AFFIRMATIVE ACTION is a good thing.

This newspaper practices it. That's good for the paper because it broadens our perspective and helps us report on the community more effectively. It's good for our readers because everyone can see that people with backgrounds like theirs are involved in reporting the news. It's good for society as a whole because it helps address the problem that many people, simply because of who their parents and grandparents were, don't have the same access to opportunity that others possess.

It's good for business, which is why businesses across the country practice it and support it.

President Bush believes in the goals of affirmative action, too. He just won't say so. He won't even say the words. He uses buzzwords intended to appeal to both sides, such as "diversity" (he's for it), and "quotas" (he's against them). But after trying to have it both ways, he has government lawyers intervene in a lawsuit against the University of Michigan's affirmative action system. He calls it a "quota" system. It isn't. It gives points for being a member of an underrepresented group (such as African-Americans, or Californians, or applicants from Michigan's largely white Upper Peninsula), but it gives far more points for academic achievement.

The administration suggests that it's good to increase minority enrollment, just as long as you do it without taking race into account. In other words, it's saying this is something we should do, as long as we don't do it on purpose. What kind of sense does that make?

By intervening, Justice Department lawyers aren't asking the court to disturb existing precedents. So if the government is not trying to clarify national policy, what is the point of the intervention? We are left to assume the point is political. The president is giving the impression that he is against that great nemesis of his party's right wing, "affirmative action." In doing so, he appeases the atavistic elements of his party who are peeved over the much-deserved overthrow of Trent Lott.

While there is nothing wrong with the words the president spoke last week, there is a problem: The president believes in "diversity" -- as demonstrated not only in his words, but in his choices of key aides -- but is too anxious to cater to people who don't.

This is like when he chose to kick off his South Carolina campaign in 2000 at Bob Jones University. He didn't say or do anything objectionable that day. But by choosing that venue, he sent unmistakable signals to people who believe that, say, banning interracial dating is a good thing.

What is affirmative action? It's not about quotas. It's not about lowering standards for anybody. It's about going out of your way -- acting positively, rather than waiting passively -- to find people who might not otherwise emerge as candidates, either for a job or for slots in a university. It doesn't guarantee outcomes. But you can guarantee that if the effort isn't made, minorities will be underrepresented, if only for the simple reason that they tend not to be plugged into the same communication networks that others take for granted.

Having a variety of different kinds of people in an organization is good not only for the "different" people who benefit directly from successful affirmative action efforts, but for others in the organization, whose studies or work will be enriched by different perspectives.

The president believes in those things, and should stop trying to give the opposite impression for political reasons. He should try to persuade those who don't believe in promoting diversity why they are wrong.

That's what leaders do.