Corn , soybeans, oil and---CASH are "fungible". That is why the Chamber or Commerce's "explanation"

[Atticus]

as to how they have "procedures" and "practices" in place to insure that no foreign money is used in their attack ads against Democrats is embarrassingly bogus. It doesn't embarrass THEM because they are incapable of that, but it embarrasses ME because that caliber of ignorance is shameful. This is America and we should be beyond such---is it ignorance or mendacity?

A product or resource is "fungible" when one unit of it is indistinguishable from any other unit of it. One grain of corn is essentially identical to all others in the bin. The same indistinguishability exists between individual soybeans, individual drops or barrels of oil, and dollars. See: http://www.answers.com/topic/fungible

When dollars from, say, China are collected by the Chamber of Commerce and mingled with other dollars collected elsewhere, they are "commingled", i.e., incapable of any rational identification as to which is which or where a particular dollar came from. Since the Chamber funds their attack ads against Democrats---to the tune of $75 million---from the "general fund" where these foreign dollars are deposited, it is impossible for them to say that foreign money was somehow "kept separate" or "tracked".

When folks like the Chamber of Commerce and Karl Rove are reduced to "Trust us" and "How dare you suggest we are doing something improper!", you can bet your sweet ass it's because they have their mammary in the Maytag and are scrambling for something to change the subject or distract the public.

This issue is understandable, simple, emotional and THEY have already voiced how innapropriate it is for a US politician to receive foreign funds. When the Bill Clinton campaign unknowingly received $100,000 from a Chinese source, the GOP smelled blood and demanded an investigation and prosecution EVEN THOUGH THE MONEY HAD BEEN RETURNED! http://home.earthlink.net/~mrnetwork/redmoney.html

"Foreign money", "funds from Communist China" and "What are they hiding?" are sound bites that should be used in ALL Democratic ads between now and November 2nd.

[pa28]

1. Where have I heard this argument before?

Oh yeah. It was the same line of reasoning banks paraded around over taxpayer subsidized seven figure bonuses during the financial crisis.

They contended the million dollar internal handouts falling like confetti were "different money" even though the major financial institutions were bankrupt otherwise.

BTW way to go in keeping up the attack. This story could take from now until election day to unravel and the chamber of commerce might be just the beginning.

[tsuki]

2. I tried "fungible" on a couple of Republicons around here. Wasn't

happening. And the explanation took too long. Started using the joint bank account analogy. Works a lot better.

[Hannah Bell]

3. CofC = treasonous organization serving international capital.

and i will say the same about the supreme court's "citizens united" decision.