I’m not doubting Spitzer’s motive *at all*, but does anyone have any ideas as to WHY A of SB won’t print it?
The usual reason. Every retraction erodes credibility of (relatively) scientific journals by demonstrating failure of their review process. Retraction of a relatively prominent and widely cited paper is particularly damaging.
Credibility in this particular area of research is exceedingly precious. The main editor or editorial board is being pain averse. They know they’ll have to publish the retraction or a “correction” at some point. That’s not the hard part. It’s writing some sort of explanation how the original article got through review in the form it did. The more elementary the failure, the more painful it is to admit to it.