The Magic Middle from WNYC's Brian Lehrer Show by listenerservices@wnyc.org (WNYC, New York Public Radio)

Welcome to Politics Bites, where every afternoon at It's A Free Country we bring you the unmissable quotes from political conversations on WNYC. On today's Brian Lehrer Show, Thomas Frank, columnist for Harper's Magazine and author of The Wrecking Crew and What's the Matter with Kansas, says the success of the Tea Party shows that going after the "magic middle" of the American electorate is a mistake. Where is the "center" in American politics? Not where you think, according to Thomas Frank. Politicians are always trying to win over the median voter, which is itself a theoretical abstraction that describes people who fall between the extremes of the left and the right. Of course, that encompasses most Americans, so politicians rightfully cater to this center. However, Frank says that for all the effort politicians spend on winning the "magic middle," the government as a whole hasn’t been striking a true balance between left and right.

See that webpage here. Download the podcast here. See also: What's the Matter with Kansas?: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America, The Conquest of Cool: Business Culture, Counterculture, and the Rise of Hip Consumerism, One Market Under God: Extreme Capitalism, Market Populism, and the End of Economic Democracy