*Sen. Barack Obama made it clear to Republicans that his wife, Michelle, is off limits when it comes to attack ads.

      During an interview on "Good Morning America," the wife of the Democratic presidential candidate was asked about an ad from a GOP Internet campaign in Tennessee featuring Michelle Obama's comments "for the first time in my adult life, I am proud of my country."

      Her husband said, "Let me just interject on this," and proceeded to call the GOP tactic "low class" and "detestable." The Illinois senator told "Good Morning America" that he expects hardball tactics from the Republicans if he becomes the Democratic presidential nominee.

      "But I also think these folks should lay off my wife," he told "GMA" as his wife chuckled beside him.

      "The GOP, should I be the nominee, I think can say whatever they want to say about me, my track record," Obama continued. "I've been in public life for 20 years. I expect them to pore through everything that I've said, every utterance, every statement. And to paint it in the most undesirable light possible. That's what they do."

      "But I do want to say this to the GOP. If they think that they're going to try to make Michelle an issue in this campaign, they should be careful. Because that I find unacceptable," he said.

      Obama praised his wife's patriotism and said that for Republicans "to try to distort or to play snippets of her remarks in ways that are unflattering to her I think is just low class ... and especially for people who purport to be promoters of family values, who claim that they are protectors of the values and ideals and the decency of the American people to start attacking my wife in a political campaign I think is detestable."

      Obama later added, "I think that the American people also would like to see some restoration of decency to this process. And when you start attacking family members, there's a lack of decency there."