Separating Fluff from Substance - What Political Mistakes Matter?

From my left leaning friends over at BuzzFeed:

Michele Bachmann's First Campaign Promise Is A Killer!

Michele Bachmann's presidential campaign is already a fiasco. In an interview with Fox News today, she claims to possess the spirit of another Waterloo, IA native - John Wayne. Problem is that John Wayne isn't from Waterloo, IA (he's from Winterset, IA, nearly three hours away). However, serial killer John Wayne Gacy spent some time in Waterloo, where he was convicted of homosexual assault and sentenced to 18 months in prison.

From my right leaning friends over at SurivalistBoards.com:

Jared Monti: Obama forgets soldier's heroic death
[Full Story Here]

How in the H**l can you make a mistake like this?
Forgetting that the medal was given to his parents.

Disrespect - Disdain - Visceral hatred
are all I can come up with to describe how I see his views of our troops.

The press will go bonkers over E-mails, and any conservatives gaffe, but wont touch this.

Bachmann's campaign is a total "fiasco" -- really? Because she no doubt repeated some town lore that actually has some basis? And Obama, arguably one of the busiest men on the planet, misspeaks about a soldier(which he apologized for), and he hates the troops?

I can't help but see misstatements like these as what they are: real people making reasonable errors. And yet, both sides treat them as evidence of a much deeper problems.

As the 2012 election season heats up, I'd given anything for a concrete way to tease apart these oopses these from actual issues. Politifact is an ideal resource for this. If BuzzFeed wants to hammer Bachmann on something, they've got plenty of statements to choose from. And the folks on the right can do the same with Obama's press conference from today, as he's made some misstatements there.

In an ideal world, Obama and Bachmann would march their behinds out in front of cameras and revise/correct/strike their original statements. Not unlike what Jon Stewart just did.

Beyond that, I'm not quite sure how to separate the fluff from the substance. But, I'm really hoping someone figures something out, it's going to be a long 2012 election at this rate.