Politics Disadvantage - Open Evidence Project

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 1 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Politics Disadvantage

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 2 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Notes: What’s here? Links, internal links, and theory. The impact arguments will come out in a supplemental file soon. In the meantime, there is plenty here for you to debate the link and internal link components in your practice rounds, using the starter set for the impact components of your debates. Additionally, this file should form the beginnings of the CORE file you can use for politics debates throughout the season, regardless of the impact scenario.

Where can I find link turns? For link turns, you should look in the NEG Link sections – Generic, Mechanism, Countries. For many aff areas and plans there are link arguments in each direction, organized in the link sections of the file.

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Link Uniqueness

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AT – Aid Now Obama not pushing foreign aid now – minimalist strategy now States News Service, 5/25/13 [May 24th 2013, States News Service, “Expert: US Foreign Policy In ‘Retreat’,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] A former senior advisor to the late Richard Holbrooke, who served as U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, says when it comes to foreign policy, the U.S. is in "retreat." Vali Nasr, who is now dean of Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), said the Obama administration has concluded that the best way forward for the United States is to do "less in the world." On VOA's Press Conference USA, he said President Barack Obama had adopted a "minimalist foreign policy" strategy, partly due to what Nasr called an "overreach" by former President George W. Bush in handling the Iraq war. Mr. Bush was widely criticized for mischaracterizations about Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's so-called weapons of mass destruction as a justification for the war. "We still are in the shadow of the Bush years," said Nasr, but added, "The world is not used to America suddenly disappearing." Nasr said even if the U.S. made "mistakes," it is still considered a pivotal force for stability in many regions of the world. Nasr outlines his theory in his new book. "The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat." His title borrows from a phrase used by former President Bill Clinton, who said "America stands alone as the world's indispensable nation." Nasr said the U.S. approach to the Afghanistan conflict is an example of the Obama's administration's "retreat" on foreign policy. The U.S. and other foreign combat forces plan to withdraw from the country by the end of 2014. "Now that we have declared we are leaving, we have very little influence" in the region, said Nasr. He said Afghan President Hamid Karzai, the Taliban and Pakistani officials had already begun "factoring" out the United States in the region and pursuing their own policies. President Obama defended the planned U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan during a speech Thursday on counterterrorism at the National Defense University. "In the Afghan war theater, we must support our troops until the transition is complete at the end of 2014. That means we will continue to take strikes against high value al-Qaida targets, but also against forces that are massing to support attacks on coalition forces," Obama said. The president said the U.S. would no longer have the same needs for force protection by the end of 2014. He also said progress against al-Qaida elements in the region would reduce a need for drone strikes. In spite of his overall criticism of Obama foreign policy, Nasr said the president does have "tremendous equities" at his disposal. He said Obama's assets include his "global popularity," his "power of persuasion," and the "goodwill of the international community." Nasr said the Obama administration could use the equities to more forcefully engage in the conflicts in Syria, Iran and Iraq. Johns Hopkins foreign policy analyst James Mann outlined a similar view in his book, "The Obamians," saying Obama's view of the U.S. role in global affairs was "more modest and downbeat" than the views of his predecessors, former presidents Bush and Clinton. Mann said the Obama administration has placed greater emphasis on domestic issues.

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Obama shifting focus from foreign aid to foreign trade – Africa Proves Deseret Morning News 7/2/13 [Decon Merling, July 2nd 2013, “Obama’s African trip emphasizes economic partnership over aid,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] President Barack Obama ended his three-country tour of Africa Tuesday by meeting with former President George W. Bush to participate in a wreath-laying ceremony at the U.S. Embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, the site of a terrorist bombing in 1998. Obama previously said that the meeting would be an opportunity to speak with Bush about the HIV/AIDS prevention program PEPFAR that Bush instituted during his first term in office. On his trip, Obama has responded to critics who say that unlike Bush, he has not paid enough attention to development and aid in Africa during his time as president. The PEPFAR program has been very successful in reducing the levels of HIV/AIDS among the people of South Africa, according to the Washington Post. Rates of infection have fallen to 30 percent, and nearly 2 million people are on antiretroviral drugs. But since 2010, the budget for the PEPFAR program has been cut by more than 12 percent. This has left some advocates disappointed in the Obama administration’s commitment to reducing the spread of HIV/AIDS on the continent. Knowing that Africa has many challenges, with fighting AIDS being one of the biggest challenges, we were really expecting President Obama to continue where President Bush had left off,? Hilary Thulare, country director of the nonprofit AIDS Healthcare Foundation, told the Washington Post. ‘But it’s been a disappointment. Obama is retreating on AIDS and, by this, retreating on Africa.’ Obama has responded to these critics by saying the programs are running more efficiently and that the realities of the current economy and political climate make it more difficult to fund the program. "Given budget constraints, for us to try to get the kind of money President Bush was able to get out of a Republican House for massively scaled new foreign aid programs is very difficult," he told reporters during the trip. Obama’s trip has reflected an African policy that is aimed more at development and trade than foreign aid, perhaps in response to China’s major investments in the continent. Africa's economies are growing faster than those of almost any other region of the world. And the three countries in which Obama stopped ? Senegal, South Africa and Tanzania ? have very different economies, but according to Quartz they share the distinctive feature that their trade with the U.S. is growing faster than the rest of Africa. “I think everything we do is designed to make sure that Africa is not viewed as a dependent, as a charity case, but is instead viewed as a partner,” Obama said while in Cape Town, South Africa. He reinforced that message later in his trip. "We don't want to just provide food, we want to increase food self-sufficiency," Obama said at a news conference with Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete. "So ultimately, the goal here is for Africa to build Africa for Africans." While in Cape Town, Obama pledged $7 billion to develop an electrical power grid in subSarahan Africa over the next five years. Currently, two-thirds of the population of sub-Saharan Africa lacks access to electricity, according to the White House. “It’s the lifeline for families to meet their most basic needs, and it’s the connection that’s needed to plug Africa into the grid of the global economy,” he said.

Obama not pushing foreign aid – foreign aid panel postponement proves Gerstein, Politico White House Reporter, 5/17/13 [Josh, 5-17-13, POLITICO, “Obama Foreign Aid Panel: 2 ½ Years and Still Counting”, http://www.politico.com//blogs/under-the-radar/2013/05/obama-foreign-aid-panel-years-and-still-waiting164264.html, accessed 7-8-13, HG]

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 6 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core After two-and-a-half years on the runway, President Barack Obama's Global Development Council was finally poised for take-off this week—but, no. The council was slated to meet Friday at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in the White House complex. But the session was postponed at the last minute. A POLITICO reporter who had asked to attend the public meeting got an email Thursday morning saying the session was off. Members of the panel were apparently told earlier in the week. Obama announced plans to create the council in September 2010 as part of a major "presidential policy directive" aimed at overhauling the U.S. Government's approach to foreign aid and development assistance. He did not get around to issuing an executive order officially authorizing the panel until February 2012. Then came the wait for nominees to actually serve on the council. Those emerged last December, with bond investing guru and regular CNBC guest, Mohamed El-Erian of PIMCO taking the chairman's job. Obama named eight others to the panel, though in the meantime Sylvia Burwell Mathews was named to head the Office of Management and Budget, so she's probably out. It's unclear why Friday's inaugural session was canceled. It's possible President Barack Obama was to attend and his schedule had to be rejiggered several times this week to address urgent matters like the controversies surrounding the Internal Revenue Service and sexual assault problems in the military. The president spent much of Friday in Baltimore at jobs-related events. Asked about the delay, a White House official who asked not to be named said: "For scheduling reasons, we had to postpone the first meeting of the President’s Global Development Council from our original tentative date of May 17. I expect that we will have a new date soon and will issue an updated notice to the public. In the meantime, since late February, the GDC has been meeting informally and holding frequent conference calls. We look forward to scheduling the first official meeting in the near future." "They had some listening conference calls in March where people offered ideas for what the council should work on," a person familiar with the council told POLITICO. The White House did not respond to queries about whether the president had planned to attend or why the council has taken more than 31 months to get up and running. The September 2010 White House announcement was vague on what the council's role would be, saying simply that it would be "comprised of leading members of the philanthropic sector, private sector, academia, and civil society, to provide high-level input relevant to the work of United States Government agencies." More than two years ago, Brookings published a paper offering suggestions for what the panel could do. Other White House advisory panels have had organizational diffculties and sometimes long hiatuses in their work. Obama's faith-based council was dormant for a long period. And Obama's Jobs Council went a year without an official meeting, before being dissolved. The panels' use of unannounced conference calls and subcommittees to do their work has also raised concerns among transparency advocates. Friday's planned session of the Global Development Council was announced to the public in the Federal Register last week, though without a specific time and without the usual 15-day notice. No other meetings of the council have been announced.

Foreign aid funding is being cut now Kadden, Senior Legislative Manager for InterAction, 4-10-13 [Jeremy, 4-10-13, Huffington Post, “The Good, the Bad, and the Budget: What President Obama's Plan Means for Foreign Aid,” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeremy-kadden/obama-budget-foreignaid_b_3056552.html, accessed 7-9-13, MSG] The $3.77 trillion budget proposal that the Obama Administration rolled out today contains mixed news for supporters of international aid. His plan includes boosts to some health and development

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 7 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core programs, and overall higher funding levels for foreign assistance than what Congress has put forward. But his funding recommendation is still a decrease from previous years, and specific cuts he proposes to humanitarian programs are cause for concern. Obama proposed $52 billion for the International Affairs Budget, or 150 account, of which $48.2 billion is in the "base" budget and $3.8 billion is in Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO). This overall funding level compares favorably to both the House and the Senate budget committee blueprints: The House and Senate have allocated significantly less for the base budgets, $38.7 billion and $45.6 billion, respectively. But the administration's recommendation is lower than previous requests and past funding levels. In FY13, for example, President Obama requested $56.2 billion for the 150 account -- 7 percent more than he has requested this year. The FY14 request for 150 is also 11 percent lower than the $58.6 billion that was enacted just four years ago in FY10.

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AT – Venezuelan Aid Now Venezuelan aid is currently a drop in the bucket Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. 25, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] Because of Venezuela’s oil wealth and relatively high per capita income level, the United States has traditionally only provided small amounts of foreign assistance to Venezuela. In recent years, assistance has focused on counternarcotics and support for democracy programs. Table 3 below shows U.S. assistance level to Venezuela since FY2006. From FY2002 to FY2007, Venezuela received small amounts of U.S. assistance under the State Department’s Andean Counterdrug Initiative (ACI) focusing on counternarcotics cooperation and judicial reform support. Since FY2008, no counternarcotics assistance has been requested for Venezuela, although in FY2009, the United States provided $0.5 million in International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement (INCLE) assistance.

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Generic Links

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Link Boosters

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Controversial Policies Spend Political Capital Controversial policies drain political capital Burke, University of Vermont political science professor, 9 (John P., Presidential Studies Quarterly 39.3 (Sept 2009), “The Contemporary Presidency: The Obama Presidential Transition: An Early Assessment”, p574(31). Academic One; accessed 7-15-10) President Obama signaled his intention to make a clean break from the unpopular Bush presidency with his executive orders and early policy and budget proposals. At the same time, he also sought to tamp down public expectations for quick results on the economy. Early--and ambitious--actions were taken, but as he cautioned in his inaugural address, "the challenges we face are real" and they "will not be met easily or in a short span of time." His initial political capital seemed high. But was the right course of action chosen? The decision was made to embrace a broad range of policy reforms, not just to focus on the economy. Moreover, it was a controversial agenda. His early efforts to gain bipartisan support in Congress--much like those of his predecessors--seem largely for naught and forced the administration to rely on narrow partisan majorities. The question that remains is whether his political capital, both in Congress and with the public, will bring him legislative--and ultimately policy--success. Good transition planning is propitious, but it offers no guarantees. Still, without it, political and policy disaster likely awaits. So far, President Obama seems to reside largely on the positive side of the equation. But what the future might portend remains another matter.

Unpopular action ensures backlash against the president – politicians are emboldened when they smell blood in the water Stolberg, New York Times, 3 (Sheryl Gay, 9-13-3, New York Times, “Democrats Find Some Traction On Capitol Hill”, p. A1, Lexis) "A presidential speech, instead of boosting support, is followed by a seven-point drop and suddenly the atmosphere changes," said Thomas Mann, a scholar at the Brookings Institution who follows Congress. "Republicans, who have been reluctant to get off the reservation, now say, 'Wait just one minute.' And Democrats have all the more reason to be unified." Ross K. Baker, a political scientist at Rutgers University, agreed. "Any sign of weakness out of the White House is going to be perceived by the president's allies in Congress as an opportunity to act a little bit more like free spirits, and on the part of the opposition to be more aggressive," Professor Baker said. "It's the blood-in-the-water syndrome."

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Soft on Terrorism Link Magnifier Democrats and Republicans align on harsh terror response—Obama’s attempts to soften his approach have faced unprecedented political backlash Scheuerman, Indiana University political science professor, 7/3/13 (William E. Scheuerman, Ph.D. @ Harvard University and Indiana University graduate director, Eurozine, “Barack Obama's "war on terror",” http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2013-03-07-scheuermanen.html, Accessed 7/11/13, JC) A third proposed explanation offers an easy answer to the last question: partisan politics. As anyone familiar with the increasingly polarized US political scene can readily attest, Republicans have been hell bent on discrediting Obama by depicting him as "weak on terrorism." The fact that presidential polls in 2012 suggested that voters had come to trust Obama more on security matters than the Republicans – who apparently believe that they possess a natural monopoly when it comes to exploiting anxieties about terrorism – has clearly frustrated and indeed outraged Obama's political rivals. So one reason he has generally stuck to Bush's script is because he and his advisors have been forced to ward off a nasty and arguably unprecedented partisan political backlash, hardly unrelated to the fact that Obama represents a another nail in the coffin of white racial supremacy in a country where black political rights were only secured with the Voting Rights Act of 1965. This third proposed answer downplays the unsettling fact that Obama's early attempts to overhaul counterterrorism law and policy met with well-nigh universal condemnation. Legislation barring him from effectively closing Gitmo by prohibiting Obama from transferring detainees to the US mainland was passed in 2009 when his own party had large majorities in both houses of Congress. The vote in the Senate was 90-6 against Obama, with only six Democrats supporting his efforts. The House vote in favour of the propagandistically entitled "Keep the Terrorists Out of America Act" drew similarly massive bipartisan support. Obama's decision to follow a draconian path cannot solely or even chiefly be attributed to partisan hostility: there is simply too much evidence that harsh antiterrorist policies now have bipartisan support among political elites and perhaps also within the US citizenry at large.

Softening terrorism stance costs political capital—Obama’s first term proves Goldsmith, Harvard Law School professor, 12 [Jack, April 26, 2012, Washington Post “Obama’s weak spots on counterterrorism are open to Romney,” http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-04-26/opinions/35450785_1_guantanamo-detainees-presidentobama-terrorist-detention, Accessed 7/11/13, ML] As the general-election campaign comes into focus, conventional wisdom holds that President Obama is untouchable on national security. But the presidential politics of counterterrorism are less clear than they may seem. Mitt Romney has advantages; the risk is that he will overplay them. The nation has suffered no major terror attack during Obama’s presidency. Through bold use of intelligence, drones and special forces, Obama’s team has killed Osama bin Laden and dozens of other senior terrorists. Almost as important, Obama’s rhetorical focus on war against al-Qaeda rather than war against Islamists has damaged al-Qaeda’s brand and has drawn complaints from terrorists (including bin Laden, according to documents found after his death). The original al-Qaeda organization seems in disarray. Unsurprisingly, Obama receives high marks from the American people on national security.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 13 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core These successes have not translated into political capital on counterterrorism issues at home. Obama failed in his signature pledge to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center. His administration had to back down from its attempt to prosecute in civilian court senior terrorist leaders held at Guantanamo. In both contexts, large majorities in Congress, with broad popular support, opposed the president’s policies and enacted laws that forbid closing Guantanamo or trying terrorists held there in civilian court. Congress pushed back against Obama partly for political reasons and partly because lawmakers did not fully trust his judgment in those contexts. Problems began with some clumsy public errors in the administration’s first year, including the ill-advised attempt to release some detainees into the United States, a waffling reaction to the failed Christmas Day attack by “underwear bomber” Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab and the poorly vetted decision to prosecute 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed in civilian court. These and related controversies spurred Republicans and many Democrats to hurl charges of insufficient seriousness on counterterrorism — and led to the unprecedented congressional restrictions under which Obama labors.

Weakening the war on terror is unpopular- the public still feels like there can be an attack Baker, NY Times White House correspondent, 13 [Peter, 5-27-13, New York Times, “In Terror Shift, Obama Took a Long Path,” http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/28/us/politics/in-terror-shift-obama-took-a-longpath.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] Mr. Obama’s eventual speech, at 59 minutes one of the longest of his presidency other than a State of the Union address, reflected the process that developed it. Even as he set new standards, a debate broke out about what they actually meant and what would actually change. For now, officials said, “signature strikes” targeting groups of unidentified armed men presumed to be extremists will continue in the Pakistani tribal areas. Even as he talked about transparency, he never uttered the word “C.I.A.” or acknowledged he was redefining its role. He made no mention that a drone strike had killed an American teenager in error. While he pledged again to close the Guantánamo prison, he offered little reason to think he might be more successful this time. Yet even the promise of change left some people scathingly critical. “At the end of the day,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, “this is the most tone-deaf president I ever could imagine, making such a speech at a time when our homeland is trying to be attacked literally every day.”

Softening war on terror unpopular with Republicans Corn, Mother Jones, 13 [David, 5-23-13, Mother Jones, “Obama's Counterterrorism Speech: A Pivot Point on Drones and More?,” http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2013/05/obama-speech-drones-civil-liberties, accessed 7-1113, MSG] These moves may not satisfy civil-liberties-minded critics on the right and the left. Obama is not declaring an end to indefinite detention or announcing the closing of Gitmo—though he is echoing his State of the Union vow to revive efforts to shut down that prison. Still, these moves would be unimaginable in the Bush years. Bush and Cheney essentially believed the commander in chief had unchallenged power during wartime, and the United States, as they saw it, remained at war against terrorism. Yet here is Obama subjecting the drone program to a more restrictive set of rules—and

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 14 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core doing so publicly. This is very un-Cheney-like. (How soon before the ex-veep arises from his undisclosed location to accuse Obama of placing the nation at risk yet again?) Despite Obama's embrace of certain Bush-Cheney practices and his robust use of drones, the president has tried since taking office to shift US foreign policy from a fixation on terrorism. During his first days in office, he shied away from using the "war on terrorism" phrase. And his national security advisers have long talked of Obama's desire to reorient US foreign policy toward challenges in the Pacific region. By handing responsibility for drone strikes to the military, Obama is helping CIA chief John Brennan, who would like to see his agency move out of the paramilitary business and devote more resources to its traditional tasks of intelligence gathering and analysis.

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AT – Plan Popular Only a risk of a link – There’s always opposition to be overcome Rosati, University of South Carolina Government and International Studies professor, 4 (Jerel A., THE POLITICS OF UNITED STATES FOREIGN POLICY, 2004, p. 388) The fragmentation of public ideological and foreign policy beliefs gives a president great opportunities but also creates great risks. Unlike those in the 1950s, presidents now are no longer driven to pursue only an anticommunist containment policy. Yet it is unclear how far a president may go in pursuing any policy before losing public support. Presidents no longer come to office with automatic majorities behind their policies. No matter what the president and his advisers believe, a substantial number of Americans – in the mass public and especially the elite public – disagree, or are open to disagreement, with presidential policy. Hence, the continual presidential search for, and frustration in obtaining, consensus and policy legitimation.

