Based on the tough economic news that is dominating the headlines, some readers have started to complain that we're focusing too much on the negative and feeding the perception that the state is hurting.

It's understandable. The business climate has not been good lately, with the layoffs at Aloha Airlines and ATA, the closing of Molokai Ranch, foreclosures up, car and home sales down, gas and food prices skyrocketing.

Consider these Advertiser headlines in just the past three weeks: "Median price of O'ahu homes still sliding," "Isles struggle to move cargo after Aloha," "Isles feel sting of high airfares," "Grants cutbacks strain nonprofits," "No gleam on Golden Week," "Lean times for food bank," "Symphony sinking in debt," "Fewer visitors and less money in Isles forecast," "Average resort home price may drop again," "Airline layoffs about to skew Isle jobless rate" and "Bankruptcy filings up 25% in January-April."

And these are just the local stories. Last time I checked, the economy was the No. 1 issue in this year's presidential contest.

The Hawai'i bankruptcy story brought an angry response from a reader who says the economy here is not as dire as we are portraying it and wondered if The Advertiser had lost credibility by trumpeting the state's problems. The news from the Mainland, he said, suggests that the housing and unemployment picture may be on the rebound, an assessment that's debatable but still worthy of coverage.

A woman from Honolulu wrote me to say she is tired of the dreary drumbeat.

"While Hawai'i goes through a transition period with the loss of Aloha Airlines and ATA, rising fuel costs and the mortgage industry crises, it does not help to open the daily news to one negative headline after the other," she wrote. "In addition, your contributing columnists reflect the whiny self-absorption that is helping to mold today's society. Does Hawai'i not have any intelligent writers who can offer solutions, alternatives and creativity?"

She said she was once a "true die-hard supporter of the local print media" but is ready to give up reading the newspaper.

It got me to thinking about Gov. Linda Lingle's April 25 speech about Hawai'i's economy and how she suggested that residents shouldn't be discouraged by what they hear and read in the media.

"Our state's economic growth has slowed but it has not stopped," she said in a story we played on Page One. "Most important indicators show moderate growth, that when contrasted with the rest of the nation is a fortunate position for Hawai'i."

It's the governor's job to play cheerleader for the state she represents but is it the newspaper's job to ignore what are troubling signs all around us? The reader who suggested we have lost credibility by painting a bleak picture of the economy should worry more about taking us seriously if we were to hide the news behind all the headlines mentioned above. If anything, I believe we have been cautious by sticking to exactly what is occurring here with the economy.

For every story mentioned so far, I can point out many more newspaper articles over the past few years when home sales prices were rising, office occupancy and unemployment were lower and hotels and airplane seats were jammed. That's all that filled the front page and, yes, some readers accused us of kowtowing to the tourist industry.

We don't make the news. We can only report it. And we certainly cannot pretend it doesn't exist, as unpleasant as it may be.

Mark Platte is senior vice president/editor of The Advertiser. Reach him at mplatte@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8080.