New studies suggest Tea Baggers have higher probability of being racially resentful, may be greater motivator than their stated concerns about reckless federal spending

Since its beginning last spring the Tea Bagger movement has been plagued by charges of racism. 

Placards at rallies have depicted President Barack Obama as a witch doctor, denounced his supposed plans for white slavery, and likened Congress to a slave owner and the taxpayer to a n----r. Faction supporters claim that the hateful signs are the work of a small fringe.

A new survey by the University of Washington Institute for the Study of Ethnicity, Race & Sexuality suggests that 25% of people who are Tea Bagger supporters have a higher probability of being racially resentful.

Surveyers asked respondents in California and a half dozen battleground states  a series of questions that political scientists typically use to measure racial hostility. On each one, Tea Baggers expressed more resentment than the rest of the population, even when controlling for partisanship and ideology.  The study revealed that Tea Party enthusiasts were also more likely to have negative opinions of Latinos and immigrants.

A recent New York Times/CBS News survey showed that Tea Party sympathizers are whiter, older, wealthier, and well-educated than average Americans. They are more likely to be employed, and more likely to describe their economic situation as very or fairly good, according to this survey.

If Tea Baggers are doing relatively fine, what are they so riled up about? These studies suggest that, at least in part, it's about race. New demographic data shows that minority births will soon outpace white births. By 2050, Hispanics are expected to account for more than a quarter of the American population.

David Bositis with the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, which examines issues of race, said “The Tea Baggers feel a loss, like their status has been diminished. If you listen to their language, it's always about 'taking our country back.' But it's really not taking the country back as is. It's taking the country back"—as in time.”

Bositis finds the movement's arguments about reckless federal spending unpersuasive. Why, he asks, weren't they up in arms when President George W. Bush launched two costly wars and created a new unfunded mandate with his Medicare prescription-drug plan? Why didn't they take to the streets when he converted a surplus into a massive deficit?  Given modern societal norms, "they know they can't use any overtly racist language," he contends. "So they use coded language"—questioning the patriotism of the president or complaining about "socialist" schemes to redistribute wealth.

Some Tea Partiers blame the media for casting them as racists. "It really makes me mad," says Tom Fitzhugh, a Tea party activist in Tampa. "They have tried to portray us as a bunch of radical extremists." He considers Obama an abomination—possibly "the most radical-voting senator that ever was" and someone likely to "take us down the path of destruction." He believes the administration is intent on taking away his guns, trampling on states' rights, and opening the borders with Canada and Mexico. He has serious doubts that Obama was born in the U.S. and suspects that the president is a closet Muslim. (There's no evidence to support any of these accusations.) But his anger has nothing to do with race, he says. The real issue is that Obama is "taking down the Constitution and the way it's governed us for hundreds of years." All he wants, in other words, is to take his country back.