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AT – Plan Popular with Public Public popularity is irrelevant – Tea Party opposition overwhelms Tomasky, Democracy editor in chief, 11 (Michael Tomasky is a liberal American columnist, journalist and author. He is the editor in chief of Democracy, a special correspondent for Newsweek / The Daily Beast, a contributing editor for The American Prospect, and a contributor to The New York Review of Books, 9/19/11, “America Needs Its Edge Back; Obama is right. We need new roads and schools. But the Tea Partiers will fight him all the way.” Lexis, THW) The most pertinent bill in Congress is the one Obama name-checked in his speech: an infrastructure-bank proposal sponsored by Democratic Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas. It's designed specifically to try to win bipartisan backing: the bank's initial funding would be only $10 billion; it would have to become self-sufficient within a few years; it would be overseen by an independent board; there's even a provision for making sure rural projects don't get shafted. The public-private nature of the proposal is key, says Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, lead sponsor of a companion House bill. "If we can really bring clarity to that," she says, "we have a shot." Hutchison, who got interested in infrastructure when George H.W. Bush appointed her to a commission, says she thinks the bill could appeal to Republicans, but she hasn't spent much time talking it up to her colleagues. "It's a kind of complicated and in-the-weeds type of legislation, so I have not tried to get a big sponsorship," she says. Kerry holds on to optimism. "The idea is so powerful and such common sense that my hope is that the better angels will prevail for the good of the country," he says. A member of the recently formed "supercommittee" tasked with meeting the spending numbers agreed to in the debtceiling deal, Kerry says that the panel has a broad-enough mandate that his bill could be included in any deficit-cutting agreement. But that's an awfully tall order. Janet Kavinoky of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce says the chamber endorsed the Kerry-Hutchison plan and has backed the infrastructure-bank idea since 1982. Trying to get Republicans on board, she says, has been daunting. "We've got several who say, 'We believe you, and we'd like to do this,' but getting people to say publicly that they want to make infrastructure an exception is a real challenge." This is all the more maddening because support for such investments among the general public is broad and deep and crosses ideological boundaries, notes Nicholas Turner, who heads transportation initiatives for the Rockefeller Foundation. "The bipartisan support was stunning," Turner says. In a poll the foundation commissioned in February, even 59 percent of Tea Party supporters considered infrastructure investment to be vital. But as long as Barack Obama is for it, the Tea Partiers in Washington will fight it.

Public support doesn’t matter – politicians are greedy Knott, University of Southern California School of Policy, Planning and Development professor, 12 (Jack H., March, Presidential Studies Quarterly, “The President, Congress, and the Financial Crisis: Ideology and Moral Hazard in Economic Governance,” p. 82, YGS) How was it possible that senior economic officials in the president’s administration and prior administrations did not see this crisis developing or pursue policies to avert

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 17 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core it? The basic argument of the article is that the system for governing the market—the institutions, rules, regulations, and personnel practices that shape the way the market operates—is central to understanding the development of and failure to anticipate the financial crisis. In developing this argument, the article focuses on the role of the president in interactions with the Congress, economic advisors, and the independent regulatory agencies. Over the course of three decades leading up to the financial crisis, the give and take of macroeconomic ideas representing different economic interests and professional views converged into a common set of policy preferences and ideology across political parties, the houses of Congress, the president, and professional experts. Reinforcing this development was a powerful political moral hazard —a condition in which public officials and private interests had strong incentives to take actions mutually beneficial to them but adverse to the overall economy and the interests of the general public—that led to a decline in institutional checks and balances in economic regulation. The system of economic governance thus failed to function as envisioned, and thereby, contributed to the crisis.

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AT – No Blame Zero sum nature of politics ensures president is assigned political blame Fitts, Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, 96 (Michael, “The Paradox of Power in the Modern State,” University of Pennsylvania Law Review, January, 144 U. Pa. L. Rev. 827, Lexis, accessed 7-8-09, AB) To the extent that the modern president is subject to heightened visibility about what he says and does and is led to make increasingly specific statements about who should win and who should lose on an issue, his ability to mediate conflict and control the agenda can be undermined. The modern president is supposed to have a position on such matters as affirmative action, the war in Bosnia, the baseball strike, and the newest EPA regulations, the list is infinite. Perhaps in response to these pressures, each modern president has made more speeches and taken more positions than his predecessors, with Bill Clinton giving three times as many speeches as Reagan during the same period. In such circumstances, the president is far less able to exercise agenda control, refuse to take symbolic stands, or take inconsistent positions. The well-documented tendency of the press to emphasize the strategic implications of politics exacerbates this process by turning issues into zero-sum games.

Presidency is the focal point of politics – president gets the credit or the blame Rosati, University of South Carolina Government and International Studies professor, 4 (Jerel A., THE POLITICS OF UNITED STATES FOREIGN POLICY, 2004, p. 80) Given the popular image of presidential power, presidents receive credit when things are perceived as going well and are blamed when things go badly. Unfortunately, American politics and the policy process are incredibly complex and beyond considerable presidential control. With so many complex issues and problems to address – the debt problem, the economy, energy, welfare, education, the environment, foreign policy – this is a very demanding time to be president. As long as presidential promises and public expectations remain high, the president’s job becomes virtually an impossible task. Should success occur, given the lack of presidential power, it is probably not by the president’s own design. Nonetheless, the president – the person perceived to be the leader of the country – will be rewarded in terms of public prestige, greater power, and reelection (for him or his successor). However, if the president is perceived as unsuccessful – a failure – this results not only in a weakened president but one the public wants replaced, creating the opportunity to challenge an incumbent president or his heir as presidential nominee.

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AT – Plan Not Perceived Salience ensures a link – policies that are salient with the public receive congressional scrutiny Rosati, University of South Carolina Government and International Studies professor, 04 (Jerel A., THE POLITICS OF UNITED STATES FOREIGN POLICY, 2004, p. 309-11) The third pattern to consider is that Congress is the ultimate political body within the U.S. government. Members of Congress are “political animals” who are preoccupied with their institutional status and power, their electoral security, and how they are perceived within and beyond the Washington beltway. They tend to be obsessed with reelection and are constantly soliciting funds from private contributors for reelection campaigns. A preoccupation with reelection also makes them overly sensitive to public perceptions, political support, political trends, and their public images. If the public and their constituents are interested in an issue and have staked out a position, members of Congress tend to reflect the dominant public mood. If the public is uninterested, members of Congress have more freedom of action; yet they are constantly pressured by the president, executive agencies, congressional colleagues, special interest groups, and their constituents.

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Engagement

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Unpopular - Spending Latin American foreign aid is unpopular—members of Congress want a reduction Meyer, Latin American Affairs Analyst, & Sullivan, Latin American Affairs Specialist, 12 [Peter and Mark, 6-26-12, Congressional Research Service, “U.S. Foreign Assistance to Latin America and the Caribbean: Recent Trends and FY2013 Appropriations,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R42582.pdf, accessed, 7-5-13 MSG] At this juncture it is uncertain if Congress will approve a stand alone FY2013 foreign aid appropriations measure, or whether such legislation will be rolled into an omnibus appropriations measure that combines several appropriations bills. With increasing frequency, Congress has included the language of appropriations bills that have not first received House or Senate floor action in omnibus appropriations measures. In these cases, the lack of floor action on the individual bills has reduced the opportunities for Members to consider and amend regular appropriations measures. For example, for FY2012 foreign aid appropriations, neither chamber approved individual State Department, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs appropriations bills before such appropriations were include in the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2012 (P.L. 112-74). If similar action is taken for FY2013, it would continue the pattern of reduced opportunities for Members that are not on the Appropriations Committees to consider and debate foreign aid legislation, including assistance to Latin America and the Caribbean.

GOP budget cutting guarantees no Latin American engagement The Economist 11 (The Economist, 9/3/11, “Partnership, and its obstacles”, http://www.economist.com/node/21528271, Accessed 7/9/13) SHORTLY after he took office in 2009, Barack Obama attended a 34-country Summit of the Americas in Trinidad where he pledged a “new era of partnership” between the two halves of the region, in place of “stale debates and old ideologies”. Honouring this promise has not been easy: Mr Obama has had other priorities, both abroad and at home, and events in the region, such as a coup in Honduras just two months after the Trinidad summit, revived some of those old debates. Nevertheless, the administration has taken some modest initiatives in Latin America. But now the new partnership risks falling victim to partisan infighting in Washington. In July the Republican majority on a committee of the House of Representatives deleted funding for the Organisation of American States (OAS) from next year's budget. Conservatives dislike the OAS's secretary-general, José Miguel Insulza, a Chilean social democrat, whom they accuse of complicity with threats to democracy and media freedom from leftist autocrats, such as Venezuela's Hugo Chávez. The Republicans have similarly used their powers to hold up the appointment of administration nominees for diplomatic jobs whom they consider too conciliatory towards Mr Chávez and his friends. At the same time, American ambassadors have been expelled from, or not accepted in, Venezuela, Ecuador and (in 2008) Bolivia. There are plenty of criticisms that can be made of the OAS and of its secretary-general. Mr Insulza's grandstanding over Honduras—he pushed for its immediate suspension from the organisation— arguably made a negotiated settlement of the conflict between supporters and opponents of the ousted president, Manuel Zelaya, harder. Weeks earlier Mr Insulza had irritated the Obama administration by pushing to end the half-century suspension of non-democratic Cuba from the OAS (though it has not rejoined). On these issues, Mr Insulza reflected majority opinion in Latin America. He has spoken out

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 22 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core against Mr Chávez on several occasions. Indeed, the OAS is still seen by the left in Latin America as a yanqui poodle. While Latin American clubs have proliferated, the OAS remains the only regional diplomatic body which includes the United States. And some bits of it, especially the Inter-American Human-Rights Commission and Court, do valuable work in defence of freedom and democracy. For these reasons the Democrats who control the Senate may restore the $49m in annual funding the United States gives to the OAS, which accounts for around 60% of its total budget. But they may do so reluctantly. “The Republicans sense the administration is in a bind over the OAS,” according to Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue, a think-tank. The OAS does not inspire confidence in Washington, but cutting it would depart from the administration's commitment to multilateralism, he says.

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Popular – GOP GOP leadership loves economic engagement Palmer, Reuters Foreign Policy trade correspondent, 12 (Doug, Reuters, 5/8/12, “Boehner urges deeper US engagement in Latin America,” http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/08/usa-trade-boehner-idUSL1E8G81HM20120508, Accessed 7/9/13) The U.S. Congress' top Republican on Tuesday called for deeper U.S economic engagement with Latin America, but also expressed concern over Iranian influence in the region and the "alarming willingness" of some governments to abandon international norms. "In both Colombia and Mexico, and the entire hemisphere, the U.S. must be clear that we will not disengage in the fight for free markets and free, secure people," U.S. House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner said in remarks prepared for delivery at the U.S. State Department. "We must be clear that we will be there, with our friends and partners in the region, committed to fighting and winning the war for a free, stable, and prosperous hemisphere," Boehner said, speaking to the Council of Americas, an organization representing companies that do business in the region. Boehner is due on Tuesday to receive an award from the group for his work last year on winning congressional approval of free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea. The pacts were negotiated during the Republican administration of former President George W. Bush, but President Barack Obama, a Democrat, did not submit the agreements to Congress until late 2011, after negotiating changes to make them more palatable to Democrats and securing a commitment for renewal of a worker retraining program known as trade adjustment assistance. "When the Colombia Free Trade Agreement enters into force (on May 15), it will be an important moment for the prosperity of our hemisphere. It is equally important that the Panama Free Trade Agreement be fully implemented in the months ahead," Boehner said, referring to the Obama administration's ongoing work with Panama to implement that agreement. Boehner said it was important the United States "keep the momentum going" by negotiating new agreements to open markets to American exports, and said he was disappointed Obama has not sought legislation known as "Trade Promotion Authority" which would help the White House do that.

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Mechanism Links

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Foreign Aid Links

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Political Capital Foreign aid spends political capital Pflanz, Christian Science Monitor Correspondent, 6/30/13 [Mike Pflanz, June 30th 2013, The Christian Science Monitor, “Obama pledges to help double electricity in sub-Saharan Africa; President Obama is casting the $7 billion initiative as part of a new US strategy to move the region forward with development not charity dollars.,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] President Barack Obama is to launch a $7 billion US-funded program to double access to electricity for people in sub-Saharan Africa, the first new big bucks initiative of his tour of the continent. The Power Africa plan is expected to be announced during Mr. Obama's visit to Cape Town later Sunday. It follows announcements of new US funds for food security and leadership mentoring schemes for young Africans. Taken together, these all signal a shift in US policy that would leave the world's poorest continent less "a dependent" or "a charity case" and more "a partner," to use buzzwords that the president has repeated during his visit. In these times of austerity and sequestration, this new approach to foreign aid - "the least popular part of the federal budget," Obama concedes - is also cheaper and makes use of innovative joint public-private cash vehicles. This refreshed focus drew on "the lessons of Nelson Mandela's life," the president told reporters on Air Force One Friday, evoking the man Obama called "a personal inspiration for me, and an inspiration for the world." Mr. Mandela began his fourth week in the hospital Sunday, struggling to recover from a recurrent lung infection and still in a "critical but stable" condition. His family, and South African President Jacob Zuma, say he has improved from the worst days of last week. Mandela's ailing health has overshadowed Obama's visit to South Africa, but the US president has regularly spoken of links between his new thinking on how to assist Africa and the example set by the anti-apartheid icon. "If we focus on what Africa as a continent can do together and what these countries can do when they're unified, as opposed to when they're divided by tribe or race or religion, then Africa's rise will continue," he said. "That's one of the central lessons of what Nelson Mandela accomplished not just as president, but in the struggle to overcome apartheid and his years in prison." Help Africans help themselves These are grand words. In reality, the message is simple: With a more hands-off approach, the US wants to help African countries help themselves, under umbrella themes of better food, better businesses, and better governments. On the first leg of his trip, in Senegal last week, Obama focused on food security, dwelling on ways that small-scale farmers - "essentially small businesspeople," he said - can grow more crops to earn more money. There, and again in South Africa, he applauded his hosts' democratically elected governments and their institutional reform agendas, and praised Nelson Mandela for stepping down after just one term. In Tanzania Monday, at a round-table for local CEOs, he will talk trade, and add details of the new electricity access initiative at a visit to a power station outside Dar es Salaam. Trade not aid Together, the aim of the "trade not aid" mantra is a goal familiar to many back home in the US: making individuals wealthier and businesses more profitable, in societies that respect laws and thus create confidence for new investors. It's capitalism 101. It opens new markets for American goods, too.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 27 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core And - unlike George W. Bush's immensely popular but immensely expensive HIV/Aids PEPFAR programme - Obama's aid plans come with a relatively cheap price tag for US taxpayers. The president is very aware of the dilemmas he faces in winning approval back home to spend dollars overseas. "Our foreign aid budget is around 1 percent of our total federal budget. It's chronically the least popular part of our federal budget," Obama told reporters. "We've got budget constraints back home, which means that we've got to come up with new and creative ways to promote development and deliver aid. Every dollar that we're putting in, we're getting a huge amount of private-sector dollars. "If we're working smarter, the amount of good that we can bring about over the next decade is tremendous."

Increasing foreign aid is unpopular in Congress—contradicts public opinions on spending in time of severe cuts POLITICO 2/22/13 (Kevin Robillard, “Poll: Most only want foreign aid cuts,” http://www.politico.com//story/2013/02/pollmost-only-want-foreign-aid-cuts-87948.html, Accessed 7/9/13, JC) Of 19 options for cutting government spending, only one — reducing foreign aid — was supported by more than 40 percent of Americans, according to a poll released Friday. The widespread rejection of most ideas to slash spending in the poll from the Pew Research Center shows the difficulty of translating a popular GOP message — the federal budget needs to be shrunk down to size — into political reality. Even on foreign aid, only 48 percent want to cut, compared with 49 percent who want to increase funding or keep it at the same level. It also displays the difficulty of replacing the $1.2 trillion in spending cuts scheduled to hit March 1. While both Republicans and Democrats say they want to avoid the across-the-board slashes in defense and domestic spending, negotiations are at a standstill and an agreement on replacement cuts could be elusive. Decreasing funding for the State Department and cutting unemployment aid are both supported by around one-third of Americans. Cuts to the Defense Department and to aid for the needy in the U.S. are backed by about a quarter of Americans. Cuts in all other areas suggested by Pew, including energy, health care, entitlement programs, infrastructure, scientific research and combating crime, receive even less support. For most categories, a plurality of Americans want to keep spending at the same level. Even among Republicans, there’s majority support for only two cuts: foreign aid and unemployment assistance.

Foreign aid causes a political firestorm Washington Post 5/13/13 [Editorial Board, May 13th 2013, “Hurdles in reforming U.S. food aid,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] AMONG THE MORE laudable ideas in President Obama's budget for fiscal 2014 is a plan to modernize and reform the $1.5 billion U.S. food aid program. Mr. Obama would end "monetization," the inefficient practice whereby the federal government buys commodities from U.S. farmers and ships them abroad (on U.S.-flagged vessels) to governments and nongovernmental organizations - which sell them and use the proceeds for development projects. Monetization raises costs for U.S. taxpayers while displacing goods produced by farmers overseas. Alas, Mr. Obama's plan has run into political opposition on Capitol Hill. Members of Congress from both parties have objected, citing the potential losses for U.S. farmers, ports, ships and

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 28 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core merchant seamen. Not surprisingly, these senators and representatives generally hail from port cities or farm states. A bit more surprisingly, perhaps, some of them are from our own area: On April 5, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) sent a letter to the president arguing that his plan "would significantly reduce the amount of U.S. farm products our nation could provide to those in need around the world. It would also threaten our national security preparedness by reducing the domestic sealift capacity on which our U.S. military depends." Signatories included Gerald E. Connolly (D-Va.) and Eleanor Holmes Norton (DD.C.). Interestingly, two of these legislators told us that they don't oppose Mr. Obama's plan on its merits. Ms. Norton's spokesman said she "thinks the president's policy is correct," but signed the letter as a courtesy to Mr. Cummings and because of a collateral concern that food stamps might be affected. Mr. Connolly, too, said that Mr. Obama's plan would make sense in "an ideal world," but that political realities are such that foreign aid cannot get funding unless domestic U.S. constituencies also benefit. Mr. Connolly's rationale is a familiar one - indeed, it was part of the Eisenhower administration's original argument for food aid. But poor people abroad have been hostage to interest-group politics in the U.S. long enough. The time has come for some fresh thinking of the sort Rajiv Shah, Mr. Obama's foreign aid administrator, is trying to introduce. Among the many points Mr. Shah makes are that food aid shipments have declined by 64 percent in the last decade anyway, so it's a bit late for farmers and merchant mariners to be claiming that they can't survive without them. In fact, farmers are prospering as never before, thanks in part to commercial exports. As for the merchant marine, the number of U.S.-flagged ships has been in steady decline for decades, yet the U.S. military managed to prosecute several wars overseas. If we need sealift for national security, it would be more transparent to subsidize that directly. Perhaps it's true that funding for foreign aid, always politically tenuous, has depended on greasing interest groups. But it's also true that foreign aid depends on persuading taxpayers in general that their funds are being well spent. And there are more taxpayers than special interests.

New aid allocations will cost political capital Merling, Deseret Morning News, 7-2-13 [Devon, “Obama’s African trip emphasizes economic partnership over aid”, Lexis, Accessed 7-8-13, AFB] Rates of infection have fallen to 30 percent, and nearly 2 million people are on antiretroviral drugs. But since 2010, the budget for the PEPFAR program has been cut by more than 12 percent. This has left some advocates disappointed in the Obama administration’s commitment to reducing the spread of HIV/AIDS on the continent. ?Knowing that Africa has many challenges, with fighting AIDS being one of the biggest challenges, we were really expecting President Obama to continue where President Bush had left off,? Hilary Thulare, country director of the nonprofit AIDS Healthcare Foundation, told the Washington Post. ‘But it’s been a disappointment. Obama is retreating on AIDS and, by this, retreating on Africa.’ Obama has responded to these critics by saying the programs are running more efficiently and that the realities of the current economy and political climate make it more difficult to fund the program. "Given budget constraints, for us to try to get the kind of money President Bush was able to get out of a Republican House for massively scaled new foreign aid programs is very difficult," he told reporters during the trip. Obama’s trip has reflected an African policy that is aimed more at development and trade than foreign aid, perhaps in response to China’s major investments in the continent. Africa's economies are growing faster than those of almost any other region of the world. And the three countries in which Obama stopped ? Senegal, South Africa and Tanzania ? have very different

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 29 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core economies, but according to Quartz they share the distinctive feature that their trade with the U.S. is growing faster than the rest of Africa. “I think everything we do is designed to make sure that Africa is not viewed as a dependent, as a charity case, but is instead viewed as a partner,” Obama said while in Cape Town, South Africa. He reinforced that message later in his trip. "We don't want to just provide food, we want to increase food self-sufficiency," Obama said at a news conference with Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete. "So ultimately, the goal here is for Africa to build Africa for Africans." While in Cape Town, Obama pledged $7 billion to develop an electrical power grid in sub-Sarahan Africa over the next five years. Currently, two-thirds of the population of sub-Saharan Africa lacks access to electricity, according to the White House. “It’s the lifeline for families to meet their most basic needs, and it’s the connection that’s needed to plug Africa into the grid of the global economy,” he said.

