The UTNIF Debate Blog

UTNIF COUNT DOWN! MONDAY IT ALL BEGINS.

2009-06-20T13:17:00.002-05:00

Camp is about to start. This is the time to start posting ideas for affirmatives and negative arguments you might want to work on. We take requests. If you think something is indispensable let us know so we can start prepping the research before you arrive.

Jairus

Is Violence Against The Homeless a Hate Crime? Is this an Affirmative?

2009-06-05T13:14:00.005-05:00

Is protection against hate crimes topical? Is it a social service. Increased policing is often considered a social service so is increased access to social workers and other organizations to improve the reporting of violence as in the case of the Child Welfare provision of the social services budget under the HHS (Health and Human Services).

Separate from the question of topicality is the substantive question as to why the poor or the homeless do not count as a 'class' in legal terms under the Equal Protection clause. Would establishing class as a legal 'class' improve the situation for those that are economically marginalized?

Check out this Time article on the increasing violence against the homeless and the possibility of trying to add the homeless to Federal Hate Crimes legislation.

Neoliberalism Redux

2009-06-05T10:17:00.005-05:00

It has been brought to my attention that the previous post on Neoliberalism lacks scholarly analysis. I dont disagree. For those who want more background but do not want to wade through Foucault's lectures I am posting David Harvey's Brief History of Neoliberalism. In fact this book picks up, historically speaking, where Foucault's lectures end.

Click Here For Text

Neoliberal Newspeak

2009-06-04T15:14:00.005-05:00

In this very helpful article French Sociologists Loic Wacquant and Pierre Bourdieu describe the ways that neoliberalism has colonized our language for describing the world around us. As the beginning of a critique of the language of much of United States Social Services this article describes how concepts like 'underclass' employability, accountability and other terms have comes to secure the stability of economic inequality rather than change it. Neoliberalism or what is sometimes described as 'the third way', meaning it is neither liberal nor conservative, attempts to depoliticize economics casting it as a natural science rather than a series of overt political choices.

After reading this article take a look at news coverage of welfare reform and discussion of poverty to track how often neoliberal newspeak finds its way into every discussion of the financial meltdown and even the reforms proposed to prevent another meltdown. While it is true that many high profile freemarket advocates such as Alan Greenspan and Richard Posner have moderated their views on government regulation discussions of reform are often only preludes to describe how a more perfect market could be established that would not fail. Even in the aftermath of the housing crisis and credit crunch many in position of power cannot let go of the neoliberal newspeak that got us here or quit the short term profit at all cost mentality that threatens a record number of families with homelessness and hunger.

Check it out it! Click Here For Article.

Federal Poverty Guidelines

2009-06-04T08:42:00.003-05:00

This weblink is very helpful for determining the logic and process behind the U.S. Federal Poverty Guidelines. It gives the history behind how they were developed as well as the math behind how changes in calculations change benefits and services.

Check it out!

Topicality What are Social Services

2009-06-04T08:38:00.002-05:00

So far I have not found any exclusionary definitions of Social Services. All definitions seem to be extraordinarily broad and generally include the phrase "services to improve the quality of living". Here are the definitions I have stumbled across so far.

UNESCO Definition
Social services.
Services generally provided by the government that help improve people's standard of living; examples are public hospitals and clinics, good roads, clean water supply, garbage collection, electricity, and telecommunications.

Social services
Social Services A local government department responsible for the non-medical welfare care of people in need. Social Services departments organise needs assessments for people with dementia and provide services under community care provisions.

Basic Social Services - social services designated to provide meaningful opportunities for social and economic growth of the disadvantaged sector of the population in order to develop them into productive and self-reliant citizens and promote social equity. Basic social services of the government includes Self-employment Assistance and Practical Skills Development Assistance, among others.

HHS Discussion
Social Services Block Grant (SSBG): Funds provided by title XX of the Social Security Act that are used for services to the States that may include child care, child protection, child and foster care services, and daycare.

Synergy's Further Questions

2009-06-02T23:51:00.001-05:00

How does the plan change the nature of social services? It seems like it just distributes the same social services across regions in more fair proportions. You take money from a suburban community that doesn't need the services as much to give more funding to an urban community. The CP fiats that same amount of money be given to urban communities by increasing overall social service budgets.

