The past may offer clues as to how negative the friends of Team Dubie might go in a close race this fall. This week the AP did some notable reporting about Brian Dubie and the Green Mountain Prosperity PAC. The report stands out in contrast to much of the coverage of Dubie’s substance-averse, image-driven campaign by opening a window into the actual character his campaign is taking and who his camp followers are.  

Green Mountain Prosperity is RGA’s spin-off PAC set up to assist the Dubie campaign. Some finance filing disclosure questions are being brought up. The article noted that GMP PAC to date has reported no expenditures, thus saving its money for later, which has been the pattern with the RGA’s tactics in the past. Late in the 2004 election, the RGA spent a huge $300,000 in advertising support for Gov. Douglas’s re-election.  

With this in mind, it is worth remembering Dubie’s 2004 campaign benefited late in the election from another PAC’s money. [see who below the fold]

Ultimately the outcome wasn’t close, but even into the last days of October the three way race for Lt. Governor was considered close by the press. One late October headline read: Candidates for Lt. Gov. campaign in tight race and said that the candidates “Find themselves in a competitive race in the final days before the election”  

In 2004, the American Taxpayers Alliance (ATA) spent $50,000 in support of Dubie to run a series of controversial ads late in the campaign. In the days before Brietbart and Youtube, maybe akin to Nixon’s dirty tricksters, they featured distorted and out of context quotes and broadcasted his opponents’ home phone numbers.    

The ATA (a so called stealth PAC) avoided having to disclose donors or beneficiaries and operated without direct coordination from the Dubie campaign. I can’t find any record of Dubie commenting at the time on these ads or ever disavowing their negative style or content in any way.  

The Times Argus wrote that year about the level of negative campaigning in Vermont.  About the ATA’s Dubie ads they said:  

Another negative ad campaign was a nearly $50,000 affair funded by the American Taxpayers Alliance. Unlike the RGA, the alliance is a so-called stealth political action committee, because its donors and beneficiaries are not disclosed.  

The campaign – putatively on behalf of Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie – featured out-of-context and distorted remarks about former state Sen. Cheryl Rivers, who, along with Progressive Steve Hingtgen, ran against Dubie. The ad concluded with Rivers' home telephone number