Foreign aid faces an uphill battle – aid budgets cut Mazzetti, New York Times Pulitzer winner, and Landler, New York Times White House Correspondent, 5/27/13 [Mark Mazzetti and Mark Landler, May 27th 2013, The International Herald Tribune, “In Obama's ambitions, hurdles and inconsistencies; Risks are posed by giving diplomacy priority over military and intelligence,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] President Barack Obama, in one of his most significant speeches since taking office, has not simply declared an end to the post-9/11 era. He has also offered a vision of the American role in the world that he hopes could be one of his lasting legacies. It is an ambitious vision - one that eschews a muscle-bound foreign policy, dominated by the military and intelligence services, in favor of energetic diplomacy, foreign aid and a more measured response to terrorism. But it is fraught with risks, and hostage to forces that are often out of a president's control. From the grinding civil war in Syria and the extremist threat in Yemen to the toxic American relationship with Pakistan and the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan with no clear sense of what comes afterward, Mr. Obama's goal of taking the United States off ''perpetual war footing'' faces a multitude of hurdles. One of the more daunting is a sprawling wartime bureaucracy that, after nearly a dozen years, has amassed great influence and has powerful supporters on Capitol Hill. It will be difficult to roll back what has been a gradual militarization of U.S. foreign policy, even in an era of Pentagon budget cuts. Nor can Mr. Obama escape his own role in putting the United States on a war footing. He came into office pledging to wind down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but within a year had ordered 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan and oversaw a significant expansion of the Bush administration's use of clandestine drone strikes. ''We have no illusions that there are not challenges,'' said Benjamin J. Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser who wrote Mr. Obama's Thursday address. ''But we should not be defined by our role in terrorism, by the airstrikes we order or the people we put in prison.'' Of all these threats, Mr. Rhodes said the White House was most worried about a surge of extremism following the Arab Spring. And yet the bloodiest of those conflicts, in Syria, reveals the limits of Mr. Obama's policy. He has steered clear of U.S. involvement, despite signs that extremist groups with ties to Al Qaeda are making gains. Precisely because of the challenges across the Middle East, Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican and frequent critic of the administration, said Sunday that Mr. Obama's tone had seemed dangerously acquiescent. ''At a time we need resolve the most, we're sounding retreat; our enemies are emboldened all over the planet,'' he said on ''Fox News Sunday.'' ''This speech did not help.''

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 30 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Amid this uncertainty, it was telling that neither the president in his speech nor his aides afterward made firm declarations about where the United States could carry out targeted killings, or about whether drone strikes would be carried out by the Pentagon or the C.I.A. Administration officials spoke of a ''preference'' to use the military to conduct lethal operations, but said that Mr. Obama's hands would not be tied and that he reserved the right to use the C.I.A. for covert drone strikes in far-off countries when, as a White House fact sheet put it, ''doing so is both lawful and necessary to protect the United States or its allies.'' At the same time, Mr. Obama put renewed emphasis on diplomacy and foreign aid, saying these were important ways to address ''the underlying grievances and conflicts that feed extremism.'' As if to underline his point, John Kerry has proved to be a surprisingly activist secretary of state, plunging into shuttle diplomacy between the Israelis and the Palestinians and becoming the administration's point man for dealing with the strife in Syria. It is also true, though, that the administration is pushing a diplomatic solution in Syria because there is so little public support for military engagement and because all other available options carry risks. ''The real question over time may be whether we can mobilize others to join with us to deal with these threats,'' said Dennis B. Ross, a former senior adviser to Mr. Obama on the Middle East. ''Look at Syria: would others be prepared to do more that could be effective if they saw that we were prepared to do more?'' Another problem with this new focus is that the administration cut the budget of the State Department and the United States Agency for International Development by 6 percent, to $47.78 billion, from $51 billion in the current year, reflecting the broader budget squeeze. The impact of those cuts is even greater since there are increases of $1.5 billion for additional security personnel and upgrades to embassies and other diplomatic buildings.

Massive pressure to cut foreign aid Millennium Challenge Corporation, 5/1/13 [5-1-13, States News Service, “Bipartisan Support for Foreign Assistance at MCC Forum on Global Development”, Lexis, accessed 7-9-13, HG] A former Secretary of State, a top Obama administration official and a long-serving U.S. senator each voiced strong support for foreign assistance during the Millennium Challenge Corporations Forum on Global Development on April 29. The Forum, held at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington, provided an opportunity for some of international developments top leaders and practitioners to meet and exchange ideas. MCC also presented three awards to individuals and organizations using the power of partnerships to make an impact in the lives of the worlds poor. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice provided the events keynote address and discussed foreign assistance during a conversation with master of ceremonies Frank Sesno. Michael Froman, assistant to President Barack Obama and Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economic Affairs, addressed the role of the private sector in international development. And Senator Patrick Leahy, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Appropriations Subcommittee on State Department and Foreign Operations, spoke about the need for sustained funding for foreign aid. Rice, who served as Secretary of State and chair of MCCs Board of Directors from 2005 to 2009, emphasized that U.S. Government foreign assistance has lifted people up from all over the world for many, many decades. Rice acknowledged a pressure to cut foreign assistance funding and focus spending at home but believes the U.S. Governments spending on foreign aid which is less than 1 percent of the federal budget is money well spent.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 31 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core I would say to the American people, yes, we need to deal with our problems here at home. But just look at what's going on around the world. Just look at all the preventable disease. Just look at all of the children who could be saved. You'll want to have American foreign assistance be a part of that story. During Rices tenure as chair of MCCs Board, the agency signed 16 compacts worth more than $6.3 billion and 20 Threshold Programs totaling almost $439 million. She called MCC A story of shared success. I've always thought that American foreign policy indeed, America is at its best in the world when our interests and our values come together. And I can think of no better example of our interests and our values coming together than MCC. Froman who is responsible for coordinating policy on international trade, financial, energy security, climate change, development, and democracy issues discussed the changing role of the U.S. Government in foreign assistance. From the planning of development programs, to their coordination with other donors, to their implementation, and through the data-driven evaluation of their effectiveness, we recognize we have to do more with less, he said. But we also recognize we have to do better from beginning to end. Froman called MCC a critical input to the administration's development policy since the first days of the administration. MCC's experience has been enormously helpful as we've worked to make our assistance more effective, including by leveraging public sector reform and private sector capital flows, he said. And one of the lessons of the MCC is the power of example and the importance of incentives. Leahy, who is the most senior member of the Appropriations and Agriculture committees, noted that, What we have to do is focus on what we get for the money not just spending more money, but what do we get for it. I commend MCC for working on that. We have to make sure we're getting the direct feedback from the intended beneficiaries. I have to fight every year in the Senate and the Congress to get money for foreign aid , he said. It's not the most popular thing to ask for , although it's one of the most important things in a great country like ours, and I'll keep fighting for it.

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Unpopular – Rand Paul Plan will spark a backlash by Senator Paul – and he has clout Burns, Politico, 12 [Alexander Burns, Staff writer, October 13th 2012, Politico, “Rand Paul seizes the moment,” http://www.politico.com//blogs/burns-haberman/2012/10/rand-paul-seizes-the-moment-138375.html, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] For Rand Paul, campaign season is just getting started. Less than a month before the end of the 2012 election, the first-term Kentucky senator is embarking on his most vigorous effort yet to expand his national profile. Over the past week, Paul used his political committee — RAND PAC — to launch television ads in the Ohio, West Virginia and Florida Senate races, hammering incumbent Democrats on foreign aid . That offensive will intensify in the coming weeks, Paul advisers said, with an additional two or three Senate races on the Republican’s target list. When Paul’s leadership PAC reports its fundraising haul later this month, a Paul strategist said RAND PAC will have more than $1 million in the bank. Paul intends to put that hefty sum to active use: the TV ads he has begun to air bolster congressional efforts to block foreign aid to Libya, Egypt and Pakistan. Paul describes the measure as a response to attacks on American diplomatic outposts in North Africa and Pakistan’s imprisonment of a doctor who helped the U.S. locate Osama bin Laden. Paul has ramped up his political travel, too, making trips across Kentucky’s northern border to stump for Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan in Ohio. Later this month, he’s slated to appear in New Hampshire as a Romney-Ryan surrogate — Paul’s second visit in recent months to an early presidential primary state, after a spring trip to Iowa where Paul visited with top evangelical organizers. If all that sounds like the maneuvering of a man who hopes to run for president in 2016 or beyond, Paul and his advisers don’t rule out that possibility. But, they say, Paul’s increased national presence — and especially the TV campaign from his PAC — have more to do with his passionate opposition to gratuitous overseas spending than any long-term political goal. “It’s about the issue. I mean, what happens to me – who knows?” Paul told POLITICO at Thursday night’s vice presidential debate here in Danville. “We have limited resources as a country and I’m not for sending it to countries that are burning our flag, disrespecting us, imprisoning a doctor who helped us get Bin Laden. I say if you want to be our ally, act like it.” Paul advisers say the ad campaign springs from the senator's desire to hold wrongheaded colleagues accountable and change the GOP's outlook on foreign policy, more than any electoral calculus. In any case, Paul's activities are making him the Republican Party's most prominent advocate for military and spending restraint overseas, at a moment when the national mood has moved in that direction. Whatever happens in the presidential race, all this will leave Paul in a unique and potent position for his activities in the next Congress and beyond.

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Unpopular – Public Americans want less money spent on foreign aid – they massively overestimate how much is spent on foreign aid World Public Opinion Org, 10 [11-29-10, World Public Opinion, “American Public Vastly Overestimates Amount of U.S. Foreign Aid”, http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/brunitedstatescanadara/670.php, accessed 7-9-13, HG] As debates about how to deal with the budget deficit have heated up in recent weeks, a new WorldPublicOpinion.org/Knowledge Networks poll finds that Americans continue to vastly overestimate the amount of the federal budget that is devoted to foreign aid. (Image: US Navy) Asked to estimate how much of the federal budget goes to foreign aid the median estimate is 25 percent . Asked how much they thought would be an "appropriate" percentage the median response is 10 percent . In fact just 1 percent of the federal budget goes to foreign aid . Even if one only includes the discretionary part of the federal budget, foreign aid represents only 2.6 percent. This set of questions has been asked repeatedly since the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) first asked them in 1995, and it was subsequently asked by other organizations as well. Over the years the most common median estimate was that foreign aid represented 20 percent of the budget, most recently in a 2004 poll by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Thus the most recent number represents an increase of 5 points in the median estimate. Steven Kull, director of PIPA comments, "This increase may be due to Americans hearing more about aid efforts occurring in Iraq, Afghanistan and Haiti over the last few years. There have been some increases in foreign aid under both Presidents Bush and Obama, but, of course, nowhere near to the perceived level." The median amount proposed as appropriate has consistently been 10 percent in other polls including the 2004 Chicago Council poll. In the current poll estimates of foreign aid vary by education, growing more accurate with higher levels of education. Among those with less than a high school education the median estimate was that foreign aid represented an extraordinary 45 percent of the budget, those with only a high school diploma 25 percent, those with some college at 20 percent. However, even those with a college degree or higher still overestimate by a wide margin, with a median estimate of 15 percent of the budget. Steven Kull comments, "It is quite extraordinary that this extreme overestimation has persisted for so many years, even among those with higher education." Overall, the percentage of respondents who estimated anywhere near the correct amount was quite small. Only 19 percent estimate that foreign aid is 5 percent or less of the budget. On the question of how much of the budget should go to foreign aid only 42 percent say that the amount it should be is 5 percent of the budget or less and only 20 percent say that it should be 1 percent or less. The percentage saying that foreign aid should be eliminated is quite small--just 10 percent of respondents. Those who identify themselves as Republican are somewhat lower in their estimates than Democrats. But Republicans still overestimate the amount with a median estimate of 20 percent, while Democrats have a median estimate of 25 percent and Independents 25 percent.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 34 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Attitudes about what percentage of the budget should go to foreign aid tend to track the amount estimated. The median preferred level is 5 percent for Republicans, and 10 percent for Democrats and Republicans.

Foreign aid massively overestimated by the public Morales, staff writer for Devex, 2/26/13 [John, 2-26-13, Devex, “Foreign Aid Cuts America’s Top Priority”, https://www.devex.com/en/news/poll-foreign-aid-cut-tops-america-s-priority/80388, accessed 7-9-13, HG] What could such a deal mean? A mix of cuts and revenue generation through taxes, perhaps. In that case, it’s either slice the big-ticket items like defense or cut the small ones like foreign aid. The hammer, however, would likely fall on priorities that would not cost big political fortunes. Why foreign assistance tends to appear on so many shortlists of cuts may have something to do with America’s perception about it. Americans believed 25 percent of the federal budget goes to foreign aid, according to a 2010 survey by World Public Opinion. Yet the United States’ whole foreign policy is just $1 for every $100 spent on other sectors, U.S. officials have noted. In his first major foreign policy speech delivered last week, Secretary of State John Kerry argued: “Over 1 percent, a little bit more, funds all of our civilian and foreign affairs efforts — every embassy, every program that saves a child from dirty drinking water, or from AIDS, or reaches out to build a village, and bring America’s values.” It’s particularly hard to make a case for increased aid spending when most of Americans want other things to be prioritized in times of spending cuts. Based on Pew’s latest survey, about 70 percent of citizens would favor increasing military defense spending or keep it at the current level as against the 49 percent of citizens who want to increase or keep aid spending as it is. If U.S. lawmakers can’t agree on a plan to avert this sequestration just in time, this could mean $200 million less for humanitarian assistance, $400 million for global health, $70 million for food aid, and $70 million for USAID’s operating costs, as per estimates by the State Department.

U.S. is unaware of foreign policy – lack of knowledge about foreign spending proves Paque, U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, 10 [Joel, 12-3-10, U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, “Americans Massively Overestimate U.S. Foreign Assistance”, http://www.usglc.org/2010/12/03/americans-vastly-overestimate-u-s-foreign-assistance/, accessed 7-10-13, HG] A new poll shows Americans continue to vastly overestimate the amount of foreign assistance given by the United States. Conducted by the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) at the University of Maryland, the November poll finds the median estimate of the percentage of the federal budget most Americans think is spent on foreign aid is 25%. When you ask Americans how much would be appropriate to spend on foreign assistance, the median response is 10%. In fact, only a little over 1% of the federal budget currently goes to foreign assistance. These findings echo previous surveys going back over a decade, but this recent survey saw the largest yet estimate of foreign assistance, up from 20% in 2004. Steven Kull, PIPA director, attributes this increase since 2004 to public awareness over aid expenditures in Afghanistan and Haiti. He also noted that, although assistance levels have increased since 9/11, the public still doesn’t have an accurate perception of aid spending, saying, “There have been some increases in foreign aid under both Presidents Bush and Obama, but, of course, nowhere near to the perceived level.”

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 35 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core The overestimation of our foreign assistance holds true across the political spectrum. Those who identified as Republicans overestimated our foreign assistance somewhat less, with the mean response of 20%, while the mean response from those who identified as Democrats and Independents was 25%. When asked how much of the budget should go to foreign aid, the mean for Republicans was 5%, whereas for Democrats and Independents it was 10%.

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Popular – Bipartisan Foreign aid and assistance is popular with both Democrats and Republicans – perceive it stimulates U.S. growth, expands relations, and expands U.S. development worldwide Rep. Crenshaw, Florida Republican & Rep. Smith, Washington Democrat, 6/10/13 [Ander and Adam, 6-10-13, POLITICO, “The Vital Role of Foreign Assistance”, http://www.politico.com//story/2013/06/the-vital-role-offoreign-assistance-92516.html, accessed 7-9-13, HG] Foreign assistance programs are important for spurring our economy, too. More than half of our exports go to the developing world now and that number is growing. The key to expanding our economy and creating jobs here at home lies beyond our shores, and reaching the 95 percent of the world’s consumers who live outside the U.S. requires investment in these rapidly growing markets. Careful attention must be paid to how we spend every taxpayer dollar. As the co-chairs of the Congressional Caucus for Effective Foreign Assistance, our goal is to help ensure the global investments we make bring the best return possible to America. Significant strides have been made over the past decade to make these programs more effective, and a new “Report on Reports” released by the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition details areas of consensus on how we can do even better. Just as military leaders have called for, we need to strengthen the capacity of our civilian agencies. Both Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush have taken steps to increase the footprint and quality of development experts and diplomats around the globe, but we are still understaffed and underfunded with the challenges we face around the globe. Given our fiscal environment, we have to focus on real results in every federal program. Enhanced evaluation and accountability in our development efforts are being implemented. As an example, the Foreign Assistance Dashboard allows taxpayers to see where our dollars are being spent. More focus on data-driven innovations like this are necessary to ensure we get the best bang for the U.S. buck. The private sector now accounts for more than 80 percent of capital flows to the developing world, playing a more critical role than ever. Working together, public-private partnerships are changing the way we do foreign assistance, and we need more of them. Our development and diplomatic programs create the enabling environments with host governments for U.S. businesses and nongovernmental organizations to operate successfully. That’s a role only our development experts and diplomats can play, which is why it is so essential for us to maintain sufficient resources for these programs around the globe. Efforts to better coordinate the many foreign assistance programs across our government are also needed. Streamlining decisions and improving coordination across agencies would enhance the effectiveness of our programs. Finally, we have to focus and prioritize our efforts. We cannot do it all, so we must concentrate on what we do well and where we can have the greatest effect. In addition to ensuring the integrity of our development and diplomacy programs from further deep cuts, Congress should ensure that these programs are focused where they have the most impact. It is gratifying to see the initiatives and pioneering efforts on accountability and transparency in our foreign assistance programs. This is good government. We look forward to continuing to work with our colleagues in Congress to expand and strengthen these efforts even further. There is agreement across the political spectrum that foreign assistance is an essential part of America’s leadership.

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Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 38 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Popular – Public Foreign aid is growing in popularity Sullivan, Council on Foreign Relations, 2-2-13 [Kevin, 2-2-13, The Borgen Project, “Public Opinion Favors Increased Foreign Aid,” http://borgenproject.org/public-opinion-favors-increased-foreign-aid/, accessed 7-8-13, MSG] According to the Council on Foreign Relations’ website Americans, in general, want our country to supply more non-defense related international aid. A study of the 2011 federal budget and public opinion found that defense and military spending made up about 20 percent of that year’s budget while non-defense related aid was less than one percent. The study noted that the amount of humanitarian, non-military aid has been increasing over the last decade but has yet to reach even one percent. One proposal to build more support for increased international aid is to fight misconceptions about how foreign aid is distributed and to educate the public about how non-defense related spending helps U.S. economic interest abroad, but the author of the study worried that such a money-driven portrayal of international aid programs may not attract positive attention from voters who support increased international aid from a strictly altruistic stance. One way or another, support has seemed to be slowly building over the last ten years and that’s a positive sign. While that trend in opinion is encouraging it does seem to work in competition with the large amount of funding running toward military spending. Even over the course of the last ten years in which we have executed one of the largest military pull-outs in history defense-related spending is still the Goliath to the David that is humanitarian aid, but perhaps this trend in public opinion and vocal supporters could help turn the tide.