How does the aff solve for the Prison Industrial Complex? Your only claim was that current census structure deprives urban communities (from which the criminals originate) of redevelopment resources. The CP fiats they get those resources.

urban areas are voting democratic now because the status quo republicans/centrists do not give enough social services and populist democrats are able to mobilize the urban poor by promising them change. your claim was that more social services causes more democratic party votes.

JG's Response to Synergy

2009-06-02T23:50:00.000-05:00

The current 'reactive' social services, assistance that maintains subsistence rather than attack root causes of poverty, will only be changed if there is a significant increase in visibility. Otherwise what you increase is more of the status quo. You cannot fiat Political Will and money because we will not what to do with it or where to give it without the plan.

Fiscal discipline is non-unique but we have quite literally a shortage of money and we are having trouble generating more of it via the treasury department i.e. selling debt to other countries, which means the only other means for 'making money' is printing more of it. Here is where I control the uniqueness. While investor confidence is low as a result of the amount of money printed for the bail out we have not crossed the threshold of actual rapid inflation. When that happens everything goes to hell. That has not happened yet your blanket approach results in it.

However you are correct what we have here is a debate. No aff is perfect but these are potentially winning arguments if debated well. Also you still havent answered the Prison-Industrial-Complex advantage. P-I-C crushes competitiveness and is Racist, and causes civil wars and terrorism in developing countries.

On the last point trust me on the more votes for democrats. Lots of cards. Also just demographics. Cities vote for democrats. Look at the last 4 presidential maps. All cities, all the time for democrats. Then look at the number of states in the last 4 elections (including the last one) that would have gone democratic if there was a 5 percent increase in urban population. Its ugly. This matters for congressional seats at both the state and national level.

Jairus

Synergy Further Develops His CP

2009-06-02T23:49:00.003-05:00

1. the cp fiats political will and investment. the census-visibility solvency deficit doesn't matter because the cp solves the impact to it. plan is worse than cp – plan doesn't increase investment, it merely distributes it in different proportions. this also means the cp causes more people to vote, since a greater number would feel included and you said "People vote more when they feel included"

2a. that's a debate to be had, but you said yourself that the plan "results in crushing the Republican party" 2b. fiscal discipline is mind-blowingly non-unique. cp isn't "dumping resources where they are not needed" since some authors argue that social services are massively underfunded in the status quo, so more resources are needed everywhere.

Also, when people feel underserved by government and angry as a result, i'd think they are a) more easily mobilized to vote for change and b) vote for populist candidates. i'll grant your #3, that urban voters turned out for obama in 2008, but they did so because they lacked basic social services and he was the only candidate promising change. however, when people are content with the status quo, they are less likely to care about elections. this is just what is logically intuitive to me – but if you can find cards showing a causality between social services and increased votes for Democrats, than that's good enough for a debate.

Jairus Responds to Synergies CP

2009-06-02T23:49:00.001-05:00

CP to just increase social services is not effective for two reasons:
1. CP doesnt solve the visibility claim that people in the United States drastically underestimate the number of poor people. Changing this visibility key to political will and investment to end poverty.

2. CP doesnt solve politics or the economy. A. Drastically increasing welfare is overwhelming less popular than changing the census. This counterplans links a lot more to politics. B. There is not an infinite amount of money. We are broke and printing money as it is. Therefore dumping resources where they are not needed rather than targeting the areas with the most poverty (the location of which we do not know because of the faulty census) is the only way to end poverty with crushing the U.S. economy.

Jairus Responds to the Point About Urban Voters

2009-06-02T23:48:00.001-05:00

1. As someone who registered voters and worked for the last presidential campaign in urban and isolated rural areas voting turn out is about resources. If you have a small population on the books you have fewer precincts and fewer resources to so that voting is even possible.

2. You are wrong the apportioning of districts are determined by the census not on the basis of who votes. You are just wrong. In fact if you want to read the census code up for debate and the districting question at issue I direct you to: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/16/us.../16census.html

3. People voted in urban areas at rates in the last election that were dramatically higher than they ever have been.

4. People vote more when they feel included the crux of the affirmative is no representation it is receiving social services. Everything from literacy support to fire trucks are determined by the census.

