There's lots of speculation about what will be the core narrative for the Obama campaign, in the buildup to his convention speech. Today, the "Are you better off today...?" meme is running pretty hard in the media, and getting good pushback. It strikes me as a distraction - Romney trying to be Reagan.
The main critique of Romney's speech is that he didn't really say much about what policies he would commit to, what actions he would take. He cut & pasted the CBO's employment numbers in, and that was about it. The core Republican criticism of the Obama campaign, in a textbook case of attacking your opponent on your main weakness, is that Obama is running an Anyone But Romney campaign, rather than proposing a clear vision for his reelection.