ConMac

=__**2ac Politics Drill - July 12**__= Comments by Peyton

Great volume/speed/clarity Work on strategic choices (see comments to Max about not necessarily just impact turning, maybe read some link/uniqueness defense, and about the Mead card having some tension with your turn) Careful about reading the Internal link defense – the congressional action doesn’t solve argument takes out your ice age turn and seriously reduces your offense/makes part of your speech irrelevant.

=__Politics DA Block Extension Speech - July 15__=

Comments by Tate
--I am very glad that you have an overview/impact calculus to start your speech. Overall, I would rate this as a very good overview for a debater your age. However, I think we can make some tweaks…it was pretty word inefficient. Long impact overviews are fine as long as we are efficient making a bunch of different arguments. --It was good to make evidence comparisons in regards to having similar authors on the Ice Age turns. However, impact that – what does it get you if you are reading a card from their author that says “yeah, but there won’t be an Ice Age for 700,000 years”? --Overall, good volume and speed. We slow down somewhat when we are giving analyticals…those analyticals tend to even slow down a bit more when the analyticals drag on. Think about your analytical as only needing two parts – “the tag” (what is the argument” and the warrant “the why”. --Good volume and presence.  --I would highlight a few of these cards down…a few of these warming cards were a bit too lengthy.  --With an impact turn debate, it is *imperative* that the judge has a filter or framing device for your side of the debate that serves as a foundation for all of your arguments OR has a trump card. For example, in a heg good/heg bad debate, the uniqueness arguments about heg being sustainable or not sustainable is that filter. In a warming debate, have a filter at the top that is either a prodict to warming bad authors or some type of “try or die”.  --No need for underview.

=__Mini-Debate #1 - Aff vs. Konstantine/Fri - July 16__=

Comments by Jeffrey Xu
Team Comments: Aff: Good cross-x questions, just need to turn these into arguments in the 2AC. --Put more varied arguments, particularly offense, in the 2AC. Do impact calc based on the 1AC. --Good on pointing out how the neg cards don't answer the specifics of your arguments.

=__Practice Debate #3 - Neg (2N) vs. Dhara/Luke - July 24__= ===Comments by Jonathan Blough=== **1. Rebuttal structure** – The last three speeches were rambling and blippy. I encouraged them to develop more efficient speeches that focus on round-winning arguments **2. Citing evidence** – Cards weren’t cited as well as they could have been (often the reference was just forgotten, humorously after the speaker had criticized the other team for making analytics), and when they were cited people took 10 seconds just to say what the other team’s argument was **3. Making offensive arguments and sounding like you’re making offensive arguments** – No one phrases any good arguments like they’re winning them, and very little of this round consisted of focusing on offense. **4. Be more efficient with your computer** – There were multiple instances where people spent 30 seconds of their speech rummaging through their computer flows and saying nothing Combatic Geoblackmail **1ac c-x** COIN has not been around for a decade. War in Afghanistan yes, COIN no. **2nc** - Start slower. You begin with a racing pace then almost immediately slow down. Saying “without this, al qaeda is just a bunch of dudes sitting in a motel talking about airplanes” was neither funny nor useful. You need a more concrete explanation of “insurgency” – “it makes terrorism multinational” is not a definition. **2nr –** You should spend more than 55 seconds on the sole disad you’re going for. Just saying “Russia has some nukes” doesn’t help you much. You need to form the 2nr into more of a cohesive statement on why you win the round and focus less on hitting every single base. Your speech seems to touch on impact calculus multiple times, but in different ways. Condense this.
 * Major points for all: **
 * The Sarah Palin award for the words in the English language invented during this round **

=__Practice Debate #4 - Aff (1A) vs. Mike/Shreyas - July 25__=

Comments by Jeffrey Xu
Your 1AR should focus on arguments you think the 2AR can use to win the round. On the counterplan, you could have spent much less time because the neg block didn't have a good response to perm do the CP. Make sure to put T at the top of the speech so you get to it with enough time. When you are low on time and need to pick an advantage to kick, look at how the advantages interact with the other flows. In this case, I would have kept the heg advantage because the neg dropped arguments about how that advantage accesses their impacts. You made good points in cross-examination of the 1NC, but you don't need to beat a dead horse and keeping asking for them to produce evidence that it's clear that they don't have.

