Palin 2012??

A recent Newsmax Media-Zogby poll showed former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin leading the Republican field as the party’s preferred candidate for president in 2012.

And a breakdown of demographic and other data from the survey offers some interesting insights on current Republican thinking about GOP candidates in the next presidential election:

• Sarah Palin, who grabbed 22.2 percent of the vote in the poll, is more popular in the East than anywhere else in the country. Interestingly, she has been described as a Western and Southern candidate, but our Zogby poll found that 25 percent of Easterners supported her. The West, in fact, gave her the lowest figure — 20 percent.
• Palin is not as strong with 65-plus voters — her percentage there dropped to 19.7 percent. She seems to be popular with younger voters, with 23 percent of those between ages 18 and 29 supporting her.
• Newt Gingrich came in at 12.4 percent, but he seems to skew with stronger support among males, 14 percent, while female Republican voters gave him 11 percent.
• Palin skews favorably with women, with 23.3 percent of Republican women supporting her compared to 21 percent of Republican men. She also does very well in the 55-to-69 demographic group, where 24 percent of Republicans back her. That number drops dramatically to just 14 percent in the 70-plus group.
• Mike Huckabee seems to be a favorite of black Republicans, garnering 24.2 percent of the vote, more than any other candidate in the field.
• Palin draws exceedingly well with born-again and Evangelical Christians, pulling a strong 28.4 percent of their vote. She also gets strong support from less educated voters — 28.6 percent of those who said they did not have a college degree voted for her, while those with a college degree gave her just 18.5 percent.
• Mitt Romney had consistently strong poll numbers across all demographic groups. Interestingly, although he is a Mormon, he led the pack among Catholic voters, even beating out Palin, 23.6 percent to 21.1 percent.
• Romney also seems to be very favorably viewed by Jewish Republicans, gaining a remarkable 32 percent of their support.
• Geographically, Palin is very strong in small cities, 27.4 percent, and rural areas, 27.8 percent. Romney, on the other hand, is very strong in large cities, with 22.8 percent of the vote, and in suburbs with 22.3 percent.

Other possible GOP candidates included in the poll were Scott Brown, Jeb Bush, David Petraeus, and Tim Pawlenty.