This is one of those things that seems patently obvious to me (perhaps because I'm missing something). It would go a long way to defusing the Republican "reasonable" argument for removing the filibuster on the ground that "Every nominee deserves an up-or-down vote".
The Democrats should be making the point that "The filibuster is an up-or-down vote on the nominee."
The filibuster does not prevent the nominee from being voted on, but simply raises the bar for the number of votes needed to confirm. The Senate cannot and should not give up its important Constitutional role to "advise and consent". When finding a nominee extremist, corrupt, or otherwise unqualified, the Senate has a sacred duty to make their determination known. [ED:
In effect,] the use of the filibuster requires only that the nominee have 60 rather than 50 votes for confirmation (with the VP casting the deciding vote). By use of the filibuster, the minority party advises that "We have deep concerns on the nominee, and if you have 60 votes, you can have your nominee despite our concerns."
This is an accurate and reasonable argument the American people can get behind, which defuses the Republican distortion of what a filibuster is. After all, the Republicans spent the bulk of the Clinton administration actually actively preventing Clinton's nominees from coming to a vote by not letting the nominees out of committee.
I'm disappointed I haven't seen this argument from the Democrats, and have been seeing the usual media parroting of Right-Wing talking points. Perhaps I'm missing something, and I'd appreciate someone better informed letting me know.
How do we get this message out there?