer [http://observer.com/2014/10/teachout-and-wu-endorse-golden-rival-kemmerer/]).

Tim Wu was no potted plant at the event, either. According to Bredderman’s  report, “Mr. Wu–a law professor who coined the term “net neutrality”–heralded Mr. Kemmerer, a web developer, as both an old-fashioned anti-corruption crusader and as a new kind of cutting edge, tech-savvy pol. ***   ‘Jamie is exactly the kind of person we need in New York politics. He is in politics for the right reasons. He’s not going to the state senate to try and enrich himself. He’s not going to Albany because he’s interested in brokering a few deals to get campaign contributions in exchange for favors,’ said Mr. Wu. ‘He shows that when it comes to the industries of tomorrow, when it comes to people who are thinking of the future, it is the Democratic Party and men like Jamie who are leading the way against the past, against Marty Golden, against the politics of yesterday’....”

When it was Jamie Kemmerer’s turn to speak, he said that, if elected, he would sponsor what he called “The Golden Rule.”   That is his  bill that would prohibit politicians from spending campaign money at any business where a member of their family works. Then he used the Bay Ridge Manor itself as a prop, saying “We are not standing in front of a catering hall. We’re standing in front of a bank. The scheme Senator Golden employed here allows him to take campaign dollars and turn them into personal dollars....”

Will Bredderman also gave this background information: “State campaign finance rules are notoriously lax, and candidates are rarely penalized for any expenditure they can demonstrate was somehow connected to their campaign. Mr. Golden has never been accused of any wrongdoing, though the Moreland Commission was reportedly examining his relationship with the catering hall and with a number of real estate developers.”

Showing that he is a fair reporter of such things, Bredderman also allowed Golden's people to get in their digs.  Unfortunately, for Golden, his vassals seemed more snarky than substantive.  Ray Riley was quoted as saying it like this: "It’s never a surprise when Occupy Wall Street gets together. It’s unfortunate when it comes to Bay Ridge....”  and this "“Jamie worked hard to try to keep Governor Cuomo from getting the Democratic nomination and Zephyr is returning the favor. It’s what some would call a political quid pro quo.”

A better item for Mr. Riley to have addressed would have been that both Teachout and Wu "...highlighted the need for a Democratic-controlled State Senate to push forward key liberal policies like public financing of elections...."  Now that's something that would make most good Republicans' and Conservatives' blood boil.