Gavin Newsom sat down with a group of bloggers on Saturday, April 25th at the California Democratic Convention for an hourlong Q&A session. I’ve been a bit slow to write this up, but it was a very valuable conversation that at least for me helped clarify what kind of campaign, and perhaps even what kind of gubernatorial administration, Gavin Newsom will run.

Before getting into specifics, I want to make some broader observations. I have always been impressed with Newsom’s grasp of issues and policy. He clearly understands government, and understands it quite well. He isn’t as strongly progressive as I am, and certainly not as much as many of my San Francisco colleagues rightly prefer. But his experience in city and county government over the last five years has given him a good perspective on the problems with state government, seeing as the cities and counties often get hit the hardest and yet do not have the kind of policy tools to deal with the crisis.

At the same time, Newsom isn’t going to be drawn on the details, and isn’t going to promise an openly progressive administration. He seems to be running an Obama-style campaign, both in his effort to build a grassroots movement early, but also in his approach to the issues. I got the distinct impression that Newsom is going to try to avoid being pinned down on the “taxes vs. spending cuts” debate that is dominating CA politics, and try to find a way to provide reform with accountability. “I’m a pro-business Democrat who believes in fiscal responsibility,” he said, but he is open to progressive solutions as well – what Newsom seems to want to do is find a way to sell those solutions in a pro-business form.

Newsom knows that we need a new economic base. He understood that housing fueled the economy for the last 10 years and that’s no longer possible – we have to provide broadly shared prosperity. He spoke of green jobs, but still needs to articulate more clearly what the next 30 years will look like. That being said, he’s much further along in that process than Jerry Brown is, at least so far.

More details over the flip.

In response to questions about the May 19 propositions, Newsom made some strong points against Props 1C, 1D, and 1E – “I can’t support balancing the budget by asking poor people to buy more lottery tickets” for example. His “first instinct was to oppose” Props 1A and 1B, but concluded that there was no alternative, no answer to the “what then?” question. Newsom speaks often of San Francisco’s “rainy day fund” as part of his effort to pass Prop 1A, but otherwise isn’t openly campaigning for them.

Of course, Newsom does recognize there are indeed alternatives. He supports a Constitutional Convention, is open to a split roll property tax (excluding commercial property from residential property tax protections). He believes the sales tax should be modernized.

David Dayen asked about prison reform, and while Newsom showed he understands the unsustainable nature of the prison policy – and believes the drug war to be a failure – he didn’t talk about sentencing reform or embrace Prop 5 as David had specifically asked.

Adam Bink of Open Left asked Newsom about immigration, and specifically whether Newsom would pull a Gillibrand and abandon his progressive stance on immigration, including sanctuary policies, in order to win statewide. Newsom said he would not do that – that he “would be ineffective if he said one thing privately and another thing publicly.” He supports immigration reform that includes a path to citizenship and isn’t afraid of “cable networks” that attack him for this position, and Newsom also said we must “celebrate diversity, not just tolerate it.”

Becks of Living in the O asked about the gutting of state transit funding. Newsom’s response was “we are a wealthy state” and we should be able to fund transit. He gave a strong push for high speed rail, comparing Europe’s advanced trains with California’s much slower and weaker rail infrastructure. Newsom understands that we must “move beyond freeways and airports and sprawl” and knows HSR is a way to do that. Of course, this isn’t really an answer to Becks’ question about restoring STA funding.

Ultimately, Newsom is positioning himself the same way Obama did – someone who says enough things progressives can get behind without openly promising a progressive administration, and saying it in a way that can attract moderate voters. It’s smart politics, and might be enough to win him the Democratic nomination, maybe even the general election.

But it’s also vague on the details, and Newsom can only take a vague but informed set of answers to the issues so far. I can’t imagine Jerry Brown will be merely proposing 1978 vintage solutions forever, and Brown has long demonstrated his ability to make quick and bold policy statements. Newsom will have to eventually articulate his solutions to the budget mess, to providing an economic base for our future, and ultimately a vision for the next 30 years.

Newsom’s vision will probably never be my vision. But it could be close enough, and will likely be enough for most progressives to embrace. Newsom is doing everything he needs to do to win the 2010 election, and so far, is setting a higher bar for Jerry Brown, maybe Antonio Villaraigosa, to meet.