Race confusion

Jay Nordlinger opens up the mailbag in today’s Impromptus column and one letter writer had a devilish proposal:

“Jay, what would happen to affirmative-action programs if a significant portion of college applicants intentionally misreported their races? Even if most applications were marked correctly, by either dutiful whites or unashamed minorities, a little civil disobedience could introduce just enough margin of error to really bring out the pure intellectual chaos and moral repugnance of affirmative action.

"Think about it: Schools would be forced to visually confirm the race of every applicant who claimed to be a minority. The explicit process of racial classification . . . the naked barbarity of the data collection . . . would render affirmative action politically indefensible. What dean of admissions wouldn't be a little uncomfortable in front of Fox News cameras turning away a previously accepted student on the first day of orientation because he or she had the incorrect skin pigmentation?"

This could work for some applicants but I don’t think I’d be able to fool anybody into believing that “Lindholm” is of African descent.