[aristeides]

Good and decent people- liberals and conservatives will be forever barred from the judiciary. The big "losers" (of course---as usual) will be the American people.

I don't think that's what the result will be. I think what will happen is that recess appointments will become the normal way to appoint federal judges. Thus, there will be de facto term limits on those judges. I'm not so sure that's a bad idea.

[nyconse]

The problem with recess appointments is that judges could be forced off the bench in the middle of important cases. Lawyers would try to delay cases to get judges perceived as unfriendly off the bench before a case is tried. It would be a nightmare. It is not what the framers of our constitution intended. The best case scenerio is that Democrats are punished so severely at the polls in 2004 for their behavior towards Estrada and other judicial nominees that their members will not even consider filibustering judges despite Daschle, Leahy et al.