The question was provocative, and a good sound bite. In other words, vintage Lindsey Graham.

It came in a packed Capitol hearing room Tuesday as South Carolina's junior senator questioned Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, among the first to document the growing scandal involving abuse of Iraqi prisoners.

"Saddam Hussein is in our control," Graham said. "How would you feel if we sic dogs on him tomorrow?"

"...Sir, we still have to follow the tenants of international law," Taguba replied

"...I am so proud of you," Graham said. "What are we fighting for ... To be like Saddam Hussein?"

Less than 18 months into his first term, the GOP senator has grabbed the spotlight during the inquiry into prisoner abuse.

Sunday he was on NBC's "Meet the Press" with retired Army Gen. Wesley Clark. Tuesday he appeared on the Fox network's "O'Reilly Factor." His questioning of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others as a member of the Armed Services Committee has landed him on news reports across the country.

Graham, 48, elected in 2002 to replace Strom Thurmond, commands attention in part because of his experience in military law.

After graduating from the University of South Carolina law school, he served in the Air Force for six and half years as both a defense lawyer and prosecutor. His defense of a pilot on a drug charge 20 years ago put him on "60 Minutes" and helped expose widespread flaws in the Air Force's drug-testing system.

The only senator in the National Guard or Reserves, he's an Air Force Reserve colonel and reserve judge on the service's Court of Criminal Appeals.

"It's important to me being a military lawyer that people have faith in our military justice system," he told the Observer Tuesday. "I want to show the world that there is a difference between a democracy and a dictatorship."

Neal Thigpen, a political scientist at Francis Marion University in Florence, S.C., said Graham always has been "somebody that the talk show people and public affairs forums have been after."

"He's a right smart little fellow," Thigpen said. "He always says something that's intelligent. He acquits himself very well."

One reason: Graham's plainspoken directness.

"What do you say to those people calling for your resignation?" he asked Rumsfeld last week.

It was the style he showed years ago as one of the House managers of President Clinton's impeachment.

"Where I come from a man who calls someone up at 2:30 in the morning is up to no good," he said at the time.

Critics say Graham loves to grandstand. Supporters say he just puts things in terms people understand.

"He has a particular gift for boiling or distilling ideas or concepts down," said S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford, a Republican who served with Graham in the House. "That's very powerful in this age of information clutter, that ability to boil things down to the core."

Like Sen. John McCain, the Arizona Republican whose presidential campaign he backed in 2000, Graham cultivates an independent streak.

In 1997, he helped organize the overthrow of GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich. Last week he chided Vice President Dick Cheney for saying that people should get off the back of Rumsfeld. He's broken with the administration on several issues, and last year was one of nine Republicans who voted against a prescription drug benefit bill sought by President Bush.

Last year he even co-sponsored a bill with Sen. Hillary Clinton, the New York Democrat whose husband he once tried to impeach.

"One of the things that is appealing about him is that he's so independent," said Thigpen. "He is anything but a rubber stamp for the administration."

Getting to the bottom of the mess, Graham said, may mean going toward the top.

"It would be a sad day for me if only privates and sergeants were held accountable," he said in an interview. "There was command failure. ... There was certainly a lack of discipline and we need to look up the chain at people who had a responsibility to not make this happen."

Or, as he recalled his earlier experience as a defense lawyer, "It was my job to fight and question the system," he told one reporter this week.