It’s time for Dolittler's Second Annual Pet Food Recall Awards!

(For the record, the First Annual Pet Food Recall Awards was kind of boring: Diamond Pet Foods swept in all categories. This year’s awards are far more exciting!)

The Insomniac Award (for its round-the-clock work to prove that one in six animal deaths in a controlled setting really can be the result of a toxin in pet food and not the work of malevolent, pet-hating aliens):

And the award goes to…Cornell University! (OK so there’s always a shoe-in.)

The Artful Dodger Award (for the most competent in evading individualized public scrutiny and for collectively keeping its well-guarded industrial secrets under wraps without suffering PETA protests and other hateful consequences):

And the award goes to…It’s a tie! What a great surprise! Every brand who outsourced production to Menu Foods wins a bronze urn emblazoned with the name or number of a dearly departed Menu Foods “test pet.” Guess what’s inside?

The Skinniest Man Alive Award (for keeping his “cool” in the face of equal and opposite industry and public pressures):

And the award goes to… Mr. Stephen Sundlof of the FDA's Center for Veterinary Medicine! I think he hasn’t moved in about ten days. Hey, you, Mr. Sundlof! Are you breathing?

The Careerist Award (for the most likely individual to win significant career advancement hot on the heels of the recall):

And the award goes to…Ms. Tuite, Menu Foods spokesperson! For keeping her cool and for single-handedly keeping the alien conspiracy theory alive, this individual is well poised to gain Federal government employment in the very near future. “What a talent!,” Mr. Rove has been overheard to remark. Could it be she’ll be on his payroll soon? I predict we’ll see Tony Snow fired for “performance” reasons in due course.

(Oops, I meant Sarah Tuite)

The Invisible Man Award (for the most transparent display of faux emotion after the recall):

And the award goes to…The President and CEO of Menu Foods, Paul Henderson, for his “angry moment.” (To be fair, his anger may well spring forth unbidden from the mythical font bearing “omigod-my-career-has-gone-to-hell-how-will-I-ever-make-

payments-on-the-Porsche?” waters.)

Gosh darn it I just can't seem to download his picture. Here's a link, though.

The Gentle Giant Award (for their proven consistency in the treatment, consideration and care of pets):

And the award goes to…China! Yes, the nation of dragons has proved, yet again, that an economy can evolve faster than the human brain! Potentially more effective than mass-clubbing (though certainly not as exciting), the [arguably “accidental”] distribution of banned rodenticides is a neat, passive-aggressive antidote to all those nasty American ideals. (Overheard at a Party party: “Can you believe it?—vermin in their living rooms and some say even in their beds!”) OK, so maybe I’m being unfair to China. Could it be they’ve changed their tune and simply want to cure our pets of cancer? †

The Best In Show Award (for the best and bravest recall reporting by a blog):

And the award goes to…The Pet Connection, for it’s sound (and restrained) reporting of the news and its brilliant method of amassing numbers of potentially affected pets. (Any blog that can make the big guys quiver in their corner offices gets my vote.)

And that’s all she wrote, folks. Please consider adding new categories of your own so that we might have an even more exciting round of awards next year!

† This award represents the blogger’s [perhaps irresponsible] conjecture on the [thus far] unproven mechanism of contamination of pet food with the known cancer-drug, methotraxate (AKA, the rodenticide, aminopterin). I mean, according to Menu Foods, the source has not yet been identified. (Could it be that aliens are still at large?) Give that woman another award!