IE 'null' is null or not an object

IE 7 & 8 come up with the same error "'null' is null or not an object" when using this module. I've narrowed it down to whatever happens on line 103 of jquery.swfembed.js in both 6x-1.x-dev and 6x-1.4

$(this).html(obj);

The this variable is of course initialized, and obj is a valid string. I'm using JQuery 1.3.2.

What could be going on when adding the object to the DOM?

The $swf variable is initialized like below with the various PHP variables containing correct values. A simple theme call is used to display the flash player.

  $swf = new SWFObject('http://player.ooyala.com/player.swf?embedCode=' . $embed_code . '&version=2');
  $swf->param('allowFullScreen', 'true')
    ->param('type','application/x-shockwave-flash')
    ->param('movie','http://player.ooyala.com/player.swf?embedCode=' . $embed_code . '&version=2')
    ->param('bgcolor','#000000')
    ->param('allowScriptAccess','always')
    ->param('allowFullScreen','true')
    ->param('wmode','transparent')
    ->flashVar('maintainAspectRation', 'true')
    ->flashVar('loop', 'false')
    ->flashVar('play', 'true')
    ->flashVar('embedCode', $embed_code)
    ->flashVar('pluginspage', 'http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer')
    ->flashVar('wmode', 'transparent')
    ->height($height)
    ->width($width)
    ->noFlash('<noscript>
      <object classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" id="ooyalaPlayer_6zg0j_gnw0k6wg" width="' . $width . '" height="' . $height . '" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/get/flashplayer/current/swflash.cab">
        <param name="movie" value="http://player.ooyala.com/player.swf?embedCode=' . $embed_code . '&version=2" />
        <param name="bgcolor" value="#000000" />
        <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" />
        <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" />
        <param name="flashvars" value="embedType=directObjectTag&embedCode=' . $embed_code . '" />
        <param name="wmode" value="transparent" />
        <embed src="http://player.ooyala.com/player.swf?embedCode=' . $embed_code . '&version=2" 
          bgcolor="#000000" width="' . $width . '" height="' . $height . '" name="ooyalaPlayer_6zg0j_gnw0k6wg" align="middle" 
          play="true" loop="false" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" 
          type="application/x-shockwave-flash" flashvars="&embedCode=' . $embed_code . '" 
          pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer" wmode="transparent">
        </embed>
      </object>
    </noscript>')
    ->minimumVersion('9.0.28');