I read "hard questions" here as "questions we won't like the answers to", which is kinda funny if that's how they mean it, because in that case they know they won't like the answer (probably because it's staring them in the face) so they just avoid asking the question, and shout "Russian propaganda!" at anyone who does.

And this little dynamic is coincidentally an answer to the main question the article is posing, already baked into itself.