Increased foreign aid is popular despite misunderstanding of foreign aid budget – 67% support Morales, staff writer for Devex, 2/26/13 [John, 2-26-13, Devex, “Foreign Aid Cuts America’s Top Priority”, https://www.devex.com/en/news/poll-foreign-aid-cut-tops-america-s-priority/80388, accessed 7-9-13, HG] If U.S. citizens had their way, foreign aid may be the first to be reduced in times of need, a new poll suggests as the dreaded sequester deadline approaches. While most Americans don’t support spending cuts, about 48 in 100 think aid to the world’s needy should be reduced, Pew Research Center’s latest survey shows. The survey, released Feb. 22, gave 19 options for cutting government spending, and foreign aid was chosen by 70 in 100 Republicans and 25 in 100 Democrats. Even then, Pew’s polling results can be read in another way: Half of Americans also want to increase foreign aid or keep it at the current level. While Pew’s survey speaks of a divided nation on foreign aid spending, a survey released last month by the Better World Campaign painted a different picture of America’s sentiment on development assistance. About 67 in 100 Americans across the political spectrum support keeping or increasing the portion of the U.S. federal budget on global health aid. About 80 percent of Americans believed it’s in “America’s best interest to continue to actively support the United Nations.” While these polls, and similar ones, may be inconclusive, they may still find prominence in the coming days as lobbying and backroom bartering intensifies to find a deficit reduction deal that avoids the dreaded sequestration, which would usher in $85 billion across-the-board cuts.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 39 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core What could such a deal mean? A mix of cuts and revenue generation through taxes, perhaps. In that case, it’s either slice the big-ticket items like defense or cut the small ones like foreign aid. The hammer, however, would likely fall on priorities that would not cost big political fortunes. Why foreign assistance tends to appear on so many shortlists of cuts may have something to do with America’s perception about it. Americans believed 25 percent of the federal budget goes to foreign aid, according to a 2010 survey by World Public Opinion. Yet the United States’ whole foreign policy is just $1 for every $100 spent on other sectors, U.S. officials have noted. In his first major foreign policy speech delivered last week, Secretary of State John Kerry argued: “Over 1 percent, a little bit more, funds all of our civilian and foreign affairs efforts — every embassy, every program that saves a child from dirty drinking water, or from AIDS, or reaches out to build a village, and bring America’s values.”

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Popular – Spin Obama will spin the plan favorable – defense, economics, diseases, stability National Jewish Democratic Council press release, 5/28/13 [May 28th 2013, US Official News, “Washington: President Obama Right to Emphasize Foreign Aid,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] During his speech yesterday at the National Defense University, President Obama spoke candidly about his support for foreign aid. He stated: I know that foreign aid is one of the least popular expenditures - even though it amounts to less than one percent of the federal budget. But foreign assistance cannot be viewed as charity. It is fundamental to our national security, and any sensible long-term strategy to battle extremism. Moreover, foreign assistance is a tiny fraction of what we spend fighting wars that our assistance might ultimately prevent. In a world that is becoming increasingly globalized, it is great to see that President Obama understands foreign aid’s importance. As President Obama indicated, foreign aid is a “tiny fraction of what we spend fighting wars,” and yet surprisingly, it serves as our country’s first line of defense. Because of the aid our country provides, we are able to safely and securely promote American interests abroad without putting any troops on the ground. Our assistance helps developing nations build stronger economies and plays a part in securing a robust global market. Equally as important, our aid programs fight diseases, provide natural disaster relief and promote stability to previously unstable governments. All too often, American citizens - including our elected officials - seemingly forget these truths . There are countless of in-plain-sight instances where foreign aid has been mutually beneficial to the U.S. and a recipient. Take Israel for example. Because of increased U.S. security assistance to Israel under the Obama administration, our two countries have been able to fund some of the most advanced weapons defense systems in the world including the Arrow, David’s Sling and Iron Dome. This was on full display last fall during Pillar of Defense when the Iron Dome allowed the time to properly negotiate a ceasefire with Hamas. Foreign aid is a seriously important tool, and President Obama made that evident in yesterday’s speech. Hopefully, the message was also clear to both policymakers and the American public. Foreign aid needs to continue to be a centerpiece of our national security.

Obama will spin the plan – Africa proves Pickler, Associated Press 6/28/13 [Nedra Pickler, Staff writer, June 28th 2013, Associated Press Online, “WHITE HOUSE NOTEBOOK: Obama pitches aid in Africa,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] President Barack Obama is pitching U.S. foreign aid and, by extension, an image of a new Africa -not one of malnourished children with hollow eyes and distended tummies, but one of smiles and plump babies. Obama on Friday toured a series of booths set up behind his Dakar hotel that were designed to showcase Senegalese agriculture with a focus on nutrition and fortified foods. At one of the booths, a large poster featured a healthy-looking baby in the arms of a smiling mother. "That's a big, fat and happy kid," Obama said. At another, he spoke to a farmer who displayed a sweet potato fortified with beta-carotene.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 41 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core "This is not just your average sweet potato," Obama said. "This is your super-duper sweet potato." The message was in part meant for an audience back home, where foreign aid in an age of budget squeezes is often first in line for cutbacks. The food programs get help from Feed the Future, a public private partnership initiated during Obama's first term that the administration says has helped seven million small farmers in 19 developing nations, including 7,000 in Senegal. "When people ask what is happening to their taxpayer dollars in foreign aid, I want people to know that this money is not being wasted," Obama said. "It's helping feed families, it's helping people to become more self-sufficient, and it's creating new markets for U.S. companies. It's a win-win situation." Speaking to reporters later aboard Air Force One, Obama said the aid serves as an economic development tool by increasing farmer income that in turn builds a new middle class that can support local manufacturing. "Our foreign aid budget is around 1 percent of our total federal budget. It's chronically the least popular part of our federal budget," he said while en route to Johannesburg. "But if you look at the bang for the buck that we're getting when it's done right, when it's well designed, and when it's scaled at the local level with input from local folks, it can really make a huge difference." During the agriculture tour in Dakar, he needled U.S. reporters traveling with him, whose questions have focused on recent Supreme Court decisions back home and on the whereabouts of secrets-leaker Edward Snowden. "I know that millet and maize and fertilizer doesn't always make for sexy copy," he said. He asked a farmer at a display booth to show reporters some of his rice. "These are some city people," he said of the reporters. Then teased them, as if imparting a lesson: "This is where rice comes from." As for the rice, he said he'd like to see it served at the White House. "We'll have the White House chef whip it up," he said.

Obama will spin the plan as anti-terrorism CBS News 5/23/13 [May 23rd 2013, CBS News, “Obama: America at a "crossroads" in fighting terrorism,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] In a sweeping speech addressing the nation's counterterrorism strategy, President Obama on Thursday unveiled new restrictions on the nation's controversial targeted killing policy, and - despite repeated interruptions from a heckler -- officially outlined plans to restart transfers of Guantanamo Bay prisoners to third countries. During an hour-long speech at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C., Mr. Obama outlined his strategy for addressing a changing global climate, and stressed the need to understand and address the shifting threats facing the nation. Unlike in years past, Mr. Obama argued, the core of al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan is no longer the greatest terrorist risk confronting the U.S. Instead, he said, the U.S. has seen the emergence of threats from localized al Qaeda affiliates around the world, as well as from "radicalized individuals here in the United States." Attorney General Holder: Drones killed 4 Americans since 2009[1] Obama: Guantanamo must close[2] "America has confronted many forms of violent extremism in our time. Deranged or alienated individuals - often U.S. citizens or legal residents - can do enormous damage, particularly when inspired by larger notions of violent jihad," Mr. Obama said. "Homegrown extremists. This is the future of terrorism." And force, he argued, is not the only solution to combating these dangers. Mr. Obama argued that the U.S. must also support other countries in their pursuit of democracy, work to promote peace

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 42 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core abroad, and supply the necessary foreign aid to help countries modernize their economies, improve their education, and encourage business growth.

Foreign aid is spun as smart power Las Vegas Review, 5/16/13 [Chris Sieroty, Staff writer, May 16th 2013, “Foreign aid, trade crucial,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] Influential government and business leaders, concerned that the foreign aid budget could be reduced as Congress deals with fallout from sequester and the possibility of more budget cuts, say there are benefits from using "smart power." Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, former Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., and Steven Hill, executive director of the Governor's Office of Economic Development, on Wednesday stressed the importance of U.S. foreign aid and trade at the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition breakfast at the Four Seasons. Ridge and Bryan brought attention to the connections between foreign assistance, economic prosperity and national security, saying investing overseas makes the world a "safer, better place." "About 1 percent of the national budget is spent on foreign aid," Bryan said. "The challenges we face today are different. Foreign aid is terribly important." President Barack Obama's proposed $3.8 trillion budget for the 2013-2014 fiscal year, allocates $58 billion for foreign aid. In a speech to about 150 attendees, Ridge said that the country certainly needs a strong military, but that the military isn't the only option. He said the U.S. also needs diplomacy and foreign assistance - also known as smart power - to advance its national interests around the world. "There will always be some resistance to foreign aid," Ridge said. He said there are some people known as political protectionists who want to withdraw from the world, while other opponents, described as economic protectionists, cite costs. The former Pennsylvania governor emphasized that both sides argue it is in America's best interest to withdraw from the world. "How can it be in (our) best interest to be less engaged?" Ridge said. "It is in our interest to be more engaged, not less engaged. The world expects us to lead whether we like it or not." Bryan cautioned that an absence of being involved around the world "does have consequences for our national security." Access to foreign markets also is crucial to Nevada's economic recovery, with one in five jobs statewide dependent on trade. Nevada's export shipments of merchandise last year totaled $10.2 billion.

Plan will be spun as an investment Kadden, Senior Legislative Manager for InterAction, 4-10-13 [Jeremy, 4-10-13, Huffington Post, “The Good, the Bad, and the Budget: What President Obama's Plan Means for Foreign Aid,” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeremy-kadden/obama-budget-foreignaid_b_3056552.html, accessed 7-9-13, MSG] Now that the administration's proposal is on the table alongside House and Senate budget plans, it is up to Congress to hash out where spending will fall. In doing so, they must remember that povertyfocused development and humanitarian accounts make up less than 1 percent of the U.S. budget. Cutting these programs will not address the deficit, but supporting them is a wise investment and makes a real difference for people around the world working to improve their lives.

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Popular – Efficiency Foreign aid popular- it’s cost-effective, saves lives, and is spun as preserving American power Huckabee and Lincoln, Former Arkansas Governor and Senator, 12 [Mike Huckabee and Blanche Lincoln, October 22nd 2012, Politico, “Why U.S. foreign aid still makes sense,” http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1012/82684.html, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] Indeed, in the seven decades following the Second World War, American global leadership has helped the world achieve a level of prosperity unprecedented in human history. We helped Europe dig out of its darkest days through the Marshall Plan, stood fast in the defense of freedom during the Cold War, and paved the way for global commerce by helping to establish international financial and political institutions. As President Ronald Reagan said about U.S. international engagement, “We cannot play innocents abroad in a world that is not innocent.” Credit for America’s global leadership role belongs to both major political parties and Americans of all stripes – business leaders, students, clergy, union members, and everyone in between. Americans across the board have always been guided by the notion that all lives have equal value, regardless of where someone was born. Nevertheless, we recognize that Americans today are suffering at home from one of the worst economic recessions in modern history. We understand that there might be temptation to cut back on U.S. humanitarian programs and investments abroad. However, the cost of cutting back on such programs is not worth it. Not even close. It would affect too many peoples’ lives and damage American economic and national security interests at a time our world is more interconnected than ever. It might come as a surprise to learn that less than one percent of the U.S. budget is spent on foreign assistance. It might even be shocking to discover that, despite this relatively small amount, these funds are literally saving millions of lives and improving the lives of many more millions of people. For example, American investments in cost-effective vaccines will help save nearly 4 million children’s lives from preventable diseases such as pneumonia and diarrhea over the next five years. We’ve also helped to deliver 290 million mosquito nets to Malaria-stricken countries, and put 46 million children in school for the very first time. And thanks to the leadership of Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, 8 million HIV/AIDS patients now have access to life-saving treatments, up from just 300,000 a decade ago, making an AIDS-free generation a real possibility within our lifetimes. A healthier, less impoverished planet is good for all of us. From an economic standpoint, it allows people to contribute more to the marketplace and lead productive lives. U.S. foreign assistance opens new markets to U.S. goods and services and creates new trading partners and allies. Consider Africa, where, for the first time, the continent is receiving more foreign investment than foreign aid. Six of the 10 fastest growing economies are in Africa, which has sustained average economic growth above 5 percent over the past decade. Countries in Africa and the rest of the developing world are becoming global players essential for our own continued growth. From a security perspective, the fight against extreme poverty is one of the best ways to tackle the root causes of instability, violence, and war. That’s why our military leaders are integrating socalled ‘soft power’ solutions into our national security strategies. The Pentagon knows that R.B.s (“relationships built”) are often as important as any other tactic in achieving victory. Policymakers worried about inefficiencies should look to U.S. foreign aid as a model of smart, effective government. Most programs are administered through grants to private organizations like

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 44 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Arkansas-based Winrock International, Save the Children, and Catholic Relief Charities, groups that are efficient, on-the-ground, and working to make a real difference in people’s lives. The U.S. also works with other international donors and aid recipients themselves to help them become self-sufficient. Helping people help themselves is a long-standing American value. As Americans we are enormously blessed to live in the greatest country on the globe, and, to whom much is given, much is expected. We have an exceptional leadership role to play in the world. Even in tough economic times, we are extremely fortunate. Around the world, nearly one billion people will go to bed hungry tonight. In this year alone, 2.4 million children will die as a result of malnutrition. One thing all Americans can agree on – even in the midst of this rancorous campaign season – is that we are at our very best as a nation when we offer a helping hand to support others in need.

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Trade Links

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 46 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Popular – Political Spin Trade focus bolsters spin Pflanz, Christian Science Monitor, 6-30-13 [Mike, The Christian Science Monitor, “Obama pledges to help double electricity in sub-Saharan Africa; President Obama is casting the $7 billion initiative as part of a new US strategy to move the region forward with development not charity dollars.,” Lexis, accessed 7-8-13, AFB] Trade not aid Together, the aim of the "trade not aid" mantra is a goal familiar to many back home in the US: making individuals wealthier and businesses more profitable, in societies that respect laws and thus create confidence for new investors. It's capitalism 101. It opens new markets for American goods, too. And - unlike George W. Bush's immensely popular but immensely expensive HIV/Aids PEPFAR programme - Obama's aid plans come with a relatively cheap price tag for US taxpayers. The president is very aware of the dilemmas he faces in winning approval back home to spend dollars overseas. "Our foreign aid budget is around 1 percent of our total federal budget. It's chronically the least popular part of our federal budget," Obama told reporters. "We've got budget constraints back home, which means that we've got to come up with new and creative ways to promote development and deliver aid. Every dollar that we're putting in, we're getting a huge amount of private-sector dollars. "If we're working smarter, the amount of good that we can bring about over the next decade is tremendous."

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 47 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Renewables Links

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Unpopular – GOP Renewables unpopular with Republicans – they intend to crush the budget Spross, Thinkprogress, Blogger 6-29-13 [Jeff Spross, 6-29-13, Climate Progress, “House Republicans Want To Cut Nearly $1 Billion In Renewable Funding For 2014”, http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/06/29/2233591/house-republicanswant-to-cut-nearly-1-billion-in-renewable-funding-for-2014/?mobile=nc, accessed 7-07-13 AMS] This past Tuesday, President Obama unveiled his second-term plan for cutting carbon emissions, and delivered a bracing call for the American economy to advance into a clean energy future. This past Wednesday, House Republicans responded by moving a bill out of the Appropriations Committee that would cut investments in renewables by nearly a billion dollars. The legislation in question is the Energy and Water appropriations bill, which is the fifth of twelve spending bills the House must pass to establish the discretionary budget for 2014. Sequestration — the across-the-board spending cuts that went into effect earlier this year — set a top-line level of $967 billion for that spending. But Republicans are attempting to ease the cuts to the military by slicing even deeper into other programs. That led to a party-line vote in the committee to cut renewable investments in the bill by $911 million from their level in 2013.

Renewables are unpopular- Republicans want to defy the Obama administration Abrams, Associated Press, 7-10-13 [Jim, 7-10-13, Huffington Post, “Renewable Energy Budget Cut In Half In House Republicans' Spending Bill,” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/10/renewable-energy-budget_n_3575842.html, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] WASHINGTON -- House Republicans are proposing to slash money for renewable energy research and defy the Obama administration's decision to close the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in a bare-bones annual spending bill for energy and water programs. The House could vote late Wednesday on the legislation. The bill has little support in the Democraticled Senate and faces a White House veto, but makes clear just how far apart the two parties are on policy and budgetary matters. The bill would approve $30.4 billion for Energy Department programs, including nuclear weapons maintenance, almost $3 billion below the amount approved last year. It would cut spending for renewable energy programs by half.

Any renewables investment will face opposition – Republicans will prioritize the military SustainableBusiness.com, News 13 [6-19-13, “Renewables Slashed as GOP Shifts Budget To Defense”, http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/24988, accessed, 7-07-13 AMS] Just as Ernest Moniz, new secretary of the Department of Energy (DOE), talked up the importance of renewable energy, energy, Republicans are preparing to slash its budget. The House Appropriations Subcommittee voted Monday to cut renewable energy spending at DOE in half - by $911 million - in fiscal 2014 (not counting 8.7% cuts in the current sequester), ostensibly to cope with a second round of automatic sequestration cuts.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 49 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Since they want to raise defense spending $28 billion above the sequester level they are looking for cuts elsewhere. "In a challenging fiscal environment, we have to prioritize funding, and the Subcommittee chose to address the readiness and safety of the nation's nuclear stockpile and to invest in critical infrastructure projects to protect lives and property and support economic growth," says Energy and Water Subcommittee Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-NJ). Nuclear security would be funded at $11.3 billion - $661 million above the sequester level - while renewable energy would get less than $1 billion next year. They also want steep cuts in one of DOE's flagship programs, ARPA-E, which funds breakthrough energy research.

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Unpopular – Oil Lobby Oil lobbies have massive Congressional influence—they’ll try to defeat clean energy Think Progress 12 (Rebecca Leber, 10/24/12, Think Progress, “Three Ways Big Oil Spends Its Profits To Defend Oil Subsidies And Defeat Clean Energy,” http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/24/1064231/three-waysbig-oil-spends-its-profits-to-defend-oil-subsidies-and-defeat-clean-energy/?mobile=nc, Accessed 7/10/13, JC) The oil industry reinvests tens of millions of these dollars for political purposes, including nearly all political contributions to Republicans, lobbying, and campaign ads. Through its enormous spending, these five and other Big Oil companies have fought to maintain $4 billion of their annual subsidies, while seeking to undermine clean energy investments: $105 Million On Lobbying Since 2011, 90 Percent Of Campaign Contributions To GOP: The big five companies have spent over $105 million on lobbying Congress since 2011, according to lobbying disclosures through the third quarter. The biggest spenders were Shell ($25.7 million), Exxon ($25.4 million), and ConocoPhillips ($22.9 million). The five companies’ oil PACs have donated over $2.16 million to mostly Republican candidates this election cycle. Koch Industries also spends big money to pressure Congress, with $16.2 million on lobbying and more than $1.3 million from its PAC (the top oil and gas spender). In total, the oil and gas industry sends 90 percent of its near $50 million in contributions to Republicans, far eclipsing their record spending in 2008. Misinformation Campaigns, Including Over $150 Million In Election Ads: Over $150 million has been spent on TV ads promoting fossil fuel interests, particularly oil and coal, reports the New York Times. In addition to traditional campaign donations, the oil industry has turned to outside groups running attack ads. Earlier this year, Americans For Prosperity — founded and funded by the Koch brothers — launched a bogus ad claiming that clean energy stimulus dollars went overseas. And the oil lobby American Petroleum Institute has its own campaign promoting myths about oil production and gas prices. For example, API chief Jack Gerard, rumored to be on Mitt Romney’s shortlist for a White House or agency appointment, claimed that oil production on federal land is down. This is simply not true, since oil production is up 240 million barrels on federal lands and waters under President Obama compared to the Bush administration. And oil companies hold 20 million acres of federal oil, gas leases in Gulf of Mexico that remain unexplored or undeveloped. This is just one of the many myths Big Oil has pushed this campaign cycle. Behind-The-Scenes Campaign To Defeat Clean Energy: Koch Industries and fossil fuel groups are mobilizing to defeat the extension of modest tax incentives for wind energy, even though oil tax breaks are permanent. The American Energy Alliance, which has Koch ties, aims to make the credit “so toxic” for Republicans it would be “impossible for John Boehner to sit at a table with Harry Reid.” The Koch-funded Americans For Prosperity is also campaigning against wind energy. Meanwhile, the industry has argued its own century-old tax breaks are necessary to maintain, despite years of record-breaking profits. Overall, these efforts to keep their tax breaks while weakening public health safeguards from pollution have paid off in Congress and for Republican candidates. The House of Representatives is the most anti-environment in Congressional history, averaging at least one anti-environment vote per day to eliminate or undermine pollution protections, many benefiting Big Oil. And the Romney/Ryan budget plan would give the big five oil companiesanother $2.3 billion annual tax cut beyond existing loopholes.

