How We Report

Allen Analysis exists to do one thing: connect the dots between what powerful people say and what the record shows they did. This page explains the discipline that makes that possible, and the standards every piece is held to before it carries our name.

The reader is a juror

We do not write for people who already agree with us. We write for a juror: someone willing to follow an argument, weigh evidence, and reach a conclusion on the strength of what is presented. That framing governs everything. A juror is not persuaded by adjectives or volume. A juror is persuaded by a documented sequence of facts that lead, on their own, to an unavoidable conclusion.

So we build cases, not commentary. We lead with the strongest documented conflict in a story, lay out the record that establishes it, and let the conclusion land because the facts require it. When the evidence is thin, we say so in the prose rather than papering over it with confident language.

Named primary sources

Every factual claim traces to a source a reader can check. We prioritize primary documents and on-record, named statements over anonymous characterization. When an official says something on the record, with their name attached, that carries weight an anonymous claim does not, and we treat it accordingly. When a claim rests on a single sourcing chain, we tell you that in the text and ask you to weigh it as such.

We do not launder speculation into fact. If something is an analytical inference rather than an established event, the prose marks the difference. The distinction between "this happened" and "this is what the pattern suggests" is not a technicality to us. It is the line between reporting and noise.

The sourcing floor

Before a piece publishes, it must clear a sourcing floor: a minimum threshold of primary and major sources appropriate to the claim being made. A story that cannot meet the floor does not get dressed up to look like it did. It either gets the additional sourcing it needs, or it carries a visible flag that the reporting is thinner than our standard, stated up front so you can calibrate your trust. We would rather show you the seams than hide them. For the full standard, see our Four-Tier Verification page.

Language discipline

We write in tight, declarative prose. No hedging where the record is clear. No passive voice used to obscure who did what. No hype, and no manufactured outrage: the facts, presented plainly, are enough. When we are angry, the anger is in the selection and sequence of evidence, not in the volume of the language.

What we owe you when we are wrong

We will get things wrong. When we do, we correct them in the open, promptly, and visibly, not quietly in the dark. Our standing record of corrections lives on the Corrections page. A publication that never corrects anything is not careful. It is hiding.