Chris Stephen: Tea Party leads the charge to the right as Americans punish Obama for not performing miracles

BARACK Obama is a lawyer by training so perhaps it was not surprising to see him add a qualifier to his famous election slogan when interviewed last week by TV satirist Jon Stewart, telling him: "Yes, we can, but…"

But US voters don't get the joke. With unemployment high and the economy in the doldrums they are set to give Republicans control of the House and possibly the Senate.

Obama's promise of change now sounds as hollow as that famous "Yes We Can" slogan, and voters are in no mood to be told that when they elected him in 2008 they should first have read the small print.

Stewart - who gets more truth through satire than most serious commentators can manage - spoke for millions when he cornered Obama, asking him: "What have you done that we don't know about? Are you planning a surprise party for us, filled with jobs and healthcare?"

Unfortunately for the Democrats, he isn't. Eye-watering amounts of money have already been poured into banking bailouts, economic stimulus, healthcare reform and the war in Afghanistan, and the national malaise continues.

The one consolation for Obama is that voters heap equal amounts of blame on a Congress routinely criticised as by turns ineffectual and beholden to special interests.

But popular disaffection has come from the right, in the shape of the Tea Party movement. When Obama took office, this grassroots movement was unknown. Now 35 per cent of voters tell pollsters their objectives chime with those of the Tea Partiers. These include cutting taxes and slashing federal spending, plus more traditional social conservative policies such as opposing gun control, abortion, immigration and gay marriage.

But the central theme of the Tea Partiers is an attack on government itself: Throughout the summer the various groups in its loose coalition took aim at Republican establishment candidates in the House and Senate primaries, bundling them out in favour of their own more radical candidates, thus dragging the party to the right.

Critics say the Tea Party is not what it seems, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi calling it not grass-roots but "astroturf" because their cash comes from Big Business. Others point out that Obama inherited record debts, the banking catastrophe and two wars from the previous administration.

But this is to miss the point: The Tea Party is fuelled by ennui, and the aggression of its members - predominantly white, conservative, and middle-aged or older - masks the fear they feel of a country they see sliding out of control.