McCloskey,+Thomas

Thomas McCloskey Judging Philosophy

Spring 2013

Currently in PhD School at University of Maryland Part-time coach for Cypress Bay High School (Manatee, FL)

Previously coached at: Cypress Community College Southwestern Community College

I competed in parli at Willamette University for 4 years from 2001-2005, then coached parli/speech at Pacific University for a year (the year they had a debate team!), then coached parli at CSULB from 2009-2011 and I was the Director of Forensics (and speech/parli/policy coach) at Cypress High School from 2010-2012. I am current a first-year PhD student at University of Maryland. I guess you could call me tabula rasa, but see below. Presentation skills are not important beyond making good arguments in debate rounds. Again, see below. On case arguments are somewhat important depending on the round—see below.

__**I will take the easiest, most defensible way out I can.**__ Typically this is a dropped argument somewhere in the debate that is weighed well in the rebuttal, so to facilitate this, I like mechanisms that put certain arguments ahead of others and give me the easy-out I want. Speed serves this function, as do critical and procedural arguments, so I am perfectly fine with all three. In my opinion, intervening is a worse crime then voting for a crappy argument, and I will do what I'm told.

If you run a fact or value case in front of me, even when the resolution suggests such a case is appropriate, you lose the right to complain about my decision. Although I see the value in all types of debate, I am looking for easy-to-evaluate rounds and fact/value topics usually don't lead to those debates.

Hey, here's a thought—put offense on procedurals! Here's how 90% of debate rounds go:

PM: Case, blah blah blah, we all know this won't matter. LOC: 1-2 bad procedurals, case turns, disad, disad. MG: I'm an idiot so I'm going to spend 4 minutes on the procedurals but not give the judge any way to vote for me there, then undercover the second disad. MOC: OMGTHEYDROPPEDTHEDISAD! Extend the we-meet, 5 minutes on the disad of weighing, ballgame.

The way out of this is to put offense on procedural arguments because I will happily vote on an RVI if you do the work there.

The easiest way to get my ballot is to not drop anything and weigh arguments well in the rebuttal.