Reid Wilson over at National Journal:

Democratic strategists want voters to know that House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio sees regulatory reform as a nuclear weapon aimed at the ant of Wall Street’s financial misdeeds. That Rep. Joe Barton of Texas wants to apologize to BP rather than hold the oil company accountable for the widening environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. And that Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele believes that a land war in Afghanistan is the last thing the United States should be involved in. In short, Democrats seem to care an awful lot about the Republicans’ minor inside-the-Beltway flare-ups that won’t get a lot of attention from swing voters.
It’s all part of Democrats’ effort to make the election about more than their performance. Given President Obama’s lousy approval ratings and polls that show a plurality — if not a majority — of voters in the mood to kick the bums out, Democrats have to offer voters a choice.
“With history against them and a recession to boot, [Democrats] would be foolish to nationalize the election,” party strategist Paul Begala said. “As David Axelrod keeps telling anyone who will listen, this needs to be a choice, not a referendum. Highlighting Boehner’s comments about the economy, and Steele’s comments about [Afghanistan], and Barton’s apology to BP helps make it a choice by showing voters how the GOP would govern — and whose side they are on.”
The trouble is, voters don’t much care, especially when the only good news — that the unemployment rate went down last month — is followed by the bad news that thousands of Americans gave up looking for work.