When evaluating a case, advantages can be independent. A person can lose one and win the other. If the person loses one, but it is not turned on them (i.e. the plan will cause China to burn more fossil fuels), then the AFF may not win that ADV, but should not be punished for only hoping to win the first ADV on the economy.

In the end, Travis has learned (as we all have) that perception plays into voting quite a bit. Given that the judges are all over the map on what they like to see, and given that there are clearly AFF bias judges and NEG bias judges, and also judges who become bias against a debater for losing one argument in the round, etc., and time allocation and such, debaters can learn a ton this early in the year about how to adapt to judges.

Every decision by every judge is “right”, just ask Michael Miller and his lovely discussion about the mink jockstrap. So debaters are wise to pry and then not get angry but try to adapt. If it is too whacky and unpredictable, then try another venue or just do it to have fun and not necessarily to win.

Second, I too found Alex’s argument re: China very persuasive. Both in that Travis’ card didn’t say China will do the plan and that Travis’ use of the card seem stretched from the beginning. That hurts credibility and can wreak havoc all over the flow. If China doesn’t adopt high speed rail and continues to spew CO2 then advantage 1 goes away. So we’re left with Adv2 – economy. As I wrote on my ballot I thought Alex won that debate.

Perhaps the judge should have explained their decision further but in my decision the debate over Global Warming did matter a lot to the affirmative – the economy advantage was 1:24 of the first affirmative speech (5:56-7:20 in the video). Thus, from a perception process the Global Warming position seems much more important. Losing that seems like it would be bad for the affirmative.

Third, in the 2AR, Travis says the China/Global warming is “the most important thing you are going to look at” twice (38:30 and 39:34). As such, I think it’s very reasonable that as a judge, if the econ debate was a wash, which in many respects it was (ie, both debaters made good arguments), and the affirmative debater is telling me Global warming is most important, my decision on global warming decides the round.

Fourth, I think it’s important to emphasize that NFA-LD is not supposed to be a technical rules style of debate, at least in my vision of the activity. Instead, “[i]t is a communication event, by which we mean the philosophy of the activity is consistent with that which governs other individual events” (NFA-LD rules) a more wholistic approach to judging should be encouraged. Indeed, as a judge my mission is to evaluate debaters “on their analysis, use of evidence, and ability to effectively and persuasively organize, deliver, and refute arguments” (NFA-LD rules). In many ways Travis did an excellent job in the round as did Alex. But making the round a technical this argument versus that argument decision misses the true value of NFA-LD both in my mind and the framers of the activity.

Let me emphasize again I write the preceeding words NOT as an attack on any of the debaters but to continue the discussion Phil started from the perspective of a judge. Congrats again to both debaters and I look forward to judging both of them in future debates.

Ok. This isn’t a reason to vote. If a claimed advantage is that China is looking to the US to set an example on fossil fuel emissions, Mr. Lamascus argues that the card doesn’t say China will build high-speed trains… yep. When will LD teach argument theory? can someone explain why it is legitimate to allow arguments to be voting issues which are not logically valid as negation? Did losing that debate mean Travis “lost” a stock issue?

I don’t think Alex read a link card that says your plan will spend a lot of money, just that we have no money to spend. I don’t think you need a card for every argument; Alex didn’t. But one thing is to have a set list of answers to Disads. I’ll send you something via e-mail.