Thoughts on Filibusters

Why shouldn't someone being given a lifetime appointment on the federal bench have to get a super-majority rather than simple majority in the Senate? It seems to me that needing to get sixty percent rather than 51 percent of the votes in the Senate is a reasonable incentive for presidents, regardless of party and where they fit on the political spectrum, to nominate someone from the pretty big middle. If it seems that either party in the Senate is blocking reasonable nominees for political gain, let that party be punished at the ballot box in the next election. In the meantime, extremists don't get lifetime appointments.

Regardless of the many other reasons why Frist and Santorum must be stopped (their hypocrisy and venality, the extreme right-wingers Bush has and will nominate, the odiousness of the attempt to make the Democrats of today look like the anti-Civil Rights southern Democrats of yesteryear, etc.) this seems like a reasonable, common-sense idea that moderate Republicans ought to be able to get their minds around.

Also, I'm a bit confused about the idea that the minority is using the rules of the Senate to thwart the majority. Isn't the Senate itself a pretty clear example of the anti-majoritarian thrust of the Constitution?