The middle is the hard part; and that's the point™

How it threads the needle and makes everyone right. The research runs straight down the middle; not the mushy shrug between left and right, but the honest center that costs the most to hold and asks something of both sides. The game is the joke; the middle is the hard part; and making that middle is exactly the point. Anyone can pick a team and shout; the expensive move is the argument a red reader and a blue reader can both check and both keep (Dear Liberals and Dear MAGA each got a letter, both told they're wrong too). Threading the needle isn't splitting the difference; it's building the one thing that makes everyone right by making everyone check (kin to the truth is the middle, and the joke that wears an argument as pants; the comedy is the skin, the hard center is the load-bearing part). The floor-is-lava reason it's hard; the easy ground is a side, and the side is where you stop thinking. Kin: the truth is the middle, the best hybrids win, the joke that wears an argument as pants, the Art of the Hard Testings, the defense of the devil's advocate. (His coin; machine's read, refine to his.)