The 2008 election was slated to be an era-defining victory for Democrats. With Bush's presidency in the ground and Democratic majorities in Congress, the talking heads on cable TV started discussing the end of the Republican Party.

But things didn't quite turn out that way. The conservative backlash against Barack Obama was swift and powerful. It all started with—you guessed it—the economy.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was Obama's big move on the economy. This was his attempt to fulfill the promises he had made in the 2009 inaugural address to start to steer America out of the storm. The act invested hundreds of billions of dollars in public projects.

American conservatives generally oppose government spending. Remember all that talk of small versus big government that was so trendy during the Clinton era but so passé by the time Obama's inaugural address rolled around? Conservatives were definitely still very much in the small camp, and preferred to see the market correct itself naturally. After the "stimulus," as the act became known, a grassroots conservative movement calling itself the "Tea Party"—named after the event from the American Revolution— started to make waves across the nation, holding protests against the administration. Tea Party activists considered themselves to be a movement of resistance against government overreach.

By the time the 2010 congressional elections rolled around, the Tea Party had gained traction throughout the country and was producing candidates for office. They became known as "Tea Party Republicans." These politicians vehemently opposed the Affordable Care Act, the Obama administration's initiative to reform the health care system.

If you're a big Isaac Newton fan, you might say that even in politics, every action has an equal and opposite reaction.