The Tea Party Conceals its True Nature While Frank Rich Exposes the Koch Brothers

While right-wing radio host and Fox News commentator Glenn Beck exhorted the thousands of the Tea Party faithful gathered at the Lincoln Memorial to reflect on God and pay tribute to the service men and women who've sacrificed for this nation, many people including myself were wondering where the real Tea Party was.

Frank Rich of the New York Times had an answer ready in the form of a must-read blistering critique of the Tea Party's three main billionaire backers; Rupert Murdoch and the highly controversial and mysterious Charles and David Koch.

Men whose extremist ideology stands in complete opposition to Dr. King's vision of racial equality, social justice and government responsibility for workers, the impoverished and those relegated to the margins of this society.

The anniversary and location of Dr. Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech struck many in this nation as a peculiar place for a rally for a political movement financed in large part by the Koch brother's wealth.

To others, the Tea Party's presence on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, and Becks self-righteous attempt to lay claim to a vision of America as a nation of faith was simply an insult and an affront to the ideals of the civil rights movement.

Veteran political reporter Taylor Marsh attended the rally and reported the crowd was not a diverse mix of different segments of America as Tea Party defenders try to present it; despite the appearance of Dr. King's anti-abortion advocate niece. No offense to Dr. King's relative but she's never been relevant to the national political dialog and she isn't now; just because she showed up on stage doesn't mean the Tea Party platform is somehow magically linked to the legacy of Dr. King.

In the end the sanitized public version of the Tea Party on display on Saturday for mainstream media will be a distant memory as the November elections heat up and the reality of Beck's lunatic right-wing ramblings reverts back to the same narrow-minded rhetoric we've become all too accustomed to.

Will history remember Beck's rally more than 40 years from now? Probably not. Cheap political stunts like that rarely stand the test of time. Dr. King's defining vision will forever symbolize America's hope to fulfill it's potential.