Right now you can right click on Search Path, or other kinds of non-files and non-folder nodes and attempt to publish the selected 'files'. Note that the command is only available once you've done a publish through the wizard (you need to at least import publish settings).

The command should not be available on non-files or non-folders. If you attempt it on invalid nodes, then you'll issue a publish operation which cannot complete, cannot be canceled, and you won't be able to close VS.

For now this will be documented as a known issue, because this is caused by a bug in an external component.