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Oil and gas lobbies fight spending on renewables—causes Congressional backlash Doering, USA Today Gannett Washington Bureau, 12 (Christopher, ¶ 7/2/12, USA Today, “Renewable advocates battle oil industry over energy policy,” http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/story/2012-07-02/renewable-fuels-oilcongress/55987052/1, Accessed 7/10/13, JC) Among the factors making a major shift of U.S. energy policy difficult are the upcoming elections, the inability of lawmakers to reach a consensus on how to change it, and the high costs necessary to expand access to fuels such as natural gas for consumers at U.S. filling stations. That hasn't stopped the oil industry from aggressively wooing Congressional lawmakers on hotbutton issues, including lobbying against renewable fuels. Last year alone ConocoPhillips, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil, Chevron and the American Petroleum Institute, the trade group that represents these energy giants, used $66.2 million for lobbying efforts, nearly 44% of the $150 million total spent by the oil and gas industry, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics. Collectively, nearly 800 lobbyists worked on behalf of oil and gas interests in 2011. The total towers over the $53 million spent by what the center classifies as the "miscellaneous energy" industry — which counts the Renewable Fuels Association, Growth Energy and the American Wind Energy Association as its members. The grouping includes 751 lobbyists.

Renewables unpopular with oil lobbies- they will relentlessly fight against renewables Buis, Growth Energy CEO, 6-26-13 [Tom, 6-26-13, Ethanol Producer, “Big Oil Talks Out of Both Sides of Mouth,” http://ethanolproducer.com/articles/9992/big-oil-talks-out-of-both-sides-of-mouth, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] As a matter of fact, Big Oil has erected every possible barrier to prevent higher blends, such as E15, from entering the commercial marketplace, protecting their market share and record profits at the expense of the free market and consumer choice. They have launched an aggressive and endless public relations campaign designed to deceive and distort the truth about the true benefits of renewables. They have also taken their challenges to the courts. Big Oil’s deep pockets are funding a relentless campaign to lobby Congress to repeal the renewable fuel standard (RFS). Oil companies have made it clear they will do whatever it takes to maintain their stranglehold on the liquid fuels market.

Oil lobbies spend extensive capital in Congress to crush renewables Leber, ThinkProgress, Reporter, 12 [Rebecca Leber ,University of Rochester, B.A. in political science, 10-24-12, Thinkprogress, “Three Ways Big Oil Spends Its Profits To Defend Oil Subsidies And Defeat Clean Energy”, http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/10/24/1064231/three-ways-big-oil-spends-its-profits-to-defend-oilsubsidies-and-defeat-clean-energy/, accessed 7-10-13 AMS] Starting tomorrow, the world’s largest oil companies — ExxonMobil, Shell, Chevron, BP, and ConocoPhillips — will begin to announce their third-quarter profits for 2012. In the first half of 2012, these companies — all ranked in the top 10 of Fortune 500 Global — earned over $60 billion. The oil industry reinvests tens of millions of these dollars for political purposes, including nearly all political contributions to Republicans, lobbying, and campaign ads. Through its enormous spending,

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 52 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core these five and other Big Oil companies have fought to maintain $4 billion of their annual subsidies, while seeking to undermine clean energy investments: $105 Million On Lobbying Since 2011, 90 Percent Of Campaign Contributions To GOP: The big five companies have spent over $105 million on lobbying Congress since 2011, according to lobbying disclosures through the third quarter. The biggest spenders were Shell ($25.7 million), Exxon ($25.4 million), and ConocoPhillips ($22.9 million). The five companies’ oil PACs have donated over $2.16 million to mostly Republican candidates this election cycle. Koch Industries also spends big money to pressure Congress, with $16.2 million on lobbying and more than $1.3 million from its PAC (the top oil and gas spender). In total, the oil and gas industry sends 90 percent of its near $50 million in contributions to Republicans, far eclipsing their record spending in 2008. Misinformation Campaigns, Including Over $150 Million In Election Ads: Over $150 million has been spent on TV ads promoting fossil fuel interests, particularly oil and coal, reports the New York Times. In addition to traditional campaign donations, the oil industry has turned to outside groups running attack ads. Earlier this year, Americans For Prosperity — founded and funded by the Koch brothers — launched a bogus ad claiming that clean energy stimulus dollars went overseas. And the oil lobby American Petroleum Institute has its own campaign promoting myths about oil production and gas prices. For example, API chief Jack Gerard, rumored to be on Mitt Romney’s shortlist for a White House or agency appointment, claimed that oil production on federal land is down. This is simply not true, since oil production is up 240 million barrels on federal lands and waters under President Obama compared to the Bush administration. And oil companies hold 20 million acres of federal oil, gas leases in Gulf of Mexico that remain unexplored or undeveloped. This is just one of the many myths Big Oil has pushed this campaign cycle. Behind-The-Scenes Campaign To Defeat Clean Energy: Koch Industries and fossil fuel groups are mobilizing to defeat the extension of modest tax incentives for wind energy, even though oil tax breaks are permanent. The American Energy Alliance, which has Koch ties, aims to make the credit “so toxic” for Republicans it would be “impossible for John Boehner to sit at a table with Harry Reid.” The Koch-funded Americans For Prosperity is also campaigning against wind energy. Meanwhile, the industry has argued its own century-old tax breaks are necessary to maintain, despite years of recordbreaking profits. Overall, these efforts to keep their tax breaks while weakening public health safeguards from pollution have paid off in Congress and for Republican candidates. The House of Representatives is the most anti-environment in Congressional history, averaging at least one anti-environment vote per day to eliminate or undermine pollution protections, many benefiting Big Oil. And the Romney/Ryan budget plan would give the big five oil companies another $2.3 billion annual tax cut beyond existing loopholes.

Massive attacks against renewables from oil lobbies, block the necessary shift in energy policy Doering, Gannett Washington Bureau, 12 [Christopher Doering, 7-02-12, USA Today, “Renewable advocates battle oil industry over energy policy”, http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/story/2012-07-02/renewable-fuels-oilcongress/55987052/1, accessed 7-10-13 AMS] Big oil and natural gas companies may vastly outspend and outman the renewable fuels industry on Capitol Hill but the general gridlock in Washington gives advocates of wind, ethanol and other new-age sources the upper hand in the growing battle to overhaul the country's energy policy. "This Congress…seems unable to make a national energy policy," said Bruce Babcock, an Iowa State University economist. "The renewable fuels have an advantage in that they are part of current law, and it's always easier to maintain current law than it is to change it."

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 53 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Among the factors making a major shift of U.S. energy policy difficult are the upcoming elections, the inability of lawmakers to reach a consensus on how to change it, and the high costs necessary to expand access to fuels such as natural gas for consumers at U.S. filling stations. That hasn't stopped the oil industry from aggressively wooing Congressional lawmakers on hotbutton issues, including lobbying against renewable fuels. Last year alone ConocoPhillips, Royal Dutch Shell, Exxon Mobil, Chevron and the American Petroleum Institute, the trade group that represents these energy giants, used $66.2 million for lobbying efforts, nearly 44% of the $150 million total spent by the oil and gas industry, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics. Collectively, nearly 800 lobbyists worked on behalf of oil and gas interests in 2011. The total towers over the $53 million spent by what the center classifies as the "miscellaneous energy" industry — which counts the Renewable Fuels Association, Growth Energy and the American Wind Energy Association as its members. The grouping includes 751 lobbyists. Despite the huge financial disadvantage, renewable fuels groups remain unconvinced that the public relations push by the deep pockets of the fossil fuel industry will be enough to get lawmakers in Washington to act. "I think what you're seeing out here over the past couple of years is the oil industry has tried to runup the negatives on any type of renewable energy," said Tom Buis, head of Growth Energy, which represents ethanol producers. "They've pushed real hard on the political front and certainly on the advocacy front." "We do not consider the renewable fuels industry as a threat at all." said Carlton Carroll, a spokesman with API, who touted his industry's investments in renewable fuels such as wind and solar. "We need all forms of energy going forward, including renewables." Any action by Congress to end or alter a 2007 mandate that established a threshold for biofuels use in transportation fuel, or allowing existing subsidies for wind to expire at the end of this year, would threaten to hobble the industry and batter states such as Iowa that have thousands of jobs and millions of dollars invested in the sector. This year alone the standard mandates the use of 13.2 billion gallons of alternative fuels, with most of it coming from corn. The Environmental Protection Agency recently gave final approval to sell fuel containing a 15% ethanol blend in newer vehicles, up from the current 10% level, which could help boost demand for the corn-based additive. A major threat to renewable energy remains the surge in natural gas production in the United States that has resulted in record low natural gas prices. The glut has spurred businesses and power plants to turn to the fuel as part of their own efforts to cut costs. In addition to creating a new threat to renewable fuels, all the new oil and natural gas production further highlights the geographical and political boundaries between grain-dependent biofuel states in the Midwest versus the fossil fuel juggernaut of Texas. "You always have geographic concerns. Texas is a big oil state," said Buis. "I don't think we're going to win over too many people in that state but if you look at the policy, Congress hasn't changed the policy and I don't think they will."

Oil Lobby groups will fight with renewables programs and the EPA Shauk, Houston Chronicle, 12 [Zain, 7-25-12, Fuel Fix, “Oil Lobby Chalanges Renewable Fuel Mandate”, http://fuelfix.com/blog/2012/07/25/oil-lobby-group-challenges-renewable-fuel-mandate/, accessed 7-1013, HG] The American Petroleum Institute filed a lawsuit Tuesday claiming the government is requiring refiners and gasoline importers to purchase renewable fuels that don’t exist.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 54 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core The lawsuit, which was filed in a federal court in Washington, argued that the Environmental Protection Agency’s mandates are unreasonable, according to the API, an energy industry trade and lobbying group. “EPA’s unattainable and absurd mandate forces refiners to pay a penalty for failing to use biofuels that don’t even exist,” Bob Greco, the API’s director of downstream and industry operations, said in a statement. The EPA did not immediately respond to inquiries about the disputed renewable – cellulosic biofuel — ethanol fermented from products other than corn, which is the main source of U.S. biofuel now. The agency has said that wood chips, wood residue, grasses, agricultural residue, animal waste and municipal solid wastes can also be used to produce cellulosic biofuels. In 2012, the EPA will require gasoline producers and importers to displace 0.006 percent of their total gasoline production with the purchase of cellulosic biofuels. As is the case with other EPA-supported biofuel incentive programs, biofuel makers can sell a credit to gasoline producers for each gallon of biofuel they make. But no credits have been generated for cellulosic biofuels this year, or ever, according to the EPA’s website. In the absence of credits, the EPA will allow gasoline producers to purchase cellulosic biofuel waivers at a cost of 78 cents a gallon to meet obligations at the end of the year. Oil and gas lobbyists are arguing that the incentive program will require refiners and importers to pay for 6.6 million gallons of the “nonexistent biofuel.” The agency has mandated cellulosic biofuel credit purchases since 2010, but no credits were available, so companies were required to buy waiver credits from the government. In total, the credits have cost the industry about $14 million over two years, Greco said in a telephone interview. “That’s, in effect, a tax,” Greco said. “We’re having to pay for a fuel that doesn’t exist when the EPA could have adjusted the mandate to reflect that reality.” The API filed a petition with the agency last year, asking the EPA to reconsider the 2012 mandates because of the limited availability of cellulosic biofuels. The agency has stuck with the mandate, with the intent of creating an incentive for more production of the fuel. “API supports a realistic and workable (Renewable Fuel Standard) and continues to recommend that EPA base its prediction on at least two months of actual cellulosic biofuel production in the current year when establishing the mandated volumes for the following year,” the lobbying group said in a statement. “This approach would provide a more realistic assessment of potential future production rather than simply relying on the assertions of companies whose ability to produce the cellulosic biofuel volumes EPA hopes for is questionable.”

Oil lobbies are fighting against renewables SustainableBusiness.com, 4.18.13 [“Big Oil Prefers to Crush Renewables Rather Than Invest in Them:, http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/24788, accessed: 7/10/13, ML] BP dropped its long-standing solar and wind divisions, Shell focuses on how wind energy can assist fossil fuel extraction, and Exxon and Chevron have pulled back from biofuels. And with the help of ALEC, the oil industry is attempting to eliminate the US Renewable Fuel Standard and prevent California and the Northeast from implementing local standards. Why? Because big oil has discovered that since they make much bigger money by sticking with their core business, why bother branching out? Instead, it's much easier to crush competing forms of energy. In 2007, when Chevron was exploring biofuels, it helped California Governor Schwarzenegger write the first-in-the-nation Low Carbon Standard, that by 2020 will cut greenhouse gases from cars and trucks by

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 55 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core 10% below 2010 levels. It was passed in 2011 and the state is on track to meet the goal. Transportation fuels account for 36% of California's emissions. Now, the company is leading the charge against it because "it is not achievable." Why? Because they can only get 5% returns on biofuels when they get triple that from oil, reports Bloomberg. In the US, transportation fuels are a $500 billion market. "The best outcome for the oil companies is if nothing changes," Paul Bryan, former vice president of biofuels for Chevron, told Bloomberg. "You can make money today making advanced biofuels - you just won't make as much money as the oil companies would like." He left Chevron in 2010 after working there for 15 years. They have since wound down those investments. ExxonMobil Corp., which splashed television ads for years touting their foray into algae-based fuels, has largely retreated from those efforts. While the companies accept the science of climate change and its causes, they say California's law must be stopped because substitute technologies are too far down the road and until then, the result will be much higher gas prices and loss of jobs (since when are they concerned about this?). Several organizations funded by the oil lobby are working against low carbon fuel standards. Fueling California spent over $327,000 in the last two years lobbying against them and the Consumer Energy Alliance runs campaigns instilling fear of losing hundreds of thousands of jobs from these mandates. That resulted in a New Hampshire law passed last year that prohibits participation in the proposed Northeast Clean Fuel Standard without legislative approval, reports Bloomberg. ALEC is urging other states to adopt that same law because it doesn't want the government to "dictate" peoples' choice of fuels. From 2009-2010, when federal climate legislation almost passed, big oil spent half a billion dollars lobbying against it. Nine of the 10 top scientists that produce research questioning climate change are linked to ExxonMobil.

Renewables unpopular with oil lobbies – past court cases prove Shauk, Houston Chronicle, 1/15/13 [Zain, 1-15-13, Houston Chronicle, “Oil Industry Lobby Targets Mandate for Renewable Fuel”, http://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/Oil-industry-lobby-targets-mandate-for-renewable4196897.php, accessed 7-10-13, HG] On the same day an appeals court threw out a challenge to one of the federal requirements for renewable fuels in the nation's fuel supply, a top oil industry lobbying group launched an aggressive push to scrap the entire mandate. The American Petroleum Institute on Tuesday unveiled a new line of TV, radio and newspaper advertisements designed to highlight the value of U.S. refineries. The ads feature the same black-suited woman who appears in the organization's long-running Energy Tomorrow campaign. One shows her in front of scurrying workers and cars speeding along the highway, as she outlines what it takes "to make America run" including "lots of hard-working Americans creating the fuels for nearly 250 million vehicles." The industry wants to get rid of an 8-year-old rule that forces refiners to blend steadily increasing amounts of ethanol and other alternatives into the nation's transportation fuel supply. By 2022, the mandate will require 36 billion gallons, up from 13.2 billion gallons last year. On Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld a lower court's decision throwing out a challenge to a portion of the mandate by plaintiffs including oil and food industry trade groups.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 56 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core They opposed the Environmental Protection Agency's approval of gasoline blends containing up to 15 percent ethanol, questioning the blend's reliability for use in vehicles and arguing that because most U.S. ethanol is made from corn, ethanol production drives up food prices. The courts held that the plaintiffs failed to detail how they were harmed by the rule. The renewable fuel rule also requires refiners to use cellulosic ethanol made from switchgrass and other non-edible plant materials, but that fuel has not been mass-produced. American Petroleum Institute President Jack Gerard ridiculed that rule at an event last week, saying it lets regulators penalize the industry "because we don't use a fuel that doesn't exist." But Bob Dinneen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association, said that the federal fuel standard is "stimulating investment in next-generation ethanol." He suggested the oil industry's opposition is driven by competitive fear. Patrick Kelly, the American Petroleum Institute's downstream refining manager, told reporters on Tuesday that even without a renewable fuel requirement, the nation's transportation fuels generally would continue to contain about 10 percent ethanol.

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Popular – GOP Majority of Republicans support renewables – Studies prove Hower, Sustainable Brands, Associate Editor, 4-4-13 [Mike Hower, Triple Pundit, Contributor, 4-04-13, Triple Pundit, “Ending the Debate: Most Republicans Actually Support Increased Renewable Energy Use”, http://www.triplepundit.com/2013/04/breakingdebate-republicans-actually-support-increased-renewable-energy/, accessed, 7-07-13 AMS] Apparently, the debate over global warming is not as big as the hard-liners at Fox News and on Capitol Hill would lead us to believe. A recent study released by Yale and George Mason University found that nearly 80 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents support increasing renewable energy use and more than 60 percent believe the United States should take action to address climate change. Interestingly, the report also found that only a third of Republican respondents agree with the GOP’s position on climate change, which has changed dramatically since 2008.

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Biomedical Research

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Unpopular - GOP Increased spending on biomedicine is politically unpopular—low success rate and sequestration cuts prove Science Insider 5/21/13 (Jocelyn Kaiser, 5/21/13, Science Insider, “Sequester's 5% Cut Rolls Through Biomedical Labs,” http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2013/05/sequesters-5-cut-rolls-through-b.html, Accessed 7/11/13, JC) Given that sequestration lopped off a staggering $1.55 billion from the National Institutes of Health's (NIH's) budget this year, it shouldn't be hard to find examples of how the cut is harming research labs. Although sequestration "has already dealt a devastating blow," said NIH Director Francis Collins at a Senate hearing last week, it turns out it's not that easy to spell out the damage. One reason is that many grantees won't receive good or bad news about their proposals until later in the fiscal year that ends 30 September. Even then, the effects will be part of a larger pattern of declining funding over the past decade, NIH watchers say. "People are feeling a lot of pain, but to actually put it on sequestration versus other pressures on the budget, we're only guessing," says Howard Garrison, deputy executive director for policy at the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology. At the individual level, "it's hard to say what the actual source is." NIH is losing $1.7 billion this year from sequestration and other cuts, lowering its budget to $29.15 billion. New and competing grants are going down by 703, from 8986. As a result, the NIH grant success rate (the portion of reviewed grants that received funding) may drop from an already recordlow 18% in 2012 to 16%, according to Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), chair of the Senate spending subcommittee that discussed NIH's 2014 budget request last week.

Obama faces an uphill battle on biomedical spending—fiscally conservative Republicans Coalition for Life Sciences 9 (CLS, 2009, “A New Year, a New Congress—What This Means for the Biomedical Research Community,” http://www.coalitionforlifesciences.org/be-an-advocate/legislative-alerts/129-a-new-year-anew-congresswhat-this-means-for-the-biomedical-research-community, Accessed 7/11/13, JC) A session of Congress always brings changes and new experiences. In Washington, we are gearing up to face a new, more fiscally conservative Congress. Many of the newly elected Republicans were elected by campaigning for smaller government small and lower federal spending. The new Republican majority in the House is reinvigorated and ready to make a real impact on the way Washington operates. One proposal being discussed is to cut the budgets of federal agencies to 2008 levels. If this were enacted, the appropriation for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) would be 6.4% lower than FY2010 final levels and the National Science Foundation (NSF) budget would be 13% lower. These cuts could devastate the research community. Since the end of the doubling of the NIH budget in 2003, funding for biomedical research has been erratic—resulting in a real decline in the amount of funding that is available to support medical breakthroughs and a new generation of scientists. The research community has a strong supporter in the White House. In a press conference on November 3, the day after the election, President Barack Obama said he was opposed to cuts in research and development. This is a sign that the White House is likely to oppose such draconian actions by Republicans. "I don't think we should be cutting back on research and development, because if we can

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 60 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core develop new technologies in areas like clean energy, that could make all the difference in terms of job creation here at home," President Obama said.

