There are a couple of aspects to look at with this current LD topic, Resolved: Rehabilitation ought to be valued above retribution in the United States criminal justice system.
The pragmatic approach (utilitarianism view) and the moral view need to be examined. To give you some insight into what's currently going on in this debate look at the following articles:
This one
and this one
Hope they help
Monday, January 21, 2013
Feb. PF Topic Analysis II - "Interests of the U.S."
Eat your vegetables! Go to bed on time!
When you're young your parents tell you these things because they're looking out for you. A parent who didn't care how much soda you drank or what time you went to bed would be considered a pretty awful parent. Even when people age, the concept of what's good for you isn't necessarily what you want to do is still very much alive. Find time to work out! Avoid fast-food! Don't tell that person what you really think of them! The things that are in our best interests often run contrary to our desires. Doing those things that would be beneficial to us often require discipline and self-restraint. We work out not because we enjoy making time for it, getting sweaty and waking up sore the next morning, but because we see the long-term value in the activity benefiting our interests - namely the interest of health. We restrain ourselves from telling off certain people because it benefits our professional relationship and helps us develop tact. The point is that good health, positive professional relationships and diplomacy are worth the sacrifice.
So when we're trying to asses whether the rise of China is beneficial to the interests of the U.S., it's important for the PRO to remember that what is good for someone (or some country) may not always be what is immediately preferable. There are several different ways to measure the interests of the U.S. There are 3 which should really be looked at for this debate:
Economic
No country wants high national debt, inflation and a high unemployment rate, but the U.S. economy has suffered from these maladies. China owns a little over a $1 debt of our $15 trillion debt. In looking at how our economy is related to China's check out the trade deficit and how China manipulates its currency to keep its products cheap.
National Security
It's hard to separate The War on Terror from our National Security interests, but it's important to remember that we have other issues to deal with outside of terrorism. China isn't endorsing or supporting Al-Qaeda but there are a couple of areas that merit attention. One would be China's partnership with Iran. Another would be China's expansion into Africa.
Foreign Affairs
Our global influence has been tarnished lately with the ascension of China the and downgrading of our credit rating. It's no secret to the rest of the world that the U.S. was one of the first dominoes to fall in the global recession. Our authority and sheer hegemony has been suspect with the inconclusive results of the campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the surging of militant Islam in Libya, Mali, Algeria and Egypt. The bottom line is that U.S. is no longer viewed as the world's "Superman." We've recently proven to be vulnerable abroad and have made some foreign policy blunders.
These are some VERY broad-strokes. That means these are some VERY general areas to explore, this is not an exhaustive list of areas to utilize. It's very likely that at Hastings and Olle the main PF competition will be internal; our teams against our teams. So the more you diversify your case with solid arguments, the better prepared you'll be. And your judges will appreciate hearing some different arguments.
When you're young your parents tell you these things because they're looking out for you. A parent who didn't care how much soda you drank or what time you went to bed would be considered a pretty awful parent. Even when people age, the concept of what's good for you isn't necessarily what you want to do is still very much alive. Find time to work out! Avoid fast-food! Don't tell that person what you really think of them! The things that are in our best interests often run contrary to our desires. Doing those things that would be beneficial to us often require discipline and self-restraint. We work out not because we enjoy making time for it, getting sweaty and waking up sore the next morning, but because we see the long-term value in the activity benefiting our interests - namely the interest of health. We restrain ourselves from telling off certain people because it benefits our professional relationship and helps us develop tact. The point is that good health, positive professional relationships and diplomacy are worth the sacrifice.
So when we're trying to asses whether the rise of China is beneficial to the interests of the U.S., it's important for the PRO to remember that what is good for someone (or some country) may not always be what is immediately preferable. There are several different ways to measure the interests of the U.S. There are 3 which should really be looked at for this debate:
Economic
No country wants high national debt, inflation and a high unemployment rate, but the U.S. economy has suffered from these maladies. China owns a little over a $1 debt of our $15 trillion debt. In looking at how our economy is related to China's check out the trade deficit and how China manipulates its currency to keep its products cheap.
