Sharron Angle: The Press Should be My Friend

"We needed to have the press be our friend," Angle told Carl Cameron, prompting Cameron to interject and say her comment sounds "naïve."

"Well, no. We wanted them to ask the questions we want to answer so that they report the news the way we want it to be reported," said Angle. She added that she wants to be able to tell people to send money to her website.

The comments prompted derision from both the right and the left.

National Review Online asked, "Did She Just Say That Out Loud?," while the Washington Monthly's Steve Benen wrote, " I'm trying to imagine what the response on the right would be if President Obama said he needs independent news organizations to be his 'friend.'"

Angle has undeniably come in for criticism from the national media, in part because of her near-refusal to speak to mainstream media outlets. She explained to CBN's David Brody that "I'm not going to earn anything from people who are there to badger me and use my words to batter me with. What I need is to reach out into that public who will, go to Sharron Angle.com and send that $25."

Angle is in a tough battlewith Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, with polls showing the two running neck and neck. Reid, a relatively unpopular longtime Democratic senator seen by many in Nevada as out of touch with his constituents, has been aggressively spending to negatively frame Angle, a Tea Party-backed insurgent whose positions on a variety of issues have raised eyebrows.