Last week, the Center for American Progress Action Fund's Think Progress revealed that partisan attack ads from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are funded in part by foreign corporations seeking to influence America's midterm elections. Their report clearly ruffled some feathers.

At first, the Chamber attempted to deflect from the story by attempting to discredit Think Progress through talk radio-esque attacks on George Soros. Seeing that wasn't working, the Chamber's spokespeople decided to ignore large parts of the allegations, instead focusing on the role of “AmChams,” overseas business councils.

Examining the charges, the New York Times fell for the Chamber's line, writing:

[The Chamber's chief lobbyist Bruce] Josten said the Chamber of Commerce had 115 foreign member affiliates in 108 countries, who pay a total of less than $100,000 in membership dues that go into its general fund.

The group's total budget is more than $200 million, and Mr. Josten said the group had safeguards to segregate the small fraction generated overseas from other accounts to comply with federal law and avoid bleeding into political spending.

But these AmChams are but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to foreign money lining the Chamber's pockets. As Think Progress' Faiz Shakir noted:

In a statement provided to Sargent, the Chamber reveals that foreign-based “AmChams pay nominal dues to the Chamber -- approximately $100,000 total across all 115 AmChams.” But “AmChams” are only a small piece of the puzzle.

Most of the Chamber's foreign sources of funds come from large multi-national corporations who are headquartered abroad, like BP and Siemens. Direct contributions from foreign firms also are accepted under the auspices of the Chamber's “Business Councils” located in various foreign countries.

Rather than letting the Chamber of Commerce get away with the ol' AmCham straw man argument, the New York Times should push past the spin and get to the truth. As the “paper of record,” it has a responsibility to tell Americans who is behind the Chamber's efforts to defeat progressive candidates.

The always-helpful Shakir went ahead and posted some readymade questions for journalists to pose to the Chamber:

1) How many foreign sources of funding does the Chamber have? The Washington Post's Greg Sargent received this statement from a Chamber spokeswoman: "[Of] the Chamber's 300,000 members, a relative handful are non-U.S. based companies." How many is a “relatively handful,” and how much do they contribute?

2) Are the foreign funds being directed into the same general account that is used to pay for partisan attack ads? Again, the Post's Greg Sargent pressed on this point. The Chamber, which is running more than $10 million in political advertising just this week (the largest expenditure in one week by an outside group), said, “We are not obligated to discuss our internal accounting procedures.”