National Security
It's hard to separate The War on Terror from our National Security interests, but it's important to remember that we have other issues to deal with outside of terrorism. China isn't endorsing or supporting Al-Qaeda but there are a couple of areas that merit attention. One would be China's partnership with Iran. Another would be China's expansion into Africa.
Foreign Affairs
Our global influence has been tarnished lately with the ascension of China the and downgrading of our credit rating. It's no secret to the rest of the world that the U.S. was one of the first dominoes to fall in the global recession. Our authority and sheer hegemony has been suspect with the inconclusive results of the campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the surging of militant Islam in Libya, Mali, Algeria and Egypt. The bottom line is that U.S. is no longer viewed as the world's "Superman." We've recently proven to be vulnerable abroad and have made some foreign policy blunders.
These are some VERY broad-strokes. That means these are some VERY general areas to explore, this is not an exhaustive list of areas to utilize. It's very likely that at Hastings and Olle the main PF competition will be internal; our teams against our teams. So the more you diversify your case with solid arguments, the better prepared you'll be. And your judges will appreciate hearing some different arguments.
A couple of links to get you started
Googling, Binging, Yahooing - whatever you want to call it - "Chinas impact on the U.S." brought up these websites:
This is on about.com which is usually suspect so check the sources.
This is from a CNN blog from a couple of years ago. And it's on CNN so it's dumbed down. That's right: CNN is for dummies.
And this is from The Heritage Society. The Heritage Society is very Conservative.
Enjoy.
This is on about.com which is usually suspect so check the sources.
This is from a CNN blog from a couple of years ago. And it's on CNN so it's dumbed down. That's right: CNN is for dummies.
And this is from The Heritage Society. The Heritage Society is very Conservative.
Enjoy.
Sunday, January 20, 2013
Feb. PF Topic Analysis I
Resolved: On balance, the rise of China is beneficial to the interests of the United States.
Another proposition of fact...ugh. And we have "On balance." I want to set those aspects aside for now and just focus on framing the topic.
After WWII, the United States was more or less the only developed country standing. Unless you lived in Pearl Harbor, your town was pretty much able shift from making war supplies to manufacturing goods to be consumed by a population that saw its men return from the war and start families. Home construction shot up. Jobs were created. Our economy was pretty self-sufficient not just because it had the resources but because it HAD to be. Who else was going to help? Most of the developed countries in Europe were in shambles. Japan had been decimated and cowed into submission. And the United Kingdom was digging itself out of the Blitzkrieg and taking care of its own.
So what was happening in China? What follows is highly generalized: The Soviet Union kicked Japan out of China. With the Japanese out, China faced a power struggle between the communists and the faction representing the Republic. The communists won and China became "The People's Republic of China." The U.S. most definitely saw the rise of China's communism as a threat but were soon entangled in a different Asian country: Korea. The ensuing Korean War pulled the U.S.'s attention away from China.
During the 1970's, the government "relaxed" a lot of its policies. Despite the fact that the Chinese constitution provides for free speech, freedom of the press, etc. the government tightly regulates these rights. But China recognized that truly communist governments don't usually have thriving economies. Cuba. North Korea. Venezuela (I know - they're Socialists, but bear with me). These countries do not have thriving economies. So China adapted it's brand of communism to partner with free markets. It's not that China's human rights record is much better than those other countries, but what China did pose was a threat in terms of its rapidly expanding population and the fact that it has nuclear weapons. As a result, President Nixon opened trade with China as a way of keeping your friends close, but your enemies closer. The idea was that China would be a viable trading partner the U.S. could benefit from. Few people, if any, predicted that China would wind up having the power in the relationship via owning our debt because our own economy would demand high government spending and decrease the value of our dollar. Currently, China owns about $1.2 trillion of the U.S. debt.
The "rise of China" is a figurative rise. Their economy, their hegemony, their military and their global influence have all risen from what was a borderline third world environment over the past sixty years. The debate over whether or not China is a "developing nation" or "developed nation" is not relevant to this debate (this is my opinion). The "rise" is not what's in question. The question is whether or not it can benefit us or harm us.
Another proposition of fact...ugh. And we have "On balance." I want to set those aspects aside for now and just focus on framing the topic.