I take your point that the affirmative may not solve as well if people dont vote but it still stops communities invested in the Prison-industrial-complex from having a disproportionate vote as well as drastically increases the resources urban neighborhoods have at their disposal for redevelopment.

Synergy Proposes Counterplans that Just Dump Money

2009-06-02T23:46:00.002-05:00

Synergy writes:

Quoting Jairus:
This results in massive undercounting of urban areas and therefore fewer districts and votes are apportioned to those areas. That benefits Republicans who almost only ever win in rural and suburban areas.

Synergy writes: The reason the inner-city poor or homeless "don't matter" politically is because they do not vote, not because the aren't part of the US census. If a low standard of living and constant threat to life aren't enough to make them turn out to vote for populist Democrats, there's little chance that having a social worker show up to ask them some questions will. The way districts are split is based on those actually who do vote, and even if you increase the number of districts, what is the point if you don't cause the poor to vote more? The crux of this aff seems to be increasing the power of populists politicians, so could you please explain how census-inclusion achieves this?

Quoting Jairus:
The topic does not say adopt or create a social service program it instead says increase social services. Changing the census process so that impoverished people and homeless people legal exist is the only way to do this. Social Services budgets are set and apportioned to districts, counties, or cities on the basis of population. You do not give a town with 2500 people bellow the poverty line the same amount of federal aid as a town with 100,000. However in urban areas and remote rural areas such as those in Appalachia that do not get counted at all or ineffectively many people do not receive social services or they receive insufficient amounts. In order to 'substantially increase' you have to identify the vast number (maybe as many as 30 percent) of people bellow the poverty line that currently do not legal exist.

Synergy writes: CP: Increase funding for social services in all areas. solves poverty better because your plan only redistributes in "more fair proportions" (thus taking away from some places) and avoids the political backlash from having obama pass policy clearly favoring Democrats.

Jairus Response to Synergy about Homelessness

2009-06-02T23:45:00.001-05:00

For starters I am no fan of Arendt I just think she had a point which I think is made all of the more topical by your question regarding communities of homeless. While it is absolutely true that there are homeless communities, even extensive national and transnational homeless networks, homeless settlements or living spaces particularly those on public property or on abandoned private property are not given the same rights under the law.

For instance if you live under a bridge the police do not have to obtain a warrant to search or destroy your property. This is not true in all jurisdictions but it is true in most. So the point of the affirmatives is to think about ways that one could have a less property-centric notion of the home and still allow people to be nomadic or live outdoors. Shelters and homes are simply not possible for many people. Some people just can stand the idea of being cooped up others cant deal with the constraints of living in institutions. However people that need to live in otherwise than normative
arrangements (either temporally or spatially) should still be able to participate politically and receive social services. The fact that you do not have an address should not keep you out of school or deprive you of food or health care.

As for Palestinians that are not poor, that seems somewhat irrelevant to the point of the affirmative or the topic. Yes it is true an affirmative could not remedy all forms of homelessness world wide. That being said the notions of belonging and land that allow settlements and those with the legal recourse to property rights to displace others is in part a result of a certain understanding of place that is challenged by an affirmative that recognizes presence and investment in a space rather than ownership of a space as the grounds for making a political claim.

The original interpretation of squatters rights in Amsterdam before the recent changes makes a lot of sense to me. If a space has been abandoned long enough for you to live in it and make improvements for more than 6 months it is now a place for which you cannot be removed. It is not 'your' place in the possessive, individualistic sense presumed by capitalist notion of property rights. Instead you have a claim to be there and not be removed. Before enclosure most claims to land were based on use and presence. This is not a perfect system but it seems substantially more just than the status quo.

