Hillary’s on top (currently leading the polls at 43 percent), the kids love Bernie (he’s reached a million online donors faster than any candidate ever before), and Joe Biden is playing coy. But with the first 2016 Democratic debates just hours away, one question remains: Who the hell are those other guys?

With Larry Lessig left out for essentially being presumed a troll, that still leaves Martin O’Malley, Jim Webb, and Lincoln Chafee—all names you may very well be reading for the very first time. So let’s give these generally forgettable figures the spotlight for once, and learn a little about exactly who it is we’ll be spending our time with this evening. Here are our white-haired, besuited extras in the Bernie and Hillary Las Vegas Showdown.

Martin O’Malley

Currently polling at 0.4 percent, the most notable thing about nondescript white man Martin O’Malley is that, as a generic Democrat with no real discernible weakness (yet!), he’s the establishment fallback in the event that Hillary finally crumbles. (Except that he can’t even build a base of support as the anybody-but-Hillary candidate, so the Democrats may need a fallback to the fallback.) O’Malley is a former governor of Maryland, a gay-marriage pioneer, and the former lead guitarist of Celtic rock group O’Malley’s March.

But O’Malley boasts more than just rock chops—as a governor for eight years and a mayor for eight more, he certainly has the most executive experience on stage tonight. He also benefits from the fact that he vast majority of people have absolutely no idea who he is. In other words, if he can come out Celtic harp (he is also a major proponent of gun control) blazin’, he may see a Carly Fiorina-esque (media-assisted) “bump.”

Jim Webb

Coming in at a hearty 0.9%, Jim Webb actually hasn’t actually been a Democrat for all that long. Before 2006, he was a (sorta left-of-center) Republican who switched sides to (successfully) take on Republican Senator George Allen for the Virginia Senate seat. He’s also the only combat vet (Webb fought as a Marine in Vietnam) in the entire current presidential field, a best-selling novelist, and, uh, a staunch defender of the Confederate Flag, writing on Facebook:

But we should also remember that honorable Americans fought on both sides in the Civil War, including slave holders in the Union Army from states such as Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland and Delaware, and that many non-slave holders fought for the South. It was in recognition of the character of soldiers on both sides that the federal government authorized the construction of the Confederate Memorial 100 years ago, on the grounds of Arlington National Cemetery.

Sure, Jim!

Conservative leanings and racist sympathies aside, the most notable thing about Jim Webb is that, despite his appearance tonight, no one’s totally sure that the man is actually running for president. Mother Jones even went on a quest this past week to find out, writing that “calls to Webb’s campaign headquarters (listed as a post office box) brought me to three different voicemail boxes, and a message wasn’t returned.”

Lincoln Chaffee

Ranking in last place at a relatively depressing 0.3%, Lincoln Chafee is just glad to be invited. Coming from a long line of Republican politicians, Chafee himself served as Republican in local government as the mayor of Warwick, Rhode Island, and later as a Republican senator from that state. He finally left the GOP in 2007 before serving a single term as Governor of Rhode Island, for which he ran as an independent. Ideologically, though, Chafee is the most libertarian-leaning dem on stage.

Chafee is probably going to lean heavily on the fact that he was the only Republican senator to vote against going into Iraq—something Hillary certainly can’t say and a fact that Chafee loves to remind her of. But despite his Republican (and independent) past, Chafee has been a huge supporter of Obama, voting for him in both elections.

More important than all this, though, is the fact that he attended Montana State University’s Horseshoeing School, later working as a blacksmith at racetracks all over the United States. A vote for Lincoln Chafee is a vote for blacksmiths.

Joe Biden’s Spare Podium

Never to be used, never to be forgotten.

Contact the author at ashley@gawker.com. Images via AP. GIF by Jay Hathaway.