Paul “The Huntsman” Heintz performed a real public service in this week’s issue of Seven Days, as his “Fair Game” column was entirely devoted to Bruce Lisman’s thoroughly opaque political plans. He fell short in a couple of key areas, but it’s full of news and insight, and well worth your time.

First big news: The price tag for Lisman’s vanity project nonprofit advocacy group Campaign for Vermont is over the $800,000 mark. And, in spite of CFV’s claim to be the fastest-growing grassroots organization* in Vermont**, all of it comes out of Lisman’s Wall Street fortune.

*If, by “grassroots,” you mean “top-down group completely funded by its wealthy patron.”

**It’s easy to be the “fastest-growing” when you start from a membership of one.

Second big news: He’s prepared to spend a lot more. Yep, now that the Summer of Bruce is wrapping up and his merry band of Lisketeers* is headed back to campus, Lisman’s minions will start haunting the halls of the Statehouse, lobbying on behalf of… er… cough… whatever it is that CFV stands for.

*The much-bruited “grassroots advocacy team,” initially described as a skilled, experienced group with a broad range of political views, was in fact little more than a squad of cheerleaders. As Heintz put it, the “seven part-time, paid interns” were “charged with marching in parades and manning booths at county fairs.” It’s easy to gather names on your mailing list and claim the title of “fastest-growing” when you can afford to pay a bunch of college students to do your scutwork.

Because after a whole lot of time and effort — Lisman’s own two-year personal tour of Vermont, meeting and speaking with “real Vermonters,” and a series of well-publicized but sparsely-attended policy forums, CFV still has precious little to show in the way of specific proposals.

They’ve got a truckload of glittering generalities couched in reassuringly nonpartisan catchphrases: overall, a public-policy fog thick enough to hide a hundred Jack the Rippers. In its present form, CFV’s platform turns Lisman’s preoccupation with “transparency” into a bad joke.

Anyway, so Heintz’ piece is recommended reading. Now, for the two places where he fell short of the mark.  

First, he falls into a common trap for political reporters: the laser-like focus on future campaigns. Heintz just can’t help but ask Lisman if he’s running for Governor. Over and over and over again.

This is always a waste of time. It never works. And it didn’t work here:

[H]is answer… was as dodgy as answers get.

“Well, right now we are entirely focused on Campaign for Vermont,” he said.

Asked whether that was a yes or a no, Lisman responded, “No plans to.”

No plans to. OK. Does that mean you are affirmatively saying, “I will not run for governor in 2014?”

“I’m affirmatively saying this is what I do. This is what I’m good at,” he said.

That’s not very affirmative.

“I think it is,” Lisman countered.

But you’re not ruling it out, obviously.

“I don’t give it any thought,” he said. “I don’t take it seriously.”

The sad thing is, according to Heintz’ reporting, he’d been trying to corner Lisman on a much more important point: his political ideology. And Lisman was, as usual, playing rope-a-dope. But instead of pushing that point — instead of, say, citing some of Lisman’s past words and seeking his reaction — Heintz went back to the same-old same-old “are you running” business.

Sorry, Paul, but that goat was long ago sacrificed and its entrails thoroughly examined.

And besides, I don’t care whether Lisman wants to run for Governor. Because he’s not going to win.

Why? Because (1) He’s not conservative enough for the dead-enders in charge of the VTGOP, (2) third-party or independent bids never work unless you’re Jesse Ventura, which Lisman definitely is not, (3) he has no political profile among the general populace, (4) he has no political skills, and (5) Vermont has shown a consistent antipathy toward One-Percenters who try to buy elections. (See: Rich Tarrant, Jack McMullen, Jack McMullen, Lenore Broughton, et al.)

No, I’m much more concerned with Lisman’s policy agenda than his political ambitions, real or imagined. And here’s where Heintz falls back on another tired trope of his profession: the ol’ he-said-she-said, without any attempt to weigh the evidence. And, despite Lisman’s efforts to cloud the picture, there are plenty of signs that his policy prescriptions lean rightward.

Let me count the ways…

— CFV’s full official name, which is almost never used publicly, is “Campaign for Vermont Prosperity.” Despite Lisman’s scrupulous attention to high-minded concepts like transparency, accountability, and education, when shit gets real, it’s All About Da Scrilla.

