The new "poll" by Esquire/NBC news is actually a juvenile lark parading as some sort of science.
While I actually agree that it is one of the fundamental problems with America that the extremists (and in particular Right wing extremists, a.k.a. the Tea Party) get WAY TOO MUCH attention at the expense of the non-hysterical majority, the mechanics of this particular enterprise are laughably stupid.
I've taken their "poll" several times and, aside from the fact that the method is infantile (asking leading questions with a choice of "agreeing" or "disagreeing" on a scale(?) from 1 to 7), it is also so arrogantly presumptuous that no matter what you answer you get condescendingly pigeonholed into a category with a stupid name like "minivan moderates" or "bleeding heart liberal."
The only point to it seems to be: allowing Chuck Todd to bloviate about how "passionately" Americans are in their ignorance.
I don't know what to say. It's just so absurd that the worthless Chuck Todd now has a new bone to chew while it is so obviously a bad term paper by an underachieving middle school student.