Tea Party movement confused about taxes and the Boston Tea Party

For most of us, the stress of filing our income tax return is subsiding and we can get on with the usual business of figuring out how to pay our regular monthly bills. But what will surely continue beyond tax day is the strange co-opting of the Boston Tea Party by the anti-tax Tea Party movement.

I hasten to preface this with the fact that I don't begrudge anyone the right to organize and protest against perceived injustices. This isn't another hit piece about how the Tea Party movement is awful or driven by race or controlled by corporate lobbyists. However, the notion of an anti-tax Tea Party movement that borrows its name from the Boston Tea Party seems bizarre and contradictory.

After all, the Boston Tea Party was ultimately a protest against a corporate tax cut, whereas the modern Tea Party movement is in favor of tax cuts.