wannem kain kantri bilong yu?

The most fundamental question is "What kind of country will we have here?"

Republicanism and all that goes with it is still popular among two segments of the population:

1) A majority of rich capitalist buccaneers and blue-blooded American aristocrats (such as Mittens) still identify as Republican (but there are dissenters such as Mr. Buffett in this class).

2) An indeterminate number of faithful, God-fearing, working class types, including Fox News brainwash victims, dittoheads, hayseeds, plow jockeys, crackers, gun nuts, wingnuts, goober-shuckers, survivalists, AM radio burn sufferers, and residents of places where there's no difference between the way people pronounce the words "oil" and "all." People for whom politics is an emotional and liberating experience, rather than intellectual and analytical.

And for analysis, here's the Krugmonster:

Essentially the entire GOP is committed to radical policy goals that are also deeply unpopular. Alll but 10 House Republicans voted for the Ryan plan, which would privatize and defund Medicare, impose savage cuts on Medicaid, and cut taxes on the wealthy and corporations.

But the public favors higher taxes on the affluent, and strongly supports all the major social insurance programs. So the divide within the GOP is about how to get past this awkward political reality.

One faction basically wants to use the party’s power of obstruction: threaten to provoke a crisis over the debt ceiling — in fact, do this again and again — and thereby force Obama to implement the GOP agenda.

The other faction wants to achieve the same goals by stealth. Pretend that what you’re really concerned about is debt and the fate of our children; cultivate the Very Serious People and the deficit scolds; impersonate a budget wonk; and smuggle the agenda in by dressing it in fiscal responsibility camouflage.

So it is, as I said, the extortionists versus the con men: same goals, different tactics.

Yup. That's about it. Unfortunately for them, the recent election answered a lot of questions about what kind of country we're going to have, and the Repus lost. More people are waking up to that these days.

We have had, and hope to have again, the kind of country envisioned by Eleanor Roosevelt.