Edited sentence: The filibuster, to which the cloture vote is the antidote, is under attack in the US Senate in 2005 (by Republicans who don't want Democrats to use it to prevent floor votes on presidental judicial appointments the Democrats consider radical activists); the Republican plan to declare filibuster on such appointments improper is referred to in political circles and the press as the Nuclear option, the Constitutional option, or the Byrd option after Democrat Senator Robert Byrd who has used the tactic in the past