NPR News with Tony Cox - Racial Identity in Multi-Ethnic America:

The topic of White privilege has been left out of your report. Our racial identities do not exist in a vacuum. Mr. Rodríguez may talk about the "browning" of the US. However, before we talk about the "mestizaje" or browning of U.S. racial identity, we need to talk, understand and ultimately, take out the cancer of White privilege, or White supremacy, if you will, that permeates our society. White privilege is the paradigm by which all non-White cultures are judged in the United States. It is not so much that we, people of color, are being more "accepted", but rather that in our desire to conform, to fit in, to be more like Whites, we are trying to live up to, without any success I should say given that the same old stereotypes continue to exist, the cultural expectations established by the paradigm of White privilege. It is like playing by the rule of others with the hope that one day those who exercise White privilege will acknowledge the value, and contributions, of our cultures.

A true browing of the United States can only occur when the conditions of play are the same for all players and we no longer expect acceptance, like slaves wanting to be invited to dinner with the master, like Mr. Rodríguez seems to be doing with the bucolic tales of his youth, but demand and receive respect for who we are, as we are, in all of our wonderful colors and glorious languages.

I found the treatment given to Russell Means by Richard Rodríguez and your other guest very disrespectful. If you listen again to his comments, you would see that the issue is not one of "supremacy", but rather of cultural survival, which given the conditions American Indians face it is more than understandable. His desire is for the persistence of his culture, of his people.