Good News! The News Guy is back on line.

There was, it turns out, a worn-out gizmo. It has been replaced. If only there were similar solutions for all worn-out gizmos.

The repair, welcome though it was, came too late to leave much time for a substantive post. That will next come Friday, when we will have real news.

Meanwhile, let’s clean up a few loose ends.

Apologies for the typos in the August 24 posting – “A Triptych” – in which readers presumably understood that what was intended by “being best in America does not necessarily men being very good,” and “are acing in a manner neither sane nor responsible,” was “mean being very good,” and “acting in a manner….” For reasons which slip the mind, the proof-reader was given (or took) the night off.

A few readers suggested that in “No Giants Here,” on September 11, the News Guy was too harsh on theSnelling Center for Government, described as a “think tank about which nobody thinks.”

OK, that may have been a little snide. If nothing else, reliable sources report that the Snelling Center does an excellent job of training newly elected legislators and education officials from all around the state. A valuable service.

There remains, however, the matter of its reports, which are often (if not usually) fonts of the conventional wisdom expressed in what the great Nelson Algren called dead-stick prose.

Just consider the Report on the Commission on the Future of Economic Development,” the very title of which should be banned by law, which includes the recommendation that: “Vermont’s businesses, educators, non-governmental organizations and government form a collaborative partnership that results in a highly skilled multi-generational workforce to support and enhance business vitality and individual prosperity.”

You write like that in my class, you get an F.

Is this an argument against electing Mark Snelling as lieutenant governor?

Maybe.