Counting null and non-null values in a single query

This works for Oracle and SQL Server (you might be able to get it to work on another RDBMS):

select sum(case when a is null then 1 else 0 end) count_nulls
     , count(a) count_not_nulls 
  from us;

Or:

select count(*) - count(a), count(a) from us;

If I understood correctly you want to count all NULL and all NOT NULL in a column...

If that is correct:

SELECT count(*) FROM us WHERE a IS NULL 
UNION ALL
SELECT count(*) FROM us WHERE a IS NOT NULL

Edited to have the full query, after reading the comments :]

SELECT COUNT(*), 'null_tally' AS narrative 
  FROM us 
 WHERE a IS NULL 
UNION
SELECT COUNT(*), 'not_null_tally' AS narrative 
  FROM us 
 WHERE a IS NOT NULL;