“Oslo Beats Copenhagen”? (Updated)

ABC reports that “Obama senior advisor David Axelrod said on MSNBC this morning that he could not say if Obama would go to receive the award in person, saying it was ‘all news to us.'” But
last week
, Rahm Emanuel told CNN’s Ed Henry: “It’s clear Oslo beats Copenhagen any day of the week.”
That was clearly a reference to the Nobel Prize. Was he joking, or did he know something was in the works?
Correction: Emanuel made that statement this morning, not last week. I regret the error.