"Swift Boat Alumni"

Aunque más tarde que hace cuatro años, parece que algunos nombres conocidos del esfuerzo anti-kerry de 2004 comienzan a asomarse tímidamente a esta campaña. Nuevamente, la ayuda llega del bolsillo de algún exitoso bucanero de los negocios del Estado de la Estrella Solitaria, "el mejor y más grande de todos." Texas. Group With Swift Boat Alumni Readies Ads Attacking Obama

(...) A new group financed by a Texas billionaire and organized by some of the same political operatives and donors behind the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against Sen. John F. Kerry in 2004 plans to begin running television ads attacking Barack Obama, a signal that outside groups may play a larger role than anticipated in the closing days of the presidential race.

The American Issues Project has amassed a multimillion-dollar fund, and the group is putting the final touches on an eleventh-hour campaign targeting the Democratic presidential nominee, sources said.

(...) AIP emerged on the scene in August, airing controversial anti-Obama ads in four battleground states -- Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan -- that sought to raise questions about his ties to William Ayers, a member of the Vietnam War-era radical group known as the Weathermen. The ad was sponsored entirely -- at a cost of more than $2 million -- by Harold Simmons, a Dallas-based businessman who also helped fund the Swift boat activities four years ago.

The new group was launched by Chris LaCivita, who was intimately involved in the Swift boat campaign, and Tony Feather, one of the co-founders of Progress for America, which spent tens of millions backing Bush in 2004.

According to sources familiar with AIP, it has secured significant financial backing from a handful of major donors and is planning more ads like the Ayers commercial in the weeks between now and Election Day. (...)