Wisconsin Forensics Daily

Who writes these topics?

This is a proposition of fact and annoying; there’s no value judgment or policy action required to be discussed by the resolution. Granted the claim is in doubt but this debate is very vanilla if we aren’t talking about what to do with Russia once it has become a threat or what is the best way to handle threats to the United States. The discussion may be well and good, but its the equivalent to the pre-war discussion if Iraq has weapons of mass destruction. Whether or not they had WMD, is irrelevant to the larger policy and value questions we seek to have our students grapple with. (Is pre-emptive warfare just or is attacking Iraq good for the perception of the united states - etc).

Fact based discussions are just not interesting to me. There’s a reason why we don’t have debates about whether there is life on Mars. Because there is no impact to engaging in the discussion.

I’ll also readily concede that its hard to articulate value claims and policy claims in a short amount of time. But that doesn’t mean that ignore the act of attempting to persuade people to these issues are without value. The short time span should force debaters to become more word economical. The sheer reality is that this is a dying art that few coaches understand. Giving debaters a cop out isn’t the solution, the solution is to get better at pursuing what’s difficult.

I’m deeply concerned about the lack of quality public forum topics (and LD for that matter too) because the writing of the topic focuses the debate to a large degree. The resolution is where these debates lie, not in the proposals the teams develop. This means that it is imperative for PF to have quality topics. Crappy topics = crappy debate. And if PF can’t have great topics, then it can’t be the format of debate we hope it to be.

By Nick Bubb on Jan 4, 2008

I thought the intent was to make PF distinct from LD and Policy. Resolutions of fact seems to be the easiest way to do that.

I think fact-based discussions are just the kind of substantive debates PF should deal with. LD and Policy are all about impact comparisons. We spend too little time discussing the premises and root assumptions. We construct just the kind of threats that PF was hoping to steer clear of when they formed it.

Unfortunately, the risk in rez of fact-type debates is that they pick a topic that is hard for negs to disprove. In this case, I think the literature is pretty balanced.

I wouldn’t mind hearing a good definitional debate over what constitutes a threat.

My only concern with the topic is the risk to clash because they didn’t specify type of threat. Is it economic? If so, debates will focus on the petrol dollar, Russian trade relations, and organized crime.

Is it diplomatic? If so, there will be debate over Russia’s actions in the UNSC, some trade relations debate, and Russia’s relations with China/Iran/etc.

Is it military? If so, debates could discuss recent efforts to shore up the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Russian hard line stances against “terrorism”, and Russia’s moves to re-assert it’s nuclear power projection.

I don’t know, this sounds like an interesting topic…perhaps it could have actually been more focused rather than broad as Nick suggests.

Incidentally, is there any reason why a Con can’t criticize US militarism, threat construction or securitization and claim that the Pro team is constructing threats to further US imperial ambitions? Wouldn’t that provide the substantive debate and discussions of implications?

By Cory Puuri on Jan 7, 2008

I agree with Cori’s analysis of why this kind of resolution can work in PF. Beyond what constitutes a threat, what constitutes a US interest? That might be economic, military, cultural, etc. The relationship between our 2 countries is complex and ground can be found on both sides of the resolution.

Those who know me know that I’m not a huge fan of PF, but I think I’d enjoy hearing a round or two on this resolution.

By John Knetzger on Jan 8, 2008

to me this is dumb to me. those silly russians aint gonna blow us up…ha… go McCain!

By kathryn stokes on Jan 14, 2008

what is the exact topic?

By joe on Jan 14, 2008

i’m dying here, please give me pro ad con points. please and thankyou

By jenny on Jan 14, 2008

get a life or atleast put something helpful on the site

By you all suck on Jan 15, 2008

What you think about new google style?
I like it :)

By Solvetepbet on Nov 16, 2008