Tonight's the all-night talkathon in the Senate about the Democrats' illegal filibusters of Bush judicial nominees.

I'll likely watch some of it when I get home from work, but the exercise is really meaningless. The show may get a little additional press coverage of the Democrats' illegal tactics, but it is not a serious effort to get the nominees approved.

Last night on Fox News' "Special Report with Brit Hume," National Public Radio's Mara Liasson said that Republicans wouldn't use the so-called nuclear option (making a move to change Senate rules to bar filibusters on judicial nominees) because the GOP might want to use the illegal tool themselves.

Despite the fact that they had never used the tactic when they were in the minority.

The Senate Republicans, on this issue, are both chicken and unprincipled for not standing up to the Democrats. I'll say it again: The Democrats' filibuster of judicial nominees is unconstitutional and illegal. The refusal of the GOP to stand up to them is cowardly. All of the Senators swore a vow to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States -- and all of them have broken that vow by political pandering or a fear of political fallout on other issues.

The GOP should use the so-called "nuclear option," get the judges through and then let the Democrats follow through on their "threat" to obstruct, whine and seethe -- that won't help them come election time to be seen as bigger obstructionists than they already are.