I think his point is that "white" is becoming synonymous with "privileged", and that people are responding by grouping Asians with "whites" because they are inc

I think his point is that "white" is becoming synonymous with "privileged", and that people are responding by grouping Asians with "whites" because they are increasingly enjoying the same systematic privilege that whites do. The whole privilege debate has always bothered me a bit. I don't doubt that having a particular ethnic background helps in certain situations, but "privilege" suggests a certain binary-ness that doesn't accurately capture all the nuances of race and ethnicity in America. For instance, there's a large amount of variation among different Asian groups. There is a world of difference between the socioeconomic status of the Hmong community in Michigan and the Taiwanese community in the Bay Area. Or even between the Chinese immigrants who came in the 1800s and the latter wave of immigration in the last few decades. And while it may be fair say that, all else equal, being to a particular ethnic group grants certain advantages relative to belonging to other groups, that advantage isn't uniform. For example, being Chinese or Indian is probably a net plus if you want to be a software engineer in the valley; it's probably a net minus if you want to be an actor in Hollywood. That said, I don't think the answer is to be color-blind. Race and ethnicity clearly matter in America -- it's just not as simple as privileged / not-privileged or majority / minority.