Towards a Normie Politics
not an abandonment of liberal social ideals, but a strategy for pursuing them
You might be forgiven, at first glance, for making some assumptions about John Fetterman. Given his bushy goatee, preference for jeans and work boots, and various tattoos, you might assume Fetterman is a roadie for Metallica, or perhaps a proud restaurant owner appearing on Diners, Drive-ins, & Dives. But Fetterman is in fact the Democratic candidate for Senate in Pennsylvania, a genuine radical in comparison with mainstream American politics, and a frontrunner. And I suspect that it’s precisely his regular-dude vibe that has helped him secure his polling advantage. Perhaps it’s this kind of appeal, this vision of politics pitched towards the interests of normies, that can rescue Democrats in a dark historical moment for the party.
It’s here that I must immediately inform you that when I say normie politics, I don’t mean centrism. I don’t mean both-sidesism. I don’t mean economically liberal but socially conservative. I don’t mean Bill Clinton. Indeed, Fetterman is well to the left of Conor Lamb, the establishment candidate he faced and slaughtered in the primary. By normie politics I mean, instead, a politics that plays to the electorate’s sense of normalcy and which assuages their fundamental fear of change through symbol. Normie politics is not inherently moderate but rather presents its positions and candidates as commonsensical and in keeping with folk wisdom. And I believe that such a politics can help Democrats stop the bleeding as they face potential electoral annihilation this fall.
The association with the mainstream and centrism in American political life depends on a very selective view of the normal. The current state of affairs in American healthcare, for example, is not remotely left-wing and also not remotely “normal,” compared to other developed countries, especially in terms of our costs and bad outcomes. Normie politics allow for far-left alternatives, if they are presented intelligently. Fetterman, after all, supports Medicare for All, a radical (and badly needed) proposal to rip America’s system for funding healthcare up from its roots. The viability of this proposal is of course fiercely debated, but it enjoys consistently strong polling support, and benefits from its great moral simplicity: tax people more and let the government fund everyone’s healthcare. This is a far-left goal, but it’s quintessentially normie politics. In contrast, I would say that Obamacare’s bewildering subsidies and exchanges and tiers of coverage stand as the antithesis of normie politics. In contrast to normie politics, Obamacare was the apotheosis of wonk politics, politics for people who ride the Acela every day. In other spaces, the normie demand might indeed be more centrist than alternatives, but it’s fundamentally not the centrism that makes politics normie. It’s the constant return to framing that emphasizes the comfortable and the mundane.