her operating assumption seems to be: every major national media hit is an opportunity to introduce herself to some cohort of voters, and so the aim should be to hit the main points and otherwise do no harm

I think that she used to have a tendency to ramble a bit off the cuff and she's (intelligently) compensated by just focusing on her messages rather than trying to engage in open ended explorations of whatever the interviewer wants.

Yup. Which makes sense, even if it's less than thrilling for the interviewer.

My beef is that the press used to respond favorably to message discipline. They would write admiringly when a candidate stayed on message while they were still hoping to get something fresh

Also, you basically can’t repeat your core messages enough. A marketing guy once told me that you don’t know your message is really breaking through until you hear people say they’re sick of it.

Seems like she's good at this politics stuff

So do you think that at some point she should take a risk, and show more inner self? Americans love that.