Wait a second

Section. 2.

Clause 2: (The President) He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

From the US Constitution; Article I – Powers textually committed to Congress

Section. 5.

Clause 2: Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Concurrence of two thirds, expel a Member.

Based on the Constitution itself, the President has the sole power to appoint supreme court justices. The Senate is only involved to give their advice and consent. For more then two hundred years the Senate has used their Article II; Section 5; Clause 2 powers to give advice and consent to the President by way of a simple majority up or down vote on the Senate Floor. For the first time in the history of the country, the Democrats are filibustering justices thereby requiring a 60 vote super-majority to properly advise and consent. If anything, the Democrats are the ones who have changed the Senate rules on advising and consenting, and the Republicans are merely attempting to change the rules back to the way they have always been (a simple majority up or down vote on the Senate floor).

Now the great mystery to me is why the hell the Republicans dont simply call the Democrats bluff and make them filibuster instead of taking this roundabout way to solving the problem that THE DEMOCRATS caused in the first place. However, that is completely irrelevant in regards to whether or not Republicans have the power and are justified in using their elective power to alter Senate rules in such a way as to bring current proceedings back in line with over 200 years of Senate history. Bottom line, the Senate has the power in Article I to determine the Rules of its Proceedings. The Republicans are completely within their Constitutional powers to change Senate rules. Secondly, we all know that the Republicans would never use this tactic of filibustering judges (or atleast they never would have been the first to use it) and we also all know that if they ever attempted to and the Democrats were the majority party, the Democrats would have absolutely no qualms about using their elective power to change the rules.