How to be smarter about the news | Ian Bremmer
TED Talks Daily
TED
4.1 • 12.1K Ratings
🗓️ 23 May 2026
⏱️ 53 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Political scientist Ian Bremmer has access to the rooms, conversations and world leaders who make the news of the day. So how does he stay on top of everything that’s going on? In conversation with TED’s Helen Walters, Bremmer opens up about how he thinks about sources, how he avoids getting spun — and what we can all do to think more clearly about the news. (This interview was recorded on May 20, 2026.)
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. |
| 0:09.4 | I'm your host, Elise Hume. |
| 0:11.3 | Today we're bringing you another special episode of TED Explains the World with Ian Bremmer. |
| 0:16.9 | Ian, president and founder of Eurasia Group and G0 Media, sits down with Helen Walters, Ted's head of media and curation to discuss topics ranging from news gathering and intelligence to access to world powers. |
| 0:29.5 | All of that and more is coming up right after a break. And now our conversation of the day. |
| 0:44.5 | Hello, everyone. |
| 0:45.8 | It's May the 20th, 2026, and we are doing something a little different today. |
| 0:50.7 | We are going behind the curtain to talk about how reliable, trustworthy analysis and reporting |
| 0:56.6 | actually happen. So as the founder of Eurasia Group and GZero Media, Ian Brammer is one of the most |
| 1:03.3 | closely followed voices in geopolitical analysis. He has access to the rooms, the conversations, and the |
| 1:09.4 | world leaders who make and respond to the news of the day. |
| 1:12.9 | And today, we are going to get a better sense of how he does what he does. |
| 1:17.3 | I am Helen Walters. |
| 1:18.5 | I am the head of media and curation at TED. |
| 1:20.9 | And here is Ian. |
| 1:22.3 | Ian, thank you so much for being here. |
| 1:24.6 | A pleasure as always. |
| 1:26.9 | Helen, very good to see it. |
| 1:28.3 | So I mentioned that word trustworthy. So let's start with that very small topic of trust. |
| 1:34.3 | So what public sources of information and analysis do you trust the most? And what makes a source |
| 1:40.3 | trustworthy? |
| 1:42.3 | Public sources. |
... |
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