In theory, I would agree with you, but I think it is naive and off-base in reality.
To rely on either Republicans or Democrats to restrain themselves without any filibuster is naive since the Republicans are swiftly headed toward the extreme right and the Democrats, albeit at a slower pace with more pushback from moderates, are headed toward the extreme left as well.
After seeing the Republicans get away with what they have since 2008 including stealing a SC justice, rewarding their 1% cronies, extorting allies, open domestic corruption, manipulating at least half of the American public, working to steal an election and unleashing a violent coup against our republic, I have lost any trust self-restraint is possible any longer. If that is now acceptable political behavior, nothing is out of bounds.
I also think popularity is a bad criteria. As we see with most of these cultural issues, the country is pretty evenly split so what may be popular to one side is by definition going to be unpopular on the other side. Plus even if something is popular does not mean it is good for the country or our society. For example, gun ownership is very popular, but as we've seen for centuries it creates very bad consequences for our society.