As much of a crazy warlock as Charlie Sheen is, most Americans would probably not want to put him in charge of our military and nuclear arms program. Yet according to the results of a new poll by the Democrat-affiliated Public Policy Polling firm, registered Dems and Independents would still vote for a guy who hasn't slept in two decades over former Alaskan Gov. Sarah Palin by a significant margin. Independent voters gave Sheen a 41 percent vote to Palin's 36 percent, while Democrats amped it up a notch and put her at 24 percent versus the guy filled with Tiger Blood, who'd win with 44 percent of the vote. Another 21 percent of Americans polled said they were "unsure" whom they would vote for between Palin and Sheen.
Republicans also gave Charlie the role of POTUS in a race against him and Barack Obama, though their margin was smaller: 37 percent to 28 percent.
As noted in the PPP blog post about the results, this does not speak well of our country's abilities to see past party lines:
"Sheen is one of the most unpopular figures we've ever polled on. 10% of Americans rate him favorably to 67% with a negative opinion of him...
Sheen's unpopularity is pretty universal across party lines so it says something about the level of polarization in the country right now that Democrats would support him by a 44-24 margin for President over Palin and that Republicans would support him 37-28 over Obama. People may not have any respect for Sheen but they still think he'd be a better alternative than their opposing party's leading figure."
The message at the end of the article shows a glint of favoritism when they conclude that this poll proves "just how minuscule her (Sarah Palin's) chance at the Presidency would be even if she did decide to get into the race." At the same time, the numbers speak for themselves. PPP was named by the Wall Street Journal as the second most accurate projectionist of swing state votes in the 2008 election, and Nate Silver has also put it high on his list of accurate polling firms in America; so despite the group's interpretation of the raw data, the information it gathered still points to a scary lack of bipartisanship across a country that would rather have a convicted abuser and drug user run the nation than a figurehead from the opposition's party.
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