Thursday’s stunning rules change by Senate Democrats can best be described as Obamacare II: another exercise of partisan political power to permit the majority to do whatever it wants. This time, the goal was advancing its agenda unchecked through the courts and executive agencies.

With all Republican members opposed, the Senate voted 52 to 48 to invoke the “nuclear option,” allowing a majority of senators present and voting (so, not necessarily 51) to approve presidential nominees except for Supreme Court justices. For those positions, this eliminated the filibuster, which required 60 votes to proceed to an up-or-down majority vote.

This was the most dangerous restructuring of Senate rules since Thomas Jefferson wrote them. It creates a perpetual opportunity for “tyranny of the majority,” which Alexis de Tocqueville called one of the greatest threats to American democracy.

As Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) noted, quoting former senator Arthur Vandenberg on Thursday: “If a majority of the Senate can change its rules at any time, there are no rules.” It is as if the Red Sox, finding themselves behind in the ninth, added a few innings to make sure they could defeat the Cardinals in the World Series. Future majorities could, for example, end the filibuster for legislation, removing any obstacle to tyranny of the majority.

Democrats offered flimsy excuses, many of which are untrue:

Excuse No. 1: President Obama’s appointees have been unfairly denied seats by failed cloture votes, or filibusters.

According to the Congressional Research Service, no Supreme Court nominee has been defeated by filibuster in the Senate. None. (An arguable exception is Abe Fortas’s doomed nomination as chief justice, about which President Lyndon Johnson engineered a face-saving cloture vote.)

The number of federal district judge and Cabinet nominees defeated by filibuster? Zero. Regarding sub-Cabinet nominees, there were two for President Obama, three for George W. Bush and two for Bill Clinton. That’s it.

As for appeals court judges, Republican filibusters have blocked five, but that happened only after Democrats first blocked five. Beginning in 2003, Democrats blocked 10 Bush nominees. This was the first time that a president’s circuit court nominees were blocked by the failure to obtain cloture. Republicans considered the nuclear option, decided against it, and five of the 10 were confirmed.

Excuse No. 2: President Obama’s nominees have waited too long for confirmation.

According to the Congressional Research Service, Obama’s second-term Cabinet nominees have been confirmed at about the same pace as those of Presidents Clinton and Bush.

This year, the Senate has confirmed 36 of Obama’s second-term nominees to circuit and district courts, compared with 14 for Bush at this point in 2005.

On Friday, the Senate’s executive calendar listed 54 nominees who have been waiting less than three weeks for confirmation, 16 who had waited for up to nine weeks and only eight who have been waiting more than nine weeks. Two of those eight nominees were being “held” by Democratic senators.