My guess is Schumer chose the filibuster as a test of Yertle's resolve, and as an early test of Trump the President. He lost, bigly. However, the man may have gotten smart after that spanking. He DID get the budget he wanted and he HAS tried to meet with Trump on DACA.
If Schumer has learned anything - he may be dumb but he ain't stupid - he has already passed out the Kabuki Theatre scripts to the Dem Senators. That is, he's said:
"Look, we can defeat this nominee if we all vote against AND pick off Collins or Paul or Murkowsky. But we'd lose up to 3 Senate seats which means we are doomed when RBG or any of 'our' Justices dies or retires. So, let's give the people a little political theater...Manchin, you talk tough against me to win political re-election points, I'll remain a looney on MSNBC . Yea, we will lose this confirmation (the guy may be a stealth Dem a-la Roberts anyway...thankfully he isn't a Gorsuch) but we will keep our 3 seats on the bubble and be strong in 2019 and prepare for the 2020 Presidential run."
Good points as to what is going on behind the scenes. Yes, Schumer will be the looney on MSNBC, while Manchin can sound like he’s not taking any guff from Schumer.
Schumer probably expects to lose a few Senate seats this time around.
I haven’t heard any chatter in many months, about the possibility of the Democrats taking back the Senate. There’s still chatter about the Democrats taking the House, but not the Senate.