Are we supposed to believe this is a promotion?

Vicki Gowler is stepping down as editor of the Pioneer Press. As suggested in this morning's Star Tribune, Knight Ridder announced today that Gowler will be taking over the top job at The Idaho Statesman, in Boise.

Filling her post at the Pi Press will be Thom Fladung, currently managing editor of the Detroit Free Press. Fladung has previously worked at the Akron Beacon Journal, in Ohio, and The State, in Columbia, S.C.

Gowler was named editor of the Pi Press in November, 2001. She's overseen a tumultuous period at the paper, with several high profile writers departing. Columnists D.J. Tice and Nick Coleman defected to the Star Tribune, while music scribe Jim Walsh moved on to City Pages. The paper was also radically re-designed on her watch, with the editorial pages being shifted to the local section and page two now devoted to a recounting of the day's headlines dubbed "speed read."