PHILADELPHIA — Since when is the filibuster sexy?

Since now. An arcane parliamentary tactic used by the Senate Democratic minority to block 10 of President Bush's judicial nominees has become the hottest issue in politics. With most Senate Republicans hoping to change the rules and erase the tactic, a potentially historic moment, this clash of wills has taken on the trappings of an ideological war.

And, as in war, truth may be the first casualty.

As evidenced by the latest rhetoric, both camps — focused solely on winning in a vote expected Tuesday — have been spinning with impunity, omitting inconvenient facts that might dilute their arguments and alienate their ideological allies, many of whom equate nuance with weakness.

For instance:

Republican senators say the Constitution requires that a presidential nominee be voted up or down by a simple majority of senators. On the floor last week, John Cornyn said this view is supported by "200 years of consistent Senate and constitutional tradition," and his Texas colleague, Kay Bailey Hutchison, later said, "The Constitution in every way indicates that a majority vote is required." But the Constitution says neither. There is no language requiring senators to take nominees to the floor, nor to confirm or reject by a simple majority or any other margin.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist has acknowledged this. He was challenged on the floor this month to find the constitutional language that supports the GOP stance. He said: "The answer is no, the language is not there."

The Constitution specifically permits the Senate to come up with rules on how it might "advise and consent" on judicial nominees. Since the early 19th century, those rules have permitted filibusters — stalling tactics by the minority, in the form of extended debate — and the rules since 1975 decree that 60 senators are needed to cut off a filibuster. These facts are stated on the Senate Web site.

Democratic senators are wrapping the filibuster in the flag. Tom Harkin of Iowa said that "for more than two centuries ... it has been essential to America's system of checks and balances." Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey called it "an American tradition." John Kerry of Massachusetts said the principle of minority rights "makes our democracy so respected by people across this planet."

Harkin, however, chose not to mention what he said in 1995, when he called the filibuster "a relic of the ancient past" and declared his interest in "slaying the filibuster dinosaur." Indeed, he co-sponsored a bill to do just that. It failed, but 18 senators — all Democrats frustrated by GOP resistance to President Clinton's agenda — voted with him.

Two of the would-be slayers were Lautenberg and Kerry.

Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah lamented that the Democratic filibuster was tying up 10 Bush court nominees (there are 55 GOP senators, five shy of the current number required to break the stalemate). Hatch, visibly alarmed, said, "What's wrong with taking a vote up or down? The Senate can't confirm nominees if senators can't vote on them!"

But Hatch didn't mention the strategy he employed as Judiciary Committee chairman in the Clinton era. By changing panel rules, he ensured that many of Clinton's court choices would be stuck in committee. The new language decreed that anyone could be put on hold if either senator from the nominee's home state — in that era, presumably a Republican — filed an objection known as a "blue slip."

This tactic was not a filibuster, but it prevented more than 60 Clinton nominees from receiving up-or-down votes on the Senate floor. Some nominees remained in limbo for up to four years. (Later, with Bush in office, Hatch changed the rule. It now takes both senators from the home state to put a nominee in limbo.)

On the Democratic side, Lautenberg and others noted — again with help from the Senate Web site — that at least 14 judicial nominations had been filibustered since 1968, rebutting the claim of Pennsylvania's Rick Santorum that the Democratic tactic was "an infection that has entered the bloodstream."

But no Democrat has mentioned that the party decision to filibuster 10 Bush nominees and prevent floor votes by the GOP majority is a major escalation of partisan strife. Past filibusters had been launched ad hoc against individual nominees. But the current Democratic strategy was mapped in 2001 with liberal interest groups, which rated Bush nominees on ideological grounds. The American Bar Association, by contrast, has vetted favorably the 10 nominees now being stymied.

On the Senate floor, Republicans repeatedly describe their impending vote to eliminate the filibuster as "the constitutional option."

They don't mention, however, that, as in any political campaign, positive wordplay is important. And Republican wordsmiths have concluded that the original term, "the nuclear option" (coined by GOP Sen. Trent Lott), sounded too negative. So here's what a GOP Senate memo advised the other day: "Do not refer to 'the nuclear option'; it should be called the constitutional option."

The memo also urged GOP senators to use positive words such as "fairness." David Vitter of Louisiana may have received the memo: "And [Bush nominees] don't even get an up-or-down vote on the floor? That's not fair. That's not fair in the minds of ordinary Americans ... "

Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, an architect of the current strategy, said, "there is nothing in the Constitution" that bars filibustering; by stalling those Bush nominees, Democrats are standing up for "our precious system of checks and balances." He didn't mention that, in 2000, when GOP senators were stalling Clinton nominees, he considered such behavior to be "a mockery of the Constitution" and "a breach of the Senate's constitutional mandate" to vote on presidential nominees.

Frist, in his condemnation of filibusters, omitted the fact that he joined an unsuccessful Republican filibuster in 2000 against Clinton judicial nominee Richard Paez. And while Republicans insisted last week that a GOP-led move to stall the 1968 high-court nomination of Democratic choice Abe Fortas was not a filibuster, they omitted this item, which appears on the Senate Web site: "October 1, 1968: Filibuster Derails Supreme Court Appointee."