Republicans hate the plan Coalition for Life Sciences, 12 [Coalition for life sciences, “A New Year, a New Congress—What This Means for the Biomedical Research Community”, http://www.coalitionforlifesciences.org/be-an-advocate/legislative-alerts/129-anew-year-a-new-congresswhat-this-means-for-the-biomedical-research-community, accessed: 7/10/13, ML] A session of Congress always brings changes and new experiences. In Washington, we are gearing up to face a new, more fiscally conservative Congress. Many of the newly elected Republicans were elected by campaigning for smaller government small and lower federal spending. The new Republican majority in the House is reinvigorated and ready to make a real impact on the way Washington operates. One proposal being discussed is to cut the budgets of federal agencies to 2008 levels. If this were enacted, the appropriation for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) would be 6.4% lower than FY2010 final levels and the National Science Foundation (NSF) budget would be 13% lower. These cuts could devastate the research community. Since the end of the doubling of the NIH budget in 2003, funding for biomedical research has been erratic—resulting in a real decline in the amount of funding that is available to support medical breakthroughs and a new generation of scientists. The research community has a strong supporter in the White House. In a press conference on November 3, the day after the election, President Barack Obama said he was opposed to cuts in research and development. This is a sign that the White House is likely to oppose such draconian actions by Republicans. "I don't think we should be cutting back on research and development, because if we can develop new technologies in areas like clean energy, that could make all the difference in terms of job creation here at home," President Obama said. We will be monitoring the new political climate and will let you know when action is required to protect the funding of the Federal agencies that fund research in biology and medicine. It would be helpful at any time to let your elected officials know that you and your colleagues depend on Federal funds to support life science research and jobs in your region.

Prominent Republicans fight biomedical research Baily, award-winning science correspondent for Reason magazine , 12 [Ronald, January, “Who’s Reason.com, More Anti-Science: Republicans or Democrats?”, http://reason.com/archives/2011/12/27/whos-more-anti-science-republicans-or-de, accessed: 7/11/13, ML] Berezow acknowledged that many prominent Republican politicians, including several presidential candidates, deny biological evolution, are skeptical of the scientific consensus on man-made global warming, and oppose research using human embryonic stem cells. Democrats, Berezow argued, tend to be more anti-vaccine, anti-nuclear power, anti-biotechnology, and anti-biomedical research involving tests on animals. In support of these claims Berezow cited polling data from a 2008 survey conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, which identified a number of partisan divides on scientific questions. On biological evolution, the survey reported that 97 percent of scientists agree that living things, including human beings, evolved over time, compared to 58 percent of Democrats and 49 percent of Republicans.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 61 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core On climate change, the Pew survey reported that 84 percent of scientists believe that recent warming is the result of human activity, compared to 64 percent of Democrats and only 30 percent of Republicans. That’s a truly deep divide on a scientific issue. The Pew survey next asked about federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research, which Democrats favored by 71 percent compared to only 38 percent for Republicans. But the GOP response is likely tied to two issues: (1) the belief that embryos have the same moral status as adult people; and (2) the general belief that spending taxpayer dollars on research is suboptimal. These are policy differences rather than scientific differences. But what about Berezow’s examples of left-wing bias? Mooney’s basic assertion is that Democratic antiscience is a fringe with no power, unlike the know-nothing Tea Party activists who influence Republican politics. For example, Mooney argues that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals “is not a liberal group commanding wide assent for its views on the left, doesn’t drive mainstream Democratic policy, etc.” Fair enough. But the Pew survey does report that 48 percent of Democrats oppose using animals in scientific research, whereas only 33 percent of Republicans do. Like stem cells, using animals in research is often framed as a moral issue. With regard to nukes, the Pew survey found that 70 percent of scientists are in favor of building more nuclear power plants, compared to 62 percent of Republicans and just 45 percent of Democrats. This difference reflects divergent views on nuclear safety: A 2009 Gallup poll reported that while 73 percent of Republicans are confident in the safety of nuclear power plants, only 46 percent of Democrats agree. What about partisan attitudes toward genetically enhanced crops and animals? A 2006 survey by the Pew Trusts found that 48 percent of Republicans believe that biotech foods are safe compared to 42 percent of Democrats. Are they right to be leery? A 2004 National Academy of Sciences report noted: “To date, no adverse health effects attributed to genetic engineering have been documented in the human population.” That is still the case today.

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Cuba Links

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Embargo Links

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Political Capital – Congress Plan saps Obama’s capital Birns & Mills, Council on Hemispheric Affairs director and senior research fellow, 1/30/13 (Larry and Frederick B., Council on Hemispheric Affairs, “Best Time for U.S.– Cuba Rapprochement Is Now,” http://www.coha.org/best-time-for-u-s-cuba-rapprochement-is-now/, Accessed 7/9/13) Despite the basic intransigence of US policy towards Cuba, in recent years, important changes have been introduced by Havana: state control over the economy has been diminished; most travel restrictions affecting both Americans and Cubans on the island have been lifted; and the “group of 75” Cuban dissidents detained in 2003 have been freed. Washington has all but ignored these positive changes by Havana, but when it comes to interacting with old foes such as those of Myanmar, North Korea, and Somalia, somehow constructive dialogue is the order of the day. One reason for this inconsistency is the continued opposition by the anti-Castro lobby to a change of course by Washington. The antiCastro lobby and their allies in the US Congress argue that the reforms coming out of Havana are too little too late and that political repression continues unabated. They continue to see the embargo as a tool for coercing either more dramatic reforms or regime change. It is true that the reformist tendency in Cuba does not include a qualitative move from a one party system to political pluralism. Lamentably, Cuba reportedly continues to use temporary detentions and the occasional jailing of nonviolent dissidents to limit the parameters of political debate and total freedom of association. The authors agree that no non-violent Cuban dissident should be intimidated, detained or jailed. But continuing to maliciously turn the screws on Havana has never provided an incentive for more democracy in any sense of the word nor has it created a political opening into which Cuba, with confidence, could enter. The easing of tensions between Washington and Havana is more likely to contribute to the evolution of a more democratic form of socialism on the island, the early stages of which we may presently be witnessing. In any case the precise form of such change inevitably should and will be decided in Cuba, not in Washington or Miami. To further moves towards rapprochement with Cuba, the U.S. State Department should remove the country from the list of state sponsors of terrorism. It is an invention to depict Havana as a state sponsor of terrorism, a charge only levied by the State Department under pressure from Hill hardliners. As researcher Kevin Edmunds, quite properly points out: “This position is highly problematic, as the United States has actively engaged in over 50 years of economic and covert destabilization in Cuba, going so far as blindly protecting wanted terrorists such as Luis Posada Carilles and Orlando Bosch, both former CIA agents accused of dozens of terrorist attacks in Cuba and the United States ” (Nov. 15, 2012, Kevin Edmonds blog). It was precisely the propensity of some anti-Castro extremists to plan terrorist attacks against Cuba that urgently motivated the infiltration of such groups by the Cuban five as well as the close monitoring of these organizations by the FBI. Another gesture of good will would be for the White House to grant clemency to the Cuban five: Gerardo Hernandez, Ramón Labañino, Fernando Gonzalez, Antonio Guerrero and René Gonzalez. They are Cuban nationals who were convicted in a Miami court in 2001 and subsequently sentenced to terms ranging from 15 years to double life, mostly on charges of conspiracy to commit espionage. Despite requests for a change of venue out of Miami, which at first was granted and later denied, the trial took place in a politically charged Miami atmosphere that arguably tainted the proceedings and compromised justice. Supporters maintain that the Cuban five had infiltrated extremist anti-Castro organizations in order to prevent terrorist attacks against Cuba and did not pose any security threat to the United States. It would be an important humanitarian gesture to let them go home. Perhaps such a gesture might facilitate reciprocity on the part of Cuban authorities when it comes to American engineer Alan Gross who is presently being detained in a Cuban jail. There would probably

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 65 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core be a political price to pay by the Obama administration for taking steps towards reconciliation with Havana, but if Obama’s election to a second term means that there is to be a progressive dividend, surely such a dividend ought to include a change in US policy towards the island. Mirabile dictu, the Administration can build on the small steps it has already taken. Since 2009, Washington has lifted some of the restrictions on travel between the US and Cuba and now allows Cuban Americans to send remittances to relatives on the island. The Cuba Reconciliation Act (HR 214) introduced by Representative Jose Serrano (D-NY) on January 4, 2013, and sitting in a number of congressional committees, would repeal the harsh terms of the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 and the Helms-Burton Act of 1996, both of which toughened the embargo during the special period in Cuba. The Cuba Reconciliation Act, however, is unlikely to get much traction, especially with ultra-hardliner Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), chairing the House Foreign Relations Committee, and her counterpart, Robert Menendez (D-NJ), who is about to lead the Senate Foreign Relations Body. Some of the anti-Castro Cuban American community would likely view any of the three measures advocated here as a capitulation to the Castro brothers. But as we have argued, a pro-democracy and humanist position is not in any way undermined, but might in fact be advanced by détente. An end to the embargo has been long overdue, and the judgment of history may very well be that it ought never to have been started.

Plan guarantees congressional backlash Hanson, Council on Foreign Relations associate director, and Lee, CFR senior production editor, 1/31/13 (Stephanie, coordinating editor at CFR, Brianna, Council on Foreign Relations, “U.S.-Cuba Relations,” http://www.cfr.org/cuba/us-cuba-relations/p11113, Accessed 7/9/13) Many recent policy reports have recommended that the United States take some unilateral steps to roll back sanctions on Cuba. The removal of sanctions, however, would be just one step in the process of normalizing relations. Such a process is sure to be controversial , as indicated by the heated congressional debate spurred in March 2009 by attempts to ease travel and trade restrictions in a large appropriations bill. "Whatever we call it--normalization, détente, rapproachement-- it is clear that the policy process risks falling victim to the politics of the issue," says Sweig.

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Political Capital – Cuba Lobby Cuba lobby will block passage - whether or not the embargo is good doesn’t matter Jilani, former Communications and Outreach Coordinator for United Republic, 12 [Zaid, 4/10/12, Republic Reporter, “It’s Not Just Ozzie Guillen: How The Cuba Lobby Paralyzes U.S. Policy”, http://www.republicreport.org/2012/ozzie-guillen-cuba-lobby-paralyzes-us-policy/, accessed: 7/4/13, ML] Informally referred to by leading writers as the “Cuba Lobby,” this tight-knit group of Political Action Committees (PACs), social organizations, and the lawmakers allied to them have successfully maintained a failed diplomatic freeze, travel ban, and embargo between the United States and Cuba for decades. By exerting its influence, this lobby forces Washington politicians to ignore American public opinion at large. A 2009 Gallup Poll found that 60 percent of Americans favor restoring full diplomatic relations with Cuba, and a majority of Americans wanted to see an end to the embargo as well. Figures and political groups with as varying politics as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Pope, and former president Jimmy Carter have all called for ending the unilateral sanctions. The powerful Cuba lobby, based in the crucial political swing state of Florida, exerts its influence largely through being a powerful political spender. The U.S.-Cuba Democracy PAC, for example PAC spent a million dollars in 2008, and has already spent a quarter of a million dollars during this election cycle. In 2008 and 2010, the majority of the PAC’s funds went to Democrats, but during the 2012 cycle the organization is spending more heavily in favor of Republicans. It’s treasurer is Gus Machado, a Floridan wealthy auto dealer who regularly raises millions of dollars for charities in the area. At a fancy gala in 2010, the organization brought together leading congressional Democrats and Republicans to support the US-Cuba embargo. “When it comes to the topic of Cuba, first comes Cuba and then comes the party,” said Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ), a leading embargo proponent, at the event. The PAC is the largest foreign policy-related PAC spender according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Cuba lobby is powerful – no one will support LeoGrande, professor in the department of government at American University, 13 [William, 4/11/13, Foreign Policy, “The Cuba Lobby”, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/11/the_cuba_lobby_jay_z?page=0,1&wp_login_redirect= 0, accessed: 7/4/13, ML] When Obama was elected president, promising a "new beginning" in relations with Havana, the Cuba Lobby relied on its congressional wing to stop him. Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), the senior CubanAmerican Democrat in Congress and now chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, vehemently opposes any opening to Cuba. In March 2009, he signaled his willingness to defy both his president and his party to get his way. Menendez voted with Republicans to block passage of a $410 billion omnibus appropriations bill (needed to keep the government running) because it relaxed the requirement that Cuba pay in advance for food purchases from U.S. suppliers and eased restrictions on travel to the island. To get Menendez to relent, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner had to promise in writing that the administration would consult Menendez on any change in U.S. policy toward Cuba. Senate Republicans also blocked confirmation of Arturo Valenzuela as Obama's assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs until November 2009. With the bureau managed in the interim by Bush holdovers, no one was pushing from below to carry out Obama's new Cuba policy. After Valenzuela

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 67 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core stepped down in 2012, Senator Rubio (R-Fla.), whose father left Cuba in the 1950s, held up confirmation of Valenzuela's replacement, Roberta Jacobson, until the administration agreed to tighten restrictions on educational travel to Cuba, undercutting Obama's stated policy of increasing people-to-people engagement. When Obama nominated career Foreign Service officer Jonathan Farrar to be ambassador to Nicaragua, the Cuba Lobby denounced him as soft on communism. During his previous posting as chief of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Havana, Farrar had reported to Washington that Cuba's traditional dissident movement had very little appeal to ordinary Cubans. Menendez and Rubio teamed up to give Farrar a verbal beating during his confirmation hearing for carrying out Obama's policy of engaging the Cuban government rather than simply antagonizing it. When they blocked Farrar's confirmation, Obama withdrew the nomination, sending Farrar as ambassador to Panama instead. Their point made, Menendez and Rubio did not object. The Cuba Lobby's power to derail diplomatic careers is common knowledge among foreign-policy professionals. Throughout Obama's first term, midlevel State Department officials cooperated more closely and deferred more slavishly to congressional opponents of Obama's Cuba policy than to supporters like John Kerry, the new secretary of state who served at the time as Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman. When Senator Kerry tried to get the State Department and USAID to reform the Bush administration's democracy-promotion programs in 2010, he ran into more opposition from the bureaucracy than from Republicans. If Obama intends to finally keep the 2008 campaign promise to take a new direction in relations with Cuba, the job can't be left to foreign-policy bureaucrats, who are so terrified of the Cuba Lobby that they continue to believe, or pretend to believe, absurdities -- that Cubans are watching TV Martí, for instance, or that Cuba is a state sponsor of terrorism. Only a determined president and a tough secretary of state can drive a new policy through a bureaucratic wasteland so paralyzed by fear and inertia.

Blame avoidance is specifically true for the embargo LeoGrande, professor in the department of government at American University, 13 [William, 4/11/13, Foreign Policy, “The Cuba Lobby”, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/11/the_cuba_lobby_jay_z?page=0,1&wp_login_redirect= 0, accessed: 7/4/13, ML] In Miami, conservative Cuban-Americans have long presumed to be the sole authentic voice of the community, silencing dissent by threats and, occasionally, violence. In the 1970s, anti-Castro terrorist groups like Omega 7 and Alpha 66 set off dozens of bombs in Miami and assassinated two CubanAmericans who advocated dialogue with Castro. Reports by Human Rights Watch in the 1990s documented the climate of fear in Miami and the role that elements of the Cuba Lobby, including CANF, played in creating it. Today, moderate Cuban-Americans have managed to carve out greater space for political debate about U.S. relations with Cuba as attitudes in the community have changed -- a result of both the passing of the old exile generation of the 1960s and the arrival of new immigrants who want to maintain ties with family they left behind. But a network of right-wing radio stations and right-wing bloggers still routinely vilifies moderates by name, branding anyone who favors dialogue as a spy for Castro. The modus operandi is the same as the China Lobby's in the 1950s: One anti-Castro crusader makes dubious accusations of espionage, often based on guilt by association, which the others then repeat ad nauseam, citing one other as proof. Like the China Lobby before it, the Cuba Lobby has also struck fear into the heart of the foreignpolicy bureaucracy. The congressional wing of the Cuba Lobby, in concert with its friends in the executive branch, routinely punishes career civil servants who don't toe the line. One of the Cuba Lobby's early targets was John J. "Jay" Taylor, chief of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, who was

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 68 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core given an unsatisfactory annual evaluation report in 1988 by Republican stalwart Elliott Abrams, then assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs, because Taylor reported from Havana that the Cubans were serious about wanting to negotiate peace in southern Africa and Central America. "CANF had close contact with the Cuban desk, which soon turned notably unfriendly toward my reporting from post and it seemed toward me personally," Taylor recalled in an oral history interview. "Mas and the foundation soon assumed that I was too soft on Castro." The risks of crossing the Cuba Lobby were not lost on other foreign-policy professionals. In 1990, Taylor was in Washington to consult about the newly launched TV Martí, which the Cuban government was jamming so completely that Cubans on the island dubbed it, "la TV que no se ve" ("No-see TV"). But TV Martí's patrons in Washington blindly insisted that the vast majority of the Cuban population was watching the broadcasts. Taylor invited the U.S. Information Agency officials responsible for TV Martí to come to Cuba to see for themselves. "Silence prevailed around the table," he recalled. "I don't think anyone there really believed TV Martí signals were being received in Cuba. It was a Kafkaesque moment, a true Orwellian experience, to see a room full of grown, educated men and women so afraid for their jobs or their political positions that they could take part in such a charade." In 1993, the Cuba Lobby opposed the appointment of President Bill Clinton's first choice to be assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs, Mario Baeza, because he had once visited Cuba. According to Stone, fearful of the Cuba Lobby's political clout, Clinton dumped Baeza. Two years later, Clinton caved in to the Cuba Lobby's demand that he fire National Security Council official Morton Halperin, who was the architect of the successful 1995 migration accord with Cuba that created a safe, legal route for Cubans to emigrate to the United States. One chief of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Cuba told me he stopped sending sensitive cables to the State Department altogether because they so often leaked to Cuba Lobby supporters in Congress. Instead, the diplomat flew to Miami so he could report to the department by telephone. During George W. Bush's administration, the Cuba Lobby completely captured the State Department's Latin America bureau (renamed the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs). Bush's first assistant secretary was Otto Reich, a Cuban-American veteran of the Reagan administration and favorite of Miami hard-liners. Reich had run Reagan's "public diplomacy" operation demonizing opponents of the president's Central America policy as communist sympathizers. Reich hired as his deputy Dan Fisk, former staff assistant to Senator Helms and author of the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act. Reich was followed by Roger Noriega, another former Helms staffer, who explained that Bush's policy was aimed at destabilizing the Cuban regime: "We opted for change even if it meant chaos. The Cubans had had too much stability over decades.… Chaos was necessary in order to change reality." In 2002, Bush's undersecretary for arms control and international security, John Bolton, made the dubious charge that Cuba was developing biological weapons. When the national intelligence officer for Latin America, Fulton Armstrong, (along with other intelligence community analysts) objected to this mischaracterization of the community's assessment, Bolton and Reich tried repeatedly to have him fired. The Cuba Lobby began a steady drumbeat of charges that Armstrong was a Cuban agent because his and the community's analysis disputed the Bush team's insistence that the Castro regime was fragile and wouldn't survive the passing of its founder. The 2001 arrest for espionage of the Defense Intelligence Agency's top Cuba analyst, Ana Montes, heightened the Cuba Lobby's hysteria over traitors in government in the same way that the spy cases of the 1950s -- Alger Hiss and the Amerasia magazine affair -- gave the China Lobby ammunition. Armstrong was subjected to repeated and intrusive security investigations, all of which cleared him of wrongdoing. (He completed a four-year term as national intelligence officer and received a prestigious CIA medal recognizing his service when he left the agency in 2008.)

Cuban-american lobby opposes and controls the embargo Chelala, UN international public health consultant, 12

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 69 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core [Cesar, Phd, 12/3/12, Japan Times, “The politics and insanity of the Cuba embargo”, http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2012/12/03/commentary/the-politics-and-insanity-of-the-cubaembargo/#.UdaEx222YUV, accessed: 7/4/13, ML] As you know, relations among nations many times have a psychological connection, aside from their obvious historical one. Because of that, relations among or between nations can contribute to the creation either of a climate of antagonism and war or of cooperation and peace. Nowhere is this truer than in the relationship between the United States and Cuba. Mainly because of internal political considerations, both countries have chosen the path of antagonism. While the influence of the Cuban lobby in Florida dictates U.S. policy toward the island country, keeping alive the antagonism with the U.S. agglutinates the Cuban people’s support for the Castro brothers.

