USA Today Takes Down Doctored Condi Photo

USA Today has taken down the photo of Sec. Rice I posted about earlier today. In its place is the original photo without the doctored eyes.
They’ve also left this editorial note:

Editor’s note: The photo of Condoleezza Rice that originally accompanied this story was altered in a manner that did not meet USA TODAY’s editorial standards. The photo has been replaced by a properly adjusted copy. Photos published online are routinely cropped for size and adjusted for brightness and sharpness to optimize their appearance. In this case, after sharpening the photo for clarity, the editor brightened a portion of Rice’s face, giving her eyes an unnatural appearance. This resulted in a distortion of the original not in keeping with our editorial standards.

Take a look at the pictures here (along with the screencap of the USA Today article with the doctored photo in place).
I have a hard time believing that the changes to Sec. Rice’s eyes were the result of “sharpening the photo for clarity.” Anybody familiar with digital photography can see that some special attention was paid to the eyes in that photo.
Somebody was playing games, and got caught. USA Today should ‘fess up.