MANCHESTER, N.H. — Senator Clinton is turning to her trump card — the economy.

While Senator Obama has the novelty of the new and John Edwards carries the charisma of the coif, only Mrs. Clinton has a direct tie to the years of economic prosperity, remembered, by some, as “The Clinton Boom.” By delivering a “major policy address” yesterday on the economy in Manchester, N.H., where in 1992 campaign aides to then-Governor Clinton took on the mantra “it’s the economy, stupid,” Mrs. Clinton is taking her campaign back to her roots.

“Some of you might remember that while we began the 1990s with record deficits, we ended the decade with a balanced budget, a record surplus, higher wages for the middle class, and 22 million new jobs,” she said.

In 1992, New Hampshire was in the throes of a painful recession that wracked New England. Nowadays, with Wall Street booming and the economy growing, Mrs. Clinton has identified specific areas of economic grievance on the part of the middle class: the high cost of college, the transfer of American jobs overseas, the exorbitant price of health care. “It’s as if we have gone back to the era of the robber barons,” the senator, who invoked President Theodore Roosevelt and called for a new “progressive vision,” said.

This was no John Edwards “Two Americas” speech. Mrs. Clinton, stressing her suburban Illinois upbringing, is aiming directly at Main Street America. “I grew up in a middle-class family in the middle of America in the middle of the last century,” she said. “Now the middle class is under assault.”

Given recent stories about Mr. Edwards’s ties to a high-flying hedge fund and his expensive haircut, the speech appeared to be targeted at distinguishing the New York senator from the former North Carolina senator as much as from the Republicans.

Interestingly, the word “Iraq” merited only one mention in this address, and she filled up her speech with nutritious items to place into the Democratic lunch pail.

The Clinton campaign appears to want to push economic themes and will likely translate today’s address into television ads eventually. A sign hanging at the entrance of the event at the Manchester School of Technology suggested as much, alerting attendees: “Event will be filmed for campaign purposes.” The campaign converted the school’s high-ceilinged carpentry room into an attractive makeshift studio. Mrs. Clinton’s delivery was comfortable, and her throngs of staffers — there’s no question the campaign is vastly overstaffed — made sure the tele-friendly speech went off seamlessly.

Bill Shaheen, co-chairman of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign in New Hampshire and husband of a former governor, Jeanne Shaheen, suggested that the senator’s focus on the economy could be the difference. “I ask people, ‘Wouldn’t you like to go back to the 1990s?’ and they say, ‘Yes,'” Mr. Shaheen, who is among the most highly skilled and knowledgeable Democratic political hands in the Granite State, said.

Eventually, New Hampshire voters “are going to put the war in perspective. But what happens after that?” he said. At that point, voters will look to issues such as the economy to determine their vote, he said.

“When I talk to my constituents on the local level, this is exactly what they’re frustrated about,” a Massachusetts state senator, Marc Pacheco, said. Another longtime ally of Mr. and Mrs. Clinton’s, Mr. Pacheco hugged the candidate after her speech.

Still, a focus on economic issues could also raise some difficult questions for Mrs. Clinton. Yesterday, she raised the specter of jobs being shifted abroad due to globalization — saying, “instead of working for all of us, globalization is only working for a few of us” — without mentioning the modern president most associated with globalization, Mr. Clinton. He pushed for the passage of NAFTA and other free trade agreements over the opposition of the economically liberal wing of the Democratic Party.

It’s possible that Mrs. Clinton can say, as she did yesterday, that the problem is the management of globalization, not free trade in and of itself. Still, the issue could be a sticky one.

So, too, could her allusions to the rich. Mrs. Clinton is identifying herself with the middle class, but it was her husband who turned hob-knobbing with the wealthy and powerful into an art form. Mr. Clinton had a bevy of plutocratic pals and ultimately pardoned the international fugitive and financier Marc Rich.

Mrs. Clinton delivered a speech that under normal times would appeal to most reasonable-minded Democrats, remarks of the type a Democratic front-runner should give. If the party doesn’t listen, it will be a sign of exactly how loony the left has become.