Wisconsin Forensics Daily

Thursday Thing to Read: Politics Disadvantages

One of the main staples of modern policy debates are politics disadvantages.  Many judges often see these arguments as unrelated, poorly researched arguments.  Others love them.  But what are politics disadvantages?  How can debaters make them?  And are they good for debate?  Sheboygan North's recent graduate and current assistant coach, Jon Voss, takes on these issues in today's Thursday Thing to Read.

The Political Swamp: Washington’s impact on Policy Debate

I was going to open with a joke…but come on; what’s a bigger joke than me talking about something that isn’t Consult Australia?  Politics disadvantage you say? Let’s give it a shot.

At her core, Policy Debate necessitates a discussion of the United States Federal Government implementing a policy.  The nature of said policy obviously changes with the resolution—one year we might find ourselves debating US Policy on Argentina; the next, American domestic assistance to victims of natural disasters.  Speaking in a ‘policy debate’ framework (one in which the affirmative team defends fiat), the affirmative plan is usually implemented by one of three actors: the Congress, the Court, or the Executive. The power of Fiat allows the affirmative team to debate in a world in which the Federal Government actually implements the plan. Though entirely hypothetical, this method of debate achieves ‘real world education’—discussing the advantages and disadvantages of a particular plan is exactly what policy makers do at all levels of government.  Oftentimes, teams get bogged down discussing the non-political affects of the plan—while fun, these types of debates invariably become riddled with extraneous arguments. For example, the Supreme Court’s ruling in favor of an enemy combatant would probably have massive political implications here at home, but some people found it more entertaining to discuss Russia’s reaction to such a decision.  Fiat allows the affirmative team to pass the plan using legislation, an executive order, or a Supreme Court interpretation.  Generally speaking, when Congress passes significant legislation, certain parts of society are angry. Similarly, when the President unilaterally enacts a policy, the rest of the nation reacts.  Court action is a bit trickier, but it’s fair to say that decisions have potential political ramifications.  This is the thesis of the politics disadvantage—that when the Affirmative team fiats the plan, the Government has to take steps of implementation. When a plan is enacted, the public learns and forms opinions about it as a result of media coverage. The public's response, whether positive or negative, is reflected in their opinion of the acting branch and affects the outcome of future issues. Perception of the affirmative plan can help or hurt political initiatives, which can be a good or bad thing. We’ll take an in-depth look at the different parts of the politics disad and how the unique facets of the argument operate together to form one of the most effective strategies in policy debate.

The politics disad can be run in two directions: Bush Good and Bush Bad. Simply, Bush Good means that the policy initiative (for example, a bill in congress) is due to pass now, which is a good thing. The plan prevents the initiative, which in turn prevents the benefits.  Much the same, Bush Bad indicates that initiative X (which is bad) will not pass now, but the plan would allow it to pass—as a result, something bad would occur.  It’s important to note that there are really only two kinds of policy initiatives: legislation and elections.  The story on legislation is above. An elections story would look very similar–X gets elected now, which is a good thing, but plan prevents X from getting elected.

Although apparently complex, politics disads are really no different from other disads.  Just like any other disadvantage, a politics argument needs to be unique.  If your story is Bush Good, your uniqueness evidence needs to indicate that the initiative will pass now.  If Bush Bad is your argument of choice, read evidence that articulates reasons that the initiative won’t happen in the squo.  Controlling uniqueness on the politics debate is crucial—your evidence needs to very conclusive and extremely recent.  More often than not, your politics story will involve a controversial initiative—which means that evidence will be written both ways.   Chances are the other team will have comparative evidence—if you say the initiative will pass because it has bipartisan support, they’ll likely have a piece of evidence that says the base hates that same initiative.  If your evidence isn’t extremely conclusive and updated weekly, you’ll probably lose the uniqueness debate.  In highly competitive environments, it’s not at uncommon to hear same-day uniqueness evidence.

In a politics 1nc shell, the next argument would be the link. However, when discussing the politics disadvantage, one must understand the intricacies of the various internal link arguments in relation to the link. ALWAYS make sure you can win uniqueness to your internal link.  Since I haven’t debated in almost a year, I don’t believe this list of internal links to be encompassing.  However, it’s fairly thorough. 

