I debated policy at Omaha Westside from 2009-2012. This is my 5th year coaching at Millard North.

Policy Paradigm

My national circuit experience is largely with critical debate. I'm more familiar with the identity side of things than postmodern, but I've gotten to a point where I feel comfortable understanding the majority of explanations of high theory arguments, even if a detail is lost here or there.

I think debates should emphasize debating and clash. Therefore, I am not a good judge for clash avoidant strategies and mental gymnastic competitions that proliferate underdeveloped arguments.

I prefer a combination of evidence and analysis over evidence dumps. Application of arguments, direct responses and comparative analysis should start before the final speech in front of me.

RoBs are often arbitrary and self-serving. I like them when they function as a point of clash that is essentially impact comparison between competing political approaches, ideologies, methods, etc. I don't like them when people think they win because the other team "dropped" the RoB because they didn't have a competing text despite the other team being ahead on the substance of the debate (links, impacts, solvency, whatever). If that's the case I'll probably vote for the team winning the substance.

I do not vote on cheap shots. Arguments are at least a claim and a warrant.


Disads, CPs, Ks, T – Default to offense/defense within reason. Complete defense is possible but highly unlikely. Turns case arguments get away with too much because silly internal links and magic alternatives aren’t challenged.

I’ve been less active this year so I’m not familiar with the truth(ier) side of topic disads and affs. Spin supported by evidence will go far. This will be the most disorienting on T because case lists will just be random case names to me, so emphasizing the quality of cases and debates for x and y reason will be especially important.


Framework – 

Part A – General Thoughts

I have a slight aff side bias in the relatively few framework debates I’ve judged, but I think that has more to do with the average framework debater being conceptually behind the average k aff debater in framework debates than anything else. 

That being said, I think the neg block on framework is the most commonly mediocre block in debate. They’re overly scripted, non-responsive, full of blippy jargony arguments that aren’t contextualized to the aff, and the 2NCs and 2NRs are almost identical to the speeches given in other debates against wildly different critical affs. It’s about as bad as when less experienced teams are learning to run 1 off Ks and read essays worth of blocks while doing no contextualized analysis. 

I understand that framework is run to mitigate the neg prep pressure against the ballooning number of critical affs, but I think having somewhat specific case defense and adapting the block and 2NR direction according to the critical aff being faced is necessary. There's a lot of easily available quality evidence that is being underutilized.

I like critical affs, but framework can be necessary depending on team size, experience level and coaching expertise. The presence of framework also pressures critical affs to remain honest so they actually defend something worth debating. I think it’s a good argument when run well.

Part B – When I'm Judging

I think there are two main ways for the neg to collapse down when running framework. There’s the “policy-oriented debates produce skills necessary to anti-oppression politics, their form of debate does the opposite” 2NRs and the “debate is a game, limits explosion tanks predictability and denies core negative ground, competitive equity outweighs” 2NRs.

I think the former is more persuasive against affs that are heavily against state engagement, which makes a viable t version of the aff unlikely. Anti-state engagement affs also have access to sweeping impact turns that I think require mitigation outside of t version of the aff and ssd because they undermine competitive equity framing, which makes case defense and policy skills turns case arguments useful in the 2NR. 

I think the latter is better vs. more soft-left affs that aren’t particularly anti-state but instead advocate a consciousness shift or some jargony jazz as a prerequisite to effective state action. It’s too easy for those affs to win they don’t suspend state engagement and only make engagement better through reckoning with x messed up thing, which opens up more persuasive t version of the aff claims and reasons why ssd leaves enough space in the neg’s model of debate to heavily mitigate aff offense.

For me, figuring out in cross-x of the 1AC how the aff relates to the state is vital, as many 1ACs can be read either way.

Neg blocks should not drop the 2AC overview that lists disads and uses case to turn framework. This is equivalent to dropping the block’s disad turns case overview. Debaters can win without answering it but why would they put themselves in that position?

I think the neg would benefit from explaining the t version of the aff similar to a counterplan, explaining how it solves individual parts of the aff or overlaps with the area of scholarship and then using offense elsewhere on framework to outweigh the specific “solvency deficits.” 

LD Paradigm

I have little experience with national circuit LD. I’ve mostly judged locally. My national circuit experience in policy is mostly on the critical side, but I am more than comfortable with a good disad, cp case debate. 

