You asked,
>a related question, though. most countries have political parties who's
>indexes are either: workers'/peoples'/etc; or have some directly religious
>significance; or are (like australia) within the euro tradition of christian
>democrats/liberal/labour/conservative/etc. i never understood why in the
>US, the two main parties were called democrat and republican. is this
>because of something to do with the above?
The names of our main political parties date from the first half of the 19th century. The Democratic Party was originally called the Republican Party when it was started by Thomas Jefferson & friends ca.1792 at which time the name referred to the party's anti-monarchist sentiments. The party became known as the"Democratic Party" during the 1830's when led by Andrew Jackson, the first "plebian" to be elected president, and has been so called until the present. The "other" party in Jefferson''s time was the Federalist Party led by Alexander Hamilton, among others. This party eventually declined,to be replaced by the Whig Party, which then split over the slavery issue. The present Republican Party was founded in the early 1850s, chosing its name partly to appeal to some aspects of the earlier Jeffersonian tradition. Because of the party's anti-slavery position it was established only in the northern states which was enough of an electoral base to win the 1860 election for Lincoln. The later history of the party is, over the long term, rather unedifying. (The same could be said about the other party, too.) But as to the names of the parties, the answer to your question is that they have no relationship to the names of modern European or Australian parties. K. M.