Here’s a surprise: Democratic Congressman Brian Baird of the 3rd district of Washington has announced he is going to retire and not run for reelection in 2010.

Baird has been something of a free spirit among congressional Democrats. Although he voted against the Iraq war resolution in 2003, he returned from a trip to Iraq in 2007 and announced he supported George W. Bush’s surge strategy. He was the lead Democrat in supporting changes in the law and Constitution to provide for continuity in government in the event large numbers of House members were killed in a terrorist attack (the problem is that House vacancies under the Constitution can be filled only by special elections, which take time, and in the absence of a quorum of half its members the House cannot act). Recently he voted against the House Democrats’ health care bill.