Best Newspaper Columnist

Is The Shadow a man? A woman? One person, even? The guy who employs her (or him, or them), Evening Whirleditor Anthony Sanders, professes not to know. "It's probably like Jerry Berger," Sanders says. "Jerry Berger had people call him and tell him what was going on, and he had other people actually pen that stuff for him. So that's what I think it is: a bunch of media-savvy people. Because one person couldn't be in all that different stuff." The Shadow takes on patronage, corruption and just-plain stupidity in local and national politicos. But unlike most local columnists, who tend to dwell on the rehashed and the boring, The Shadow calls a spade a spade. On charter reform: "The city is a multimillion-dollar corporation, it needs strength in the rank and file. Not lazy, shit bums, who get a job because they know someone.... I am for the Charter change, and so should everyone who is paying all of these fucking high taxes and getting some employees who do not even qualify as street cleaners." Tell it, Shadow!