We were alerted to a tweet by former Politico reporter Kiki Ryan during last night’s GOP Presidential Debate, which was sponsored by her former employer and NBC. She parted ways with Politico in 2010 under polite but clear orders from management and it appeared as if she may have been getting residual bitterness out of her system while watching Wednesday’s debate.

During the brief tribute to Nancy Reagan, Ryan, who now works for the Susan G. Komen Foundation, tweeted (referring to Allbritton Corp.’s Fred Ryan): “Nows the time to praise the Reagan  library, where the CEO of Albritton Comm–owner of debate co-host Politico — serves as its chairman.”

Other than spelling Robert Allbritton‘s name with one “l” — perhaps she was restrained by the 140 character limit — was she insinuating a certain cozy inappropriateness?

Ryan denied the tweet contained any underlying sting. “As a California girl I’m obviously a big fan of Reagan,” she wrote to FishbowlDC this morning. “And as you know, I’m also a proud Politico alumna, so it was fun seeing my worlds collide.”