WHITE HOUSE AND (SUBTLE) DISINFORMATION?

On line forums are weird. But consider this recent online exchange between "Gregory" from Ohio and White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales:

Gregory, from Sandusky, OH writes:
Since the advise and consent role of Congress, as spelled out in the Constitution, specifically states that a simple majority vote is required, is it not unconstitutional for the Senate Democrats to insist that a 60 favorable vote to break a fillibuster is needed for the whole Senate to vote up or down on a judicial nomination?

Judge Gonzales
The Senate has a constitutional responsibility to provide an up or down vote. It is unprecedented for a minority of Senators to block a vote on an appeals court nominee by means of a filibuster. Both Miguel Estrada and Priscilla Owen have the support of a majority of Senators, and should receive a vote and be confirmed.

Judge Gonzales missed a great opportunity to correct a pretty serious misunderstanding on the part of Gregory, namely, that the Constitution "specifically states that a simple majority vote is required" in the nominations context. What we have here is a view that the Constitution can be interpreted to imply that requirement, a view that has been spreading in Republican ranks like wildfire (through Rush Limbaugh, for example). It takes a pretty fancy argument to claim that the Constitution must be interpreted in this way. Reasonable people can disagree here, and if the shoe were on the other foot, the arguments would cut in the other direction.

Whatever you think about that issue, note that Gonzales did not take the opportunity to correct an apparent misunderstanding on the part of his online interlocutor. Instead, he allowed the misunderstanding to continue by not addressing the factual error. That's too bad, but not unexpected.