The Washington Post headline pronounces: “Some Democratic candidates distance themselves from Obama.” Well, at least those who aren’t politically suicidal. Yes, as always, the party’s leaders warn that if they don’t embrace Obama, they’ll lose their seats (worse than they otherwise would?). But then this was the same crowd that told Democrats that ObamaCare was their insurance against an electoral wipeout. Not surprisingly, many Democrats are ignoring the advice of the party big shots and trying to save their own skins:

Indiana, Rep. Joe Donnelly is running a television ad in which he details his generally conservative stance on immigration while images of Obama and Pelosi are shown on screen. “That may not be what the Washington crowd wants, but I don’t work for them,” Donnelly says in the ad. “I work for you.”

Rep. Travis Childers, who represents a district in northern Mississippi where Obama won just 38 percent of the vote in 2008, takes a similar approach in his TV advertising — promoting the fact that he has “voted against every big budget” since winning a special election two years ago.

You know how bad things are when the political operatives start dishing like this on background:

One senior Democratic consultant suggested that the distance candidates are seeking to put between themselves and Obama is reflective of the ascendance of economic issues in voters’ minds. “Barack Obama’s economic policy of spending our way out of recession is seen as a failure at best and harmful at worst,” the source said. “That should tell candidates in competitive jurisdictions all they need to know about running with the president.”

Ouch. Unfortunately for themselves, nearly all incumbent Democrats have to date failed to demonstrate any ideological independence from the president. It’s hard for a pol to convince voters that what he says in the last three months of a campaign should supersede 18 months of voting in lockstep with Obama-Pelosi-Reid. And for those Democratic challengers pledging independence from the extremist agenda of their party leaders, the voters have reason to doubt that, once in office, they will be any more moderate than the current crop, who capitulated on virtually everything that was tossed their way, be it the now widely derided stimulus plan, ObamaCare, Supreme Court nominees, or tax hikes. In short, the key to convincing voters you will exercise moderation and independent judgment is to point to some evidence that you’ve done so in the past, an impossibility for the vast number of Democrats on the ballot this year.