Things are getting a little strange over in Burlington.

To which many a Vermonter would say: “So what else is new?” These are the folks who like to point out that Chittenden County is a nice place because it’s right next to Vermont.

But let’s not be divisive; it’s one state, and we’re all in it together. And considering that the latest Burlington strangeness was inspired by politics, known to bring out the strange in men and women all over the world, we non-Burlingtonites (Burlingtonians?) should refrain from acting in a mean-spirited manner.

But that doesn’t mean we have to ignore the obvious.

Start with Mayor Bob Kiss’s assertion on election night that the outcome “doesn’t play out as a referendum on this administration.”

Uh, actually, Mr. Mayor, it did. Your party lost  (pending a recount) a Council seat in its Ward 2 stronghold. Your party’s pet political ploy – instant run-off voting – got rejected. Your administration’s handling of the Burlington Telecom mess was certainly one reason Republican Kurt Wright breezed to an easy victory over incumbent Democrat Russ Ellis in Ward 4.

Sounds like the functional equivalent of a referendum on the administration.

In the interests of charity, it should be acknowledged that Kiss was acting like a very conventional politician (which, come to think of it, is what he is). Even extraordinary politicians  seem incapable of calling a setback by its rightful name. Recall that both Ronald Reagan (in 1982) and Bill Clinton (in 1994) were asked the day after the Mid-term elections whether their party’s defeats indicated public displeasure with their policies. No, both said. Yes, was the correct answer.

True, you can’t expect any politician (or non-politician) to be that candid. But wouldn’t it have been refreshing if one of them had said something like, “well, it wasn’t a ringing endorsement, was it?”

But the Mayor was not the only self-deluded politician in town last week. No sooner had the votes been counted than Councilor Ed Adrian, a Ward 1 Democrat, said Kiss should resign.

Resign? He’s the duly elected mayor. In a democracy, elected officials who are not seriously ill or been convicted of a crime should not resign. We should not let them off so easily. Furthermore, we should not let the voters off so easily. They should pay more attention to whom they elect, on the assumption that the winner will serve out his/her term. Voters should understand that they are going to be stuck with their choice until that term ends.

(OK, right across the lake there is a possible exception because Gov., David Paterson (a) has been charged with offenses that are not frivolous; and (b) was never elected governor. But those are peculiar circumstances. Even Burlington is not as strange as New York State).

In addition to political delusion, some Burlngtonians seem to suffer from hypersensitivity. When Kiss blamed the loss of instant runoff voting on the “naysayers” of the New North End, Ward 7 Councilor Paul Decelles, the Republican who represents part of that neighborhood, pronounced himself “appalled.” The Mayor’s statement, he said, was “beyond contempt”  The New North End, he reminded Kiss, was part of Burlington, and “not in Colchester.”

Touchy, touchy. If in fact the denizens of Ward 7 got their noses out of joint over Kiss’s comment, they need to grow up. Maybe they didn’t but Decelles decided to get in on the whining craze anyway.

Again, he was not alone. The people (or, probably, just the mayor and some self-appointed spokespersons) of Las Vegas executed a hissy fit last month after President Barack Obama told a New Hampshire audience, “you don’t blow a bunch of cash in Vegas when you’re trying to save for college.” Outraged, a Las Vegas newspaper wondered “why the president of the United States continues to use Las Vegas as an applause line in speeches about wasted money.”

But where do the folks out there think you go to blow a bunch of cash? Akron? Topeka? Perth Amboy?

Or maybe Colchester.

If you live in the nation’s sybaritic capital (or in the North End, for that matter) at least a minimal thickness of skin is recommended.

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Last week, the News Guy was on the radio, on the WDEV-FM morning call-in show hosted by Mark Johnson, who mentioned that a new poll about public opinion on the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant was about to be released.

“Who took it?” Was the first reaction from this corner. “You have to be careful about polls commissioned by interest groups.”

The poll came out later that day, justifying the caution. It was taken by a market research company called Infogroup ORC (which just this week was bought by CCMP Capital Advisor, a New York based private equity firm for some $635 million) on behalf of the Civil Society Institute.

The Institute seems to be a lively group of folks who do some valuable work. But they are unquestionably anti-nuclear, and it shows. Among the poll’s questions were whether respondents would support closure of Vermont Yankee in 2012 “assuming that a combination of increased energy efficiency, clean energy, such as hydroelectric, wind and solar, and natural gas could be used to offset the electricity from the reactor.”  Another was whether they would support closing the plant in 2012 “assuming that many new jobs could be created through investments in new clean technologies, such as hydroelectric, wind and solar.”

Would you believe that very large majorities replied that under those circumstances they would shut down Yankee? And would you agree to give away your car “assuming” it would be replaced by a chauffeur-driven limousine with a fully-stocked bar and a drop-down table constantly refilled with caviar canapés, with an all-expenses-paid, two-week trip to the Riviera thrown in as an added inducement?

