Wooing Swing Voters, Both Parties Wary of Overemphasizing Health Care - In 2010 Democrats simply avoided the subject of the historic health care law they had just passed. That got them trounced.

From The New York Times:

[Both parties'] core voters are energized, either by rage or elation, but the independents who are likely to decide the 2012 elections may be ready to move on.

Leaders in both parties acknowledge that the ruling has thrown a wrench into their campaigns for control of the House and the Senate. House Republicans have scheduled another vote next week to try to repeal the law, known as the Affordable Care Act. And they say they are ready to play offense on the reinvigorated health care debate.
      

But even as they highlight that mobilization, leaders of both parties say overemphasizing the health care issue could turn off weary swing voters who, they fear, just want to put the issue aside.

The message is muddy for both parties, in part because neither is sure whether 2012 will turn solely on the economy or echo the dynamics of 2010, when the health care law was a driving force. Democrats know they cannot repeat their strategy of that election, when they simply avoided the subject of the historic health care law they had just passed, said Representative Steve Israel of New York, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. That got them trounced.

[In 2012] Democrats will be aggressive and try to reframe the health care debate away from the size and reach of government to the issues that motivated them in the first place: access and delivery of care. That means tagging Republicans as defenders of the health insurance industry, trying to deny consumer protections even as they dismantle Medicare.