PUSH RACIAL TALK BEYOND BLACK, WHITE.(MAIN)

Byline: WILLIAM RASPBERRY

WASHINGTON -- Edwin Dorn has rescued me, at least temporarily, from my skepticism, and I'm prepared to accept that President Clinton's call for a dialogue on race just might do some good.

I never saw it as a cynical gesture. My fear was that any attempt at a national conversation on race would quickly degenerate into a dead-end fight over affirmative action: dead-end because (for too many of us) affirmative action has become a sort of litmus test by which we determine not just who makes sense but who is worth talking to. Dorn is undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, a Ph.D. from Yale, and the next dean of the Lyndon …