Kobeski,+Michael

My goal as a critic is to not allow my personal biases to interfere with my evaluation of the arguments presented in the round. I want debaters to feel free to present to me their best argument. However I also strongly believe that certain arguments have higher burdens than other arguments simply based on the very nature of those arguments. But since debate is an adversarial process, the burden to disprove those arguments is the responsibility of the other team and not my role as a critic. To that end, I will decide the round based on the arguments on my flow. I can flow fairly quickly but since I have been out of the activity for a while I have lost a few miles on my fast ball. I also need for debaters to enunciate. I have a hard time flowing rapid blippy responses. Arguments are not just assertions; they require analysis and development to be successful. I also am not extensively familiar with the poverty topic, so don’t assume a high level of specific topic knowledge. The best way to be successful in front of me is to base your rebuttal speeches on the frontlines presented in the constructives rather than lumping everything together and assuming I know where you are. I tend to view the debate round through the policymaker paradigm and weigh advantages versus disadvantages. However I do understand the world of discourse kritiks and non-policy impacts to positions. Feel free to present alternative frameworks for deciding a round, but be ready to explain and defend the framework presented. Debaters tend to be more successful when they don’t make assumptions, but make the effort to defend the analysis underlying the arguments they are making. In terms of debate experience, I debated in high school long ago and coached some very good policy teams in Washington State in the mid-90s. My career prevented me from doing much debate judging for a while, but now I have some free time I am judging again. Play nice. Please no ad homs or personal attacks. Don’t embarrass yourself or the other team, play nice. Any questions please feel free to ask.