In absolute terms, Vermont is doing better than it was twelve days ago (See Census Sense, April 7) , but in relative terms, it’s lagging just about as far behind.

As of yesterday, the Census Bureau web site showed that Vermont had a 65 percent rate of returning 2010 Census forms. That was better than the 56 percent recorded April 6. But it still lagged behind the national rate, by the same four percentage points.

And this is supposed to be the most educated state in the union?

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The late Sen. William Scott

Thanks (or perhaps more accurately, no thanks) to missed phone calls and the varying schedules of both parties, the News Guy’s report on the wisdom, or lack thereof, of stocking Vermont rivers with “put-and-take” adult trout (Taking Stock, April 9) lacked the key information of how much the Fish and Wildlife Department spent on this activity.

Tom Wiggins (inexplicably called “Wiggin” in the original post; apologies to him) reports that the total cost of the program this year will be approximately $4.57 million, $2.85 million to staff and operate the hatcheries, and $1.72 million for to administer the actual stocking.

This money does not come from the taxpayers. Wiggins said about 75 percent of is from federal funds obtained from the excise tax on fishing gear, and the other 25 percent is from the money anglers pay for their fishing licenses ($20 for a Vermont resident).

Still, every penny the Department spends on stocking is a penny it can not spent on habitat protection, which all the biologists agree is the best method for providing healthy fish populations in the long run.

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Ken Page is a mentsch.

Page is the high school principal — indeed, the head of the Vermont Principals Association – teased (if not downright ridiculed) in last Monday’s post (“Three for Monday,” April 12 ) for ungrammatically saying “less students” instead of the correct “fewer students.”

A lesser man might have been resentful, or at least have ignored the attack. Not Page, who sent an email with the subject line “guilty as charged.” He was wrong, he knew it, and he said so.

And for whatever it’s worth, Arne Duncan, the Secretary of Education of the entire United States of America, made the same mistake last week.

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Last Thursday was, of course, Tax Day, a day Americans have been conditioned to revile even though about 80 percent of all tax filers got or will get refunds, according to IRS figures. Furthermore, almost everyone is paying less in federal income taxes this year than last year.

That includes Vermonters. According to Sen. Bernie Sanders, 99 percent of Vermont working families and individuals “received a much-needed average federal tax cut of over $1,100 for 2009.” In addition, he said, “14,000 Vermont families were able to receive an expanded tax cut to send their kids to college last year (and) nearly 60,000 Vermont small businesses received tax cuts to purchase new equipment and other things.”

For those who find Sanders a less than reliable source, everything he said checks out, except calling the tax cut “much-needed” which is of course his assessment, but one that will not be disputed here.

Speaking of federal taxes, another reason Vermonters ought to temper their displeasure about them is that they got back more than they pay out to the feds.

According to the latest tabulation by the Tax Foundation, Vermont’s individuals, businesses, and governments get $1.08 for every dollar Vermonters pay to the feds (that’s total federal taxes, not just the income tax).

That puts Vermont right about in the middle – 26^th – of the rankings, which, truth to tell, might not mean much. The states that get back the most – Alabama led, getting back $2.03 for every dollar – tend to be the poorest, while those at the bottom – New Jersey got back only 61 cents – are generally the wealthiest.

Actually, that’s the way it’s supposed to work.

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Some years ago there was a U.S. Senator named William Scott, a Virginia Republican. In 1974 New Times magazine published an article noting that Scott had been named “the dumbest Congressman” by an organization affiliated with Ralph Nader.

Since New Times had little clout in Washington and less in Virginia, Scott’s best option was obviously to ignore the designation. He did not. Instead, he called a press conference to deny the description, thereby confirming it.

An incident brought to mind recently when the Rutland Herald ran an editorial titled “Prism of Paranoia” arguing that Republicans were motivated largely by “festering anger.”

Like all editorials, this one was rebuttable. Alas, in his letter rebutting it, Steve Larrabee, the Chairman of the Vermont Republican Party, displayed no small amount of…well, anger.

The assertion that “all we have to offer is anger is false and misleading,” not to mention “reprehensible and unjustifiable,” Larrabee wrote, adding, “I can only conclude that this is intentionally so.”

Larrabee’s letter did not rise (or perhaps sink) to what we might call Scottian levels. He did provide some factual evidence to support his argument that the GOP has more to offer than anger.

But here’s some free advice to political operatives responding to condemnation: when criticized for being angry, respond with wry amusement, biting sarcasm, sardonic satire or the like. Not with anger. He may not be a model Republicans want to follow, but Robert Kennedy’s advice remains sound: “Don’t get mad. Get even.”

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And finally (and again, for what it’s worth) from Vermontbiz.com , the online version of Vermont Business Magazine, comes word that the folks at U-Haul International found that many more people are moving into Vermont than out of it.

In fact,  said U-Haul President of Phoenix Operations John “J.T.” Taylor, “for states with 5,000 – 20,000 families moving, Vermont had the highest (in-over-out) percentage, with a growth rate of 16.67 percent in 2009, moving Maine to second place after two years of ranking first”

Obviously, the U-Haul folks count only those who move in and out with U-Haul vehicles, and the statement read more like an advertisement than a data-based research report.