After WWII, the United States was more or less the only developed country standing. Unless you lived in Pearl Harbor, your town was pretty much able shift from making war supplies to manufacturing goods to be consumed by a population that saw its men return from the war and start families. Home construction shot up. Jobs were created. Our economy was pretty self-sufficient not just because it had the resources but because it HAD to be. Who else was going to help? Most of the developed countries in Europe were in shambles. Japan had been decimated and cowed into submission. And the United Kingdom was digging itself out of the Blitzkrieg and taking care of its own.
So what was happening in China? What follows is highly generalized: The Soviet Union kicked Japan out of China. With the Japanese out, China faced a power struggle between the communists and the faction representing the Republic. The communists won and China became "The People's Republic of China." The U.S. most definitely saw the rise of China's communism as a threat but were soon entangled in a different Asian country: Korea. The ensuing Korean War pulled the U.S.'s attention away from China.
During the 1970's, the government "relaxed" a lot of its policies. Despite the fact that the Chinese constitution provides for free speech, freedom of the press, etc. the government tightly regulates these rights. But China recognized that truly communist governments don't usually have thriving economies. Cuba. North Korea. Venezuela (I know - they're Socialists, but bear with me). These countries do not have thriving economies. So China adapted it's brand of communism to partner with free markets. It's not that China's human rights record is much better than those other countries, but what China did pose was a threat in terms of its rapidly expanding population and the fact that it has nuclear weapons. As a result, President Nixon opened trade with China as a way of keeping your friends close, but your enemies closer. The idea was that China would be a viable trading partner the U.S. could benefit from. Few people, if any, predicted that China would wind up having the power in the relationship via owning our debt because our own economy would demand high government spending and decrease the value of our dollar. Currently, China owns about $1.2 trillion of the U.S. debt.
The "rise of China" is a figurative rise. Their economy, their hegemony, their military and their global influence have all risen from what was a borderline third world environment over the past sixty years. The debate over whether or not China is a "developing nation" or "developed nation" is not relevant to this debate (this is my opinion). The "rise" is not what's in question. The question is whether or not it can benefit us or harm us.
Sunday, January 13, 2013
National Points Explained
Disclaimer: The following is probably more than you ever really wanted to know about how I decide who goes to nationals...Which is in Birmingham, Alabama June 18-23. Students who qualify MUST attend a prep camp that runs from June 10-14 and June 17 from noon to 4:00 p.m. at Lanier.
Nationals is an open tournament but there are restrictions on what events students can cross-enter in and we can only have up to 8 in each event. When I arrived at Lanier in 2007 this was how you "qualified" for Nationals:
1. If you won 1st in a National event at any tournament, you qualified
2. For everyone else, a try-out day was scheduled around April. This was basically an in-house mini-tournament judged by the alumni.
This system worked but as our team grew and the national tournament increased in its level of competition, I began to see some problems with those criteria. For starters, winning 1st place in a tournament, while a great achievement, shouldn't really be the ultimate factor in determining that someone is Nationals worthy. There are those rare occasions where winning 1st is, for lack of a better word, a fluke. I don't mean to diminish people's accomplishments, but our debate history has proved this to be true. It was unfair to qualify someone who won 1st and never broke to finals ever again, while other students who consistently got to finals but didn't win first had to wait for the try-out date.
Another flaw with the "1st Place automatic bid" criteria is that I noticed there were a lot of students on our team who consistently made it to finals and just never placed first. Making them try-out fell just short of an insult in that I knew they were deserving of competing at the National level. At a lot of tournaments, we have an overwhelming majority of the finalists in certain events and so from tournament to tournament there's a rotation of people who win 1st. But some students never have things fall into place for them even though they were always getting to finals.
Finally, there were problems with the try-out day. Students on our team are busy with other weekend activities. And then there was this problem: During the try-out day, we would be looking for an alumni judge for an event and were stuck using an alumni who had no experience with the event. We had judges who had never done Dramatic Interp. judging DI and judges who had never done debate judging debate. This was counter to the whole reason we had a try-out in the first place.
