Carpenter,+Dylan

I debated in high school for 3 years at New Trier in Illinois.

I can't guarantee that the stuff I say here will be 100% how I judge, but it's mostly just suggestions that I think will help, or annoying idiosyncrasies you should strive to shy away from.

I know almost nothing about the topic, so shy away from acronyms and plan accordingly.

Basically, I'm ok with pretty much anything: policy or critical stuff is all fine; the best advice is to go what you're comfortable going for. I have no moral issues with debaters going for arguments that are pretty reprehensible (patriarchy/racism good, etc); if you can't beat these stupid arguments than you deserve to loose anyways.

Probably the most important caveat to what I assume will be my judging style is that as a debater I liked non-interventionist, flow-centric judges; so, I will generally judge that way. This means that you should try to be technical and not drop stuff; I'm not going to call for their politics 2nc impact add-on cards if you drop them throughout the debate and then suddenly get your shit together and realize that the "New American Civil War Impact" is absolutely idiotic. I won't be sympathetic if you drop stupid stuff like this. Just point that out earlier in the debate, and there won't be any problems.

Arguments: What constitutes an argument seems to be increasingly important as speeches get more and more blippy and more and more tricky. On the K, saying "the perm is severance, that's a voting issue" doesn't constitute an argument. And so, if the 1ar drops it, it's not a voting issue. Now, if the 2nc makes an statement why it is a reason to reject the team, then that's a different story.

Theory: You should always use it. I did - a lot. Senior year, I went for fifty state fiat a lot on the aff. So don't be afraid to go for it in front of me. Theory needs to be debated like most other arguments in debate. You need impact calc that answers meta-questions like: why does fairness precede education? why is neg flex more important than aff flex? is there an aff bias? etc. It's not enough to win that their shenanigans have screwed you over, you need to win why that is important. And how I should react. I was a 2N, so I'm open to the neg going for most stuff. Here are my predispositions:

Conditionality - lean neg, definitely not impossible. 50 state/international fiat - lean aff, definitely not impossible. Consult - lean aff, definitely not impossible. Floating PICs - aff PICs - neg Intrinsicness - neutral

K's: I went for the K a lot, so I understand that it's sometimes a little dumb. Make sure to include good, solid analytics. I remember sometimes the hardest arguments to answer were good historical examples that really tested how true the K is. This is true for both the aff and the neg.

DA's: Obviously fine. The 2A needs to make sure to include analytic arguments about how bad there evidence is (believe me, it will be). If it doesn't say lost will pass, point it out. It's not enough to say it has momentum.

In terms of impact calculus, make sure to get more advanced. Explain how time frame o/w magnitude, or vice versa.

T: Great. Do impact calc.