Eddie Izzard on Being Bilingual

I came across this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IzDbNFDdP4&feature=related

In this video Eddie Izzard talks about being bilingual.
In his joking tone he dissects the issue behind languages. He jokes through the differences between British and American pronunciation of words. he then goes onto to mention that though there are slight variations of the English languages, there are 200 languages in Europe alone. he says that we are going to have to become bilingual. He says that English speakers in particular hate the idea of having to learn more languages. The reason he gives is that quite simply, we are losing business.

The English tendency to not learn other languages is crippling America. It is limiting our abilities in almost the entire rest of the world. It means it is hard for us to understand other cultures, and frankly it is a bit obnoxious. Almost the entire rest of the world learns two or three languages from an early age. To say that we only need to know one language is both a handicap on us and a slap in the face to everyone else.