Jenny Reiss

Fracking is neither sustainable nor will it bridge the way towards renewable energy

Any environmental risk is reason enough to calm enthusiasm for natural gas, especially the process of hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking. Fracking requires pumping toxic fluid into the ground at a pressure high enough to fracture shale rocks and release the natural gas inside. This process can cause water pollution, earthquakes, the destruction of aquifers and the elimination of natural landscapes.

Eric Lanning -

Hydraulic fracking will promote sustainability by bridging fossil fuels and alternative energy

One of the dilemmas of the debates about energy in the United States is the reality that no solution is perfect. There are upsides and downsides to any decision, and both traditional — fossil fuels — and alternative — renewable fuels — involve tradeoffs between cost and impact. With this in mind, … Read More »

The team has departed, with Nader, for GSU. #GoCoogs

Stay up to date with the latest in high school debate! 

A lot of good advice here, but this first tip strikes me as right on!

You don’t need to be a top level debater in high school to be successful in college debate. If you have any interest in trying college debate, try it. Many very successful college debaters had very limited high school careers.

via 10 tips for rising seniors from college debate directors | HS Impact.

Prizes will be awarded

Name these people -

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H/T – the new #HSdebate blog HSimpact

Data seems to be from the Michigan Debate Workshops – the authors seem to be “marc” and “danny” – check it out here. 

Found this gem of coach Nick Brown, while searching for pictures of debate tubs on Google.

I love the internet.

Interesting piece on Foreign Policy about Risk that has a lot of potential for thinking about this year’s debate topic.

The Real Risks – By David Rothkopf

With each passing day, it becomes even clearer that despite what appears to be a very serious current terrorist threat, the greatest risks facing America come from our own misplaced priorities and mistaken assumptions.

As recently as late last week, I spoke with a very senior administration official — one of the White House’s best and brightest — who forcefully described the significance of America’s successful destruction of “core” al Qaeda. White House spokesman Jay Carney reiterated this point in comments to the press on Monday. But two errors in that assessment have now become abundantly apparent. The first is obvious given that the current alert is reportedly due in part to communications between a still-active … Read More »

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UH Debate knows a little about the win imperative..

In short, it’s about winning. All games are played to win.

via What Games Are: The Win Imperative | TechCrunch.

Tech giants, bone wars, and sports franchises: a special series on the greatest rivalries. – Slate Magazine.

“As Shakespeare once told us, “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.” And some, he might have added, rise to greatness because of the presence—and the provocations—of a worthy rival. In a series of articles over the next few weeks, Slate will explore how competition makes the best even better, driving creativity, innovation, and sheer bloody-mindedness in a race to the top.”

Reminds me of my earlier point about gamification and debate.

Re-post from HoustonDebate on medium.com:

I’ve recently been putting together curriculum for next week’s Houston Urban Debate League (HUDL) summer workshop and I’ve been looking for new ways to teach debate to students who are encountering debate for the first time.

The amazing part of debate, even to outsiders, is the passion and enthusiasm it creates in students for even the most arcane and complex topics. High school students spending hours researching the history of US foreign policy towards Latin America? Yes, it happens. Competitive debate somehow motivates students to learn even the most impenetrable subjects. How? Competition. The thrill of the game creates highly engaged students because they want to win.

But the impenetrability of the material is also the problem.Novices are often overwhelmed by the amount and complexity of debate jargon in addition to the difficult content of the topic that they are … Read More »

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Resolved: The United States Federal Government should substantially increase statutory and/or judicial restrictions on the war powers authority of the President of the United States in one or more of the following areas: targeted killing; indefinite detention; offensive cyber operations; or introducing United States Armed Forces into hostilities.

Survey here

Camp Evidence Gathered | GSQ @ MGW.

 Cal National Debate Institute:
Affs
(Lots of other stuff here too) - including ”goat cans”

 Cuba - End Embargo, Leadership Adv
Mexico Energy - Renewables, China
Venezuela - Russia, Latin American Instability, Relations (China Crowd out)

Emory National Debate Institute
Affs

Cuba – Both pre-camp and post-camp (much like the term “pre-fiat“)

 UTNIF
 Affs - All zipped here.

