To answer your second question first, like Cheese and Rice, I don't think the media do ignore this issue. Maybe they have this week but I can recall reading a number of articles recently and over the years on whether schools are failing boys and how girls do better than boys in exams. I agree though, that they probably haven't suggested any solutions to these problems.
In relation to your first question, why girls do better than boys, as many posters have pointed out there have been several reasons suggested for this on this thread with which you have disagreed - girls mature earlier, they work harder, they are socially conditioned to please. I don't know to what degree the above factors affect the relative success of boys and girls in school exams but I find it hard to see how you can dispute that they are often (although, as with all generalisations, not always) true in themselves, certainly the fact that girls mature earlier than boys (although no one is disputing that boys catch up).
Personally, I think the difference lies in coursework, which has been raised in a number of posts and which you mention yourself in relation to maths. Where coursework has been taken out of the final result, in Maths, boys have done slightly better than girls this year. I understand from reading a report in the paper yesterday that coursework is to be dropped in more subjects and if coursework does in fact make the difference the results should start to even up across the board.
From my reading on the subject on studies available on the internet, they seem to back up something which I think posters have pointed out already, ie. that girls are prepared to put more effort into coursework than boys rather than relying on the exam and, so accrue more points overall. The possible reasons for this have been explored in this thread and I don't know if there is anything that can be done to make boys take coursework more seriously if this is in fact the problem. However, if coursework is to be dropped anyway, then I don't suppose it will matter.
As an aside, if it is correct that the difference between boys and girls results lies in coursework, I do wonder whether dropping it to even up the results is the answer. Should coursework, which involves hard work and dedication over a long period of time, be a relevant factor in overall results in exams and should work be done to improve boys' performance in it (which might involve making sure it consists of work which boys tend to enjoy if that is a problem now), rather than simply dropping it to even the results up? After all, coursework, in the form of a thesis or dissertation, is important at university and perhaps practising it at school should be regarded as important.
Generally, I think that the reason you have found the responses in this thread less than satisfactory, OP, is that your attitude to what you perceive as girls' strengths (vague empathy) is frankly insulting and not backed up with any evidence in the form of questions which require such answers. You say you would have to pay to acquire exam questions which demonstrate this and yet, surely you must have seen some of these questions in order to make this assertion in the first place?
As far as the exams getting easier generally is concerned (which would benefit both boys and girls) I understand that this is a genuine problem and is causing problems at universities, as has been mentioned here. It would seem that all the A*s everyone is getting are making it difficult to decide between good candidates and maybe this does need to be addressed, whether by making the exams harder again or making the marking criteria tougher or by reverting to the former sytem where only a set proportion of pupis in any one year got an A, B, C etc. so universities can rely upon the fact that in any one year they know they are getting the top candidates from that year. Not being involved in education, I don't know what the better solution would be.