Angle on why she pulled out of debate she asked for: “We wanted an informed electorate”

Yes, that may be the strangest explanation for not doing a debate I have heard. As you may recall, in June, GOP Senate nominee Sharron Angle challenged Harry Reid to debate her on “Face to Face."

In her first statement explaining why she won’t debate Reid on the 21st, as a senior aide committed her to do and after she asked Reid to do so on June 29, Angle explained on Monday to a sympathetic and quite clueless conservative talk show host that this happened because your favorite Flasher tried “to go around people in the campaign.”

Silly me: I thought the candidate’s challenge and the deputy campaign manager's commitment were good enough. But in Angleworld, apparently you need the spokesman, too. Mea culpa.

For his part, continuing a long line of conservative talkers who have tried to help Angle but have not been helpful, KXNT's Alan Stock actually suggested my attempt to get her to make good on her challenge to Reid to debate on “Face to Face” debate “was a ploy to confuse you about dates and everything else.”

A ploy? Really. He said that.

Question: Are there any more qualifications to be a radio talk show host than to say outrageous and often idiotic things?

Here’s the transcript of what transpired:

Stock: I also want to ask this because there’s a debacle going on now about the whole debate scenario. You’re debating Harry Reid on October 14th, is that correct?

Angle: That’s correct. And there is another debate, I believe, the 23rd of September that I’ll be at. I think that Harry Reid’s sending a tape of his answers to the questions. He’s already had the questions. I don’t know what they are.

Stock: Well, Jon Ralston has suggested that he invited you to debate. You accepted, then you reneged on it, because you didn’t want to answer questions and stuff like that. How do you respond to that?

Angle: We’ve always been very clear that we didn’t want to debate after early voting started because we wanted an informed electorate. And we’ve held to that premise from the very beginning. That’s why the Nevada Broadcasters Association is having theirs on the 14th of October. And that’s why Harry Reid agreed to have it on the 14th is because we said we wanted an informed people voting.

Stock: So, you haven’t backed out? You are debating Harry Reid and debating him face-to-face on October 14th?

Angle: Yes, we are.

Stock: All right. The other one was a ploy to confuse you about dates and everything else.

Angle: Well, I think that, um, when you start trying to go around people in the campaign, you sometimes get confusing answers. You know, Jerry Stacy’s always been my spokesman. He has always known exactly how I felt about it – that we wanted an informed electorate. And he has always stood very firm. We said that that was our only… the only thing really required was that it not be held after early voting started.