The essence of Beattie's article - which I thought was really well written - was that in order to try and make the game safer the IRB have prevented attacking teams from being able to clear defenders out at the ruck as vigorously as they used to and therefore the game has become much slower.
With slower ball for the attacking team and an offside line that is no more than a few feet away, teams are left with no option than to grind the ball forward through the big men phase after phase or kick it away. Imagine modern rugby league played not under a ten metre or five metre offside rule but one or two metres. That's how little space union attacks have to work in most of the time.
The new laws were designed to clean up the contact area, but in reality all they have done is enable defences to slow ball down even further and bring the game to a shuddering halt.