All these things considered, it seemed we needed a system that rewarded consistency in breaking to finals and put the whole process in the hands of our local tournaments. So I adopted the system they use at the high school level for debate. In Texas, high school debaters earn points for breaking to elimination rounds in debate and to final rounds in individual events. Here is our scale:
Debate Individual Events & Congress
1st Place - 10 points 1st Place - 10 points
2nd Place - 7 points 2nd Place - 7 points
Semifinalist - 5 points 3rd Place - 4 points
Quarterfinalist - 2 points 4th Place on down - 2 points
Octofinalist - 1 point
I've used this point scale since I came to Lanier as a way to encourage friendly competition. I never intended it to be a system we would use for determining who went to Nationals. But one year, I looked at everyone who went to Nationals and drew a line at 15 points. Nearly everyone who competed at Nationals that year (with a few exceptions) had at least 15 points. So that became the cutoff. I made exceptions for certain events that weren't offered at every tournament, like Congress and Declamation. Despite the fact that our local tournaments always have that rogue/incompetent judge, my belief is that ability over time shows itself.
This summer, after talking to alumni, I raised the point cut-off to 20 points since our team is smaller and the point share is more per student than it had been in previous years. I'm anticipating that between 35 to 40 students will qualify, as opposed to the 50+ we've taken in recent years. As of today, after five tournaments, 22 students have qualified. We have five more tournaments. If we reach 40 qualifiers before we're done going to tournaments then the points will close. When we prep for Nationals and our alumni show up to coach various students, it's a lot easier for them to reach 35-40 students instead of 50 or more.
This is not a perfect system and it's something I'm willing to change as needed. It's truly heartbreaking to watch students who have given everything they have for 2-3 years in debate and not qualify, but unfortunately there are always one or two for whom this is the case. But the ultimate goal is to take a group of students who give our team the best chance of doing well at Nationals. Over the years, the National tournament has provided a field of competition that has gotten remarkably tougher each year.
If you have questions/suggestions please email me at franzfredric@yahoo.com or leave it in the comment section. Thanks!
Nationals is an open tournament but there are restrictions on what events students can cross-enter in and we can only have up to 8 in each event. When I arrived at Lanier in 2007 this was how you "qualified" for Nationals:
1. If you won 1st in a National event at any tournament, you qualified
2. For everyone else, a try-out day was scheduled around April. This was basically an in-house mini-tournament judged by the alumni.
This system worked but as our team grew and the national tournament increased in its level of competition, I began to see some problems with those criteria. For starters, winning 1st place in a tournament, while a great achievement, shouldn't really be the ultimate factor in determining that someone is Nationals worthy. There are those rare occasions where winning 1st is, for lack of a better word, a fluke. I don't mean to diminish people's accomplishments, but our debate history has proved this to be true. It was unfair to qualify someone who won 1st and never broke to finals ever again, while other students who consistently got to finals but didn't win first had to wait for the try-out date.
Another flaw with the "1st Place automatic bid" criteria is that I noticed there were a lot of students on our team who consistently made it to finals and just never placed first. Making them try-out fell just short of an insult in that I knew they were deserving of competing at the National level. At a lot of tournaments, we have an overwhelming majority of the finalists in certain events and so from tournament to tournament there's a rotation of people who win 1st. But some students never have things fall into place for them even though they were always getting to finals.
Finally, there were problems with the try-out day. Students on our team are busy with other weekend activities. And then there was this problem: During the try-out day, we would be looking for an alumni judge for an event and were stuck using an alumni who had no experience with the event. We had judges who had never done Dramatic Interp. judging DI and judges who had never done debate judging debate. This was counter to the whole reason we had a try-out in the first place.
All these things considered, it seemed we needed a system that rewarded consistency in breaking to finals and put the whole process in the hands of our local tournaments. So I adopted the system they use at the high school level for debate. In Texas, high school debaters earn points for breaking to elimination rounds in debate and to final rounds in individual events. Here is our scale:
Debate Individual Events & Congress
1st Place - 10 points 1st Place - 10 points
2nd Place - 7 points 2nd Place - 7 points
Semifinalist - 5 points 3rd Place - 4 points
Quarterfinalist - 2 points 4th Place on down - 2 points
Octofinalist - 1 point
I've used this point scale since I came to Lanier as a way to encourage friendly competition. I never intended it to be a system we would use for determining who went to Nationals. But one year, I looked at everyone who went to Nationals and drew a line at 15 points. Nearly everyone who competed at Nationals that year (with a few exceptions) had at least 15 points. So that became the cutoff. I made exceptions for certain events that weren't offered at every tournament, like Congress and Declamation. Despite the fact that our local tournaments always have that rogue/incompetent judge, my belief is that ability over time shows itself.
