The Tea Party helped the Republicans take the House of Representatives. Are its activists helping Bristol Palin take Dancing With the Stars?
We asked. They told.
"I would assume that many people who follow Sarah Palin would also be supportive of Bristol Palin," Dale Robertson of TeaParty.org told us via email.
Wait… So, there really is an organized, get-out-the-phone-vote effort on behalf of the somewhat-coordinated daughter of the Mama Grizzly in Chief?! Former DWTS competitor Marissa Jaret Winokur was dead-on in the New York Post?! ("I think Bristol is going to keep advancing because the Republicans are going to keep voting for her," Winokur said.)
Er, no, not exactly.
"Bristol has done a great job," Robertson said, "but I trust people to be objective in their decision-making rather than subjective."
And so it went with the handful of Tea Partiers we talked to today—including the guy who all but hung up on us on account of he was kinda ticked we were asking him about DWTS.
Then again, Kurt Warner's surprise elimination on Tuesday night left a lot of people kinda ticked.
"I think Bristol has improved immensely, but I think she's at the bottom of the ones who are left," Shirley Henderson told us. "…I think she should've left before Kurt Warner."
Henderson, by the way, isn't just a DWTS viewer—she's Tea Party organizer in California. And, for the record, Henderson said she doesn't cast DWTS votes, nor has she heard of any Tea Partiers voting in a pro-Bristol block.
"Actually, if there is a Tea Party that has time to watch Dancing With the Stars," Shellie Milne, another California-based activist told us, "they're not doing their job."
So, can Kyle Massey, Brandy and Jennifer Grey sleep easy? Are the same folks who ousted Russ Feingold not out to oust them?
The answer to the second question is no.
The answer to the first question is no, too. After all, Bristol Palin herself thinks just about everybody—not just Tea Partiers—want to see her succeed.
As the younger Palin told Watch With Kristin after Tuesday's show: "I think lots of people see themselves in me."
"Lots of people." That right there is the secret to winning any election. Or mirror-ball trophy.