Tonight's TV highlights

Tea Party America: This World 7pm, BBC2 The Tea Party movement that has dominated US politics in the last year or so is precisely the sort of occurrence that Europeans will be predisposed to find quaint – both because it is ridiculous (Americans complaining that their government is a socialist tyranny) and because it pretends to patriotic principle (citizens seeking to remind their government with whom ultimate power rests). Andrew Neil saunters through this eruption of petulant rage, considering what this hijacking of the Republican party by its angry wing means for Obama's first midterm elections. Twitchers: A Very British Obsession 9pm, BBC4 Twitchers are birdwatchers-cum-trainspotters who vie with each other to spot as many rare birds as possible across the British Isles. These are men who, at the drop of a hint of a sandhill crane in the Orkneys, will drive all the way up from Sussex to add it to their personal tally, sometimes with families in tow. "It's about birds and people – because they go hand in hand." says one. Hand in wing, surely? All entertainingly revealing about the anal retention and sheer lack of proportion fundamental to the British male character. Coppers 9pm, Channel 4 A surfeit of series that focus on the bish-bash-bosh! side of policing has devalued the real-life cop doc of late. In contrast, Coppers allows officers and those taken into custody to talk about their lives. The results, as we eavesdrop on life at Medway Custody Suite, Kent in the first episode, are both bleak and hilarious. Bleak, because so many suspects are sad cases – repeat offenders who get arrested time and time again; hilarious, because of the officers' world-weary perspective on their charges: "They never want their mums to know." Ace Of Cakes 9pm, Good Food Series six of the docusoap about Duff Goldman's Baltimore bakery. They make novelty cakes. This week their most exciting assignment is for the International Bridge, Tunnel And Turnpike Association. Actually, just watching them constructing the cakes is quite interesting, but a dryer, less camera-friendly bunch of bakers you could not find. We know Baltimore can't always be drive-by shootings and fast-talking alcoholic cops, but really. Made In Sheffield 9pm, Sky Arts 1 Last year's BBC4 doc Synth Britannia visited some of this material in a more swish and contextual way, but there's a lot to be said for the rawness of this film from 2001. Not for Sheffield the pub rock nouveau of London punk. Instead, inspired by the city's industrial noise and a ham radio-style curiosity about electronics, bands like Cabaret Voltaire and the Human League made avant garde noise and, later, era-defining pop. Heaven 17's Martyn Ware (the Martin Clunes of the scene) is a particularly wonderful interviewee; Phil Oakey is statuesque in both personality and haircut. Listen to the voice of Buddha, as they said back then. The Trip 10pm, BBC2 This new, Michael Winterbottom-directed six parter sees Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon reprise their roles as "themselves" in A Cock and Bull Story as slightly feuding buddies. This time they're on a voyage around the north of England as Coogan writes restaurant reviews for the Observer having broken up with his American girlfriend. A lot of it consists of the two trading impressions and funny voices – but the show exists to explore Coogan's perceived (and actual?) persona as an ennui-riddled womaniser. It's very self-aware, but often very funny. And an enjoyable foodie travelogue, too.