Democrats have had a good month (Bolton, Clean Skies, DeLay, Social Security, and especially the culture war backlash), and this article from The Hill shows that the good times might continue to roll:Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) [Editor's note, R-VA)], a leading advocate of the "nuclear option" to end the Democrats' filibuster of judicial nominees, is privately arguing for a delay in the face of adverse internal party polls.

Details of the polling numbers remain under wraps, but Santorum and other Senate sources concede that, while a majority of Americans oppose the filibuster, the figures show that most also accept the Democratic message that Republicans are trying to destroy the tradition of debate in the Senate.

The Republicans are keeping the "nuclear" poll numbers secret, whereas they have often in the past been keen to release internal survey results that favor the party. David Winston, head of the Winston Group, which conducts Senate GOP polls, did return phone calls seeking comment.

Confirming public disquiet over the "nuclear" or "constitutional" option, Santorum said, "Our polling shows that." But, he added, public thinking had been muddied by what he called false Democratic arguments that checks and balances were being eroded.

"People see checks and balances as Democrats checking Republicans, not the legislative checking the executive or the judiciary checking the legislative," Santorum said.

So it would appear that Democrats will begin the public phase of this battle with an edge. Also, the last sentence indicates to me that Demcorats should strongly consider a slight alteration in their frame, moving from "abuse of power," to "right-wing power grab." If the public views checks and balances in terms of Democrats balancing Republicans and vice versa, then the major problem the public has with the nuclear option would appear to be that they view it as a right-wing power grab. Still, we need to say it in order for the country to continue to think that way, and in order to reap political gain from the situation.

The article goes on to state that conservative activists had previously been told to prepare for the nuclear option fight next week, but now Santorum is advising against such a plan. The main reason is that the extremity of the long running Republican backlash narrative against judges (and lawyers), has recently become the focus of public attention. This has made the public extremely suspicious of any conservative action against the judiciary:

GOP aides said Santorum has made known to the leadership reasons for why Republicans should not move forward on the nuclear or constitutional option.

He was concerned that too many things are competing in the same area and you couldn't get a clean shot at it," a GOP aide said. The aide cited the "fallout" from congressional Republicans' intervening in a Florida court's decision to remove Terri Schiavo's feeding tube and the subsequent controversy caused by House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's (R-Texas) statement that "the time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior."

Democrats portrayed that statement as an incitement against judges, and it resulted in a spate of media critiques of DeLay and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who made a speech on the Senate floor raising the question of why judges are targets of violence.

Senate and House Democrats have woven the Republican intervention in the Schiavo issue, DeLay's statement about judges who declined to save her life, and GOP consideration of the nuclear option into a broad message that Republicans are abusing power.

Hey, Democrats did not weave anything. This anti-judiciary narrative has been a staple of the conservative movement since the 1950's. All Democrats have done is finally reveal one of the ugliest underbellies of the conservative movement to the public. If only we had a Noise Machine large enough to reveal the entire thing.