I was recently invited to participate in a discussion on race relations and diversity in a pleasant wooded resort, miles away from the hustle and bustle of the city and the tensions it brings.

Participating in the discussion were a group of Whites, Hispanic/Latinos, Blacks, a smaller group of Asians and even a few Native Americans.

First, there was a group discussion about race relations in the country. It included dialogue about racial profiling; fairness of opportunity; access to such things as capital�something none of the participants had any direct control over or impact on, I might add; better distribution of funding for schools in poor areas; and even debate about the need for school vouchers.

It was a good, lively discussion, after which all agreed that we are all Americans and we need to put away racial attitudes of the past and learn to, well, get along.

Everybody was fired up over the "progress" the races had made during the discussion and decided that after lunch the groups would split up into their ethnic groups for more focussed discussions on the issues concerning their groups.

Being a journalist and only participating as an observer, I had the opportunity to sit in on the different groups to listen in. Since the Native American group was the smallest, I stopped there first because they would probably get to the core issues quickest.

Their primary concerns were economic development and gaining more political power. While there was lingering anger about their past�their land being stolen and now their populations concentrated on reservations�the Native Americans stressed more focus on developing income-generating casinos that extract dollars from the outside White communities in order to become a greater political force. Economics first, politics second, was the general mood. They also stressed a need to hold on to the land they have, even as the U.S. government seeks to remove them from mineral-rich reservations.

At the Asian group, I heard a discussion about the Chinese economic development, concerns about the Japanese homeland and other Asians talked about monies sent to relatives at home and putting those coming from abroad to the States into business so they can get on their feet. They also talked about the pros and cons of financially supporting various Republican and Democratic candidates in national elections. When someone said they should run one of our own, the response came back: Our money backing them will make them our own!

In the larger group of Latinos/Hispanics, immigration laws and the move away from an Amnesty Bill that would have granted citizenship to several million "illegal aliens" was discussed. How can we be called "illegal" when we were here first, one young Mexican inquired. Don�t worry, our numbers are increasing. Give us 50 more years, we�ll have it back, one elder responded. The real issues, the elderly gentleman continued, are getting our people into business so our young people can have jobs and get the violence among them abated. We must also make sure our people at home (meaning Mexico and Latin America) get better wages since corporate America is moving from the States to our countries to exploit our labor force. I wanted to stay to hear more, but I had to move on in order to get a sampling from each group.

The largest group was that of White Americans. They seemed genuinely interested about the other groups� concerns about racism and the distribution of power. They talked about what they must get "our" President and "our" legislators to do to address race and discrimination. On the other hand, there was a muted concern about the increase in population of "foreigners" like illegal aliens and Africans and Middle Easterners. If they can�t accept our values, then they ought to go home, said one outspoken male member of the group. They talked about preservation of property values in their neighborhoods and how progressive some of their communities were because of the presence of a mixture of "minorities." No one talked about White flight.

Before the sessions ended, I hurried over to the discussion by Blacks. They were really into it by the time I sat in. They had already talked about what they didn�t like about President Bush and how Republicans stole the elections. They had breezed through a list of companies to target for a boycott. One person quoted the more than $500 billion that flows through Black hands annually and how it can be used as leverage to bring corporate America to the table�never mind that more than 95 percent of that money never finds its way back to the Black community. Someone bragged about the high number of Black elected political figures Black America has�a reward for the fight for civil rights.

Meanwhile, one young man in hip hop clothes said his family owned a small grocery store and wanted to talk about driving Black consumers to small stores like his. A scholarly gentleman told him that after the big fish�large grocery chains�are brought to the table, then we�ll deal with "mom and pop stores" like yours. When the young man stood up and demanded to know why Blacks couldn�t be encouraged to spend more of their own money with Black-owned businesses in their own communities, the Whites, Native Americans, Asians, Hispanic/Latino groups stopped their discussions to hear the response.

Boy, sit down and hush, someone from the Black group said. We�ve fought a long time to get where we are.

There came a collective sigh of relief from the other groups: "Whew! We�re okay," they whispered.

P.S.: The above account is fictional; however, any reflection on anyone living or dead is not a coincidence.