I can recognize some LD jargon but I don’t know what they actually mean. I don’t know what skep-triggers are or the permissibility vs presumption debate, and so on. I’m also not familiar with a lot of the moral theory. That being said, I can flow, follow and evaluate coherent arguments. This means there will be a higher threshold to effective explanation because I won’t be able to fill in the blanks or conceptually complete arguments for debaters because I don’t know what the best version of the arguments they’re making are.

I default to offense/defense within reason.

I’ve noticed I have a slight neg side bias when judging LD. I think this is mostly due to 1ARs having trouble and/or 2ARs collapsing to new arguments or unjustifiably new spins on previous arguments. 1ARs seem inefficient on case, especially when dealing with low quality arguments.

Generally speaking, remember that overadapting is not a good idea. You do you and I'll try my best to keep up.

Speed - Yes. Slow down when reading a flurry of analytics and don’t sacrifice clarity.

Theory – I'm accustomed to theory being read to discourage shadiness that would prevent effective debate, not as a mental gymnastics competition to avoid clash and substance.

1AR and 2NR restarts sound as vacuous as paragraph theory. 

If evaluating a theory debate I’ll first look to whether fairness or education was determined as more important (or determine who won that debate is there was disagreement) then isolate each team’s links to it. Not all forms of education and fairness are created equal. Weigh critical vs policy education, topic specific education, cost-benefit analysis, structural in round fairness vs fairness in respect to oppression, etc. Some people would categorize those as just links to education or fairness. Regardless, invest time in them. Comparative analysis is everything. 

Critical – Cool. Lack of an effective explanation of the method is the most common mistake.

julianvgagnon@gmail.com please add me to email chains

from planet debate-

this is difficult for me b/c i'm not sure i have A judging philosophy but I do have many different ideas about and for debate...some inconsistent. that being said i don't want what i think about debate to totally dictate what debaters decide to do in rounds.

topicality- generally don't like it. I find no abuse args to be really persuasive. Since I like critical arguments so much I think you can usually find ground in any debate. i don't like the competing interpretations framework very much. i find the "that limits out any aff" arg to be persuasive. but i will vote on that framework and topicality if left unchallenged. in a good topicality debate on competeing interp vs an ok no abuse arg i'll USUALLY vote aff.

cp- like em. with a critical nb even better. i think i'm a fair judge for these debates. aff theory args generally not persuasive unless unchallenged. very similar to topicality in this regards.

das- great. a lot of people are now struggling with the we control the uniqueness = a risk vs. we got d/risk of turn. i don't think the aff has to have offense to win a da but i do find in a lot of debates that with only defense it hurts the aff a bunch. especially when the neg has a cp. but i tend to weight the da first in terms of probability and then magnitude.

critical args- love em. these are the debates i find the most interesting. i'm willing to listen to virtually any way the neg wants to present them. method. alternative. text no text. don't care. case turn. obviously it's the neg's burden to provide some way to evaluate their "framework" but in terms of theory i think they are all pretty much legit. args are args and it's the other teams responsibility to answer them.

others- i like to see people be nice to each other in debate rounds. some people may say i intervene sometimes. it's true but let me provide context. if you go for you mis-spelled (jk) a word in your plan and you should lose and your winning the arg but the other team says this is stupid...we'll i'm persuaded. you just wasted a bunch of peoples time. another thing. DON'T RUN MALTHUS IN FRONT OF ME- DOESN'T MATTER IF IT RIGHTS OR NOT. i won't flow it. i think that while debate is a game we still have a responsibility to "speak truth to power". discourse is very important. definately co-constitutes with reality. this may be why i'm starting/have been hating the politics debate for the last year and a half. but hey, like i said before, i'm full of inconsistancies b/c sometimes you just don't have another arg in the box to go for. i'm sympathetic to this. especially in high school debate. i still research it for the hs topic and coach my kids to go for it.


from debateresults...

Debate is a game- i have a lot of ideas about how the game should be played but in the absence of teams making those arguments i won't default to them. i think debate should make the rules of the game and provide a framework for how i should evaulte the debate. i'm not a big fan of some arguments...like malthus in particular...but also theory arguments in general. these debates generally happen faster then my mind and pen can handle. ive judged a lot although i haven't much this year on the china topic. some people may think i have a bias towards critical arguments, and while this is true to some degree (i generally find them more intersting than other debates), it also means i have higher standards when it comes to these debates. yeah imagine that, me with high standards.