The L.A. Times local columnist writes today, "Like a lot of my colleagues, I've wondered if I should finally give it up, or might be forced to. But most of us dread the idea for the same reasons we've always had: We love what we do, we believe in the cause, and we realize that on the open market we're not as employable as, say, a laid-off IndyMac janitor." He says why he's telling us this:

Because changes at the paper are often in the news, but we generally edit all human emotion out of those stories.

And because newspapers, which are in the business of persuading companies that they have to promote their products -- especially in the worst of times -- spend next to nothing promoting themselves.

I'm also speaking up to honor the work of my colleagues who are losing their jobs as you read this, and will be sorely missed.

To educate the owners and remind them not to underestimate the sophistication of the Southern California audience, which will flee in droves if the paper is shrunk to the size of a gum wrapper despite continued profits many businesses would envy.

To let David Geffen know that if he's still interested in buying the joint, it wouldn't be the first time we rolled the dice on a short, bald owner with a Malibu beach compound.

And to thank hundreds of thousands of readers who, in the midst of a revolution that has created unlimited outlets for news and information, keep coming back to this newspaper day after day.

The 50 cents the paper costs on the street "still buy you the biggest, best, most ambitious news-gathering operation west of the Hudson River," Lopez says, with no nod to the reasons why, in Los Angeles anyway, fewer thousands of readers buy the product of that news operation than at any time since Nixon was president.