Rednecks are “the wrong kind of white people.” That’s why the “right kind” of white people — the elitists who look down their noses at rednecks — are trying their hardest to marginalize tea partiers as racist, extremist, downright scary people:

The wrong kind of white person is the one that “right kind” white people want to avoid when camping (the one in the RV); the one that watches Leno; the one who doesn’t like hummus or find Sarah Silverman funny. It’s the one who, when he goes to San Francisco, makes the Rocket Boat the highlight of the trip. It’s the white person who drives a truck, not to reject the political statement of driving a Prius but because he needs it for work. Sarah Palin, even though she’s a strong woman, in a Native American, union household with a disabled child, and an unwed, single-mother daughter is the wrong kind of white person.

Even a congressman who himself was unfairly attacked as a racist on the campaign trail played the race-baiting, tea-party-bashing game this week:

But David Letterman and his viewers are now among the tens of millions who know the right kind of white people are lying about who the wrong kind of right people really are:

The best we rednecks can hope for is that one day soon the news media, rather than the rare entertainer, will start telling the truth about tea partiers. (There have been a few good signs in recent days.) It would be nice if politicians from the president on down joined them. But that’s probably too much to expect, especially in an election year when the tea partiers are likely to send a whole mess of those politicians packing their bags in Washington.