To be fair to her: he was gracious to the writer but at the expense of proposing it was really his editors who wanted him to write the story. I.e. he removes so

To be fair to her: he was gracious to the writer but at the expense of proposing it was really his editors who wanted him to write the story. I.e. he removes some responsibility from the writer. I think it is probably too charitable and the author knew what he was writing and knew his editors would sign off. The editors probably didn't think very hard about it, knowing it looks like the other stuff they publish.