Infelicitous Reporting

I don't know yet what to think about the latest leak story -- a CIA officer had conversations with reporters in which she divulged classified information. Or maybe she didn't. Or maybe she was instructed to do it and got fired for it. Or maybe she wasn't instructed, but thought she had been. Or maybe she's a scapegoat who is being sacrified to district the public from something else. Or maybe she's the victim of a political purge. Way too many different theories, not nearly enough facts.

ABC News isn't too helpful, either:

CIA spokeswoman Jennifer Millerwise Dyck declined to comment on McCarthy specifically, citing the agency's obligations under the Privacy Act. However, Dyck said the officer in question was not terminated for having authorized conversations with reporters. "It was for having unauthorized conversations with reporters," she said.

Huh? I had to read that something like five times before I caught the difference:

...Dyck said the officer in question was not terminated for having authorized conversations with reporters. "It was for having unauthorized conversations with reporters," she said. (emphases added.)

Yes, that makes sense now. Maybe it's my fault for spending all damn day reading fine print on my computer screen. But maybe the reporter could have used a slightly different phrasing than the source for the second sentence of that paragraph, too.