The Cuba Lobby has empirically been one of the most influential political groups in determining legislation and is vehemently opposed to relaxation of the embargo LeoGrande, Dean of the American University School of Public Affairs, 4-11-13 [William, Professor of Government at the American University and specialist in Latin American politics and U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America, Former Staff Member of the Democratic Policy Committee of the United States Senate and the Democratic Caucus Task Force on Central America of the United States House of Representatives, Former Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow, Former Pew Faculty Fellow in International Affairs, Foreign Policy Magazine, “The Cuba Lobby,” http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/04/11/the_cuba_lobby_jay_z accessed 7-5-13 UR] Today, the political action arm of the Cuba Lobby is the U.S.-Cuba Democracy PAC, which hands out more campaign dollars than CANF’s political action arm did even at its height — more than $3 million since 1996. In Miami, conservative Cuban--Americans long have presumed to be the sole authentic voice of the community, silencing dissent by threats and, occasionally, violence. In the 1970s, anti-Castro terrorist groups such as Omega 7 and Alpha 66 set off dozens of bombs in Miami and assassinated two Cuban-Americans who advocated dialogue with Castro. Reports by Human Rights Watch in the 1990s documented the climate of fear in Miami and the role that elements of the Cuba Lobby, including CANF, played in creating it. Like the China Lobby, the Cuba Lobby has struck fear into the heart of the foreign-policy bureaucracy. The congressional wing of the Cuba Lobby, in concert with its friends in the executive branch, routinely punishes career civil servants who don’t toe the line. One of the Cuba Lobby’s early targets was John “Jay” Taylor, chief of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, who was given an unsatisfactory annual evaluation report in 1988 by Republican stalwart Elliott Abrams, then assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs, because Taylor reported from Havana that the Cubans were serious about wanting to negotiate peace in southern Africa and Central America. In 1993, the Cuba Lobby opposed the appointment of President Bill Clinton’s first choice to be assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs, Mario Baeza, because he once had visited Cuba. Clinton dumped Baeza. Two years later, Clinton caved in to the lobby’s demand that he fire National Security Council official Morton Halperin, who was the architect of the successful 1995 migration accord with Cuba that created a safe, legal route for Cubans to emigrate to the United States. One chief of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Cuba told me he stopped sending sensitive cables to the State Department altogether because they so often leaked to Cuba Lobby supporters in Congress. Instead, the diplomat flew to Miami so he could report to the department by telephone.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 70 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core During George W. Bush’s administration, the Cuba Lobby completely captured the State Department’s Latin America bureau (renamed the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs). Bush’s first assistant secretary was Otto Reich, a Cuban-American veteran of the Reagan administration and favorite of Miami hard-liners. Reich had run Reagan’s “public diplomacy” operation demonizing opponents of the president’s Central America policy as communist sympathizers. In 2002, Bush’s undersecretary for arms control and international security, John Bolton, made the dubious charge that Cuba was developing biological weapons. When the national intelligence officer for Latin America, Fulton Armstrong, (along with other intelligence community analysts) objected to this mischaracterization of the community’s assessment, Bolton and Reich tried repeatedly to have him fired. When Obama was elected president, promising a “new beginning” in relations with Havana, the Cuba Lobby relied on its congressional wing to stop him. Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., the senior CubanAmerican Democrat in Congress and now chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, vehemently opposes any opening to Cuba. In March 2009, he signaled his willingness to defy both his president and his party to get his way. Menendez voted with Republicans to block passage of a $410 billion omnibus appropriations bill, needed to keep the government running, because it relaxed the requirement that Cuba pay in advance for food purchases from U.S. suppliers and eased restrictions on travel to the island. To get Menendez to relent, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner had to promise in writing that the administration would consult Menendez on any change in U.S. policy toward Cuba. Senate Republicans also blocked confirmation of Arturo Valenzuela as Obama’s assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs until November 2009. With the bureau managed in the interim by Bush holdovers, no one was pushing from below to carry out Obama’s new Cuba policy. After Valenzuela stepped down in 2012, Sen. Rubio, R-Fla., whose father left Cuba in the 1950s, held up confirmation of Valenzuela’s replacement, Roberta Jacobson, until the administration agreed to tighten restrictions on educational travel to Cuba, undercutting Obama’s stated policy of increasing people-to-people engagement.

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Political Capital – GOP Plan ensures GOP leadership backlash Griswold, Cato Institute Center for Trade Policy Studies director, 5 (Daniel, 10/12/5, Cato Institute, “Four Decades of Failure: The U.S. Embargo against Cuba,” http://www.cato.org/publications/speeches/four-decades-failure-us-embargo-against-cuba, Accessed 7/9/13) For all those reasons, pressure has been building in Congress for a new policy toward Cuba. In the past five years, the House and occasionally the Senate have voted to lift the travel ban to Cuba, and also to lift the cap on remittances and even to lift the embargo altogether. Yet each time efforts in Congress to ease the embargo have been thwarted by the administration and the Republican leadership . Support for the embargo certainly does not come from the general American public, but from a group of Cuban-American activists concentrated in southern Florida. By a fluke of the electoral college, Republican presidents feel obligated to please this small special interest at the expense of our broader national interest.

Lift of the embargo is unpopular with Cuban-American Republicans and Democracy PAC Fitzgerald, Newsmax, 7/5/13 [Sandy, “Democracy Advocates Urge Obama to Keep Cuban Trade Ban,” Newsmax, http://www.newsmax.com/US/Cuba-embargo-democracy-Farinas/2013/07/05/id/513503 accessed 7/5/13 UR] The trade embargo on Cuba must stay to starve Havana's communist government of cash, prodemocracy activists have told the State Department. A steady flow of cash into Castro's government could help it crush the island's pro-democracy efforts, warned Cuban hunger striker Guillermo Farinas who met behind closed doors with Obama administration officials in Washington. The Obama administration has yet to comment about the meetings, which included one with Farinas at Foggy Bottom in late June, reports the Washington Times. The meetings were described as "extraordinary and very helpful by Mauricio Claver Carone, executive director of the U.S.-Cuba Democracy PAC in Washington. "[U.S. policymakers] now get to actually see it and feel it firsthand from the protagonists themselves,” he said. U.S. and Cuban officials in June held a landmark meeting to discuss re-establishing direct mail between the countries, and plan a July 17 meeting to talk about migration regulations. Castro, 82, who replaced his older brother, Fidel, has allowed some reforms since he took over in 2008, including easing travel bans. He plans to step down in 2018, when his second five-year term in office ends. The United States has been in a stalemate with Cuba since 1961, when the elder Castro agreed to allow the former Soviet Union to house ballistic weapons in Cuba. Even though Fidel Castro has not been in office for several years, Cuba is still on Washington's terrorism sponsors list. In addition, Cuba is still detaining American Alan Gross, who was arrested in 2009 while in Cuba working for an International Development-funded program. Cuban authorities sentenced Gross to 15 years in prison for illegally delivering satellite phones to Jewish Cubans.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 72 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core The Washington meetings suggest a thaw in the two countries' relationships, a change that some U.S. lawmakers — particularly Cuban-American Republicans — criticize. Florida GOP Rep. Ileana Ros-Lethinen said Thursday that she and other Cuban-American lawmakers met with the democracy advocates, and she remains skeptical about changes and believes the embargo needs to continue until "Cuba becomes a free and democratic society."

Plan is massively unpopular with Florida Rep. Ros-Lehtinen and Cuban-American Republicans – seen as a loss AP 6/19/13 [Associated Press, USA Today, “U.S., Cuba agree to resume immigration talks,” http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/06/19/cuba-immigration-talks/2439915/ accessed 7/4/13 UR] "Representatives from the Department of State are scheduled to meet with representatives of the Cuban government to discuss migration issues," the official said, adding that the talks were "consistent with our interest in promoting greater freedoms and respect for human rights in Cuba." Word of the jump-started talks sparked an angry reaction from Cuban-American Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, who blasted the Obama administration for what she saw as a policy of appeasement. "First we get news that the Obama State Department is speaking with a top Castro regime diplomat. Then comes the announcement that the administration is restarting talks with the dictatorship regarding direct mail between both countries," Ros-Lehtinen said. "Now we hear that migration talks will be restarted. It's concession after concession from the Obama administration."

Lifting the embargo is perceived as a concession by Rep. Ros-Lehtinen and Republican Cuban-Americans Taylor, The Washington Times, 6/18/13 [Gus, "U.S.-Cuba mail talks spark speculation of wider outreach,” http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jun/18/us-cuba-mail-talks-spark-speculation-wider-outreac/ accessed 7/4/13 UR] Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Florida Republican, said that the White House is caving to pressure from Cuban leaders desperate to end trade restrictions frozen since the 1960s. “The regime is once again manipulating the U.S. administration in this game because it wants us to lift the embargo and make further concessions,” said Mrs. Ros-Lehtinen, a former chairwoman of the House Foreign Relations Committee and a staunch opponent of easing the stand-off that has defined bilateral relations since Cuban leader Fidel Castro agreed to house Soviet ballistic missiles in 1961. Mr. Castro, 86, stepped down in 2008, and the top post is now held by his 82-year-old brother Raul. The State Department said Monday that the postal talks will occur well within policy boundaries set long ago by Congress. The talks will be led by R. Cabanas Rodriguez, the chief of mission at the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, and Lea Emerson, the U.S. Postal Service’s director of international postal affairs. Similar negotiations in 2009 failed to produce an agreement. Separate negotiations on issues such as immigration have been on hold during recent years amid tensions simmering between the U.S. and Cuba over the trade embargo and Washington’s unwillingness to remove Cuba from its official list of state sponsors of terrorism. Washington has also demanded that Cuba release jailed American subcontractor Alan Gross, who was arrested in December 2009 while working for a U.S. Agency for International Development-funded

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 73 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core program. Cuban authorities gave a 15-year prison sentence to Mr. Gross and accused him of illegally delivering satellite phones to individuals in the nation’s Jewish community. Mrs. Ros-Lehtinen alluded to the case in a statement Monday, asserting that “a U.S. citizen languishes unjustly in a Cuban prison and brave freedom Cuban activists are risking their lives while on hunger strikes to protest the island tyranny.”

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Political Capital – Cuban American Lawmakers Powerful opposition to the plan from Cuban-American lawmakers White, Center for International Policy senior fellow, 3/7/13 (Robert E., New York Times, “After Chávez, a Chance to Rethink Relations With Cuba,” http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/08/opinion/after-chavez-hope-for-good-neighbors-in-latinamerica.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0, Accessed 7/9/13) Throughout his career, the autocratic Mr. Chávez used our embargo as a wedge with which to antagonize the United States and alienate its supporters. His fuel helped prop up the rule of Mr. Castro and his brother Raúl, Cuba’s current president. The embargo no longer serves any useful purpose (if it ever did at all); President Obama should end it, though it would mean overcoming powerful opposition from Cuban-American lawmakers in Congress.

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Unpopular – Rubio Even slight relaxations of the embargo are massively unpopular with CubanAmerican senators Pecquet, The Hill, 12 [Julian, 6-7-12, “Cuban-American senators hit brick wall with Obama administration on Cuba policy,” http://thehill.com/blogs/global-affairs/americas/231487-cuban-american-senators-hit-a-brick-wall-withobama-administration-on-cuba-policy accessed 7-5-13 UR] The Senate's two Cuban-Americans spent Thursday morning talking past the Obama administration's top official for the Americas on the issue of U.S. policy toward Cuba. Sens. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) were the only two senators who showed up for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee subpanel hearing on freedom in Cuba. They called the administration's relaxing of travel restrictions to Cuba “naive” and bashed the State Department's decision to grant visas to high-profile Cuban officials, including President Raul Castro's daughter Mariela. “The Cuban people are no less deserving of America's support than the millions who were imprisoned and forgotten in Soviet gulags,” Menendez said. “I am compelled to ask again today — as I have before — why is there such an obvious double standard when it comes to Cuba?” Rubio said Castro government officials are master manipulators of U.S. policy and public opinion. The two senators favor a hard-line stance against Cuba until regime change takes place. Critics of that policy argue that more than 50 years of U.S. sanctions have only enabled Castro brothers Fidel and Raul to consolidate their power while impoverishing the Cuban people.

Rubio has been quoted opposing the plan ARMARIO, Associated Press Reporter, 12 [Christine, 12/9/12, “maintains standing with Cuban-Americans, Associated Press, lexis, Accessed: 7/5/13, ML] Another factor that could influence Cuba policy is the emergence of leaders such as Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a Cuban-American who has objected to Obama's Cuba travel expansion. Rubio has said he will not support lifting the embargo until the Castro brothers retired leader Fidel and current President Raul are gone, and Cuba releases all political prisoners and respects basic civil rights. "Every U.S.-Cuba policy decision should be guided by the simple test of whether it helps free political prisoners, stops the daily repression and paves the way for the people to express their will through free and fair elections," Rubio said.

Rubio doesn’t want the embargo removed – perception of poor human rights Senator Rubio, Republican-Florida, 10 [Marco, 5/5/10, Human Events, Interview with Marco Ruio, Lexis, accessed, 7/4/13, ML] HE: As a corollary to that, we're hearing all along about people abandoning Gov. Crist right now. Do you expect him to move to the left on key issues to try to get new support? Rubio: I thought he was already there on many of them. The bottom line is that, with all due respect, and hopefully this will change and he has time to change that, Gov. Crist's campaign has not been policybased. It's largely been personality-based and to some extent on personal attacks against me. He's spent

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 76 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core over a million dollars on personal attacks against me before switching races. I hope that we can have an opportunity to have an issues- and ideas-based debate. It's important. It's what our people want and deserve. I know the things that I stand for, whether that's limited government, free enterprise. These are things that have made America exceptional and the American people and people of Florida ought to see that reflected in this debate and in their next U.S. senator. I don't know what his ideas are going to be. It's going to be up to him to outline those I guess. HE: When we spoke a year ago, we discussed Cuba. When would you approve of lifting the economic embargo against Cuba? Rubio: When Cuba joins the rest of the civilized world in how it treats its people. That is freeing political prisoners, it means free and fair elections They can choose any form of government they like, but they have to have freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom of expression. The fundamental rights that we believe are endowed to every human being by our Creator. That's the kind of country that I'm interested in us having a relationship with. And the embargo serves as leverage for us to be able to accomplish that. You have, as we speak right now, a number of dissidents and hunger strikes in Cuba. And their brave wives are marching every Sunday. And they're being beaten, taunted, hassled and harassed. These are women. They're called the women in white. They're providing an extraordinary example of just how repressive this regime is and how it's on the wrong side of history. HE: So I take it you mean the recognition of the end of the embargo has to come with the end of the Castro brothers? Rubio: Not only the end of the Castro brothers, but also political reform in the return of political freedom to the people of Cuba. The embargo gives us leverage to negotiate that. Cuba trades with every other country in the world. The fact of the matter is that the U.S. embargo is not the reason their economy is failing. Their economy is failing because they've embraced a combination of socialism and incompetence, which may be an oxymoron because they're both the same thing. The point being that I would love for the United States to have a close economic relationship with a free Cuba. I think we're going to see that very soon, God willing.

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Rubio Key to the Agenda Rubio has major influence in Congress Allen, Politico Chief White House correspondent, & Vandehei, Politico co-founder, 12 [Mike and Jim, 12/4/12, Politico, “Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio’s makeovers”, http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/paul-ryan-and-marco-rubios-makeovers-84544.html, accessed: 7/4/13, ML] While Congress dawdled this summer, Rubio, 41, assigned his policy experts to figure out ways to help make the middle class wealthier — and add a dose of substance to the charismatic presidential hopeful’s résumé. Reaching out to academics and think tanks to build Rubio’s network, the senator and his staff developed a two-year reinvention project and an “upward mobility agenda,” including programs like early childhood education, school choice and incentives for entrepreneurs. Those are some of the proposals he’ll test-drive at the Kemp Foundation dinner, where he’ll receive the group’s second leadership award. The first winner: Paul Ryan. Rubio also plans new ideas on immigration, aimed not at broad citizenship but at creating a bigger Hispanic middle class. “The answer,” Rubio will say in his after-dinner remarks, “is not to make rich people poorer. The answer is to make poor people richer.” If he makes the sale in countless such appearances over the next two years, he’ll begin a formal presidential campaign shortly after the midterm elections of November 2014, Rubio sources tell us. Ryan, 42, will kick off his own drive to redefine the party — and himself — as the pre-dinner keynote speaker before 300-plus conservative faithful on the same stage, detailing his thinking on how people of all classes can rise up economically and improve socially. Top Republicans tell us Ryan tried to push his ideas for a more creative “war on poverty” during the presidential campaign but was muzzled by nervous Nellies at Mitt Romney’s Boston headquarters who didn’t see an immediate political payoff. So Ryan seethed when the “47 percent” tape emerged, convinced that the impact was worse because the campaign had no record on issues relating to inclusion or poverty, exacerbating the out-of-touch image that the hidden camera cemented. Republicans are eager for both men to perform an image makeover on a party dominated by older, straight, white men. Ironically, Romney’s double debacle of getting caught on tape lampooning the “47 percent” of voters who get government benefits, then blaming those “gift”-getters for his defeat, has created an enormous opening for Rubio, Ryan and other 2016 hopefuls. Suddenly, even Sean Hannity seems hungry for some change. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal — the new chairman of the Republican Governors Association and himself a possibility for 2016 — told us that the need for fresh policies is urgent. “The rich can defend themselves,” Jindal said. “It’s not about betraying our principles or becoming a second Democratic Party but, rather, showing how our principles work to help real families, and connecting that to the American dream.” By our count, upward of 20 Republicans are giving strong consideration to running for president to set the new GOP direction. Rubio and Ryan sit atop the list. But Jindal, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Jeb Bush have serious ambitions — and serious GOP cred. In the next year, though, no two men in American politics will get more attention, have more power and speak more prominently about the direction of the post-Romney GOP than Rubio and Ryan. Rubio is now the party’s biggest draw. And Ryan’s post as House Budget Committee chairman keeps him front and center in the fiscal fights dominating Congress. He is the policy pope for many, if not most, House Republicans.

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Rubio can influence Congress Business Insider, 13 [1/3/13, “The 36 Most Powerful People Of 2012”, lexis, accessed: 7/4/13, ML] Just two years into his first Senate term, Rubio has already made a name for himself as a rising star in the Republican Party. The 41-year-old Cuban-American Senator became one of the most prominent Republican voices during the 2012 campaign, garnering a lot of buzz as a possible VP pick for Romney. In the aftermath of the election, Rubio's influence has continued to grow as the GOP attempts to reshape its message to appeal to youth and Latino voters.

Rubio is key to influence immigration Darkow, Columbia Daily Tribune writer, 13 [Jan, 1/18/13, “Popular, GOP Plummetting, Congress Disdained”, Columbia Daily Tribune, lexis, accessed: 7/4/13, ML] *** On immigration reform: Attention Marco Rubio: Finally, our poll shows that for the first time a majority of Americans (52%) favor allowing illegal immigrants who hold jobs to apply for legal status in this country. That's the good news if you're a supporter of comprehensive immigration reform. But here's the bad news: There's a big difference by party. Democrats favor this by a 70%-28% margin. But independents oppose it 54%-43%, and Republicans oppose it 65%-33%. These numbers explain why Marco Rubio has spent so much time this week trying to sell his immigration plan to conservative media. To truly speed up the politics of immigration, it's going to take a conservative like Rubio to persuade other conservatives that this is the path forward.

