It is undeniable that blacks-on the whole - have had a markedly different American experience than any other ethnic group. In terms of personal history, skin color/ethnicity is one of the most revealing traits someone can posess. From a purely statistical perspective, it can be either extremely unifying or dividing. In this instance, the parellels were appropriate.
If you switch to quantitive measures, than yeah can't deny that.
I haven't read "Audacity of Hope" but I don't see how in the book I read, he describes it as having to go because of lack of financial resources, in the second I hear it's because his mother was more or less not even concerned with religion and just wanted him to concentrate on schooling, why not say that in the first book
He described himself as a barefoot boy, playing in the dirt street with local workers children.
I'll have to pick the book up, but I don't see how traveling back to Indonesia with the second husband, they would be so poor?
Most people in Indonesia are muslim, which is why the school he attended was known as Muslim. From what I recall, it was actually a public school. He also attended two years of Catholic school.
He was never a practicing muslim and he converted to Christianity at least a decade before running for any political office.