Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul are complaining that CBS News deliberately snubbed them during last night’s debate:

The Bachmann campaign went so far as to release an email that they said spokeswoman Alice Stewart had “inadvertently received” from CBS earlier in the day.

In the email string, CBS News’ political analyst John Dickerson said that Bachmann was “not going to get many questions during the debate and she’s nearly off the charts,” a reference to the Minnesota congresswoman’s low standing in the polls.

After the debate Stewart said that CBS News was guilty of “a bias” against Bachmann. “I inadvertently received an email where CBS made it clear that Michele was going to receive fewer questions than the other candidates. Clearly this is a problem,” Stewart said. …

Afterwards CBS News spokeswoman Sonya McNair shrugged off the Bachmann flap, saying, “It was a candid exchange about the reality of the circumstances — Bachmann remains at 4 percent in the polls.”

Meanwhile, no one seems to have picked up on another egregious mistake by Bachmann, in what was supposed to be the “foreign policy” debate; apparently Bachmann believes Pakistan has only one nuclear weapon. Here’s what she said when asked about foreign aid to Pakistan:

I would not agree with that assessment to pull all foreign aid from Pakistan. I would reduce foreign aid to many, many countries. But there’s a problem, because Pakistan has a nuclear weapon. We have more— people affiliated with Al Qaeda closer to that nuclear bomb than in any nation.

In reality, Pakistan has about 100 nuclear weapons. If Bachmann was aware of that fact, why didn’t she say this:

Pakistan has nuclear weapons. We have more— people affiliated with Al Qaeda closer to those nuclear bombs than in any nation.

Was it just an odd way to phrase it, or a sign of real ignorance on a very important subject? After her many other gaffes and knowledge gaps, I’m not sure Bachmann deserves the benefit of the doubt here.