Anti-Clinton Ad Puts Spotlight on Obama

WASHINGTON -- The Internet video sensation that targeted Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton now has rival Sen. Barack Obama on the spot.

Heralded by many as the embodiment of Web-driven citizen activism, the mysterious YouTube ad now stands revealed as the work of a Democratic operative employed by a consulting firm with Obama links.

"It's true ... yeah, it's me," said Philip de Vellis, a 33-year-old strategist with Blue State Digital, a Washington company that advises Democratic candidates and liberal groups.

Blue State helped design Obama's Web site, and one of the firm's founding members, Joe Rospars, took a leave from the company to work as Obama's director of new media.

Obama, Blue State and de Vellis all say de Vellis acted on his own. De Vellis left the company on Wednesday. He said he resigned; Thomas Gensemer, the firm's managing director, said he was fired.

The entire episode hangs a cloud over the Obama camp.

Since he arrived on the national political scene, Obama has won convert after convert with a vow to rise above the bare-knuckle fray of politics.

However tenuous, any link to the ad, with its Orwellian image of Clinton as Big Brother, raises questions the Obama camp would rather not face.

In a statement, the Obama campaign said it "had no knowledge and had nothing to do with the creation of the ad."

"Blue State Digital has separated ties with this individual and we have been assured he did no work on our campaign's account," it added.

In what was apparently a widely disseminated e-mail last month, de Vellis asked acquaintances to join the My.BarackObama.com network. In it, he wrote: "I designed the MyBarackObama toolbox that is on the front page and all the sidebar pages."

Thomas Gensemer, Blue State Digital's managing director, said that simply meant de Vellis had worked on the generic software that Blue State is making available to clients, including the Obama campaign.