DEAR ABBY: Perhaps the white settlers used the phrase "Indian giver" with each other when giving something they expected back, just as they knew that when their government gave land to the Indians, the government would eventually take it back.
The same could be said for "Indian" being used as a synonym for bogus or false, for the supposed valuables given to the Indians in trade were often things that had little or no value to the whites who had given them. With the passage of time, the victims were blamed with these false labels.
Make sense? I am not an Indian. -- SEEING RED IN SAN FRANCISCO