Credulous Reporting

I remarked last month about how Newsweek's cover story/interview on AMLO was a bit soft on the ex-DF mayor, given the controversial path he's cut over the past three years. But compared to the magazine's recent piece on Santiago Creel (by the same pair of authors), the AMLO article comes off like something from Mike Wallace's greatest hits. Of the twelve questions, only one was in the least bit challenging (and it was only marginally so), and virtually all the rest were beach balls. For instance: 

Having made a law that affected the broadcasters has cost you a great deal. I remember a pathetic scene on TV when they covered your face during a news piece on Televisa. And despite it all you continue at the top of the list of electoral possibilities among PAN candidates. Why is that?

Ugh. It's even more nauseating the second time around. The above question was only one of a few that were built around Creel being many panistas' pick for the presidency. Another ridiculous "question":

The man at the front of the government comes from the most doctrinaire wing of the PAN, and the man who was until a few days ago the president of the PAN also comes from that wing and is a driver of PAN doctrine. In contrast you have been singled out as neo-panista. Now you are remaking PAN doctrine. 

The word question is in quotes above because, as you may have noticed, there is no query in the preceding passage. Borrowing a tactic used by ninth-grade girls flirting their way into the hearts of upperclassmen since time immemorial, the interviewer actually asked nothing, but instead coupled a slam of Creel's enemies with a flattering opinion, expressed with no great subtlety. And a questionable opinion, at that; I (and others) generally think about Calderón as having come from the technocratic wing of the party, not the hard-core social conservative branch. Indeed, that wing of the party is usually seen associated more with Vicente Fox and Manuel Espino, who of course are allies of Creel. 

The article covers some potentially interesting ground about Calderón's strategy of building alliances with the PRI (which would seem to contradict his image as a extremist doctrinaire), but it's hard to find your way past the piles of empty adulation to anything illuminating.