Nagalla,+Shamita

I debated policy in high school for four years for Johns Creek High School in Georgia. I am currently a student at Vanderbilt University, but not on the debate team. My role was always the 2N/1A. Before I start talking about my view on specific arguments, I would like to emphasize one thing:
 * Prep time begins at the end of cross ex or last speech and ends when the flash drive leaves the computer. **Stealing prep is a sign of not being prepared, and if I catch you, it will detract from speaker points. While I will normally try to keep track of prep time, debaters should keep their own as well.

Now onto actual debate stuff. ====**Role of the ballot**: my role as a judge is determined by the debaters, so if I only get one interpretation of the role of the ballot, I will accept that. Given no interpretation I will default to being a policymaker. ==== **Performance:** As I said above, I believe in the value of a good framework debate, which will usually come with teams trying to use different media to support their arguments. If you debate the framework well, I see no reason why you shouldn’t be able to use different things to express your arguments. 
 * Topicality **: Topicality is an underused argument and, if debated well, comes before all other theory arguments. However, to debate it well you need to prove a strong link and give sufficient impact calculus.
 * Theory: ** I believe theory is necessary to preserve the integrity of debate as an activity, and I usually give theory arguments (and framework arguments) a lot of weight. I’d love to get more specific impacts than fairness and education, but between those two I think fairness is a precursor to education and is a legitimate impact. Proofs of in round abuse will go a lot farther than potential abuse. That being said, if you run conditionality for a team that is reading one conditional counterplan, I don’t think you’ll be able to prove a strong enough link for me to give you the argument.
 * Having a plan text: **If you can give me a good enough reason to why not reading a plan text is crucial to your aff, then go ahead. If you can’t give me a good reason, then I believe that the negative not being able link their disadvantages is a legitimate fairness argument, and I will err neg.

On a final note, the best rounds are ones where the debaters understand their evidence and arguments. While I think K debates can get very interesting if the debaters know what they're talking about, this rarely happens, which ultimately makes most K debates very dull. Some of the best rounds I’ve seen are simple DA and case debates where debaters pay attention to making warranted arguments.

