In the sparkling ballroom of the Fairmont Hotel in Chicago, the mood was buoyant. Alexi Giannoulias, a son of Greek immigrants and the Illinois state treasurer, seemed to be prevailing over the Republican Congressman Mark Kirk to take the US Senate seat that once belonged to President Barack Obama.

It was always going to be a dry old do, since the host is a teetotal Southern Baptist. But it was impossible to escape the feeling of deflation which swept through the ballroom of the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas late on Tuesday when Sharron Angle, darling of the Tea Party movement, saw her bid for the US Senate roundly rejected by the voters of Nevada.

The United States appears to be heading in Britain's direction: towards spending cuts and power-sharing between rival parties

Democrats fear presidential agenda will be brought to standstill

President accepts responsibility for defeat as he faces challenge of governing without majority in House of Representatives

President George W Bush considered dropping Vice President Dick Cheney from his 2004 presidential campaign to "demonstrate I was in charge," the former president says in a new memoir.

Two years from now, the Republican Party will be fighting the greatest internal threat since the Democrat split of 1860

It was a bad result for President Obama and the Democrats, as everyone knew it would be. They sustained the worst losses, across both Houses of Congress, since the Republican defeats of 1948.

President Barack Obama was on a political collision course with his opponents tonight after Republicans made sweeping election gains and vowed to undo some of his major policies.

Senate majority leader Harry Reid of Nevada survived a fierce challenge from a candidate backed by the ultra-conservative tea party movement, but was left with a greatly diminished majority.

Republicans seize momentum in House of Representatives as voter disillusionment leaves Democrats facing a tough future

When the euphoria of their wider performance has died down, the Republican Party may wonder if the plight of Angle leaves serious questions to be asked about the viability of more unconventional Tea-Party candidates

You could still see the odd person in fancy dress staggering home through Las Vegas yesterday morning, after what had presumably been extremely-convivial Hallowe'en celebrations, but heaven forbid that they should have tried to enter a polling station to vote.

The crowd went wild when Michelle Obama swept into a high-school gymnasium in Las Vegas yesterday morning, with little Harry Reid trailing in her wake and a local Mariachi band, in full dress uniform, entertaining the crowd. But behind the flag waving and anthem-singing, and the sunny optimism of a typical American election rally, there was a palpable sense of unease.