Dale Robertson, No Friend of Ours

Houston has a problem.

Rather, the Houston tea party groups have a problem — a character named Dale Robertson. He is a self-appointed “leader” of the tea party movement, most famous for carrying a sign at the 3/27 tea party in Houston with the word “niggar” on it.

Not surprisingly, he was asked to leave.

Unfortunately, the press seems to find him newsworthy. He continues to show up in mass media professing to be the “founder” of the tea party movement. From his website:

Dale, is the founder of the modern day Tea Party. Dale Robertson, a public speaker, a family man with a wife and 5 children, has lead Tea Party rallies across America from its inception.

He owns the website TeaParty.org and has even hired publicist Tim Bueler to increase his profile.

So who exactly is this guy? And what makes him a leader of the tea party movement to substantiate the publicist’s claim? For one thing, he claims to be a hero, and because of this declaration he believes he should be considered a leader:

Dale, is the progeny of a long list of heroes, being 1 of 5 children he assumed the responsibility of the protector of the family after his father’s early demise. His father was a decorated Korean War hero suffering as a double amputee Veteran. As a child, Dale proved himself by assisting his step-father, a decorated Vietnam veteran, who suffered from the result of his tour of duty. While caring for the family, Dale was an inspirational player in one of the most successful high school sport teams. His history included facing down ethnic gang members while protecting the innocent and the U.S. flag.

Unfortunately, Dale is very much not a hero to those who first encountered him in February of last year. He has been described as a fake, a con artist, and worse by frustrated tea party groups across the land. Houston’s, in particular, is so upset at being associated with the man that they sent out the following press release:

1. He is NOT a member of our Leadership team.

2. He owns a website with which we have never been affiliated.

3. He has never been a part of organizing any of the Tea Party rallies in the Houston area, or any other area that we can find.

4. We addressed some issues involving him back in April. Here it is on our website, where Mr. Robertson himself comments: http://houstontps.org/?p=318

5. We do not choose to associate with people that use his type of disgusting language.

Robertson and his publicist encourage the MSM to consider it a mere squabble between various factions involved in the tea party movement. But quick research on the internet shows that no one in the actual tea party movement wants anything to do with the man.

Needless to say, left-wing sites have been repeatedly drawing attention to him as an example of racism in the tea party.

Dennis Myers quotes a frustrated tea party member:

On one tea party-oriented site, a David Weigel (a tea party leader?) wrote, “The nice treatment of Robertson in the Washington Times … demonstrates just how hard it can be to deny someone “leader” status in the tea parties.”

The MSM was in search of a means to verify what they already believed — that tea party members are racist hicks (paying no heed to the movement’s sizable minority population). Dale Robertson provided them with that bugbear. Mr.Robertson clearly enjoys his time in the limelight. He does not seem to care how he got there or what kind of damage he is doing to the movement he professes to lead. Dale’s latest fundraising email showing Obama as a pimp has not helped his reputation, nor that of the movement.

We shall see how long it takes before the tea party movement finally gets the mainstream media to avoid this man. They have, for the most part, corrected the blogosphere. But they have a lot work left to do to marginalize this man.