The catch is that an unsolicited email, even if marked “off the record,” or understood to be off the record, isn’t actually off the record until the reporter agrees it is. We generally don’t burn sources in these cases because it isn’t usually newsworthy, and a source that feels burned won’t ever be a source for you again. There are rare exceptions. It was less newsworthy that Barack Obama once wore a Muslim-y outfit than it was that Hillary Clinton‘s campaign wanted people to know that.

This might be the reasoning that Wallace used in not revealing the source of the information, that even if it wasn’t technically off the record, he wished to honor the spirit of that unspoken agreement. If that’s the case, though, then he had no business revealing that the research even existed; that, in and of itself, would be a violation of off the record communication.

The reason he revealed it was that the source itself was newsworthy, that “top Republicans” were trying to undercut Ted Cruz. If the public has an interest in knowing that, then they surely have an even greater interest in knowing which top Republicans were doing it. Simply put, something can’t be a little bit off the record, any more than you can be a little bit pregnant. If Wallace concealed his source because they were off the record then he shouldn’t have mentioned it at all. If he was serving the public interest in revealing it, then he abdicated that interest by not revealing the source of the oppo research, and the contents of it. Sarah Palin is right, he should come clean.