The Emily Latella Award

A surprise in this category. The odds-on favorite was a repeat victory for the Shrub team with its "We never said 'imminent'" routine, but after a stumble by Donald "The Rummer" Rumsfeld, they tried to substitute the case of Capt. James Yee, the former Muslim chaplain at Guantanamo Bay who was arrested on suspicion of espionage - only to have the case more and more limited until finally all charges were dropped the end of the week.

But that proved to be not enough and Team Bush was overtaken by a last minute surge from our winner and new champion -

Pakistan!

What a year this has been for them! Already winners of the Sgt. Shultz "I see nothing! I hear nothing!" Award for their performance in the case of the sale of nuclear technology by Abdul Qadeer Khan, they have copped a second prize with an equally brilliant performance in their rendition of "Which way did they go? Which way did they go?"

First, in the immediate wake of a meeting with Colin Powell, they said on Friday that they believed they had Ayman al-Zawahiri, claimed to be the #2 man in al-Qaeda, surrounded in the mountains near the border with Afghanistan.

Then

on Saturday, Pakistani military officials began to back away from the possibility that the trapped leader was Dr. Zawahiri. ... Lt. Gen. Safdar Hussain, the commander of Pakistani Army forces in the border area, broadened the range of possibilities, adding a senior Uzbek militant, Quaran Ata, or even a local Pakistani tribesman, Nek Muhammad.

"It could be Quaran Ata," General Hussain said. "It could be Zawahiri. It could be Nek Muhammad. He could be very important for these people."

Later that same day, they said it was "unlikely" Zawahri was among those surrounded.

Finally, on Monday, officials said "no evidence had emerged" that Zawahiri was ever there.

All in all, an outstanding performance that obtained a well-deserved award.

Footnote: The Pakistanis also announced on Monday that they had

discovered a network of tunnels Monday inside the homes of tribesmen believed to be sheltering foreign militants. ...

Pakistani officials said the tunnels could have allowed militants to slip past army forces on the first night of fighting.

That is, there might not be anybody of any "importance" there at all, raising the possibility of a twofer. A truly exquisite effort.