• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, November 8, 2011

Yahoo and ABC News Tuesday kicked off expanded political coverage online leading up to the 2012 election starting with interviews of the Republican presidential candidates on the eve of the Michigan debate. Yahoo’s yearlong election program includes “Remake America,” an original Web show debuting in early 2012 that focusing on the real-life experiences of eight American families dealing with economic issues.

Yahoo News will also feature increased opportunity for social interaction across election-related content, beefed-up original reporting from its team of political correspondents and expert analysis from other established writers across the political spectrum. Yahoo is also launching a blog called “The Signal” providing up-to-the minute political predictions and opinion including looking at how other political news and economic and financial indicators might impact the elections. A beta version of the blog debuted today.

Yahoo and ABC News last month announced a deeper content-sharing partnership that includes co-branded Web programming that runs on both Yahoo News and the ABC News sites. The two entities have had a video-sharing arrangement since 2005.