Habig,+Jason

I am affiliated with Hathaway Brown School in Cleveland, Ohio.

I am a coach whose background is mostly in policy (debated in high school and college), but now coach all events, including LD.

If left solely to my own beliefs, I would always default into a policymaker paradigm, yet I am willing to switch into any paradigm argued by the debaters. Even though my knowledge base and interest in kritiks is lower than with more traditional politics / counterplan debate, I am finding myself more frequently voting on critical arguments with each passing year. I use the 2NR / 2AR overviews as a frame through which to view the round, and as such the comparative aspects of these speeches are paramount…
 * __Policy Philosophy__**

- I don’t like to read evidence after the debate, and will only do so as a way to decide between conflicting interpretations of evidence. - One of my major problems with the way most students debate kritiks is that they assume that I know how the impacts of them function in the debate. Don’t just assume that I understand how your kritik should be weighted vis-à-vis the affirmative advantages - I rarely if ever find myself voting on cheap shot theory arguments that are not developed in the 2ac or the negative block, even if “dropped”. - While I can flow above average speed, at times I miss arguments on the flow. 99% of the time, any argument that I miss, I can fill in later in the debate, but especially on theory and topicality, you might need to slow down compared to the top speed on the national circuit on arguments that will be critical later in the debate. - Standards debate is the key to winning both theory arguments and topicality for me, and comparative analysis helps me to evaluate your arguments without any intervention. I guess I am a believer in the “offense-defense” interpretation of topicality. - I believe that it is very unlikely for a team to take out 100% of a link or of an affirmative’s solvency. As a result, impact analysis should compare the differences between an unlikely, if large impact to a more likely, yet possibly smaller impact. I find this analysis is frequently involved in how I resolve close, “policy oriented” debates. - If you have any other questions about how I view debate, please ask me before the round. I will answer any question you have in as much detail as I can.


 * __LD Philosophy__**

I have judged quite a bit of LD in the last three years in Ohio, but very little outside of the state. Given my policy background, speed is not an issue. I am used to judging cases that are set up in a "traditional" way, with great emphasis on a value and value criterion. This in no way implies that I need to see this sort of structure in the round, because I do not. While I believe that evidence plays a valuable role in LD debate, clear insightful analysis from the debaters can be just as important. I keep a decent flow and often find myself placing great emphasis on dropped arguments.

Given that I do not judge national circuit LD very often, I do not have a sense of exactly what other information would be helpful to you as you prepare for your debates...please feel free to ask me any questions that you have before the round.