"I will never be a subscriber while you are a writer for the rocky mountain news. Why don't you get on the bandwagon of what you can do for this country in these hard times instead of knock things down."

- safossen@****.com

That was an e-mail I received last week in response to my Nov. 7 post-election column, "Now what?" That column was a clinical assessment of the direction I thought an Obama administration and a Democratic Congress would likely take given their ideological inclinations and the influence of the party's activist left wing.

Safossen's (in deference to his or her privacy, I omitted the last part of the e-mail address) complaint would best be addressed to the Rocky's publisher or business manager who may be more sensitive to the possible loss of readership associated with my presence on their editorial pages.

Since I'm not paid very much for my weekly columns (I make more from a few days of radio or a speech or two than from a year of column writing), safossen's threat doesn't much impress me. I write my column more as a labor of love. I could "take one for the team" and give up my Rocky column to score safossen's subscription for the paper, but that might be counterproductive if it results in a loss of readership from the folks who like to read what I write. Apparently, Rocky management sees it that way, too, otherwise they'd have dumped me years ago.

As to the substance of safossen's complaint, the reason I haven't jumped on the Obama "bandwagon" is that I, along with about 58 million other Americans who voted for McCain or someone else, don't necessarily agree with Obama's vision and his overall platform. Did liberals suddenly become conservatives when Ronald Reagan was elected? Does safossen really believe that the Rocky should become the Obama Mountain News, publishing only the views of Obama worshippers? That wouldn't make for very diverse or interesting commentary. One wonders if safossen was similarly critical of those who disagreed with George W. Bush after he was elected president. Is there only room for liberals and Democrats on this nation's bandwagon?

While newspapers continue to fold in other cities, Denver is fortunate to still have two quality, major papers. From where I sit, both papers, the Rocky Mountain News and The Denver Post, lean left on their news pages. This is largely a function of the culture of the journalistic trade and the political sentiments of most of the people who are attracted to it. It puts the onus on editors who value objectivity to mentor, scrutinize and restrain the populist, liberal instincts of their reporters. I think John Temple, the Rocky's editor, does a better job of this than Greg Moore, his counterpart at the Post.

Editorially, the Rocky's opinion pages, under the direction of Vincent Carroll, lean right while the Post's lean left. This is healthy. If safossen is offended by my once-a-week opinions at this paper, he or she can find support on a daily basis from the Rocky's full-time stable of liberal metro columnists like Mike Littwin, Tina Griego and Bill Johnson; and editorial cartoonist, Ed Stein (with nary a conservative in that bunch). Or is safossen intolerant of conservative dissent from liberal orthodoxy?

Furthermore, safossen, as for my treatment on these pages of Barack Obama, soon to be our president and commander in chief, I'm as concerned as you about these difficult times. As I explained in the column that drew your ire, I don't believe he will usher in an era of post-partisan, centrist governance. He can prove me wrong by restraining his party's extremists and adopting some conservative ideas. For the good of our country, I hope that happens. And if it does, I'll give him credit, just as I reserve the right to criticize him when we disagree. Unlike the obsessive Bush-haters of the last eight years, I don't despise the man.

Mike Rosen's radio show airs weekdays from 9 a.m. to noon on 850 KOA. He can be reached by e-mail at mikerosen@850koa.com.