=__Practice Debate #5 - Neg (2N) vs. Ken/Fri - July 27__=

Comments by Tate
--This is one of the better CX periods I have seen at camp thus far. You had great ethos (started immediately, good volume, utilized space well, had the other team’s evidence so the other team had to ask for it back to answer questions). Nicely done. --I thought you did a nice job with the division of the block. --I was close to “stopping” you to try to tighten up the line-by-line…we are close but we need to be tighter in answering 2AC arguments specifically and in order. There were times you were spot on with this but other times it was lacking. --You need an overview for off-case positions…especially the ABL DA. --Do we have an answer to the space turn on ABL? This is a pretty impact turn to have dropped if we did. --I think that it is fine to have kicked the CP in the 2NR. --You do have an overview in the 2NR (which I am glad to see) but we need to structure/organize it a bit more. It was difficult to truly tell if this was an overview or just an ambiguous discussion of some “thoughts by Conor” on the case debate. :) --Make sure to do some impact calculus/comparisons between the ABL DA and the case flows. You have a partial one but it needs a bit more sophistication. It is a good start to say “timeframe” but explain why the DA has a faster timeframe or a bigger magnitude. --This speech had a lot of good arguments and some good “door closing” to win the debate but it was disorganized. If this is a speech redo, I would really try to make sure that we are organized…when on one flow, stick to that flow. Extend specific neg cards on case by cite.

=__Rebuttal Redo from Practice Debate #1 (2NR) - July 28__=

Comments by Tate
-Very small tweak but the first words out of your mouth should be "Disadvantage outweighs the case". You don't want to lose ethos by stumbling around to get to your impact calculus. -I do really like the fact that you are doing an extensive impact calculus at the top of the speech. However, it is a bit lengthy. Avoid talking about specific drops by the Affirmative on the line-by-line. I would do this impact calculus with about "half the goods" you have. You lose your "punch" with a good impact calculus if it is too long, repetitive of the line-by-line, and if you are stretching with some irrelevant arguments. --You are doing a nice job talking about your cards but I would like to hear more cards referenced/extended by cite. You are doing this to some degree, but you want a lot of specific cards extended. For example, your discussion of the first argument on the Terrorism advantage (about why COIN withdrawal increases terrorism). What is the 1NC evidence for this argument? Were there block cards read on this argument? If so, extend those cites. --I would like to see you continuing to build your extension of evidence by warrant. Talk about the specifics of your evidence. For example, you have enough "pen time" on the flow on the Terrorism flow about how COIN withdrawal increases terrorism. Your job in the 2NR is also to tell me*why* that is true...what arguments does your author make? Next time you are negative, I want you thinking about the "why" to your evidence in the 2NR.

=__Practice Debate #6 - Aff (1A) vs. Erik/Anshuman - July 28__=

Comments by Chris Mair
I think you need to spend more time on the link turn on the politics da – you did a good job on the uniqueness debate but without the link articulation you only have defense. Spend more time on the abl da, and extend more 2ac arguments on the case debate – I thought the 1ar was pretty good, had it not been for those few mistakes.

=__Back to Basics Drill: Minerals DA Block Speech - July 30__=

--Overall, you met the purpose of this drill - focusing on strict line-by-line debating and utilizing lots of evidence in the block. --I would have tried to have prepared a short overview. You probalby would not have had time in the 6:00 we gave you in lab to prepare after 2AC, but you could have prepared an overview before hand. --Don't forget to extend your cards from the 1NC. --Good to not "double cover" arguments that were repeats.
 * Comments by Tate**