In my view of all this, I do not believe the Dems and their supporters (like we here on the Blogs) will/should get the ultimate credit for the coming (hopefully) Repub loss of power or the pendulum of power swinging the other way.  We may speed up the process a bit, but we will not be the cause.  I hate to discourage all the excitement around here on the Schiavo issue, but what is REALLY happening IMO is that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely (Remember that one?)!  In other words, the Repubs have too much power and are going overboard in their ideology to the extreme, which leads to self destruction.  The majority of voters hopefully and luckily are not usually extremists, and when they inevitably see the true colors of those with too much seeming absolute power, they pull the other way.  That is the cause of the pendulum effect!  

Again, it is the greed of human nature to keep taking and taking that pushes one ideology over the cliff with time, not the opposition, IMO.  There is, however, one area where this effect is muted and therefore dangerous, although there still are degrees of pendulum fluctuation even in this area but probably within a much more confined variation.  Can you guess what that areas is?

IMO, that area is exploitation of the human condition weakness by religious, time honored customs and explanations.  By exploiting the human weakness and inability to understand the infinite condition of the universe versus man being only a chemical reaction limited in time, sharp talking HUMANS have taken advantage of other men since the beginning of the species.  The how and why of this explanation in every culture is different, but the need for such "good-almighty-parental-type" explanations seems universal in all cultures.  Again, I believe it is because of the human condition we face on this tiny limited planet in a non-understandable, infinite universe.  Therefore this religious exploitation area is the most difficult to face for opposition types to the religious status quo beliefs of a given society, and the natural pendulum process of change may be the slower to take place because of it!