1.  Sarah Palin is runner-up for Time's Person of the Year. 

While Barack Obama was named as Person of the Year, Governor Palin was named as a close second.  The others who were under close consideration were Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, and Chinese film director Zhang Yimou.

2.  Palin continues to lead in polls for 2012 GOP presidential nomination. 

Coming on the heels of her very strong showing in Gallup and Zogby polls, Governor Palin takes first place in the ConservativeHQ.com online poll at http://conservativehq.com/active-polls/

As of December 18, the results were:

39%    Sarah Palin
14%    Mitt Romney
10%    Bobby Jindal
  9%    Mike Huckabee
  9%    Ron Paul
  4%    Fred Thompson
  1%    Sam Brownback
  1%    Rudy Giuliani
  1%    Alan Keyes
  0%    John McCain
  5%    Someone else
  8%    Not sure

It is remarkable that John McCain was not the first choice of a single person in the poll to be the Republican presidential nominee again in 2012.  In fact, when asked who they LEAST wanted to be the next GOP candidate for president, the results were:

56%    John McCain
19%    Rudy Giuliani
  8%    Sarah Palin
  5%    Ron Paul
  3%    Fred Thompson
  1%    Mike Huckabee
  0%    Sam Brownback
  0%    Bobby Jindal
  0%    Alan Keyes
  0%    Mitt Romney
  8%    Not sure

While 56% of respondents said they were more active in the 2008 presidential campaign than in previous elections, a majority said that John McCain was personally responsible for the defeat of the GOP ticket, either through his performance or the position he took on issues.  The results were:

30%    McCain's performance as a candidate
24%    McCain's position on various issues
18%    The severe economic problems that arose during the campaign
14%    The record of the Bush Administration
  9%    The Republican ticket was not competitive financially with the Democratic ticket
  2%    Palin's performance as a candidate
  4%    Something else

Less than 1% cited Palin's position on various issues or the war in Iraq.

By contrast, the results for what was the BEST part of the Republican campaign showed:

79%    Sarah Palin
14%    Joe the Plummer
  1%    John McCain's performance in the last debate
  6%    Something else

When asked if the 2008 election was actually winnable, a strong plurality thought that a better-run campaign would have been successful.  The results:

45%    If they had run a better campaign, the McCain-Palin ticket could have won.
31%    A different GOP ticket could have won.
8%    If they had run a better campaign, the McCain-Palin ticket could have made it closer but not won.
8%    The McCain-Palin ticket did about as well as any GOP ticket could have done.
9%    Hard to say.