The alert went out earlier this week that the Obama attack ads were on the way to Michigan, well, they’re here, and they’re ugly.

Yesterday, a different right-wing smear group than the one mentioned in the link above, one called The American Issues Project (but one that also features persons behind the infamous Swift Boat ads of the ‘04 election), launched a full-fledged attack against Obama, pulling in every baseless lie and re-hashed false assertion in their playbook.

Not only that — it turns out the ad may be illegal. Campaign finance experts are weighing in about violations of election law. And the ad is so ridiculous that CNN and even Fox News have both refused to run it, although Fox News did in fact air the ad claiming it was a ‘mistake.’

This is exactly the kind of politics Barack Obama has said he is running to change.

Unfortunately, some TV stations in Michigan are running the ad right now, that try to link Obama to William Ayers, a radical activist in the 1960s.

John McCain claims he had nothing to do with this attack, but a former McCain consultant leads the so-called ‘third-party’ group behind these lies. An Obama spokesman, Tommy Vietor, responded to the ad:

“The fact that John McCain dispatched his paid consultant to launch this despicable ad from a so-called ‘independent’ committee shows how desperate he is to change the subject from his shocking disconnect with the economic struggles of the American people. He knows that Barack Obama has denounced the detestable crimes that Bill Ayers committed 40 years ago.

Instead of invoking Paris, Britney and obscure ’60s radicals as a means of character assassination, Sen. McCain should take the day off at one of his seven homes to consider whether his support for outsourcing, tax breaks for companies who ship jobs overseas and continued spending of $10 billion per month in Iraq is really putting “country first.”

The primary funder of the ads, Harold Simmons, is one of the main culprits behind the Swift Boating of John Kerry and a top bundler for John McCain. Christian Pinkston, the spokesman for the group also has ties to the Kerry Swift Boat attacks.

Simmons is also a backer of a controversial plan to store nuclear waste in West Texas, which his waste management company would administer.

The group running the ads is called the American Issues Project and they released the ad featured on their site in several key states, including Michigan. From the Web site, a statement about the group:

“The American Issues Project was founded to champion the conservative values that have made the United States of America a blessed nation: smaller government, a strong and ready national defense, lower taxes, and a government that encourages entrepreneurship and new job creation in America. We also know how critical it is for America to win the war against the radical Islamic extremists abroad so we do not have to fight them here on American soil.”

Michigan TV stations airing the ad:

WGTU-TV, Traverse City-Cadillac

WPBN-TV, Traverse City-Cadillac

WWTV-TV, Traverse City-Cadillac

WHTV-TV, Lansing

WILX-TV, Lansing

WLAJ-TV, Lansing

WLNS-TV, Lansing

WSYM-TV, Lansing