There was one thing he said, though, that brings many non-Americans up short. He said 'In no other country in the world is my story even possible.' His story being that his father was an immigrant, but he is on the verge (surely) of election to the legislature.
It makes me wonder what Americans think the rest of the world is like. We have traditionally had routes in place to allow poor people and marginalised people to rise up through the system: free University tuition would be an example. In the British parliament countless members are the children of immigrants (for example the leader of the Conservative party) and 11 MPs who are black immigrants or the children of black immigrants:
Paul Boateng (b. London of Ghanian parents)
Dianne Abbott (b. London of Jamaican parents)
Keith Vaz (b. Aden (now Yemen) of Indian parents)
Oona King (b. Sheffield to Jewish mother & African-American father.)
Dr. Ashok Kumar (b. India)
Piara Khabra (b. Punjab)
Mohammad Sarwar (b. Pakistan)
Marsha Singh (b. India)
Parmjit Dhanda (b. UK of Punjabi parents)
David Lammy (b. London of Guyanan parents). Tipped as the UK's first black Prime Minister. Elected to parliament following the death of Bernie Grant (b. Guyana).
Khalid Mahmood (b. Kashmir)
The US has had three black Senators ever. American influence and right wing politics in general has worked to destroy the routes which integrate the poor and the marginalised into society. The more we Americanise the harder it will be for black people, for working class people, for other excluded groups, to contribute to society. We have to fight those tendencies.
My argument isn't with individual Americans, but with those who try to impose American values on us, and with those in our country who want to follow the American pattern, and destroy the values that it took us so long to establish.