Peyser Permanente

This week, the New York Post dropped the "Columnist of the Year" tag from its layout for roving Valkyrie reporter-commentator Andrea Peyser. How fleeting is glory! Not all that fleet, actually: The label first appeared on September 1, 2004, commemorating Peyser's victory in the annual column-writing contest of the not-quite-palindromically-named New York State Associated Press Association. It lingered through September 26 of this year--more than a month after the association had named its new slate of winners. Donn Esmonde of the Buffalo News, who dethroned Peyser in the over-125,000-circulation class, said his paper had not given him any comparable graphic treatment. "I wish I got that kind of pub upstate," Esmonde said. "The News gave me a hundred bucks and that was it." The new Columnist of the Year was magnanimous about the old Columnist of the Year's slow transition. "Maybe she thinks it's like if she's president, then for the rest of your life, people call you 'Mr. President,'" Esmonde said. The Media Mob was sorry to see Peyser's credential go, too. To make up for it, the Media Mob hereby officially names Andrea Peyser to the newly created position of Number-One Columnist. She can keep that on her column through October 6, 2006.