The irony is, of course, that it isn’t necessary to hype anti-VY sentiment in the state these days. As demonstrated by the neutrally worded poll taken by Research 2000 last month, and by reaction to the recent State Senate vote not to relicense the plant, most Vermonters would be happier without it

But the hyperbole in this poll was so bizarre that it would felt right at home in…well, in Burlington.

Being a responsible citizen, the News Guy went to Town Meeting, and initially planned to write no new post for today. But events, minor though they were, intruded, requiring a few observations and clarifications.

At about 5PM, the phone rang.

Nobody on the other end.

“Hello, hello,” and finally came that delightful metallic tone of a recorded voice explaining that this was a political poll, and asking the respondent whether he had a favorable (press 1) or unfavorable (press 2) opinion about Sen. Patrick Leahy.

At which point, the respondent, being a politically sophisticated type, assumed the poll had been commissioned by a Leahy opponent.

A conclusion confirmed by the next question: Would you vote for Pat Leahy no matter who ran against him? (Or words to that effect. Notes were not being taken. It could have been something like, “regardless of who runs against him”).

Now, aside from Pat Leahy, his wife, his children, and a few devoted, down-the-line Democrats, who on earth is going to answer that question in the affirmative? Suppose Jonathan Papelbon were to quit the Red Sox, or Tom Brady were to retire from the Patriots, move to Vermont, and run for the Senate? What if Oprah moved here and wanted the job? They’d get lots of votes. Rare is the voter who would commit to a candidate without taking even a quick look at the opposition.

“That’s a pretty typical hard re-elect question used in polling,” said Dan Riley, the spokesman for Len Britton, the Republican running against Leahy, who was indeed the power behind the poll.

Well, not really. More typical would be something like, “do you think Pat Leahy has done a good enough job as senator to deserve re-election, or is it time to give somebody else a chance?”

But just because the question was unusual did not make it pointless. Britton can try to trumpet the likely result (look for a press release headlined, “80 percent might vote against Leahy”) to convince contributors that his is not a lost cause.

Which of course it is not. Eight months before the election, nobody’s cause is lost. Improbable, perhaps, but not lost.

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Outside some polling places Tuesday health care activists were handing out little slips of paper with their motto, a phrase commonly heard but rarely examined in Vermont these days: “Health care is a human right.”

It is? Who says? And more broadly, who decides what is and is not a human right?

The questions bring up the recently quoted remarks of John Mackey, the chief executive of Whole Foods Market, that “it’s not intrinsic in the nature of human beings to have a right to health care.”

Mackey is right, of course. But then it’s not intrinsic in the nature of human beings to have the right of free speech, freedom of religion, security against unreasonable search and seizure, or the power to choose the folks who will govern them.

These are all artificial inventions, or what the folks in parts of academia would call social constructs. They come neither from nature nor heaven, but from people in particular cultures, notably ours.

Intrinsic or not, it’s up to human beings to decide what rights they and their society should have. In America we have in effect (because we’ve never spelled it out) decided that health care is a human right for those old enough, poor enough, or, needless to say, rich enough.

For everybody else it isn’t. Yet.

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Some clarifications of recent items are in order here, including a clarification of a clarification. Monday, the News Guy corrected the previous Monday’s post that said the recent statewide poll taken by Research 2000 for WCAX-TV had a four percent margin of error.

Actually five percent, said the correction.

Actually five percentage points, which the numerate among you will understand is not the same thing. This is one of those stupid errors which is stupider than most stupid errors, being an error the News Guy has often corrected when committed by others, making it especially foolish of him to commit it himself.

Almost as embarrassing was the typo in Monday’s other correction. Why the spell check did not catch “secondary sourc” remains a mystery (but not an excuse; we can’t rely on spell check). Perhaps there is such a word is “sourc”? Whichever, this was supposed to be a” secondary source.”

More substantively, Monday’s post reported that the spent nuclear fuel stored at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant site in Vernon could remain dangerous for 24,000 years.

Worse than that, emailed Margaret Gundersen of Fairewinds consulting, which deals with nuclear power issues. That 24,000 years “is the half-life of the nastiest radioactive isotopes,” she said, “but it takes roughly 10-half lives for the radioactivity to decay completely and for the radioactivity to be equal to what is natural background.  So, mathematically, 10-half lives of 24,000 years means 240,000…years.

This becomes a question of personal responsibility. The News Guy wants to make sure that his error has lulled no one into thinking he or she can wander around the grounds of the abandoned Vermont Yankee plant as early as the year 26,010. That could still be dangerous. Unless the waste has first been removed to Yucca Mountain, Nevada (but don’t hold your breath for that one) or elsewhere, do NOT, under any circumstances, walk around that area until the year 242,010.

Assuming, of course, that human beings then are still counting years under the same system. Assuming that is, that human beings have not either (a) evolved into a possibly more rational species; or (b) completely destroyed themselves and their surroundings.

