Jessica Crabtree

Countdown’s Keith Olberman urges viewers to donate to the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Emergency Assistance Fund to aid those affected by a snowstorm on the reservation last week.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

And from the next night’s show:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Reservation

Indian Country Today: Winter Disaster Across Native America

USA Today: Storm Disaster for Sioux Flies Under compassion radar

No photos or video of sweet suffering faces. No popular vacation landscape for a backdrop. No personal connective ties. Are those the reasons the natural disaster in the Great Plains has gone below our philanthropy radar?

How many of us knew anything about the massive winter storms that have left the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation without power or water or heat for nearly two weeks? (Yes, I know many reading this are on the East Coast, like me, nervously wondering if today’s latest blizzard will knock out our power. But we have resources that tribal people with 80% unemployment in the remote plains simply don’t.)

USA TODAY carried a story nine days ago but, like most media focused on millions suffering in Haiti, we didn’t keep an eye on Native American who are still as freezing, isolated, and miserably unsafe now as then.

Outraged Keith Olbermann is now raising funds at MSNBC for the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Storm Relief–Emergency Assistance Fund.