Talking Points Memo

There's a body of research that suggests "culture" is what a group of people will not allow. It's more about what you are not than about what you are. Where do you draw the line in terms of acceptable behavior?

Well we aren't social scientists at TPM, but there's definitely truth to this. Consider for example some things we won't allow at TPM. For this lesson we'll draw on some information Ken Klippenstein shared about why he is leaving The Intercept to start his own newsletter. In general, he describes a dysfunctional environment in which lawyers and executives can kill stories that might upset their funders. Here's Ken's words describing why his story about a Jeff Bezos charity grant ran into internal headwinds:

Enter the Intercept's general counsel David Bralow, who said he had problems with the article. He didn't have legal concerns. Bralow instead thought it inopportune, saying that attacking Bezos might not sit well with the Intercept's own billionaire donor, Pierre Omidyar, especially at a time when he was keeping the organization afloat.

Ken goes on to describe a phone call between Bralow and The Intercept's CEO:

During the call, [Intercept editor Bill Arkin] told me immediately after, Bralow said that Annie Chabel, the CEO, had concerns about how the story might come off to the Intercept's donors. Bill said that that might be unfortunate but wouldn't influence his decision to publish, and that if Bralow had any legal concerns — as opposed to editorial — he would be happy to address them.

After a heated back and forth, Bralow declared: "I'm killing the story."

Ken says Arkin threatened to resign if they killed the story, and ultimately the story was published. But from that point forward there was all sorts of micromanaging from counsel and the CEO.

Regardless of whether any of this is true, the point is that this sort of thing is unimaginable at TPM. We're funded by readers who want us to tell the truth about important things. We don't ever have to worry about losing funding from billionaires or upsetting the donor class, or even keeping advertisers happy. Being able to operate without those kinds of slimy guardrails is not an accident. It's the result of conscious decision-making about how to best organize a journalistic organization such that the very structure itself encourages and reinforces ethical decision-making. And we take a lot of pride in that. That is part of our culture.