(CNN) -- Normally, you might think that a controversy over whether the Kennedy Center, one of the nation's leading performing arts organizations, is overlooking the contributions of Latino artists, actors and musicians would be a real sleeper. Until you heard that, during a recent telephone conversation between one lover of the arts and another, one claims the other told him to "F--- yourself." Ok, gentlemen, you have my attention. It all happened very quickly. On Sept. 14, Felix Sanchez, chairman of the National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts, and Michael M. Kaiser, president of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts talked. In multiple media reports, Sanchez said that Kaiser took none too kindly to him expressing his concern over the constant omission of Latinos from the annual list of Kennedy Center Honors recipients.
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Since 1978, the Kennedy Center has honored only two Hispanics
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Ruben Navarrette: Center overlooks contributions of Latino artists, performers
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He says America's largest minority is everywhere except on the Center's annual list
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Navarrette: Kennedy Center needs new leaders who understand our century
Kaiser owes all Latinos a symbolic apology, and he can express that by showing that he understands what @placeholder was upset about in the first place and proving that he is committed to addressing this disgraceful pattern of omission.