Graham's bipartisan edge

South Carolina's senior U.S. senator has repeatedly paid a political price for his efforts to act in a bipartisan manner. Lindsey Graham is roundly criticized in some Republican circles for trying to build bridges to the Obama administration on key issues of energy policy, immigration and Guantanamo. His recent decision to blow the whistle on partisan maneuvering by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., shows that the benefits of cooperating across the Senate aisle include being able to say no when it counts.

Sen. Graham announced last weekend that he was withdrawing his critical support for energy legislation because Sen. Reid had gone back on his promise to give it a green light for debate this week. Instead, Sen. Reid, who faces a tough re-election battle in a state that is 15 percent Hispanic, announced he would give immigration reform a higher priority.

The launch for the energy bill, which had wide-ranging support from the energy industry, was cancelled, not rescheduled.

Instead, President Barack Obama came out with a video rallying his base of "young people, African-Americans, Latinos, and women, who powered our victory in 2008," calling on them to turn out for the 2010 legislative elections.

It is understandable that Democratic leaders are trying to recover popular support after forcing through an unpopular health care reform law. But it is dishonest of them to try to label Republicans as obstructionist when promises are broken and their views are repeatedly ignored.

Sen. Reid has manuevered Republican senators into filibustering bill after bill by blocking their efforts to have input. This week, he has forced unnecessary votes on bringing up financial reform legislation prematurely just so he could have another filibuster to cite for political gain.

The majority leader's move to put immigration legislation at the top of the Senate agenda is more of the same. The subject divides his own party, and a reform bill has no hope of passage without a careful bipartisan approach.

But Sen. Reid can still use the melodrama of cloture votes to paint the GOP as obstructionist. Sen. Graham is absolutely right to call him out on this.

President Obama should also be leery. The decision to trash a bipartisan energy bill has already evoked strong disappointment in the environmental community. Sen. Reid's manipulation of the Senate calendar and his transparent hypocrisy are more liable to turn away the new voters who backed Mr. Obama than to energize them.

And Sen. Graham, thanks to his hard-earned reputation for bipartisan cooperation, has considerable credibility in criticizing Sen. Reid's divisive decision to escalate the immigration debate at the expense of the energy bill.