Defining the Columnist

Perhaps The Post needs to display regularly a clearly worded little boxed announcement that separates the tasks of a reporter and an op-ed columnist. Karl Bergsvik of Springfield [Free for All, Sept. 20] wants columnists to be "unbiased, objective" -- the job, up to a point, of a reporter -- rather than analytical, personal, educational and cranky. The Post should take pride in the range of its columnists (from Eugene Robinson to Charles Krauthammer), not the range of each columnist. Bergsvik should learn how to read a newspaper.

I suspect that doesn't all fit into a neatly boxed item.

-- Ann McC. Scott

Alexandria