Listen to this rundown on the evils of super-banks by recently-arisen British political superstar Nick Clegg. The Guardian‘s Oliver Burkeman recently called him the new Obama, but when was the last time Barack Obama spoke the truth about fix-is-in banking practices as bluntly and plainly as Clegg says it here? Obama should aspire to be the American Clegg.

“A week ago, most people in Britain considered Nick Clegg, the ‘little-known leader’ of the Liberal Democrats, to be, by all measures, a long shot to become Britain’s next prime minister,” a 4.21 Huffington Post summary reads. “But that was before ‘Cleggmania’ swept the country.

“The origins of Cleggmania can be traced to last week’s televised debate — a first in Great Britain — in which Clegg was widely considered to have stolen the show from the leaders of Britain’s two largest political parties: current Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the Labour Party, and Conservative Party leader David Cameron. The headline the next day in the London Times read ‘Clegg comes of age.’ A poll taken after the debate led the Guardian to declare that ‘Clegg is now in contention as potential PM.’

“To top it off, the latest YouGov poll shows the Liberal Democrats to now be in the lead with 34 percent of the vote. The Conservative Party came in second with 31 percent. A week ago the Liberal Dems were hovering around 16 percent. Andrew Sullivan of the Daily Dish referred to the poll result as ‘the earthquake in Britain.’ John Curtice of the Independent has called the Liberal Dems’ surge ‘the biggest shock to the electoral landscape in years.'”

Here’s an insightful, well-written piece about Clegg by the Globe and Mail‘s Doug Saunders.