to find "ar" but if it cannot be found sets AR=false.  This
leads to confusing failures during the build rather than at
configure time.

We have our own checks for ar, but as AR was already set
earlier by the libtool tests they were never exectuted.

Therefore, update the tests so that we catch any libtool
failures, and run AC_CHECK_PROG explicitly to ensure that we
see sensible output from configure prior to any potential
failure.