We don’t have much/any say in candidate recruitment. That job lies with the odious Chuck Schumer in the Senate and the fairly cool Chris Van Hollen in the House. But we do have the ability to support or withhold support from candidates, and we have the power to take sides in contested primaries. Maybe, one day, we’ll even have the cash and clout to select and fund our own candidates, but that day is still long off.

Here’s what I want to do. There are twenty races in the House where the incumbent is not running. Some of these have primaries and some don’t. I’d like to create profiles of all of these twenty races. I want to know all about the Democratic candidates.

How would they have voted on key votes like: FISA, the Military Detainee Act, the AUMF-Iraq, the Bankruptcy Bill, Webb’s troop rotation amendment, and the Iraq supplemental bills? If elected, do they plan to caucus with the progressives, the New Democrats, the Blue Dogs, some combination, or none at all? How much money have they raised? Do they have key endorsements. Etc.

To do this, I need volunteers. If you can select one of the twenty races (listed below the fold) and do a diary on everything you can find out about the candidates (look at their issues pages, for starters), that will create templates we can build on.

When we’re done, we can create an ActBlue page to support the candidates that best meet our criteria.

We also need a questionnaire that we can send to each campaign, so they can answer the questions we can’t suss out from public sources. Any one want to work on a questionnaire that has the key votes we’re interested in?

Use this thread for suggestions.

We’ve got to do something. Sitting around and bitching isn’t getting it done.

1. NY-21: D +8.7
· Incumbent: Mike McNulty (D) (retiring).
· Democratic candidates: Assembly Majority Leader Ron Canestrari, Senator Neil Breslin, Schenectady Mayor Brian Stratton (all news speculation).
· Republican candidates: Warren Redlich (2006 candidate)

2. CO-02: D +8.1

· Incumbent: Mark Udall (D) (running for Senate)
· Democratic candidates: Jared Polis, Joan Fitz-gerald, Will Shafroth.
· Republican candidates:

3. ME-01: D +6.4

· Incumbent: Tom Allen (D) (running for Senate)
· Democratic candidates: Chellie Pingree, Mark Lawrence, Ethan Strimling, Adam Cote.
· Republican candidates: Charlie Summers.

4. NJ-03: D +3.3
· Incumbent: Jim Saxton (R) (retiring)
· Democratic candidate: John Adler.
· Republican candidates:

5. NM-01: D +2.4
· Incumbent: Heather Wilson (R) (running for Senate)
· Democratic candidates: Martin Heinrich, John Adams.
· Republican candidates:

6. MN-03: R +0.5
· Incumbent: Jim Ramstad (R) (retiring)
· Democratic contenders: Terri Bonoff, Ashwin Madia.
· Republican candidate: state Rep. Erik Paulsen.

7. IL-11: R +1.1
· Incumbent: Jerry Waller (R) (retiring)
· Democratic contenders: Debbie Halvorson.
· Republican contenders: Jimmy Lee.

8. OH-15: R +1.1
· Incumbent: Deborah Pryce (R) (retiring)
· Democratic contender: Mary Jo Kilroy.
· Republican contender: state Sen. Steve Stivers. (media)

9. AZ-01: R +2.2
· Incumbent: Rick Renzi (R) (retiring)
· Democratic contenders: Howard Shanker, Ann Kirkpatrick, Mary Kim Titla.
· Republican candidates:

10. OH-16: R +3.6
· Incumbent: Ralph Regula (R) (retiring)
· Democratic contenders: John Boccieri.
· Republican contenders:

11. IL-14: R +4.8
· Incumbent: Dennis Hastert (R) (retiring)
· Democratic contenders: John Laesch, Jotham Stein, Bill Foster.
· Republican contenders: Chris Lauzen, Jim Oberweis, Kevin Burns.

12. IL-18: R +5.5
· Incumbent: Ray LaHood (R) (retiring)
· Democratic candidates: Dick Versace.
· Republican candidate: Aaron Schock.

13. NM-02: R +5.7
· Incumbent: Steve Pearce (R) (running for Senate)
· Democratic candidates: Bill McCamley.
· Republican candidates:

14. OH-07: R +6.0
· Incumbent: Dave Hobson (R) (retiring)
· Democratic contenders: William Conner, Dave Woolover.
· Republican contenders:

15. CA-52: R +9.3
· Incumbent: Duncan Hunter (R) (retiring, running for president)
· Democratic candidates: Mike Lumpkin, Jim Hester.
· Republican candidates: Duncan D. Hunter, Brian Jones, Ken King.

16. CO-06: R +10.0
· Incumbent: Tom Tancredo (R) (retiring, running for president)
· Democratic candidates: Mike Collins.
· Republican candidates: Secretary of State Mike Coffman, state Sens. Ted Harvey of Highlands Ranch and Tom Wiens of Castle Rock, and businessman Wil Armstrong, the son of former Sen. Bill Armstrong. (media.

17. OH-05: R +10.1 (special election, Dec. 11)
· Incumbent: vacant
· Democratic candidate: Robin Weirauch.
· Republican candidate: Bob Latta.

18. AL-02: R +13.1
· Incumbent: Terry Everett (R) (retiring)
· Democratic candidates: none
· Republican candidates: none

19. MS-03: R +14.1
· Incumbent: Chip Pickering (R) (retiring)
· Democratic candidates: none
· Republican candidates: none

20. WY-AL: R +19.4
· Incumbent: Barbara Cubin (R) (retiring)
· Democratic candidate: Gary Trauner.
· Republican candidates: Rep. Colin Simpson. (media).

Bonus: VA-01: R+9 (special election, Dec. 11th).
Incumbent: Vacant
· Democratic and Republican candidates will be selected tomorrow in party conventions.

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