I consider myself a D.I.Y. home improvement guy. In a prior life, I completely gutted a house - redid the plumbing, wiring, moved sewage pipes, knocked down walls, everything.
Americans are very easygoing people. If the added attention and great visibility that I have been able to generate can help open doors and expose more Chinese to American values and the American way of life, that is great.
I think that there is a concern, a question mark, by people all around the world and governments all around the world, as to what China's intentions are.
The U.S. tries to provide immigrants who grow up here with a world-class education and imbue them with the can-do attitude that has long defined American innovation.
Every year, some 65,000 high school students - many of them star students and leaders in their communities - are unable to go to college or get a good job because they have no legal status.
China is a country, still, of great contrast. While hundreds of millions of people are part of the middle class and yearn for things made in America - American brands, movies, music - there are other hundreds of millions of people throughout China who are living on the equivalent of one U.S. dollar a day.
I understand that in these difficult economic times, the potential for any additional expense is not welcomed by American businesses. But in the long run, the health insurance reform law promises to cut health-care costs for U.S. businesses, not expand them.
I'm so proud of my Chinese ancestry, but I was born and raised in America, and I really believe in American values, our American system, our freedom, our liberties.
My dad, of course, like a lot of Asian parents, wanted me to be an engineer or doctor and never could understand why I would want to be a lawyer. And then, when I first said I wanted to run for office, he thought that was absolutely insane.
The explosive growth in places like Shanghai has helped lift hundreds of millions of people out of poverty and into a thriving new middle class. What China has done is nothing short of an economic transformation, and the citizens of this country have every right to be proud.
China's own recent history proves that when it opens itself, there is nothing its people cannot accomplish. A more open China will lead to a more prosperous and stable China. That's good for China, the United States and, indeed, the entire world.
All the states are required, either by constitution or by statute, to have balanced budgets - they're not able to print money. So they have to focus on establishing priorities.
We need the private sector to succeed, because if the private sector succeeds, America succeeds. Because it's not the government that produces jobs, it's the private sector.
