Thanks for the details. Chris Wallace on Fox nailed this just after the debate. R surrogates come out swinging on this and the Navy’s demand to maintain fleet strength.
I saw a discussion of this on FOX a few minutes ago. They also showed Obama campaigning on the "trust" theme--saying that Romney says one thing today, and a different thing years ago. He was banging on the auto theme.
I think the Axelrod character assassination focus grope came up with the meme that Romney had to be hammered for changing positions, which is ironic when you consider what a shameless liar Obama is. It also is consistent with what Obama was aggressively trying to sell during the debate with quotes like, "The problem is, none of that is true."