Cuba – End Embargo
Mexico – Oil (Transboundary Agreement)

Northwestern Debate institute
Aff – (pre-camp)

Cuba - All impacts (China, Relations, Russia, Drugs, Aliens)

Michigan

Evidence from the MNDI/Classic/7-weeks it not available on the new-fangled “internets”

Affs -
Border Infrastructure Mexico

Text: The United States federal government should substantially increase its United States – Mexico North American Development Bank border transportation infrastructure investment

Text: The United States federal government should substantially increase its investment in United States – Mexico North American Development Bank transportation infrastructure projects

Text: The United States federal government should substantially increase its border transportation infrastructure projects with Mexico

Test: The United States federal government should substantially increase aid to funding … Read More »

Flow Along | GSQ @ MGW.

Dewhurst declares abortion bill dead, blames ‘unruly mob’

Really liking Branch – hoping it will catch on…

Josh Gonzalez and I just got back from a fantastic week at the Dallas Urban Debate Alliance summer workshop. It was fantastic! The students were amazing (many future Coogs, I hope)! 

The workshop and the enthusiasm of the students and staff were a great reminder of the value of debate and why it is so valuable! Here’s a video we put together about the camp!

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And here’s a link to another video about our lab rivalries!

And not hit a debater at the Harris County courthouse…

The title of this post was inspired by a 2007 Houston Chronicle Op-Ed by two UH Debate Alums, Ron Bankston & Barbara Radnofsky.

Debate is preparation for life. Not much more evidence is needed than this 1971 UH policy debate yearbook photo. Check out the interactive version here.

While debate does prepare many undergraduates for law school, the reach of its metaphorical “stick” goes much further.

Yes, UH alums are successful lawyers, honorable judges and mediators, but UH Debate alums, in particular, have excelled in fields outside of the law.  Debate coaches, professors, medical ethicists and on and on.

One goal of this blog is to showcase the accomplishments of these alumni, so stay tuned.

I’ll leave you with the wisdom of UH Debate Alum Linda Listrom – executive director of the National Association of Urban … Read More »

“Selecting an official question is not all beer and skittles. It means a lot of work and requires a lot of machinery.” – The Forensic, 1938

So it seems the topic committee has again wrapped up its unenviable work on the upcoming NDT/CEDA topic. If you also have some time to burn, you can watch the deliberation in these videos. 

As a brief side note, the number and diversity of the resolutions I think is a good sign that the committee has begun to recognize the impossibility of resolutional perfection (for more on this, see this article I wrote a few years ago about the topic process).

For those out there who are unfamiliar with the process, CEDA will in the coming weeks release a ballot with these options and the vote will be due around the 3rd Saturday in July, with the … Read More »

Today I got a big set of books from the wonderful UH library system for the upcoming War Powers college CEDA/NDT topic and I was reminded of the value of analog – i.e. “books” – in the process of debate research.

Now, this insight is not all that novel, in fact it perhaps dates me a bit. But I thought I’d post a few thoughts on why books are still relevant and useful, despite the overwhelming preference of debaters to find their evidence in electronic formats.

Uniqueness – Books have articles and chapters and writing that you can’t find elsewhere, often not even electronically. This fact is lost on those who do not read books that often. But I can’t emphasize enough that there are very good cards to be found in books that you won’t find on the interwebs (see below) .
Context – Books as a genre … Read More »

Check out this great slam poetry by UH Honors student Mahnoor Samana featured on Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls youtube channel.

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In the early 1960s, Sinclair Oil sponsored the innovative “Young America Speaks” debate show, on WFAA the Dallas NBC affiliate. The UH Archives have some amazing photos of UH on the show, featuring some very classy UH blazers.

While I’m still researching the show (hopefully I’ll be able to find some footage) I think the concept should be revived, it has to be better than insert your least favorite reality show here.

What I do know about the show comes from alums like Carmen (Stallings) Finn and Lance Funston who told my Advocacy class about their TV debate moment of fame.

Here’s a good snapshot of the event from the Abilene Optimist.

More later…

The 2013-2014 High School National Forensics League topic has been out for some time, but we’re beginning to think and work on the topic – We’ll be posting resources, links, and the like on this blog as well as cross-posting from our GSQ lab blog at the UNT Mean Green workshop.

Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially increase its economic engagement toward Cuba, Mexico, or Venezuela.

To kick it off, here’s a very cool word cloud that depicts US-Attitudes towards Mexico that is associated with a study from last year on the topic from the National Journal.

Perhaps debating this topic can change change these associations for the high school students who will be researching and discussing these questions in depth!

Next year’s debate topic area was voted on and announced today! We’ll be debating the implications of Presidential War Powers.

The topic is important, timely and should be very interesting. I’ll be posting here about the topic (among other things) so stay tuned.