Anh Joseph Cao, a little-known 41-year-old community organizer and GOP attorney, knocked off nine-term Democratic Rep. William Jefferson in a stunning upset in Louisiana’s Second District to become the first Vietnamese American elected to Congress.

In recent years Jefferson has been fighting scandals and a federal indictment for money laundering, bribery and misusing his congressional office, which he denies. Last year the FBI reported finding $90,000 in marked bills in Jefferson’s freezer.

This is rare bi-partisan good news.  The Republicans get a member of Congress to add to the “R” side of the ledger and aisle and another vote on most issues, as well they get another victory which, combined with Saxby Chambliss’s thumping in the Georgia Senate run-off race, gives them cause to attempt with a straight face to say that the Republican Party is in absolutely splendid shape.  The Democrats get to be rid of a corrupt politician who was caught with $90K in a freezer — imagine yourself in Nancy Pelosi’s position in 2006 of having to place Jefferson in committee seats lest you rid an especially vulnerable constitutency (post Katrina New Orleans residents) which just re-elected him.  And, as 2010 is likely to be a year Republicans make electoral gains, this represents one number scratched off the “Republican gain” number — it’s a Congressional District where Democrats outnumber Republicans by 26 percent–, which may look good psychologically if, say, this Democratic pick-up is the difference between 10 Republican pick-ups and 9 or 20 and 19, or… you get the picture.

So… we are truly in a post-partisan political world.  And a good year for Community Organizers at that!

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