Political Capital—understanding the theory of political capital is the necessary precursor to understanding ANY of these other internal link scenarios. Political Capital is a single entity’s ability to influence the outcome of a political event—a perception of power.  While both the Congress and the President have political capital, in terms of the politics disadvantage, teams usually make arguments regarding the capital of the President.  Political Capital, which is necessary for Bush to get his agenda, is (arguably) finite.  In a Bush Good scenario, then, the argument would be that the plan’s implementation would drain Bush’s capital because he’d have to push a potentially controversial initiative through congress. Absent capital, Bush would be politically impotent and unable to the other initiative (the one your uniqueness evidence mentions).  Running the disad the other direction is just a simple reversal—the plan would boost Bush’s capital because it’s congressionally popular. In a world where Bush has more capital, he would probably be able to pass an initiative that would not have previously passed. That initiative is bad.

Focus—This internal link is very similar to political capital. The Bush Good argument is that Bush’s political capital is only effective when he uses significant amounts of it on one initiative.  Adding the plan to Bush’s agenda would require him to take focus away from the initiative, preventing it from passing. The focus link can be particularly effective with the current president—lots of liberal authors write cards about Bush’s perceived unintelligence and inability to articulate multiple ideas at one time.  Reading a focus link on the Bush Bad side of the debate doesn’t make a whole lot of sense—the argument that an incoherent focus is key to the agenda is pretty laughable. 

Bipartisanship—is less concerned with the amount of political capital and more concerned with who determines Bush’s success.  Bipartisanship simply means that Democrats and the GOP are on decently good terms.  Bush Good arguments would assert that the plan is popular with the right and the left. By creating bipartisan climate, Bush’s capital would exponentially increase, all
owing him to get an initiative.  Again, this is primarily a Bush Good argument—there’s not really a logical reason that congressional cooperation is a bad thing for Bush’s agenda. However, many teams have had success by arguing that a presidential attempt to create bipartisanship would alienate the base because Bush would be forced to compromise some GOP values.

Base/GOP Unity—Every President has a congressional base—for Bush, it’s the moderate to far-right republicans. Bush Good stories articulate that the base doesn’t like the plan (probably because of ideological differences). Historically, whenever a president angers his base TOO much, they retaliate by hanging him out to dry on a key initiative. Thus, the argument would be that the plan angers the base so much that they’d abandon Bush, which would render his capital useless because the congresspersons that normally vote in favor of the president would, in retaliation, teach Bush a lesson.  The Bush Bad argument is just as strong with Base links.  Anyone running Bush Bad with a base link would argue that the Base likes the plan—as a result, they would rally around Bush and in addition to affirming his agenda, use THEIR OWN capital to sway swing votes in the president’s favor.  Bush would then get a bad initiative. 

Moderates—this argument is almost identical to the GOP link. The only difference is that you argue that the Base’s vote unwavering; thus, swing voters (those who play both sides of the aisle) are the crucial internal link to the agenda because they break the ties.  A Bush Good scenario would argue that the plan pushes moderate votes away. A Bush Bad story asserts that the plan captures crucial swing votes necessary to the agenda. 
Flip-Flop—back to a very capital-heavy link.  You probably heard lots about Flip-Flopping during the 2004 presidential race.  The Bush Good argument is that Presidents maintain congressional legitimacy and political capital by sticking close to party lines and beliefs.  If Bush were to implement a policy that negates previous decisions or strays from his platform on an issue (for example, if Bush arbitrarily granted a slew of rights to enemy combatants), the entirety of congress would be confused—the Base would be mad and the Democrats confused.  As a result, Bush would immediately lose all capital, sealing the fate of your initiative. This one is undoubtedly a Bush Good link story—flip flops might not always drain ALL of Bush’s capital, but they NEVER increase ANY of it.
 
Winners Lose— they key to this link scenario is determining Bush’s opinion of the plan—would he like it or hate it? Let’s assume that he likes it. The plan would be a win for Bush. The argument is that once Bush gets a big win like the plan, he wouldn’t get another one for a very long time. The reasons are manifold—no more capital, congress wants to check power, mobilized opposition, etc.  If Bush got the plan, he wouldn’t get his other agenda item.

