I always talk to scholars before they sit down to write a story for us. I like to discuss the shape of the story and what the most important ideas are to stress in it. Every once in a while, the scholar will throw in a surprising idea or comment … and that’s when things get interesting.

So yesterday afternoon, I was talking to political scientist Matt Harris, whom I’d asked to write a breaking news story about the House vote on the debt ceiling bill, due to be held that evening. I told Harris I was most interested in the fact that while the Democratic left and GOP right had gotten a lot of news coverage about their unhappiness with the bill, the bill’s passage likely hung on what lawmakers in the political center did.

Harris laughed. He told me he’d been talking with a friend about the debt ceiling negotiations and mentioned that there were incentives for centrists in Congress to cobble together a deal. And his friend was surprised: “Do we actually have centrists in Congress?”

Bingo! “There’s your lead,” I said, referring to the beginning of a news story. Which is exactly how Harris brings readers into his crisp analysis of the House vote, which took place in an institution in which, he writes, “the middle may be shrinking, but it still exists, and it is critical in a closely divided Congress.”