The Progressive Change Campaign Committee asked a few New York comedians, including bloggers Lee Camp and Baratunde Thurston, to deliver to CNBC headquarters a petition with 20,000 signatures asking them to clean up their act and actually try to hold Wall Street accountable, instead of acting as the delivery system for their own public relations efforts.

HuffPo's Sam Stein:

Since the launch of FixCNBC.com, the network has, in fact, made several programming changes. Former DNC Chair Howard Dean was brought on as a regular commentator, and Huffington Post editor-in-chief Arianna Huffington guest hosted CNBC's morning show Squawk Box last week.

"Too often, groups put up online 'petitions' that aren't tied to any larger campaign," Green said of the FixCNBC.com letter. "We wanted to make sure CNBC truly received the message that people want them to do journalism that holds Wall Street accountable. And now we'll focus the energy of over 20,000 people on electing bold progressives to Congress -- candidates who will hold Wall Street accountable."

FixCNBC.com is still accepting signatures...if you haven't signed it yet, please join our campaign. And if you're able in this troubled economy, ActBlue is taking donations to make sure that CNBC hears our voices.

Remember the progressive campaign slogan many bloggers used last year, "More and Better Democrats?" Somewhere along the line we stopped worrying too much about the "more"-- and allowed the DCCC to work on their own to elect Blue Dogs and reactionaries like Bobby Bright, Parker Griffith and Walt Minnick-- while we concentrated on the "better." Candidates we asked C&L readers to help out last year-- like Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH), Alan Grayson (D-FL), Donna Edwards (D-MD), Eric Massa (D-NY), Jared Polis (D-CO), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Jim Himes (D-CT), Steve Cohen (D-TN), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Hilda Solis (D-CA)-- have gone to DC and worked hard on a progressive agenda that recognizes the aspirations of working families rather than the special interests that dominate most of the Inside-the-Beltway politics -- on both sides of the aisle.

Today we're proud to have a guest at C&L who has embodied in his political career, the whole idea of "better Democrats," Florida state Senator Dan Gelber. Saturday we took a look at Dan and the race to win the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Mel Martinez. Today, please join us in the comments section to meet Dan and ask him the kinds of questions that you would like answered by someone running high office. And, please, if you like what you hear, consider donating to his campaign at our ActBlue page.

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Tom Geoghegan was on Fox News with Greg Jarrett yesterday, talking about the lawsuit he's filed to force a special election to fill Barack Obama's Senate seat and force Roland Burris to stand aside:

If the General Assembly or the U.S. Senate Ethics Committee isn’t prepared to unseat Sen. Roland Burris, labor lawyer and 5th Congressional District candidate Tom Geoghegan is ready to take on the fight.

At a press conference at the Dirksen Federal Building this morning, Geoghegan -- along with co-counsels Scott Frankel, Rob Cohen, and former alderman Marty Oberman -- announced that he has filed a suit in federal court against the state of Illinois and Gov. Pat Quinn seeking a special election for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama.

The plaintiffs claim that neither former Gov. Rod Blagojevich nor Quinn issued a “writ of elections to fill senate vacancies” as required by the 17th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Currently, Illinois follows a legal proviso in the amendment that allows the governor to “make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislatures may direct.” Geogeghan and his colleagues are not suggesting that Burris’ appointment was illegal—rather, it represents a temporary placeholder until the state could marshal the resources to hold a statewide election. (Geogeghan first laid out this argument in a New York Times op-ed published a few days after Burris’ appointment in January.)

Speaking to a large assembling of reporters, Geoghegan outlined three purposes for the suit: to “end the embarrassing stalemate” that is the Blagojevich-Burris charade, to establish rules so the people can vote for their elected officials, and to assure that the government is conducted by the rule of law. “This is why I went to law school” he said. “And the Constitution exists to make sure the democratic rights of the people are secured.”

Jarrett worries that whatever publicity gains Geoghegan might be making with this suit may well be offset by more mundane considerations:

Jarrett: Let me get one more in here because we're running out of time. There's a group of African American aldermen, they're vowing to help black voters punish any politician who seeks to remove Burris. That would include you. Does that strike you as a racially motivated threat?

Geoghegan: Greg, I am a labor lawyer, and I also bring civil-rights cases. I'm a civil-rights lawyer. My view is that both white and black and all citizens of the state of Illinois want to stop political corruption. That's the issue here. It's not a matter of race, it's a matter of enforcing the people's right to vote.

You know, if we want the right to recall elected officials, we at least ought to have the right to elect our senators directly.

Jarrett: Well, Tom, these black aldermen are going to come after you. You know that, because you're trying to get rid of Roland Burris, albeit in a very, very legal way. And they're going to come after you.

This seems overheated to me, but then, I'm not from Chicago. In the meantime, it never hurts to go help out progressive heroes like Geoghegan.

Reader B: "I was at the Jefferson Jackson Bailey dinner on Thursday 3/30, and Joe Shh-ed the crowd 4 times. It reminded me a lot of Dr. Evil, so I made this short video."
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We're doing really good on the Act Blue page I recently started.

Keep the donations coming for Ned Lamont and Francine Busby if you can.

You thought Lieberman was the only one jumping for joy at the SOTU as Kos reports.

"For the speech Tuesday, Mr. Cuellar positioned himself along the president's route and grabbed a seat on the Republican side of the aisle. Custom dictates that the Democrats stay to the speaker's right and Republicans to the left, making it easier to gauge party-line splits on applause lines."

Atrios has a lot more information up on this story. Suffice to say is that Cuellar needs to go and fast.

Use Act Blue for Ciro D. Rodriguez

Lieberman under 50 against Lamont

Lamont is doing great for a guy nobody has heard of...

I started an Act Blue donation page for C&L

(Update): Matt Stoller met with Lamont

Check out the new ad for Ciro. I also have it in Spanish as well. Here's his website. More kissy pictures of Cuellar with Bush are here.

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