This summer, after talking to alumni, I raised the point cut-off to 20 points since our team is smaller and the point share is more per student than it had been in previous years. I'm anticipating that between 35 to 40 students will qualify, as opposed to the 50+ we've taken in recent years. As of today, after five tournaments, 22 students have qualified. We have five more tournaments. If we reach 40 qualifiers before we're done going to tournaments then the points will close. When we prep for Nationals and our alumni show up to coach various students, it's a lot easier for them to reach 35-40 students instead of 50 or more.
This is not a perfect system and it's something I'm willing to change as needed. It's truly heartbreaking to watch students who have given everything they have for 2-3 years in debate and not qualify, but unfortunately there are always one or two for whom this is the case. But the ultimate goal is to take a group of students who give our team the best chance of doing well at Nationals. Over the years, the National tournament has provided a field of competition that has gotten remarkably tougher each year.
If you have questions/suggestions please email me at franzfredric@yahoo.com or leave it in the comment section. Thanks!
National Qualifiers
This is a list of the students who have qualified for Nationals since they have accumulated at least 20 points.
| Maddie Muehlherr | 69 | ||||
| Lekha Sunder | 57 | ||||
| Amy Yao | 52 | ||||
| Olivia Cardenas | 51 | ||||
| Nikki Goldin | 37 | ||||
| Erin Sheena | 36 | ||||
| Alisa Lu | 34 | ||||
| Lyle Derden | 33 | ||||
| Robert Brown | 31 | ||||
| Michael Hoyal | 29 | ||||
| Ali Potthast | 29 | ||||
| Michelle Tang | 28 | ||||
| Vishnu Narayana | 26 | ||||
| Adele Lauzon | 26 | ||||
| Alex Hoyal | 25 | ||||
| Cameron Biggart | 24 | ||||
| Dikla Taylor | 22 | ||||
| Maya Waterland | 21 | ||||
| Stephanie Sonik | 21 | ||||
| Maddie VanBrunt | 20 | ||||
| Stephanie Oyolu | 20 | ||||
| Rukmini Kalamangalam | 20 |
Alief Taylor Results
1st Place Sweepstakes!
| Public Forum Debate | Lincoln-Douglas | Duet Improv | |||||
| 1st | Alex Hoyal & Vishnu Narayana | 1st | Robert Brown | 1st | Adele Lauzon & Rhiannon Morris | ||
| 2nd | Olivia Cardenas & Erin Sheena | Robert Brown - Top Speaker | 2nd | Athene DelVecchio & Vega Shah | |||
| Semis | Michael Hoyal & Maddie Muehlherr | 4th | Cameron Biggart & Zibi Gugala | ||||
| Semis | Lyle Derden & Lekha Sunder | 5th | Sara Frank & Magdalena Hill | ||||
| Bowen Song - Top Speaker | 6th | Mariel Alquisira & Josephine McCalla | |||||
| Extemp. | Oratory | ||||||
| 1st | Lekha Sunder | 1st | Lekha Sunder | Humorous | |||
| 2nd | Lyle Derden | 3rd | Lyle Derden | 1st | Nikki Goldin | ||
| 3rd | Bowen Song | 4th | Abby Eastman | 2nd | Larry Zhang | ||
| 4th | Alex Hoyal | 5th | Olivia Cardenas | 3rd | Cameron Biggart | ||
| 5th | Armon Tabibzadegan | 6th | Maddie Spence | 4th | Max Nathan | ||
| 6th | William Acheampong | 7th | Katherine Nyquist | 6th | Jacob VanBrunt | ||
| 7th | Tommy Hayes | ||||||
| TV Commercial | |||||||
| Impromptu Speaking | Poetry | `1st | Athene DelVecchio | ||||
| 1st | Olivia Cardenas | 1st | Dikla Taylor | 7th | Rhiannon Morris | ||
| 2nd | Lekha Sunder | 2nd | Athene DelVecchio | ||||
| 3rd | Miguel Covarrubias | 3rd | Amy Yao | ||||
| 4th | Sam Frank | 4th | Adele Lauzon | Solo Mime | |||
| 5th | Jackson Hanna | 5th | Alisa Lu | 2nd | Larry Zhang | ||
| 6th | Robert Brown | 6th | Stephanie Sonik | ||||
