Naughty or nice? Bush is both

New Delhi: With just hours to go before the New Year dawns, Americans have voted US President George W Bush both the 'Bad Guy of 2006' as well as the 'Good Guy of 2006'. Only that the President was picked as 'Hero of the Year' by a much smaller margin.

The AP-AOL News poll on the villains and heroes of the year threw up many surprises. In the poll for the Hero of the Year, 13 per cent of those who took part in the survey named Bush as their favourite while six per cent cited the troops in Iraq.

Bush also won the villain sweepstakes hands down. When people were asked to name the candidate for villain that first came to mind, Bush far outdistanced even Osama bin Laden, the terrorist leader in hiding; and former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, who is scheduled for execution. In fact, one in every four respondents put him at the top of the bad-guy list.

The voting pattern in the survey was a clear reflection of polarised opinions among the Americans on various policies of the Bush administration.

Meanwhile, among the entertainment celebrities, Oprah Winfrey edged out Michael J Fox as the best celebrity role model while Britney Spears outdistanced Paris Hilton as the worst.

On the question of celebrity role models, the pop singer's bad behaviour claimed worst honours. When asked to choose from a list of names, nearly three in 10 adults, or 29 per cent, voted Spears the Worst Celebrity of the Year. The 25-year-old pop singer and mother of two young sons recently filed for divorce from Kevin Federline, her husband of two years.

She then followed with highly publicised nights out with party girls Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, including photographic evidence of Spears wearing no underpants, which raised questions about her fitness as a parent. Spears apologized on her website.

Second-worst celebrity billing — 18 per cent — went to Hilton, 25. She was arrested in September in Los Angeles on suspicion of drunken driving. Mel Gibson, 50, was third-worst celebrity with 12 per cent, likely the result of his anti-Semitic tirade at police in Malibu, California, during his arrest on suspicion of drunken driving. He later apologised and said he harbored no animosity toward Jews.

In the best celebrity role model category, 29 per cent of adults chose talk-show host Winfrey. Fox, who has Parkinson's disease, finished second with 23 per cent. He recently was active in support of a ballot measure promoting stem cell research in Missouri.

Actor George Clooney, who's been advocating for refugees in the war-ravaged Darfur region of Sudan, finished third with 12 per cent. Eight percent chose Angelina Jolie over boyfriend Brad Pitt, 2 percent. Newly-weds Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes tied at 2 per cent.

The survey covered 1,004 adults and it was conducted between December 19 and 21 by Ipsos, an international polling firm. The margin of sampling error was plus or minus 3 percentage points.

(With AP inputs)