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One has to wonder if this was a case of incompetence or fabrication.
When asked why she didn't just hang up the phone, Mogahed, demonstrating further ignorance about the availability of data in the age of the Internet (apparently, she's never heard of YouTube,) said:
"I assumed that very few people would watch this show but that doing something more dramatic would bring more attention."
But it was Mogahed's tepid response to and, at times, backhanded support for the objectionable opinions expressed on the show that brought attention.
To explain her reticence to speak out against such radicalism, Mogahed had another handy justification:
"As an analyst, I don't engage in ideological debates. I am always on programs to explain the views and opinions of others—in this case, Muslims around the world—not to discuss my own views. Being on a program with people who are representing ideological movements puts an analyst in a very awkward position, where they are unable to respond to objectionable comments because of the limits of our role as analysts."
This is unconvincing. What are analysts for other than to analyze what is said in discussions of which they are part? Was she invited on the show in order to "not discuss [her] own views"? In fact, she had plenty of opportunities to rebut the extremist statements of those with whom she appeared, or at least to state for the record that she—particularly as Obama's Muslim affairs advisor—disagreed. Yet she chose to remain silent. In doing so, she missed a monumental opportunity to publicly condemn Islamist ideology. Perhaps that was the point.
As for Mogahed's own endorsements of sharia law—delivered, she claimed, as the will of billions of surveyed Muslim women, not her own—she had only this to say:
"I don't feel that I have regrets about what I said. I did a fair job of reporting the data. My one regret is appearing on the show to begin with."
It's a little late for that.