Having "just" 50 (+1) votes to pass things is how democracy should work in a 2-party system. That's called "Majority Rule".
Technically, filibusters aren't about how many votes are needed for a bill to pass, just about how many votes are needed to 'end debate' (i.e. have 'cloture') on a bill so that a vote can even take place. The biggest re-interpreting of Senate rules happened back when they eliminated the need for actual debate to be taking place in order to 'filibuster' or stop a vote on an issue. The filibuster simply meant that a Senator could keep debate going indefinitely, stopping all other business in the Senate and blocking a vote on the pending issue (and everything else in the process). The only way to end that is to vote for cloture, which under current rules requires 60 votes.
So a filibuster was difficult to implement and sustain, and therefore not often used. Before that, a measure would proceed to a vote whenever actual debate ended, and if a measure got a majority (i.e. 51 votes, or 50+ tie breaker by the VP), it passed. When they stopped requiring actual debate to hold up a vote, and allowed other Senate business to continue, the net result was that it was no longer difficult to implement a 'filibuster'. A Senator just has to make it known that they intend to 'filibuster' for 60 votes to be needed - which is now always, if the minority has any opposition.
So a tool intended to be used in exceptional circumstances, when the minority had great opposition to a specific pending bill, has become the default position, requiring virtually EVERY bill to have 60 votes to pass, instead of what was previously 50+. That puts the minority in control - and that's not democracy! So if going back to the way it was working before is 'reinterpreting', then I'm all for it.
This article offers the best history and explanation of the filibuster I could find:
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/origins-of-filibuster-united-states-senate
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