You ee-vil Americans. You haven't contributed enough to Pakistani flood relief. And now you've been busted by Andrea Mitchell, who knows why you've been so miserly. It's prejudice. Prejudice I tell ya! View video here if not visible at right.
Mitchell teased her prejudiced-Americans theory at the top of her MSNBC show this afternoon, then trotted it out while talking with Ann Curry, who is in Pakistan.
How over the top was Andrea? Even fellow lib Curry had to gently talk Mitchell down, suggesting there was another very good reason why Americans would be cautious about sending money to Pakistan . . .
ANDREA MITCHELL: Even before the president waded into that mosque controversy, a new poll shows a growing number of Americans wrongly believe that President Obama is a Muslim. This as prejudice against Muslims in America might be contributing to a charity gap toward flood victims in Pakistan.
And a bit later, while speaking with Ann Curry . . .
MITCHELL: We've been looking at incredible pictures, Ann, while you've been talking about this, of this flooding. Secretary Clinton, the State Department, has announced, is going to be announcing a Pakistan relief fund, and the hope I'm told is that that will somehow validate it for Americans. The incredible numbers are, in the early days of this disaster, only $50,000 was texted in for the Red Cross and other relief organizations to the State Department in answer to their appeal, in comparison to $34 million after the disaster in Haiti, which tells you that the prejudice against Pakistan is pretty profound.
ANN CURRY: Well, I think that's right. I think that part of that may also be that Americans, and people all around the world, given the state of the world today, are concerned that money given to these flood victims in Pakistan could end up in the hands of extremists, like the Taliban.
Getting schooled on hard-nosed realpolitik by Ann Curry? Ouch!
Let's summarize Andrea's view of her compatriots: Americans are a prejudiced lot, as proved by the fact that we haven't donated nearly as much to Pakistan as we did to Haiti—and its overwhelmingly black population. Got it.
