Polipo- is a caching proxy this is used to increase speed through caching.
Privoxy- is not a caching proxy. It utilizes customisable filters, to increase your privacy while browsing. ie: change your
User Agent String (important to have this changed as it leaks information about your os, and browser type), block adds, changes referrer info, force's browser to do a http post rather than get request.
Tor- is a socks chaining service which obfusicates your ip via routing your request through a chain of user owned/operated relay's...
Tor's weakness are: - unless you also set up a vpn your traffic can be sniffed by the exit
(last relay in the chain) - you are trusting that each relay in your circuit is not keeping logs
- due to the limited amount of relay's (around 2k) it is possible for a single organisation to operate sufficient relay's that you could have a circuit consisting solely of that organisation's relay's therefore compromising your secuity
- torrents are blocked
- has high latency
So to answer your question yes it is a good idea to use privoxy with tor... no you don't need polipo and yes you still need to use privoxy with the tor browser bundle.
Tor should not be used for hacking and illegal activites that can land you jail time it is simply not secure enough to trust your freedom to.
Tor is suitable to use for things like researching topics such as..... compounds & substances, things that go boooom, visiting hacking forums, etc and preventing your traffic from being sniffed at a public hotspot.
You of course should be running "No Scripts", and "Https Everywhere". No scripts has the aility to act like Https Everywhere, however Https Everywhere is updated with rules, No Scripts you have to do that manually.
If you choose not to use the browser supplied in the browser bundle you can use mm3-proxyswitch to put a button on your toolbar for switching between the 2, however make sure you have your browser setup in a way it cannot be dupped into giving your ip, hence defeating the purpose.