About Off Script
If you’ve made it to this page, you’re probably wondering who the hell Tom Hicks is.
Fair question.
I’m a writer who’s spent most of his life chasing stories and asking questions.
I started writing professionally when I was sixteen, covering auto racing for trade publications. Since then I’ve worked in radio, spent years doing legal research where facts and precision weren’t optional, and somehow kept finding my way back to the same thing: asking questions, telling stories, and explaining complicated subjects without talking down to people.
Those jobs don’t seem to have much in common, but they taught me the same lesson. Facts matter. Context matters. And I’ve learned that the first explanation is rarely the whole story.
That’s probably why I write the way I do.
Most stories end with the headline. That’s usually where mine begin. I’ve always been more interested in the question that comes after the obvious one. Why did this happen? Who benefits? What’s missing? What aren’t we being told? I don’t start with a category. I start with a question, and then I follow it wherever it leads.
I’ve never been interested in impressing readers. I’d much rather earn their trust. That means doing the homework before I write, admitting when I don’t know something, and explaining things in plain English instead of hiding behind jargon. If I can’t make a complicated subject understandable, that’s my failure, not yours.
I also don’t believe journalism has to sound like it was written by people who have meetings about meetings. I write the same way I have conversations. Sometimes that’s serious. Sometimes it’s funny. Sometimes it’s sarcastic. Usually it’s all three before I’m finished. My job isn’t to tell you what to think. It’s to give you the facts, the context, and the questions I think are worth asking. What you do with them is entirely up to you. Frankly, I’d rather have an honest disagreement than blind agreement any day of the week.
A little over a year ago, I started a publication called The Unredacted Bastard. At the time, it was exactly what I needed. It gave me a place to write honestly, call bullshit when bullshit deserved calling, and build a community of readers who appreciated straight talk over polished talking points. Without The Unredacted Bastard, there wouldn’t be an Off Script.
But something interesting happened.
The stories kept refusing to stay inside the box I’d built for them.
One day I’d be writing about politics. The next I’d be untangling a government policy that nobody had bothered to explain in plain English. Before long I’d find myself disappearing down a historical rabbit hole or pulling apart a media narrative that didn’t survive a little scrutiny.
That’s when I realized I wasn’t following politics anymore. I was following good stories.
Good stories don’t care what section of the newspaper they belong in, and neither do I.
Eventually I had to admit what the stories had been trying to tell me all along.
It was time for Off Script.
That’s not a rejection of The Unredacted Bastard. It’s the next chapter.
The Bastard is still here. Think of him as my editorial alter ego—the guy who’s perfectly happy to point at the emperor and ask, “You know he’s not wearing any clothes, right?” Off Script simply gives that voice a bigger world to explore.
The name isn’t just a title.
It’s a promise.
No talking points.
No political playbook.
No obligation to defend an idea just because somebody on “your side” said it.
Just curiosity, evidence, a healthy amount of skepticism, and a willingness to keep asking one more question after everyone else has decided the conversation is over.
If that sounds like the kind of place you’d like to spend a little time, you’re in the right spot.
So grab a cup of coffee or tea, pull up a chair, and stay awhile.
We’ve got some stories to figure out.
— Tom Hicks