The Greek slave Pedagogue

Grammar Note: On Vermont Public Radio Friday, Sen. Phil Scott, a Republican from Montpelier and an aspirant to the lieutenant governorship, described something as “a phenomena.”

Scott was thereby guilty of what might be called the criterion phenomenon, the inexplicable compulsion to call a single phenomenon or criterion two of them.

But let us not confine our pedagogic purity to the politicians. To the contrary, we will also meticulously monitor members of the media (as we assiduously arrange the alliteration). A few hours earlier, VPR’s Mitch Wertlieb, helping the quarterly and loathsome fundraising drive had imagined “$5,000 laying on the ground.”

Possible, had the $5,000 undergone metamorphosis into human form and commenced placing objects upon the earth. Or alternatively, transformed itself into two human beings, and….oh, no. This is a family web site.

More likely the five grand was (at least in the Wertliebian imagination) lying on the ground.

If it’s any comfort to either man, on the radio the next day, Steven Chu, the secretary of Energy and, more pertinently in this case, a Nobel prize winner, talked of a competition “between (his younger brother) and I.”

This is the “between I” problem, the origin of which could be similar to that of the criterion phenomenon For decades, teachers scolded kids who said “Johnny and me are going to town,” or some variant thereof, convincing millions that it is always correct to say “(whoever) and I” even when “me” is right and “I” is wrong.

(Anyone who at this point actually said to him/her self, “no, ‘I am wrong,’” should be thoroughly ashamed, if not summarily executed.)

Political Note: Back in October, the News Guy, putting on his political prognosticator hat, suggested that State Sen. Doug Racine of Richmond had emerged, however tentatively, as the front-runner among the five Democrats running for their party’s nomination for governor.

Very tentatively indeed, as it turns out. Looking at the field today, it looks as though Senate President Peter Shumlin of Putney has become the first among equals.

Considering that the primary is at least 28 weeks away (the date may yet be changed), that no one seems to have taken an actual poll, and that most people who will vote in the primary are so far paying scant attention to the campaign, Shumlin’s hold on this position is just as tentative as Racine’s was.

Besides, in a way it was no fair. Shumlin had outside help. From the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant.

It’s not likely that Vermont Yankee or its owner, the Entergy company of Louisiana, planned things that that way. Shumlin has been one of the plant’s persistent critics, meaning the best thing it could do for him was to do just about everything wrong, calling attention to the plant’s possible safety problems and its management’s competence and dependability, or lack thereof.

Precisely what it has done in the last several weeks, almost as if the Shumlin campaign had been secretly orchestrating Entergy’s actions, or (for those who believe in such) put a hex on the company.

But Shumlin didn’t just sit there as this gift was proffered to him. He knew what to do with it. No smug I-told-you-so wise cracks. No (apparent) gloating. He’s been calm, forceful, consistent in the way he’s handled himself behind the various podiums from which he’s addressed the issue.

Of course all the candidates have been standing behind podiums. But thanks to the Vermont Yankee tritium leaks and misstatements, there have been lots of television cameras and reporters in front of those podiums while Shumlin spoke. It’s been hard for the other Democrats to get much ink or air time of late.

Speaking of which, has anybody noticed that Lt.Gov. Brian Dubie, who faces no primary for the Republican nomination, has gotten a bit of air time because Gov. Jim Douglas keeps inviting him to every podium to face the cameras even though there is no point at all to Dubie’s presence?

Well, not counting to have him face the cameras.

Since Dubie has said nothing newsworthy, he hasn’t gotten much attention. Still, he’s been pictured up there next to the other officials who actually have power to make policy decisions.

Not Dubie’s fault. The lieutenant governor just doesn’t have much in the way of power to make policy decisions.

Tax Note: Well, on the very morning of the News Guy’s last post (scroll down), the one pointing out that there was no actual evidence that Vermont’s relatively progressive income tax structure has produced a measurable exodus of wealthy folks, the Burlington Free Press’s lead story in the local section bore the headline “Tax Migration Feared.”

What? Had somebody come up with actual evidence that your humble agent had somehow missed?

In a word, no. A tax accountant said some of his clients had asked him about the tax benefits of moving elsewhere. This is actual evidence of nothing. The closest thing to evidence that the Senate Economic Development Committee heard at a Burlington session was the claim of real estate developer Ernie Pomerleau that he has no plans to move out, but knows three dozen people who have.

A nice, round figure, three dozen. Nobody seems to have asked Pomerleau for their names. But let’s stipulate that Pomerleau is an honorable fellow and has actually talked to 36 wealthy Vermonters thinking about blowing the pop stand because of last year’s repeal of the state tax preference on capital gains.

But just where will they go? Only eighteen other states (according to the Legislature’s Joint Fiscal Office) offer tax breaks on capital gains, and most of them apply only to some gains. The only states that had the kind of broad preference Vermont just repealed are Arkansas, North Dakota, South Carolina, and Wisconsin.

Somehow, a mass exodus of wealthy Vermonters to North Dakota does not seem likely.

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