(Image source: New York Times)

BY NICOLE THOMPSON

ANCHOR CHRISTINA HARTMAN

Is President Barack Obama the next Teddy Roosevelt? Some are comparing the two after a populist message Mr. Obama delivered in Kansas.

“This is a make-or-break moment for the middle class, and for all those who are fighting to get into the middle class. Because what’s at stake here is whether this will be a country where working people can earn enough to raise a family, build a modest savings, own a home, secure their retirement.”

Power to the people? A Democratic Senator tells MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, a populist message will resonate against the backdrop of the ongoing financial crisis.

“Fighting for workers, fighting for fair trade, fighting for jobs, taking on special interest. When Wall Street does what it does. When insurance companies or drug companies do what they do. And that’s why his tone is exactly right..”

Some pundits are likening Mr. Obama’s Kansas speech to one by Teddy Roosevelt at the same location in 1910, introducing his progressive square deal program. The New York Times writes in an editorial...

“Mr. Obama was late to Roosevelt’s level of passion and action on behalf of the middle class and the poor...Tuesday’s speech … seemed expressly designed to counter Mitt Romney’s argument that business, unfettered, will easily restore American jobs and prosperity. Teddy Roosevelt knew better 101 years ago, and it was gratifying to hear his fire reflected by President Obama.”

But a chorus of critics called the speech divisive. Here’s what Republican Senator Susan Collins tells CNN’s American Morning.

“The president’s rhetoric is not helpful to bring people together... What we’re trying to do is to transcend all of the partisan rhetoric regardless of which side it comes from, whether it’s the Senate, the House or the president.”

And MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough says, Mr. Obama’s critique of Republican economics is hypocritcal.

“This president shares equal blame, I think, with the Republicans. I think his policies have been disastrous because they have frozen investments in place and kept trillions of dollars on the sidelines.”

Right direction or not, CNN believes this is where the president seems to be taking his campaign message.

“The Republicans on the campaign trail are trying to focus the campaign on the here and now, on the economy and how folks are doing right now, on how president Obama has performed in office right now. And the president is pushing back and trying to make this campaign and the election on a different issue. On where he and the American people would like the economy to go. On a competing vision for where he sees America in the future.”

Stick with Newsy for coverage of the 2012 presidential campaign.

Transcript by Newsy.