It’s disengenuous to claim that the Republicans want to eliminate filibuster. The Frist-Miller proposal concerns just filibusters for appointments, and, even then, just for judicial appointments.
That said, at least he’s talking about the matter at hand, rather than the economy or welfare or unemployment or whatever.
Update: Dodd makes the same mistake.
Also, Dodd is concerned that “we’re going to change the nature of this institution” with a rules change. Let’s be fair; look at the history. The nature of the institution changed when the Democrats started filibustering judicial nominees.
“Extended debate” and “the power to amend” make this institution “so unique,” says Dodd, and thus to change the rules would “erode” the purpose of the chamber. Is this a reasonable slippery-slope argument? Not if there’s a firm dividing line, which the judicial nominee distinction seems to be. One can imagine minority senators making the same argument when cloture was first proposed, in 1917, or when cloture was applied to nominations, in 1949.
Would a change make the judiciary “the handmaiden” of the executive branch? No. The Senate was elected separately, on its own merits, as a coequal body. Especially not if one concludes that the Senate has usurped a power of the executive by expaning the sense of “advise and consent.”
Update: Hatch makes the 1917 point above.