I flagged this as Not an Answer. Apologies to Sven, but it's just plain not an answer. It's a comment asking for clarification and offering general advice. I asked for a sanity check after the decline in Comms Room and some of the other regular flaggers agree with me that it belongs as a comment (which is why I flagged it as NAA in the first place).

Can someone explain to me what it is I missed that caused this flag to be declined and ding me for -10 fw?

According to the moderator blog moderators are supposed to accept all flags in good faith. It's pretty clear to both me and other regular flaggers that there's at least one mod that isn't taking that to heart. What gives?