As previously announced, the News Guy is taking some time off.

The next new post will appear Friday, August 20.

The News Guy is slightly indisposed.

No big deal. Happens to everybody from time to time.

He will return Wednesday with renewed vigor.

A writer of clear prose (not running for governor of Vermont)

The News Guy has been summoned away (though not physically) on other business matters.

(No, they’re not very profitable, either, but can not be ignored).

He will return Friday with substantive (meaning, not just political) information.

But there is just enough time and energy left for one apology and one observation.

The apology goes to Julie Waters, who was called Julie Walters in a recent post. Ms. Waters, in her amusing corrective comment, suggested the News Guy might have gotten her confused with an actual Julie Walters, an actress.

Nope, this was strictly an eyesight malfunction, the existence of actress Julie Walters having been previously unknown in this precinct.

The observation comes after perusing Tuesday’s Burlington Free Press “Comment and Debate” page in which all six candidates for governor answered the question, “What changes, if any, would you make to how we pay for public education, how much we pay and how the public school system is structured?”

Actually, this is one observation in five parts:

–Part One: Is the Free Press aware that no more than 14 people could possible be reading these answers?

–Part Two: As has been mentioned here before, the writing of these answers, simply as writing, is execrable. Any candidate writing these answers him/her self should cease, desist, and hire a professional writer. Any candidate whose answers are already being written by a professional writer should  fire said writer and hire another.

(And Susan Bartlett, or perhaps the Free Press, should hire a proofreader. She said  school costs were rising because of “personal.” Surely she meant “personnel.”)

–Part Three: But to those of the 14 (perhaps eight) who can wade through the stilted prose, all six candidates have some sensible ideas, having to do with consolidation, distance learning technology, bulk purchasing, and other possible efficiencies.

–Part Four: Sen. Peter Shumlin, in his answer as well as on his television advertisements, calls for universal pre-kindergarten education. That can be expensive. Have his four Democratic opponents challenged him as to how he plans to pay for this? If not, why not?

–Part Five: Republican Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie said that “our problem is simple: we spend more than we have.”

No, we do not. The schools are financed from the General and Education Funds, neither of which is in arrears. Obviously, Vermont spends less on schools than it has. Otherwise, it would have nothing to spend on anything else.

Sounds as though Dubie was using evocative language to suggest that the state spends more than it should, more than its taxpayers want to spend, perhaps even more than it can afford to spend on schools. These are all plausible, if debatable, assertions.

But politics ain’t poetry. Its language should be literally accurate, not an experiment in hyperbole.

But give Dubie some credit. That was one of the few simple, declarative English sentences by any of the six.