BackboneAmerica

You have to read closely to see it, so elegant are the euphemisms, but the company that owns the company that owns the Denver Post is taking bankruptcy to get out from under $1 billion in loans it can’t repay. (“Pact lets Post’s owner cut debt,” Jan. 16.)

I note this with sadness, not any sort of pleasure, because Denver and Colorado need the Post — all the more so after we lost the Rocky Mountain News a year ago — and because I admire press lord Dean Singleton, whose MediaNews Group is the nation’s second-largest newspaper publisher in terms of circulation and who is one of the world’s true visionaries about where journalism is going in the digital age.

As today’s story explains, MediaNews is in relatively better shape than most other struggling or bankrupt newspaper owners, and given Singleton’s proven virtuosity there is reason to think he can pilot the company through current storms into sustainability when industry trends smooth out. For Colorado’s sake and in the interest of informed self-government, let’s hope so.

Disclosure: I am a Denver Post columnist.