Winners Win—The Bush bad side of winners lose, this argument would assert that the plan is a win for Bush. When presidents get a legislative win, more are sure to follow because their legitimacy increases—i.e. if Bush got the plan (a win), he’d get his other agenda item too.
Losers Lose—Again, would Bush like or hate the plan? If he hates it, the plan is a loss. The Bush Good argument articulates that losses travel in packs—if Bush lost on the plan, he wouldn’t get other agenda items either.

Losers Win—The Bush bad side of Losers Lose, the argument is that if Bush took a loss like the plan, he’d get a win next time through. There’s really no reason that this argument is true….not highly recommended, but I included it since teams do make this argument.
Concessions—This is a compromise link. Bush good stories would argue that the plan is a democratic initiative—passing it would be a concession for Bush.  If Bush made a concession to the left,  Bush good disads would assert that concessions alienate the Base, which is key to the agenda. On the other side of the debate, Bush Bad stories look like this: the plan is a concession to democrats, which is key to the agenda since Bush will get his party votes no matter what he does. As a result, Bush would have his agenda.

Popularity—this argument is less about Washington and more about the American people. The Bush Good story would argue that the plan would be unpopular with the American people. As a result, they would contact their representatives, senators, and interest groups of choice and exert pressure on all of them. In light of this pressure, the congress would be forced to throw Bush under the bus to save face. Flipping this, Bush Bad scenarios would say that the plan IS popular with the public. The people would perceive Bush as responsible for a helpful, legitimate policy—consequently, congress would have to back the President because congress reflects the needs of the people.

Lobbies—Pretty similar to popularity, the argument here is that a particular interest group would like/dislike the plan. Bush good scenarios would say that the lobby of choice is opposed to the plan, and blocks Bush’s agenda as a result.  Bush bad scenarios argue that the lobby likes the plan and helps Bush manipulate congress.

IMPORTANT!  Capitol Hill is rife with different lobbies, each of which with its own agenda. Most of the time, lobby-specific links are very effective. However, it is imperative that you read LOBBY-SPECIFIC evidence. For example, the Plan Angers the GUN Lobby, and the GUN lobby is key to the agenda. No two lobbies have the same political agenda.

Senator-Specific—Once again, similar to the lobby link scenario.  Your argument here is that a specific Senator would like or dislike the plan.  . Bush bad scenarios would assert that Senator Jones hates the plan. Since she’s the most influential Senator on Capitol Hill, she’d uniquely block Bush’s agenda.  Bush good then, is just the opposite; Senator Smith loves the plan. Smith is key to the agenda because he’s the most popular senator—appeasing Smith allows Bush to get his initiative. Personally, these link scenarios are my favorite—they’re the most believable because it’s much easier to predict the opinion of one person and they’re the most difficult to answer since so little is written about individual Senators. Teams can make similar types of arguments, substituting congressional committees for individual senators.  To the best knowledge, there is only literature on the effectiveness of the following Senators:
        John McCaine
        Harry Reid
        Joseph Biden
        Russell Feingold
        Olympia Snowe
        Susan Collins

To be sure, the politics debate gets much more complicated. Advanced teams will make arguments regarding Bush’s credit and blame, the way the media spins the plan, and Bush’s being a lame duck.  Some debaters even go to the extent of critiquing politics disads—this is something I never did, so I don’t feel qualified to explain it. Perhaps a member of the community could add some insight? Regardless, most of the debate big shots seem to agree that the Politics Disadvantage does have some role in Policy Debate.  In my four years of Wisconsin debate, I always felt that Politics was a
n under-developed and mis-understood strategy—that is to say, many teams used politics, but most debaters never argued it as effectively as they could have. I hope this helped to give some younger debaters a basic understanding of the politics disad. Perhaps it even refreshed some of the veterans. At any rate, I hope this article conjures up a good debate—most of what I wrote above is debatable.  For those of us beginning our debate seasons on Friday at Rufus King, let’s have a great start to 2006-2007!
 

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