— One of CFV’s two (count ’em, TWO) position papers is on energy, and it is also A.A.D.S. It pays lip service to renewables and reducing carbon emissions, but “affordability” is its top priority. CFV wants Vermont to develop clean energy only if it doesn’t cost any more than other sources.

— CFV’s first advertising blitz, in the winter of 2011-12, hammered over and over again at “the politicians in Montpelier” and at Governor Shumlin’s policy priorities, because they allegedly created barriers to prosperity. In other words, anti-business. While the ads never mentioned “Democrats” by name, we all know who was in charge in Montpelier at the time. It wasn’t Jack Lindley.

The group’s later advertisements adopt a friendlier, nonpartisan tone. But its energy policy paper once again drags out the old “politicians in Montpelier” bugaboo. If this is true nonpartisanship, it’d be nice to hear some criticism of the Republicans. We never seem to get that, do we?

— Since launching CFV, Lisman has refrained from directly expressing his own opinions. But on one occasion, back in 2010, he did so. And in a talk delivered to business groups in South Burlington, he revealed a decisively right-leaning, Wall Street oriented worldview. The video can be viewed online, thanks to Burlington’s community access Channel 17; I reported on the speech in a pair of GMD posts in the spring of 2012. The highlights:

a. Lisman was a top executive at Bear Stearns when the economy cratered in 2008. His 2010 description of the Wall Street meltdown? “This thing that happened to us in ’08 and ’09… It was a Darwinian asteroid that hit us.” In other words, a completely unforeseeable natural disaster, for which no one on Wall Street should be blamed.

b. He stated, baldly, that “economic growth… is the ONLY answer for what might ail [the state of Vermont]. …The Governor has to make it the most important thing on his or her schedule every day.”  Does that sound like a liberal — or even a centrist — to you?

c. He said that investment capital is “the most precious thing in the galaxy,” and that those willing to invest capital should be rewarded with lower tax rates on capital gains and corporate earnings. In other words, lower taxes for those wealthy enough to be able to put their capital in the markets, rather than those of us who put our dollars and cents into frills like electricity, heat, housing and food.  

d. He echoed the Republican talking point that there are too many people who get away with paying no income taxes. Well, shortened to “paying no taxes,” which is untrue. He wants to broaden the taxpaying base by raising taxes for the working poor and middle classes. His rationale: everyone should pay something in, so they have a stake in the process.

e. He called for a close examination of Vermont’s social safety net, and a benchmarking of all benefits to the national average. No consideration for variations between states, or to the philosophical question of whether average generosity is good enough. (Hey, if we benchmarked LIHEAP against, say, Arizona, we could save a whole lot of money right there!)

f. He issued a warm-hearted call for a return to the “kindness and caring” that “are in our gene pool,” and connected that with practicality and frugality, which he identified as two other defining traits of the Vermont character. Put those together, and what do you see? Privatizing help for the poor.

g. He called for “performance-shaped budgeting,” with every public program having a defined goal within a defined time period. Which is an echo of the conservative shibboleth that we should “run government like a business.” When, in fact, government is by nature NOT businesslike.

h. He wants us to “embrace economic growth” without trying to pick winners — another Republican talking point. Government shouldn’t invest in specific industries; it should let the markets sort things out. Which ignores the fact that most of the investments that built America — from the Erie Canal to the opening of the American West (subsdized by land giveaways to the railroads and the provision of military and communications service across the continent) to the development of medicines and medical technology to the space program to the natural-gas bonanza provided by hydraulic fracturing.

Yes, fracking was developed through government-funded research, at a time when the fossil fuel industry thought the idea was laughable.

Certainly, government funding sometimes fails. But so does private-sector investment. And when government funding pays off, it creates new vistas of economic development that private investors, with their short-term orientation toward profit, would never have the patience to underwrite.

Is that enough evidence for you? Does that provide reason, at the very least, to mistrust Bruce Lisman as an avatar of nonpartisan centrism? Does that provide grounds to question his real motives, as he continues to keep his rhetorical Fog Machine cranked up to 11?

So, Mr. Heintz, the next time Bruce Lisman consents to an interview, feel free to print out this diary and put his feet to the fire.