Excerpt
On Wednesday, with the blessing of House GOP leaders, Bachmann convened the inaugural meeting of her Tea Party Caucus, where two dozen GOP members of Congress sat down with a similar number of tea party activists behind closed doors in an Armed Services Committee room.
Then it was Bachmann's job to lead the group across the street to the Capitol for an appearance before TV cameras.
"OK, we can just go down the stairs," she called out. "You're doing great, everybody. OK, guys, this way!" She accepted a tube of lipstick from a male aide and applied it as she strode through the hallways of the Rayburn Building. "The press has been following us," she explained.
She continued her march down the Rayburn driveway ("Sorry about this long trip; I know it's warm") and across Independence Avenue ("OK, let's cross when we can!") and finally mustered them a few steps from the TV cameras. "Ready to roll?" she asked.
There and then -- on the Capitol grounds 104 days before the midterm elections -- tea party activists and Republican officeholders set aside any pretense about the two groups being separate. They essentially consummated a merger: The activists allowed themselves to be co-opted by a political party, and the Republican leaders allowed themselves to become the faces of the movement.
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