KEY POINTS:
Sometimes politicians just want to have fun.
This week we set out to find out who among are leaders are the jokers and who are the killjoys by polling readers in our Herald election character poll.
The answer was stark.
You were in no doubt who's funniest.
Asked who would be the best stand-up comedian, a whopping 45 per cent of you thought Rodney Hide, followed by Winston Peters on 39 per cent.
No-one else could even raise a titter.
Helen Clark (6 per cent) and John Key (5 per cent) barely raised a laugh but spare a thought for Peter Dunne and Jeanette Fitzsimons who were in rotten tomato territory.
So from funniest we turned to biggest killjoy. Yesterday's poll asked which leader was most likely to call noise control on you for a noisy party.
Helen Clark got a finger-wagging 36 per cent of the vote.
But the real surprises were in the next tier where Jeanette Fitzsimons was voted next most likely to not tolerate noise pollution. Making their first real impact on the polling were Peter Dunne and Jim Anderton, obviously seen as the neighbourhood killjoys, by around 13 per cent and 11 per cent of you respectively.
The results come in the daily character poll running on nzherald.co.nz.
We have taken the idea from the now defunct Australian magazine, The Bulletin, which asked Australians broadly similar questions in a light-hearted poll.
The polling, they argued, offered as much insight into how people view politicians' character and, therefore, how they might vote, than did polling on policy.
After all it's how we view our politicians as much as their policies that help us decide.
This week, we discovered that sometimes it is better to keep silent.
Helen Clark appeared to cop a backlash after saying John Key had a "tantrum" during the TVNZ debate and he might shout at home but he was not welcome to do it at her.
So we polled our readers and around 4000 people gave their views.
Shout at home? Sorry, Helen Clark, it's you who was voted most likely to sound off at home, with 42 per cent of the online poll, well ahead of Winston Peters' 27 per cent and John Key on a very well-mannered 11 per cent.
Coming next week: Which politician would be most attractive to the opposite sex?
Jeremy Rees is head of the Herald online and deputy editor of the NZ Herald.
