Understandable Insights: Information to Intelligence with Sue Gordon
Welcome to “Understandable Insights: Information to Intelligence with Sue Gordon” — the national security podcast that provides you an elemental understanding of the world as it is, not how you prefer it to be.
Each week, Eric — a former Marine, father, and entrepreneur — sits down with the Honorable Sue Gordon, the nation’s former top career intelligence officer. Together, they break down the headlines shaping our world and ask what they really mean for citizens, leaders, and institutions.
From armed conflict to emerging tech, foreign interference to the resilience of democracy — this is where raw information becomes real intelligence. Unfiltered. Candid. Unapologetically clear.
New episodes every Tuesday. Subscribe now.
Understandable Insights: Information to Intelligence with Sue Gordon
Ep. 26 Default to Trust–Why It’s Necessary, Signs We’re in Trouble
Free and open societies rely on a default to trust–a baseline assumption that institutions, experts, and alliances operate largely as advertised. This is not blind faith; it is a functional necessity that allows society to scale and people to live their lives.
In this episode, we argue that today’s disquiet is not driven by any single leader or policy–though those are also problematic–but by the erosion of systems designed to provide legitimacy, restraint, and predictability in a fast, low-authority information environment. The most dangerous consequence is not any one decision, but the second-order effect: a collapse of shared standards that forces individuals to validate everything themselves, which simply cannot work, or at the very least cannot work at speed.
Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction to Understandable Insights
01:22 Sue's Basketball Excitement
03:50 Episode 26 Overview
06:43 HHS Vaccine Schedule Changes
15:24 Women in Combat Roles Review
18:44 Investigation into Fed Chair Jerome Powell
25:52 President's $1.5T Defense Budget Proposal
29:29 US Interests in Greenland
35:52 What We're Watching
Listener's Guide:
Understandable Insights Episode 26–podcast and Listener Guide
Articles:
The Physical Weight of Trumpism
About the show:
Understandable Insights: Information to Intelligence with Sue Gordon is the national security podcast that provides you an elemental understanding of the world as it is, not how you prefer it to be.
Each week, Eric Koepp — a former Marine, father, and entrepreneur — sits down with the Honorable Sue Gordon, the nation’s former top career intelligence officer. Together, they break down the headlines shaping our world and ask what they really mean for citizens, leaders, and institutions.
From armed conflict to emerging tech, foreign interference to the resilience of democracy — this is where raw information becomes real intelligence. Unfiltered. Candid. Unapologetically clear.
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