You need to consider:
Confessing Error - Filibusters of presidential appointees violate the Constitution. - by Andrew C. McCarthy
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1402603/posts
"Making an unsound argument is bad. Leaving it uncorrected is worse. Since I would prefer to be bad than worse, it’s time — for me, at least — to reconsider filibusters.
"Back in November, I flatly asserted that filibustering judges did not violate the constitution
...(much text)
[However]
"Outside the constitution’s express grant of authority to the Senate to make its own rules, the legal arguments in favor of filibusters are mostly makeweight. Among the more frivolous is that filibusters are essential to preserve the First Amendment rights of dissenters, or the speech-and-debate rights of senators (art. I, sec. 6). These important principles guarantee a meaningful opportunity to be heard, not a suffocating right to be heard ad infinitum. They ensure the vital opportunity to persuade, not a minority right to win.
...
"There is a counterargument, though, for which I do not have a good answer. It lies in the structure of the Constitution:
...
[Concluding with:]
"Filibusters of judicial nominees have always been a bad idea. They are also an unconstitutional idea. I used to think otherwise, but I have not heard an argument that overcomes the structure of the constitution. No matter who is president, nominees deserve an up-or-down vote.
I'm not as studied as this man is. This, in addition to the fact that a requirement that a supermajority for confirmation was specifically considered on June 13, 1787 by the Constititional Convention and subsequently rejected (a fact this author unfortunately does not mention and one wonders if he considered that) - decides the question.
Supermajority is NOT required for the Senate's consent. Majority is sufficient.
975 posted on
05/19/2005 10:39:20 AM PDT by
AFPhys
((.Praying for President Bush, our troops, their families, and all my American neighbors..))
At least you are more logically consistent than the Senate majority. Under your analysis (with the regrettable exception of your "no harm" pass on committee proceedings), nothing except an up-or-down vote on the floor is acceptable. That is a position I can at least see the argument for, even if it hasn't been the accepted position in the Senate for a century or more. The argument that some tools to block a vote are okay and others are not is hogwash.