Jobs Numbers Could Affect Presidential Race WASHINGTON - Economists are slashing their already tepid growth forecasts. The unemployment rate seems stuck at around 8 percent. It is a tense time for the American economy. It is also the time that some experts believe the country's undecided voters are beginning to cement their presidential picks. That is why many political scientists and consultants consider Friday's jobs report and the ones immediately following it to be so important - perhaps more so than those of the previous three years. "I don't know whether it is because American voters are myopic, or because they are forward-looking," said Andrew Gelman, the director of the Applied Statistics Center at Columbia University. "But they appear to care most about change in the economy in the year preceding the election," rather than the state of the economy over an incumbent president's first four years. Some narrow the critical period even more, arguing that what happens from April until October of an election year weighs especially heavily on voters" minds. "It's difficult to sort out the electoral effects of specific slivers of economic conditions," said Larry M. Bartels, a Vanderbilt University professor of political science. But he cited the economic climate of the middle of the election year as unusually important - a time when even wavering voters begin to lock in decisions on the presidential race and lock out conflicting reports about the economy. This political reality is not lost on the Obama and Romney campaigns, which have sparred over the state of the economy to the near exclusion of every other issue. Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee, has centered his campaign on the notion that President Obama's incompetence as an economic steward has made recovery weaker than it need have been - with unemployment too high and job growth too slow. Mr. Obama has countered that Mr. Romney's business record at Bain Capital epitomizes the profits-at any-cost philosophy that has cut middle-class jobs. As for his own record, he argues that pushing the 2009 stimulus program through Congress has helped the economy rebound and that without it, the nation would be in worse economic straits. "Throughout history, it has typically taken countries up to 10 years to recover from financial crises of this magnitude," Mr. Obama said recently, noting the sustained recessions in Europe. He added, "Our economy started growing again six months after I took office, and it has continued to grow for the last three years." The question now is which economic messages will sink in among the pool of voters - roughly one in 10 - who tell pollsters they are undecided. Steve Schmidt, the 2008 campaign manager for Senator John McCain's presidential bid, said voter attitudes about the economy had solidified already and would not be much affected by new jobs numbers on Friday or the rest of the year. "The shape of the playing field is largely set," Mr. Schmidt said. They believe it's a very bad economy. They're pessimistic and they're anxious. The campaign that wins is the campaign best able to address the anxiety. It's a comfort argument. So far, he added, polls show Mr. Obama making headway in swing states with his attacks on Mr. Romney's priorities, his finances and his record at Bain. But Mr. Romney will have ample opportunity to sell his ideas for economic growth this fall. "The arguments that campaigns put out in July and August are largely unheard by the people who will decide the election," Mr. Schmidt said. Both sides are putting down markers for the arguments they'll make in the fall. Moreover, the arguments likeliest to prove decisive will come not from candidates directly, but from peers and acquaintances of those undecided voters - whom campaign strategists consider the most persuasive messengers. "Both campaigns will have extraordinarily sophisticated outreach and targeting operations," Mr. Schmidt said. "If you're an undecided teacher, you'll get phone calls from other teachers," as well as messages from Facebook friends and Twitter followers.