Here's one of the saddest commentaries on the state of politics we've seen in a long time: State Senate leaders are refusing to revive legislation to extend federal jobless benefits to the long-term unemployed because of political reasons. That's beyond indecent, but Republicans running the state Senate don't seem to understand that.

Perhaps it's due to their inexperience in running a major segment of state government that they're willing to prolong the misery of N.C. citizens over a transparent and hollow ideological gambit. They are more interested in trumping the governor and boxing her into a budget corner than they are in helping those who the soured economy has left behind. If they believe voters sent them to Raleigh to block help for those suffering from the prolonged economic downturn and reluctant recovery, they've missed the lessons of the 2010 election: Voters care a lot less about ideology and a lot more about getting the job done.

It's important to remember what this impasse is all about. Several weeks ago, legislators of both political parties were alarmed when state officials informed them on short notice that extended jobless benefits for as many as 37,000 North Carolinians would expire without quick legislative action. Legislators moved fast - but Republican leaders saw an opportunity to keep Gov. Bev Perdue from possibly vetoing a state budget bill if she doesn't like the deep cuts the GOP is pushing in the 2011-12 state budget. They added a continuing resolution to the jobless benefits bill that would keep state government funded next year at a rate of 87 percent of what the governor had proposed in her budget if the governor vetoes the budget bill now moving through the legislature. Evidently they thought she'd cave in and sign the bill.

She didn't, and properly so. The legislature's heavy-handed attempt to keep the governor's hands off the budget - and stop her from vetoing a bill that would damage public schools and universities - is ill-timed and ill-considered.

Perdue vetoed the bill. Ever since, Republicans have resisted renewing the legislation. Senate Republican leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, appears to be dug in on the issue, while House Speaker Thom Tillis, R-Mecklenburg, seems a bit more inclined to pass a bill.

Sen. Martin Nesbitt, the Democratic leader of the Senate, has been trying to pry the bill loose from a Senate committee, but that would require a two-thirds vote to pass - a difficult threshold.

But he has right on his side. As a hearing he organized last week indicates, many N.C. citizens are suffering because of the legislative impasse and they're distraught over lawmakers' inability to agree on benefits' extension. "They're good people and they're not deadbeats and they're not trying to beat the system," Nesbitt told N.C. Policywatch. "They're trying to survive."

The resistance to the unemployment benefits bill is mean-spirited, an example of the petty politics that drove voters to choose a new party to run the legislature last year. Polls have shown a majority of voters support extending the jobless benefits for those who qualify. Legislative opponents should reconsider - lest they find themselves unemployed after the next election.