A close watcher of these judicial fights e-mails re: that Hill piece:

Let’s leave aside for a moment the language battle that is already lost (the term “nuclear option,” which we are now futilely trying to re-label “constitutional option” because the former term is so damaging to the cause, was evidently coined by a Republican — Trent Lott). Check out this paragraph on the disagreement b/w Specter and Frist:
“One strategist said Specter was ‘at odds’ with Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) on the order in which the committee, and possibly the Senate, would take up nominees. ‘If you put out the “wrong” nominee first — one where the Democrats are more comfortable compromising — and they do get a vote and confirm, that would take some of the energy out of the filibuster-reform movement,’ the strategist said.”
Where do we get these “strategists”? This strategy has already been tried and failed miserably.
You may recall that at the very start of his first term, POTUS nominated
about 11 candidates for the Circuit Courts of Appeals, including Miguel
Estrada and a number of the others who have since been blocked and
filibustered for 4 years. To my shock at the time, one of the original
11 was Barrington D. Parker Jr. — a liberal Democrat who had been
appointed to the bench by Clinton in 1993. The idea (which never had a
prayer of working in practice) was that by extending the reasonable hand
of bipartisan compromise and picking a Democrat who would sail through,
POTUS would ease the way for candidates like Estrada. HAH! Parker did
sail through (you may recall him as the author of the 2d Circuit opinion
way back when that ruled the detention of Jose Padilla was
unconstitutional), and almost everyone else got stymied.
These “strategists” are blinking reality — the Dems don’t consider one nomination as having anything to do with the next one. If they let an uncontroversial one (because he’s/she’s a non-conservative) it’s not gonna have the slightest effect on their determination to block the next conservative nominee. All the “strategists” are thus doing here is helping the Dems make a phony public record that they are not obstructionists while not doing a single thing to advance the cause of getting good conservative judges on the bench. If we’re gonna have that fight, we ought to have it while the public is paying attention — not 6 weeks from now when everyone’s moved on to something else.