| 7th | Alex Hoyal | 8th | Magdalena Hill | Duet Lip-Sync | |||
| 8th | John Dagley | 3rd | Nikki Goldin & Kaitlyn Kelly | ||||
| Prose | Storytelling | Duet Acting | |||||
| 1st | Maddie Muhlherr | 1st | Alisa Lu | 1st | Sophie Cardenas & Adele Lauzon | ||
| 2nd | Gabrielle Keene | 2nd | Stephanie Sonik | 2nd | Maya Waterland & Amy Yao | ||
| 6th | Maddie VanBrunt | 3rd | Maddie Muhlherr | ||||
| 7th | Ali Potthast | 5th | Sophie Cardenas | Vocal Solo | |||
| 8th | Nikki Goldin | 6th | Athene DelVecchio | 1st | Cameron Biggart | ||
| 3rd | Rhiannon Morris | ||||||
| Parli | |||||||
| 1st | Curtis Yao & Zibi Gugala | Dramatic | |||||
| 2nd | Marcos Coronado & Armon Tabibzadegan | 2nd | Maddie VanBrunt | ||||
| 6th | Nikki Goldin | ||||||
Thursday, January 3, 2013
Who is Citizens United? Depends on who you ask...
So while researching the FEC is as painfully boring as waiting for a class to finish a standardized test, Citizens United is a little more interesting, mainly because of its partisan nature.
There are two things to examine:
1. What is CU's mission?
2. Who is David Bossie (CU's President and Chairman of the Board)
You don't have to do much researching to conclude that it's the Conservative's answer to Michael Moore. For what it's worth, they both have imdb profiles:
Michael Moore's imdb profile
David Bossie's imdb profile
One look at Bossie's "headshot" on imdb and he looks like Salesman of the Month at your local car dealership. Here is Citizens United homepage:
What CU is
And here is why people criticize them:
Liberals Hatin' on CU
It is worth noting that the criticism is partisan (Liberals hate them - Conservatives defend them). And when you read the article you should probably do a quick search on the Koch Brothers, who they are linked to.
Or you could read this. You're welcome.
(Disclaimer: There are a handful of spelling/grammatical errors in the above article. Apparently the desire to bash the Koch Brothers and CU overwhelmed the desire spell-check and proofread.)
There are two things to examine:
1. What is CU's mission?
2. Who is David Bossie (CU's President and Chairman of the Board)
You don't have to do much researching to conclude that it's the Conservative's answer to Michael Moore. For what it's worth, they both have imdb profiles:
Michael Moore's imdb profile
David Bossie's imdb profile
One look at Bossie's "headshot" on imdb and he looks like Salesman of the Month at your local car dealership. Here is Citizens United homepage:
What CU is
And here is why people criticize them:
Liberals Hatin' on CU
It is worth noting that the criticism is partisan (Liberals hate them - Conservatives defend them). And when you read the article you should probably do a quick search on the Koch Brothers, who they are linked to.
Or you could read this. You're welcome.
(Disclaimer: There are a handful of spelling/grammatical errors in the above article. Apparently the desire to bash the Koch Brothers and CU overwhelmed the desire spell-check and proofread.)
The FEC: Six People You Meet and Could Care Less About
With the Federal Election Commission being involved in the January PF topic, I looked into what the FEC does and who's involved. What I found was intriguing..said no one ever. I hate to sound cynical and it's important for debaters to understand the Who, Why, etc. regarding the FEC, but beyond a basic understanding of what function it serves there's very little controversy. Here's the link:
FEC
FEC
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