If you have read Herman Wouk's 1951 novel "The Caine Mutiny," you may recall Capt. Queeg's shipwide search for the missing strawberries. Turning a warship in a combat zone upside-down to account for a quart of missing food was the act of a commander who had lost it - as the ship's other officers realized.

For sheer absurdity, the County Council's exhaustive search for collusion in a contract for the installation of 11 artificial turf fields at county high schools was very nearly in the strawberry-hunt category.

The county had awarded a $10.8 million contract to Sunny Acres Landscaping, owned by Les Belcher Jr. Mr. Belcher is...