Newspapers are civic treasures; we hope the Rocky Mountain News survives

We do not presume to know the ins and outs of the finances of the Rocky Mountain News or of the Denver Newspaper Agency, which operates both the News and the Denver Post, let alone of the Scripps Howard chain, which owns the News — and which announced a couple of months ago that the News will fold unless a buyer is found.

This would be a disaster for Denver’s civic culture, Denver’s literacy and Denver’s free flow of news.

With network television, cable television, the Internet and, in Denver, the Denver Post, isn’t there already a free flow of news, you might ask? Actually, no. 

Click off the possible sources, one by one: Television does not provide in-depth coverage in the way newspapers do. That’s an open-and-shut case (and it’s not a criticism of television news, which, for immediacy, newspapers cannot match).

To our knowledge, no one has ever been sued for libel for anything “published” on the Internet. Its standards of truth and accuracy fall short of the standards expected of newspapers. Also an open-and-shut case — and also not a criticism of the Internet.

And the Denver Post? Were it the Post that threatened to go under, we would be writing in praise and support of the Post. It is an excellent newspaper. But neither it — nor the News — can do the job of both together. With different staffs, different styles, different takes on the same news, each brings out the best in the other and heightens the free flow of news in Denver. Our city is blessed — and we hope it stays that way.

Literacy is boosted by newspapers — and literacy is a critical component of success in a global economy. The US cannot afford to fall behind, as is painfully obvious in these massive-stimulus times. Kids who grow up in a home on whose doorstep the daily newspaper (or newspapers) arrive have a leg up in school.

When reading is an early, ingrained habit, educational achievement more likely follows — not to mention, one’s awareness of issues is broader and deeper. Newspapers nurture citizenship, taken in the broadest sense.

All this is before we even to get to all that sparkling writing on the News’ sports pages, the often radically different takes on the city’s editorial pages, the left, right and middle perspectives in the two newspaper’s columns, the colorful features that sometimes move you to tears — and the crusades against injustice that, very simply put, newspapers can instigate in a way that no one can match. No other media and not even government can more directly and speedily bring villains to heel, criminals to light, and discriminatory policies to an end.

At their best, newspapers are the glue that holds our civic culture together. In the Rocky Mountain News —and in the respect that both the News and the Post garner for newspapers in the Denver area — we have newspapering at its best.

It is possible that smaller newspapers will gain if the News folds, and far be it from us to make light of that. But taking the total picture into account, we fervently hope that the News survives. Sure, we have our selfish reasons — our favorite writers —and we want to keep reading them. But of far, far greater import, we know that all civic players lose when one major player is decimated. We hope the News can survive. We hope it finds the right strategy to do so.

Read the blog entry “Newspapers and attention span” on Rocky Mountain Jew.