In a crackling campaign debate, Republican challenger Sharron Angle attacked Harry Reid tonight as a career politician who lives in a Washington condominium and has voted to raise taxes 300 times. Reid called his tea-party rival "extreme" multiple times and accused her of distorting his record. "I have never voted for tax breaks for people who are here illegally," he said, rebutting one of the allegations Angle has made in their close, caustic, and costly campaign for the Senate.
Angle played the aggressor from the opening moments of the hour-long debate, at one point taunting him to "man up Harry Reid" as she urged him to concede that Social Security faces financial difficulty. Across a stage at a local PBS station, there was little or nothing the two agreed on—not taxes, health care, immigration, energy policy, or federal spending. Reid took aim at Angle's statement that it's not the job of a senator to create jobs. "What she's talking about is extreme," he said. "Harry Reid, it's not your job to create jobs," she replied sharply. "It's your job to create policy" that leads to the creation of jobs. (More Harry Reid stories.)