Perfectly Normal Democrats Think Democrats Should Try Sounding More Normal

That's not weird at all.

Back in the summer of 2024, which only feels like a century ago, Democrats were mocking Republicans as “weird.” Now, prominent Democrats are openly wondering “why can’t we just talk like normal people?” Losing an election can certainly throw off your confidence, but this really does seem like Democrats truly believe that they were the “weird” ones all along.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has said that Democrats need to start sounding more “culturally normal.” Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel has said in an interview that too many Democrats speak as if their words were “focus-grouped in a faculty lounge.” Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin said Democrats should use language “not from the faculty lounge, but the assembly line,” where she has never spent a day in her life. (Maybe that “faculty lounge” bit was focus-grouped.)

Even Barack Obama seems to think Democrats should stop acting so darn “weird.”

“What I’m more interested in for Democrats is, do you know how to just talk to regular people like we’re not in a college seminar?” the former college professor told Stephen Colbert. “Can you talk in plain English to folks? And not have a bunch of gobbledygook around it. Just talk like normal people talk. ‘The rent is too high.’” (Watch below.)

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Whenever Democrats talk like this, they sound like salesmen training recruits on how to “close” their leads. “Just talk like normal people talk” would suggest that you aren’t “normal.” Why can’t you just be yourself?

The “Try To Be Normal” strategy for Democrats is obvious and consistently depressing. You might’ve noticed mainstream Democrats are cursing more, like the common folk. Elissa Slotkin and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro have described themselves as “get shit done Democrats.” Shapiro has worked the term into his Obama cover band speeches.

Maine Gov. Janet Mills released a video for her doomed Senate campaign where she declared that she’d go to Washington, D.C. and “get shit done.” You could her stumble over the word, as if she were worried that the ad would get pulled from local airings of Murder She Wrote.

This particular “common” language seems like it was approved for FX, where they say “shit” but never “fuck.” It’s that weird area between broadcast television and HBO. Whenever I’d watch a show on FX, I’d wonder why someone is saying “shit” but never “fuck.” You’d almost prefer they just say “shirt” and “fork.”

Regular people don’t sound like they’ve focus-grouped their messaging, and the groups Democrat struggle with the most, specifically working class Americans without a college degree, have never attended a college seminar or been inside a faculty lounge. Besides, some college lectures are fun! The problem for Democrats is they sound too much like Ben Stein from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and not Robin Williams from Dead Poets Society. (Yes, I know neither are those examples are from colleges.)

However, I don’t think it’s the professorial language that’s off-putting to average voters but rather the sense that politicians are lecturing them. Working-class voters might have never spent much time in a “faculty lounge,” as Slotkin said, but they do have experience with people condescending to them, like Slotkin does.

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg came close to identifying this larger issue last April.

“What do we have to say? I mean, like, the policies, the ideas,” Buttigieg said on the Flagrant podcast. “If they’re right we should hold to it, if were not so sure they’re right we should rethink them.”

“Then there’s how do we say it,” he added. “That’s the tone, the message, the style, whether people think you’re wagging a finger at them or not. Whether people think you get the kind of pain they’re going through or not.”

That’s key. Obama suggested Democrats speak plainly: “The rent is too high,” but at least in 2024, that would have meant acknowledging that the economy wasn’t great for everyone, instead of boosting “Bidenomics.”

Obama is famous for his powerful oratory, which Democrats like Buttigieg, Hakeem Jeffries, and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro try to emulate. However, I think 2004 to 2008-era Obama was more in line with Jesse Jackson at his peak. Their political speeches were the stylistic equivalent to a rousing church sermon but without the sermonizing. Buttigieg, Shapiro, and definitely Jeffries sound more like they’re speaking in a corporate environment than a spiritual one.

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Obama could sometimes come across as scolding, particularly toward young Black men. That often played well with suburban voters who appreciated seeing Obama act like a stern dad. It was less successful when Obama tried to convince young Black men to turn out in large numbers for Kamala Harris. Metaphorical “pull up your pants” speeches aren’t great at getting out the vote.

“My understanding, based on reports I'm getting from campaigns and communities, is that we have not yet seen the same kinds of energy and turnout in all quarters of our neighborhoods and communities as we saw when I was running," Obama said at a surprise stop at a Pittsburgh field office.

There are many reasons why a separate generation of young Black male voters might feel more enthused for what the 2008 Obama campaign offered than how young Black men, already disappointed with the Biden administration, might feel for Vice President Harris’s campaign — one that openly promised more of the same.

“And you are thinking about sitting out?” Obama said. “Part of it makes me think — and I'm speaking to men directly — part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren't feeling the idea of having a woman as president, and you’re coming up with other alternatives and other reasons for that.”

That wasn’t gobbledygook. He didn’t call for more “intersectionality.” His words were “plain English,” but the issue is probably less how Democrats speak but more that they weren’t listening. It reminds me of my former corporate life when you’d get training in what was called “empathetic listening.” There was no true empathy, though. It was all a rhetorical sleight-of-hand where management appeared to care about employee concerns while still promoting its agenda. Voters don’t like it when politicians are clearly trying to “handle” them. There is no magical combination of words and phrases that will convince voters to support the same policies and positions they’ve rejected. Sometimes, what might have to change is you. Politician, heal thyself.