Rural Nevada paper endorses Reid as mining champ
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has picked up the support of a rural newspaper in northern Nevada that says it doesn't like his liberal views but that the state's mining industry can't afford to lose his clout in Congress.
The Elko Daily Free Press says longtime readers in the GOP stronghold 300 miles east of Reno "will be shocked and dismayed" it is not supporting the tea party-backed conservative Republican Sharron Angle.
The paper endorsed Republican John McCain against Barack Obama. It says it shares the tea party activists' goal of reining in government. But it says in Friday's editorial headlined "A selfish reason" that the defeat of Reid could permanently damage northeast Nevada's economy.
It says: "This is mining country, and the mining industry needs Sen. Harry Reid."
Nevada is the world' sixth-largest gold producer behind China, South Africa, Australia, Russia and Peru.