Still, for what it’s worth…

FIRST, A POLITICAL BULLETIN: Paul Beaudry, the conservative radio talk show host on WDEV in Waterbury, has resigned from True North Radio and is preparing to run for Congress.

“I have given my two weeks notice,” after four years hosting the call-in show, Beaudry said in a telephone interview Sunday evening. Though he said there was still some chance he would decide against running, he described himself as “super-strongly considering it, and doing all the things necessary” to prepare.

That included, he said, laying the groundwork for raising money and hiring staff for a campaign to defeat Rep. Peter Welch, the heavily favored Democrat who will seek a third term in November.

First, Beaudry would have to win a primary against Keith Stern of Springfield, but even Stern’s campaign manager conceded that Beaudry might be the favorite.

“Because Paul is well known he’s going to have some financial support we don’t have,” said Andrew Glover, “and unfortunately money wins the election.”

To counter Beaudry’s name-recognition and financial advantage, Glover said, the Stern campaign would argue that Beaudry is too “ultra-conservative” to have any chance against Welch.

“Keith can get the swing voters, Glover said. “Paul can’t.”

Beaudry, who is 47 and lives in Swanton would almost certainly be the most conservative Republican statewide candidate in years. But that doesn’t mean he couldn’t win the primary. In Vermont, as elsewhere in the Northeast, moderates have drifted away from the Republican fold, some affiliating with the Democrats, others redefining themselves as independents. As a result, a larger proportion of the GOP primary electorate is well to the right of center.

Beaudry said he would run as a “staunch conservative” to balance Vermont’s “bunch of liberals down there” who only want to “spend and spend and spend.”

Beaudry has been a firm supporter of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant. He has also devoted several programs to attacking the proposed Wild and Scenic designation of parts of the Missisquoi and all of the Trout River, calling it a “big government land grab.”

The radio program will apparently go on with another host. Beaudry said the owners of True North Radio, whom he would not identify, were already working with a potential substitute for him on the program. Ken Squier, the President and CEO of WDEV, who said he heard of Beaudry’s plans just the other day, also said the program would continue Like some other shows on WDEV, the station itself does not produce True North Radio, but simply sells it air time.

NEXT, A BIT OF PEDANTRY: On Vermont Public Radio’s Vermont Edition last week, Ken Page, the executive director the Vermont Principals’ Association, had some incisive comments about the school and school financing situation.

He also said – not once, not twice, but thrice – that there were “less students” in Vermont public schools these days.

Okay, we all know what he meant: there aren’t as many students as there were a few years ago. But it’s reasonable to expect a senior educator say what he means in proper English. Otherwise, why expect the kids to use proper English?

There are fewer students than there used to be.

That’s not hard, is it?

And it isn’t just pedantry, either. There are no doubt several reasons why English-speaking men and women have made contributions disproportionate to their numbers in science and literature. But surely one of them is the language itself. Its vast and ever-expanding vocabulary gives English-speakers the power to express themselves with more precision and nuance than perhaps any other language.

Maintaining the distinction between ‘less’ and ‘fewer’ is important because maintaining distinctions keeps one in the habit of…maintaining distinctions. And that’s key to precision and nuance.

FINALLY, AN UPDATE: For those who may not have noticed, Gov. Jim Douglas did what the News Guy predicted he would do (see Broken Date, March 26)  and did not veto the bill moving the date of this year’s primary from September 14 to August 24.

No, he didn’t sign the bill http://www.leg.state.vt.us/docs/2010/bills/Passed/S-117.pdf (S. 117), either. He just announced last week that he would let it become law without his signature. That way he gets to express his displeasure with the new law without doing anything to stop it.

Doing anything to stop a bill that had overwhelming support of the Democratic majorities in both houses might have upset “the general collegiality of the (Legislative) session so far,” the Governor said.

He  didn’t say, but probably knew, that refusing to move the date could put the state out of compliance with federal law, risking a voting rights suit from the U.S. Department of Justice and other messy complications.

He did repeat his earlier contention that turnout would probably be lower in August, and that it was not “in the best interest of our representative democracy to have a summer primary.”

He’s right, even if September 14 is still in the summer, scientifically speaking; the autumnal equinox doesn’t occur until September 22 at 11:09 PM. But socially speaking summer ends on Labor Day, September 6 this year. Before then, lots of people are still away on vacation, and even though absentee voting isn’t that complicated, the turnout for an August primary is likely to be dismal.

So why was there no discussion about moving future primaries (too late for this year) to the spring? A majority of states have their primaries before mid-June, when the summer gets under way. Another six states vote earlier in August, and three other states – Alaska, Arizona, and Florida – will be voting the same day as Vermont. The old argument against spring primaries was that they made the election campaigns too long. But these days the campaigns are long anyway.  May or early June is a convenient time for the voting public and would give the winning candidates enough time to organize their general election campaigns.