Synergy ask a question about the concept of Homlessness

2009-06-02T23:44:00.002-05:00

Synergy Writes: What about a group of beggars who have formed a "community" living under a bridge somewhere – they might be classified by the government as in poverty or homeless – but they themselves might consider living there with this group of people as their "home." So by your Arendian definition of homeless as without "someplace that we can call home", they would be excluded from this social service, or would they? This seems to be the problem for you with having government give social services to the homeless: the definition the government would use would be the federal classification of what is a home; that would miss the point of your view of homeless as displaced or a refugee. Not all homeless are living in poverty: those that lost their homes due to poverty fall within the federal definition, but not everyone who lost their home due to being a refugee is necessarily living in poverty (for example, not all Palestinians are poor.)

Jairus Response to Scott

2009-06-02T23:44:00.001-05:00

I have and that discussion is going on over in the 'Poverty forum" In terms of what the topic should look like. However my general impression is the Homelessness cases are not the best interpretation of the topic which I think entails change the qualification or apportionment of social services as to increase the entire mass noun "social services for persons living in poverty" no just a particular social service. However I think there is good evidence that says homelessness is at the core of the lit and is the group that is most qualified i.e. meets federal guidelines of what a 'person living in poverty' is but receives the least aid because of the problems of being homeless, transient, no mail box or permanent address, often mentally unstable, in difficult to reach places, etc. I think given the number of homeless the paucity of social services they receive I think rectifying the overall process so that they get aid has a strong case to make for being the only topical case i.e. it is not a substantial increase unless you figure out a way to include the homeless.

However this raises an interesting effects question. Do you just have to increase the available social services or actually get the social services delivered. I dont think that topic grammatically gives an answer to this question and given the literature which is actually much more about how to get the service to the people and less about what services to give i think resolving which is better for ground and predictability is very difficult.

Jairus

Jairus Responds on the Politics Question

2009-06-02T23:43:00.004-05:00

It is not a politics slayer. However, the debate is already occurring in congress (both houses), and Obama has already come out in support of it. The reason it has not passed yet is because there is no wording written yet not because the bill is buried in committee. This means two things first Obama has already taken the blame and republicans are already pissed about it. This means that while you might have very good political capital uniqueness for your impact scenario you do not have internal link evidence or link evidence to the plan. If you do than it only provides a better internal link to winners win. An argument that is particularly true of this president. 1. Because unlike many Presidents he is more popular with the people than with either party in congress. This means that his power is quite literally based on his victories, ability to get what he wants not on what congress (either Republican or Democrats think of him) 2. Because he is popular with the people (both Republicans and Democratic voters) your disad is going to stink before until after the 2010 mid-term elections. People campaigning for re-election after their party was gutted as a result of Presidential coattails do not want to look petty and vindictive against a winner. You can already see this happening with the Sotomayor nomination. The critics are almost entirely new young meaningless republicans or people that are not in congress like Rush etc. Why is this? Because as former Reagan communication director David Gergen said in his editorial a week ago Republican's want to win another election and they cant do that fighting Obama on fights they cant win. Every win Obama gets makes narrows the Republicans perception that can win, making them less likely to try and lose because of the long term political cost to their re-election.

So your ptix capital link better be on fire, assume Republicans that are not up for reelection, and assumes that they are Republicans that oppose the census change (not all Republicans do). In addition you better have great cards that explains that political capital comes from somewhere besides victories because the plan is a big victory for Obama and makes him look like he controls the game unlike the few issues Republicans will fight about like the budget and health care. Why because these are fights that are winnable with the public and with some democratic defectors and thus potential political victories.

Scott Philips asks a general question about topicality.

2009-06-02T23:43:00.003-05:00

Scotty P writes:
JG,

Have you done much/any "t work" reading in terms of what homeless assistance would be topical/What kind of things are you looking at as a mechanism?

Politics Question

2009-06-02T23:35:00.001-05:00

plzz writes: I dont understand why this being proposed in the past "non-uniques" the link to ptix, all the negative has to do is find evidence political capital now is key to x that post dates that previous action, and argue obviously obamas capital for x is key now and the plan would drain it. Also, if this proposal didnt pass in the past, then that only proves its probably unpopular.

Politics debate

2009-06-02T23:33:00.002-05:00

A debate over politics and Obama supported plans has arisen that I think would be interesting to everyone not just people who might work on the Census Reform affirmative so I am going to post that thread here. Please feel free to make comments and I will attempt to integrate them into the flow of the argument.

Jairus