I personally don't believe that not rewarding an action counts as "retaliation" for said action. I also believe, based on Xooglers commenting, that there might have been very good reasons to reject the peer bonuses (no, that was not the only case, in which peer bonuses got rejected, it's not that unheard of...).

(And I personally think, peer bonuses should be rejected in such cases Because otherwise it becomes a pure popularity-contest. But that's just, like, my opinion :) )