Author Archive
Szasz….
Well…. any negative debater who doesn’t bring up Szasz… in every debate…. may be giving up a trump card on this topic. While I’ve only so far brushed upon the topic it seems pretty persuasive that the entire concept of “mental illness” is a fiction to deem some behavior inappropriate in society. It may be [...]
Great Resource
I’m starting to get intrigued by my college mental health case – and will likely post a sample case in the next few days to give those who are new to the topic an idea of what a case should look like. Also, if you have questions about what your first affirmative constructive speech should [...]
Possible Case Area? College Mental Health?
Just got my first email with Mental Health news from Medline. Saw this interesting article that could be a good case. I haven’t researched it yet but a case dealing with the mental health of college students could be really interesting! Good Introduction card More cases of severe mental illness are being reported among college [...]
Congressional Background
I did not know this until today but… According to 44USC1333, the Library of Congress is responsible for preparing compilations of pertinent excerpts, bibliographical references, and other appropriate materials relating to the annual [high school debate] topic. The compilation is then printed as a Senate document and disseminated by GPO. The following is a listing [...]
Breaking Down the Resolution, Pt 1.
Before we start debating or writing cases I think it’s important to break down the resolution to understand where we are going. I’m going to cover everything except the last phrase (chronically mentally ill) here and finish up in a post in a few days. The 2010-2011 resolution is: Be it resolved: the United States [...]
A Good Place to Start
One of the reasons I support NFA-LD debate is that each year I get to learn so much about the particular topic being debated. Whenever anyone brings up Greater Horn of Africa, renewable energy, Cuba, transportation, etc… I feel so knowledgeable and almost always can engage in a discussion regarding possible policy solutions and their [...]
2010 Winning Topic Paper
As discussed earlier this year when we tried submitting a Southern California Topic paper each participating school in NFA-LD has the ability to submit potential topic papers for the next year’s topic. Here is the topic paper that was submitted for this year’s topic. I’ve copied/pasted from the PDF so you can view it here: [...]
Season Sweepstakes 2010-2011
Last year we tried for the first time to run a season sweepstakes. I still have to get trophies to the winners but they are in process =) here is a recap of the award winners: Lincoln Division (Highest % of adjusted wins in at least three tournaments) 1 Biola University 2 University of California, [...]
Executive Committee: 2010-2011 Student Members
I’m happy to announce the two winners of the election for the two student members of the executive committee! A total of 17 ballots were cast and using an IRV vote system the two members are: Robert Maxwell (on the right) David Saulet (on the left) So the new executive committee will be: Danny Cantrell [...]
Reminder: Voting deadline 6/24
Students Four students were interested in serving on the board for next year. Thus, we will need to have an election. The qualifications to vote are that you must be a student from Southern California, competed in at least 1 NFA-LD tournament last year (2009-2010 season), and be interested in participating in NFA-LD next year. [...]
2010 SoCal-LD Summer Tournament
Hello all! I’m very excited about a new website that I’ve recently learned about called debatehall.com It is setup very nicely for NFA-LD and I think it would be a fantastic way to keep your LD skills sharp over summer. Here is a video explaining the head-to-head debate feature: What I’m thinking is that we [...]
2010-2011 Executive Committee
OK – since the Southern California NFA-LD community is getting larger and I’d like to include more diverse voices on this blog, I’ve decided to try and setup an executive committee so that I’m not running this through fiat. I’d also like to ensure that the blog features plenty of new content each week and [...]
