“Forward.” That is Barack Obama’s new campaign slogan, and it’s another way of saying, “Don’t look back, don’t judge me on my record, don’t think about the last four years. Think about the next four and who you want running the country, me or Mitt.”

As Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt summed up this argument: “This election, like all other elections, is going to be a choice between two candidates, two records and two visions for the country.”

If Republican Mitt Romney had a one-word slogan, it would be exactly the opposite: “Backward.” In November, he is telling voters, don’t make a choice between two candidates; render a judgment about one of them. And Obama is a failure who does not deserve a second term.

”What this election is about,” Romney said in a recent statement, “is the 23 million Americans who are still struggling to find work and the millions who have lost their homes and have fallen into poverty.”

Most incumbents try to run on some version of the slogan, “You never had it so good,” but Obama clearly cannot do that. In the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll, only 17 percent describe the economy in positive terms. In an average of all polls compiled by Real Clear Politics, one out of three voters say the country is headed in the right direction; three out of five say it’s moving down the wrong track. “The more Obama takes the blame” for the economy, says ABC pollster Gary Langer, “the greater his risk.”

When voters compare the president to his rival, however, the numbers shift dramatically. On the question of who has the “the better personal character to serve as president,” voters prefer Obama over Romney 52 percent to 38 percent. And while 91 percent of Obama supporters express enthusiasm for their candidate, Romney’s rate is 73 percent.

Those results lead to the second half of Obama’s strategy. Don’t just look forward, he’s saying, look at personal qualities more than policies. “The campaign,” Democratic strategist Chris Lehane told Politico, “is all about, ‘Who does the country trust?’”