Identity In America Is Complicated But It's

Many Smart Folks Seem To Think That If You Just Get Your Metaphors And Messages Right, You'll Win. That If You Start Describing What You Favor As A 'moral Value' - 'affordable Health Care Is A Moral Value' Etc., - Then You'll Appeal To Red-state Voters.

Imagine Filling A College With The First 1,000 Students To Get Perfect Sats. Whatever The Racial Composition Of That Class Would Be, The Notion Seems Absurd Because We Know That College In America Is Supposed To Be About Creating Citizens And Leaders In A Diverse Nation.

If Half-black Barack Obama Had Decided Years Ago To Call Himself White - Which His Genes Certainly Entitled Him To Do - His Story Would Have Carried Very Different Meaning. If Millions Of Part-black People Had Followed Him Into Whiteness, Then The N.a.a.c.p. Would Be In True Crisis.

If Whiteness Were Of No Particular Advantage, Then Having A Fuller Color Wheel Of Skin Tones Would Be Purely A Matter Of Celebration. But Whiteness - Just A Drop Of It - Does Still Carry Privilege. You Learn That Very Young In America.

Conservatives Forget That Citizenship Is More Than A Thing To Withhold From Immigrants. Progressives Forget It's More Than A Set Of Rights.