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Link Magnifier/AT – Link Turns Link outweighs – embargo advocates have more influence than the plan’s supporters Karon, Time senior editor, 10 (Tony, 4/21/10, Time Magazine, “Do We Really Need an Embargo Against Cuba?” http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,48773,00.html, Accessed 7/9/13) And that has prompted a growing movement in the corridors of power to reconsider the policy. Once the preserve of dedicated liberals and lefties, opposition to the U.S. embargo on Cuba these days is an ever-expanding tent. The recent congressional effort to relax aspects of the embargo was led by farm-state Republicans and echoed a growing consensus even inside the GOP. The National Bipartisan Commission on Cuba, whose calls for a comprehensive review of U.S. policy have thus far been rebuffed by President Clinton, includes not only 16 GOP Senators (and eight Democrats), but also some of the GOP foreign policy heavyweights lined up by the Bush campaign, including former Secretaries of State Kissinger, Schultz and Eagleburger. And that's hardly surprising, since ending the embargo has long been advocated by groupings as diverse as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Vatican and, reportedly, the bulk of democracy activists still living in Cuba. While previous embargoes of countries such as Iran and Iraq have had the support of most of the industrialized world, the only country consistently backing Washington's Cuba policy is Israel. Yet, despite the burgeoning opposition, advocates of the embargo continue to hold sway with the leadership of both parties on Capitol Hill , and with both presidential candidates. Elian's enduiring legacy, however, may be that he reopened a national debate in the U.S. on the future of Cuba policy.

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Popular – Congress Relaxation of the Cuban embargo has bipartisan support in Congress Center for Diplomacy in the Americas 4-30-13 [“Members of Congress ask White House to expand Cuba travel policy,” http://www.democracyinamericas.org/blog-post/members-of-congress-ask-white-house-to-expand-cubatravel-policy/ accessed 7-5-13 UR] U.S. Representative Sam Farr (D-CA) today sent a letter signed by 59 Members of Congress to President Barack Obama, asking the Administration to expand its current policy for travel to Cuba. The letter encourages President Obama to allow all categories of permissible travel to Cuba, including people-to-people travel, to be carried out under a general license. “There are no better ambassadors for democratic ideals than the American people,” said Congressman Farr. “By including all forms of permissible travel under a general license, more Americans can engage in the kind of people-to-people diplomacy that can promote democratic change and advance human rights.” In 2009, President Obama announced Reaching Out to the Cuban People, a set of policy changes that fully restored the rights of Cuban-Americans to visit their families in Cuba and send them unlimited remittances. This has resulted in the reunification of thousands of families and has provided the capital for Cubans to take advantage of economic reforms in Cuba and start their own businesses. In 2011, President Obama took another important step by reauthorizing purposeful travel for all Americans, fostering meaningful people-to-people interaction between American and Cuban citizens. But these trips require a specific license granted to specialized travel service providers. Unfortunately, the licensing process has reportedly been expensive, slow, cumbersome, and arbitrary, causing delays and – in some cases cancellations- of trips that enable Americans to exercise their right to purposeful travel to Cuba. Earlier this year, Cuba removed the restrictions on most Cubans’ foreign travel, including travel to the United States, a move that the United States and many in the international community had been pushing for. The letter calls upon the President to use his executive authority to included people-to-people travel under a general license. “A pragmatic policy of citizen diplomacy can be a powerful catalyst for democratic development in Cuba,” said Farr. “This change is the next step in supporting a 21st century policy of engagement in US-Cuba relations.”

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Popular – GOP Republicans love the plan Vidal, On Two Shores author, 6/21/13 [William, On Two Shores (Cuba blog), “Conservatives respond to BeyJey trip by slamming the Cuba Embargo”, http://ontwoshores.com/?p=2149, accessed: 7/5/13, ML] A welcome highlight of the controversy over BeyJay’s trip to Cuba has been watching media conservatives rail against the US embargo on Cuba like never before. Geraldo Rivera of FOX News wrote an op-ed calling out the absurdity the travel ban: Cuba is not Iran. It is 90 miles away, and its 11 million are related to our million and more. I’m sure most were as pleased to see Beyoncé and Jay-Z go to Cuba as they were to see the Cuban people. Tourism is not terrorism. It is the beginning of freedom. Rivera later schooled the gang over at Fox & Friends on how to make friends and influence the Cuban people: “We’ve made friends with communist China. We do business with them,” [Rivera] added. “Vietnam – we lost 50,000 soldiers and we have normal relations.” “What if you had a relative rotting in prison there because they spoke up?” asked Brian Kilmeade. “But the way to loosen them up is to expose them to freedom,” Rivera shot back. “With Hollywood stars?” asked Gretchen Carlson incredulously. “Jay-Z and Beyoncé showed the good life to millions of Cubans who will envy America as a result,” asserted Rivera. “It was a harmless trip and the reaction was way over the top.” Judge Jeanine Pirro, also of FOX News, dedicated the entire opening of her show to questioning the travel ban and embargo, ultimately calling it a “charade”: Fifty years later this embargo has accomplished nothing. Wouldn’t American influence and American dollars put us in a more positive light as opposed to the image that Castro has created of Americans? In the end it isn’t so much about that celebrity couple who chose to vacation on that pristine island as it is about trying to make new friends in a world where we could certainly use a few more. Finally, conservative kingmaker George Will declared on ABC’s This Week that the embargo no longer makes sense (watch at 39:00 mark): The Cuban embargo may have made a lot of sense during the Cold War. The Cold War is over, and it is hard to think of a policy more firmly refuted by events than the policy of the embargo that was supposed to weaken one of the, it turns out, most durable dictators in the world. All further proof that calling for the lifting of travel and trade restrictions against Cuba is a bipartisan issue, and that the Cuba Lobby, which likes to slander anti-embargo advocates as liberal useful idiots and Castro apologists, only represents itself, not conservative values nor the CubanAmerican community.

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Popular – Oil Oil drilling makes the plan more popular Franks, Reuters, 8 [Jeff, June 12, NYT, “Cuban oil production could be a catalyst for a change in relations with U.S.,” http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/12/business/worldbusiness/12iht-cubaoil.4.13670441.html accessed 77-13 UR] The embargo has withstood repeated legislative attempts to loosen its terms, including unsuccessful bills in the U.S. Congress in 2006 to exempt oil companies. But Kirby Jones, a consultant on Cuban business and founder of the U.S.-Cuba Trade Association in Washington, and who is against the embargo, said a big Cuba oil find would change the political equation. "This is the first time that maintaining the embargo actually costs the United States something," he said. "And we need oil. We need it from wherever we can get it, and in this case it's 50 miles off our coast." An odd fact is that Cuba will be drilling 50 miles from the Florida Keys, or more than twice as close as U.S. companies can get because of regulations protecting Florida's coast. Representative Jeff Flake, an Arizona Republican who has introduced bills in Congress to lift the embargo for oil companies, said the environmental argument might be crucial because there was much concern in Florida about potential oil spills. "If there are going to be oil rigs off of Florida, I think most Americans would be more comfortable if they were U.S. oil rigs, rather than Chinese for example," Flake said.

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AT – Political Opposition No political support for the embargo Brush, MSN Money staff, 1/22/13 (Michael, MSN Money, “Time to invest in Cuba?” http://money.msn.com/investing/time-to-invest-incuba, Accessed 7/9/13) 2. Political support for the embargo is eroding. Another problem for embargo aficionados is that younger Cuban Americans in Florida, the all-important next generation of voters, just aren't as passionate about it as their parents and grandparents were. "When I lecture down there, they couldn't care less about Castro and the embargo," says Roett. A recent poll by Florida International University in Miami bears this out. It found that just 50% of Cuban-Americans still support the embargo, and 80% think it has failed. It's also worth noting that Obama got a lot more of the Cuban-American vote in Florida in the 2012 election, despite the awareness that he is more willing to lift the embargo, says Hidalgo. With their constituents defecting on the issue, congressional backers of the embargo may be losing ground. "The Cuban vote in Florida is changing, thus sticking with the embargo doesn't makes sense," believes Hidalgo.

Opposition to the plan is diminishing Bandow, Cato Institute senior fellow, 12 (Doug, former special assistant to former US president Ronald Reagan, 12/11/12, Cato Institute, “Time to End the Cuba Embargo,” http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/time-end-cuba-embargo, Accessed 7/9/13) The embargo survives largely because of Florida’s political importance. Every presidential candidate wants to win the Sunshine State’s electoral votes, and the Cuban American community is a significant voting bloc. But the political environment is changing. A younger, more liberal generation of Cuban Americans with no memory of life in Cuba is coming to the fore. Said Wayne Smith, a diplomat who served in Havana: “for the first time in years, maybe there is some chance for a change in policy.” And there are now many more new young Cuban Americans who support a more sensible approach to Cuba. Support for the Republican Party also is falling. According to some exit polls Barack Obama narrowly carried the Cuban American community in November, after receiving little more than a third of the vote four years ago. He received 60 percent of the votes of Cuban Americans born in the United States. Barack Obama increased his votes among Cuban Americans after liberalizing contacts with the island. He also would have won the presidency without Florida, demonstrating that the state may not be essential politically. Today even the GOP is no longer reliable. For instance, though Republican vice-presidential nominee Paul Ryan has defended the embargo in recent years, that appears to reflect ambition rather than conviction. Over the years he voted at least three times to lift the embargo, explaining: “The embargo doesnt work. It is a failed policy. It was probably justified when the Soviet Union existed and posed a threat through Cuba. I think its become more of a crutch for Castro to use to repress his people. All the problems he has, he blames the American embargo.”

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AT – Unpopular with Cuban-Americans Younger Cuban-Americans are increasingly open to US-Cuban economic engagement AP 6/21/13 [Associated Press, NPR, “Cuba, US Try Talking, But Face Many Obstacles,” http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=194107378 accessed 7/3/13 UR] Despite that rhetoric, many experts think Obama would face less political fallout at home if he chose engagement because younger Cuban-Americans seem more open to improved ties than those who fled immediately after the 1959 revolution. Of 10 Cuban-Americans interview by The Associated Press on Thursday at the popular Miami restaurant Versailles, a de facto headquarters of the exile community, only two said they were opposed to the U.S. holding migration talks. Several said they hoped for much more movement. Jose Gonzalez, 55, a shipping industry supervisor who was born in Cuba and came to the U.S. at age 12, said he now favors an end to the embargo and the resumption of formal diplomatic ties. "There was a reason that existed but it doesn't anymore," he said. Santiago Portal, a 65-year-old engineer who moved to the U.S. 45 years ago, said more dialogue would be good. "The more exchange of all types the closer Cuba will be to democracy," he said. Those opinions dovetail with a 2011 poll by Florida International University of 648 randomly selected Cuban-Americans in Miami-Dade County that said 58 percent favored re-establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba. That was a considerable increase from a survey in 1993, when 80 percent of people polled said they did not support trade or diplomatic relations with Cuba. "In general, there is an open attitude, certainly toward re-establishing diplomatic relations," said Jorge Duany, director of the Cuban Research Institute at Florida International University. "Short of perhaps lifting the embargo ... there seems to be increasing support for some sort of understanding with the Cuban government."

Florida Rep. Castor and Cuban-American Democrats support lifting the embargo Jackovics, Tampa Tribune, 4/9/13 [Ted, “Isolation is 'bad for the island of Cuba and it's not good for us,' Castor says,” Lexis, accessed 7/3/13 UR] U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor's three-day visit to Cuba last week reinforced her belief that overarching U.S. policy change is required to achieve benefits for U.S. and Cuban interests alike. "If America continues to isolate Cuba, we are not going to hasten change," the Tampa Democrat said. "It's bad for the island of Cuba and it's not good for us." Castor said Monday she would urge Secretary of State John Kerry to recommend that President Barack Obama end Cuba's listing on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism as a major step in that direction. That decision is expected within weeks. "Cuba is changing its economic system," Castor said. "It was an amazing experiment in communism that did not work." But even as Cuba's government provides Cubans new rights to own property, buy and sell cars, and establish co-operatives, the country cannot continue to be repressive, Castor said, pointing to human rights violations that provide political fodder for critics of normalizing U.S.-Cuba relations.

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Plan is politically popular Cuban Americans Hinderdael, Bologna Center Journal of International Affairs, 11 [Klaas, June 11, BCJIA, “Breaking the Logjam: Obama's Cuba Policy and a Guideline for Improved Leadership,” http://bcjournal.org/volume-14/breaking-the-logjam.html?printerFriendly=true accessed 77-13 UR] In the wake of a markedly diminished strategic threat from the Cuban island after the end of the Cold War, domestic political goals trumped other goals in terms of setting Cuba policy, particularly during election years. Nonetheless, legislative momentum for engaging Cuba has picked up decidedly, even as some presidents have lagged behind. This momentum has coincided with a slow shift in public opinion and demographics that make ending the embargo and engaging Cuba popular amongst both the majority of American voters, as well as the majority of the Cuban-American constituency. Two events in the late 1990s have often been pointed to as significant turning points in the political views and weight of Cuban-American voters. First, many traveled to Cuba for the 1998 papal visit, and embraced Pope John Paul II’s call for “Cuba to open to the world, and the world to open to Cuba.”40 then, two years later, the Elián González episode of 2000 allowed for a shift dubbed by Daniel Erikson the “Elián meets the China syndrome.”41 With the majority of Americans calling for Elián to be reunited with his father in Cuba, a position that anti-Castro Cuban-Americans opposed vehemently, the Cuban-American community, by taking such a hard-line stance, lost some of its legitimacy in the American political system. Furthermore, a harsh Cuba policy stood in stark contrast to a simultaneous broadening of America’s economic and diplomatic ties with China. Polls over the last decade have revealed the dramatic shift in the views of Cuban-Americans. They indicate that, while in 1997, only 22 percent of Miami-Dade County Cuban-Americans favored ending the embargo, by 2004, that percentage had risen to 34 percent, and by December 2008 to 55 percent (in 2008, 65 percent also supported ending restrictions on travel and remittances).42 these statistics indicate that Obama’s positions in the run-up to the 2008 presidential election may not have been such a bad political strategy after all. Furthermore, we should expect to see politicians increasingly catering to these beliefs as they continue to gain political expediency. Perhaps more significantly, Americans on both sides of the political spectrum support significant changes in Cuba policy, from relaxing travel and remittance restrictions to opening up diplomatic relations. They also believe that the island provides little threat to the United States, and that engagement is the most likely policy to lead Cuba towards democratic reform. An April 2009 World Public opinion poll drew the following conclusions from republican (r) and Democrat (D) pollsters:43 In terms of the US embargo policy, just days before the World Public opinion poll was released, separate Gallup and ABC polls showed that approximately 55 percent of Americans believe the embargo should be ended, with 35 percent believing it should be continued, and the rest unsure.44 Due to such strong public support for a shift in Cuba policy, the risks of making a drastic shift in the country’s Cuba policies are decreasing rapidly. Leaders willing to promote such a transformation stand to reap significant political gains. A steady demographical shift in the Cuban-American population also makes such a stance politically pragmatic. As experts have noted, first generation Cuban-Americans, traditionally more linked to Cuba policy hardliners, “are retreating from the political stage, if for no reason other than age.”45 In contrast, later-generation immigrants are no longer single-issue voters, made particularly evident during the 2008 election, as the majority of Cuban-American voters agreed with Obama’s Cuba policy, but still voted for Senator John McCain. In fact, Florida International University (FIU) polls show that on a variety of issues, including ending restrictions on remittances and travel, ending the embargo, and reestablishing diplomatic relations, there is a 15 to 20 percent hike in support for these policies among those who immigrated between 1980 and 1998, as opposed to earlier immigrants. There is an additional increase of 5 percent for those

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 86 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core who came to America after 1998.46 Clearly, as these demographics continue to provide rising support for engagement and ending the embargo, politicians should and will attempt to shift Cuba policy accordingly.

Plan is increasingly popular with Cuban-American voters Iglesias, US Navy Commander, 12 Army War College Publication [Carlos, March 10, US Army War College, “United States Security Policy Implications of a Post-Fidel Cuba,” http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA560408 accessed 7-7-13 UR] Domestically, the traditional third rail of Cuban-America politics has also just recently been deenergized. Historically the exile community has been a bulwark against any Cuba policy that loosened universal values attainment. However, a major poll of registered Cuban-American voters in 2008 reflected a reshuffling of priorities. The Florida International University poll showed for that first time since polling began, the majority of respondents favored normalization of diplomatic relations with the island.103 Even many in the older and more hard-line generations have broken with “first wave conservatives.”104 This shift of collective opinions points to a new perspective that attainment of those values has to come from within the country and the U.S.’s role is best played through “engagement with Cuba in order to help the Cuban people create the conditions for democratic change from within.”

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Guantanamo Links

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Political Capital – Congress Legislative requirements to closing Guantanamo means it will require a huge amount of Obama’s political capital Huffington Post, 5-8-13 [Newstex, “Guantanamo’s Collapse,” Lexis, accessed 7-6-13 UR] Fixing Guantanamo -- which is what Obama clearly wants --- will require him to take risky unilateral action and dedicate a great deal of political capital. First, Obama will need to stick his neck out by restarting the transfer process under the national security waiver provisions in current law. If he believes that the stain of Guantanamo is truly harming our national security, and the risk of sending some detainees abroad is not too severe, then duty requires him to approve some transfers. To do this, he will also need some help from allies in the Middle East or elsewhere that have facilities that can handle these individuals and programs that might make resettlement a legitimate option. If the Administration is unwilling to take the political heat for authorizing transfers, then it has to admit that it no longer intends to even attempt to close Guantanamo. Second, the Administration needs to clearly state where it intends to incarcerate those detainees who are either convicted in military commissions or will be held indefinitely under the law of war. Closing Guantanamo will be beneficial, because it would eliminate having a concentrated mass of detainees in one place, where they can take joint action and focus the attention of the world. Building a new detention facility for all of the same people in the United States will achieve nothing, as it will quickly be labeled Guantanamo North and cause all the same problems we have currently with Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Instead, we could disburse the population to other detention facilities, including military jails and super-max prisons in the United States where the detainees will be isolated and quietly reach old age over the next decades . The so-called blind sheik - Omar Abdel-Rahman - who was convicted of conspiring to bomb multiple sites in New York City, is serving a life sentence in a medium security medical prison in anonymity less than 25 miles from my office. Who knew? Finally, we need to come to terms with creating a solid legal framework for the extremely rare cases when dangerous individuals are captured, but for a variety of reasons, cannot be tried in our criminal justice system or military commissions. There are many proposals for how this could be accomplished in a constitutional manner, but it will require hard bipartisan legislative work and a depoliticization of the detainee issue. It is hard to see how this might occur in our current political posture, but perhaps this would be a worthy project after the 2014 elections for a lame duck president and members of Congress who recognize that our current terrorist detention system is both unsustainable and damaging to our national security.

Both sides of congress want to keep Guantanamo Cole, Georgetown University Law Center professor, 13 [David, 2/5/13, NYT, “It’s Congress’ Fault That It’s Still Open”, http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/01/09/guantanamo-10-years-later/its-congress-fault-thatguantanamo-is-still-open, accessed: 7/6/13, ML] Congress has effectively frozen in place one of the most counterproductive aspects of our national security policy – and given Al Qaeda just what it wants. Yet three years after Obama promised to close the most infamous prison in the world today, and 10 years after the first detainee was brought there, Guantánamo remains open, with no foreseeable shelf

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 89 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core life date. Why? The principal culprit is Congress. Adopting a short-sighted “not in my backyard” attitude, Congress has barred Obama from transferring any detainees to the United States, not even to stand trial in a criminal court, and has put onerous conditions on their being transferred to any other country. These measures have effectively frozen in place one of the most counterproductive aspects of our national security policy – and given Al Qaeda just what it wants. As long as some of the men at Guantánamo remain lawfully detained as enemy fighters in an ongoing armed conflict, they have to be held somewhere, so realistically Guantánamo can be closed only if we can transfer them here or to a third country. But few members of Congress have the courage to stand up to fear-mongering about holding the men here, or are willing to risk the possibility that a detainee transferred abroad might take action against us in the future. They don’t seem troubled at all about keeping men locked up who the military has said could be released, or about keeping open an institution that jeopardizes our security. In the meantime, Congress has assured that the United States will continue to be better known around the world for Guantánamo Bay than for the Statue of Liberty.

Congress hates the plan Rosenberg, senior journalist, currently with the McClatchy News, 12 [Carol, 1/9/12, Miami Herald, “Congress, rules keep Obama from closing Guantanamo Bay, http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/01/09/135179/congress-rule-keep-obama-from.html#storylink=cpy, accessed: 7/6/13, ML] The responsibility lies not so much with the White House but with Congress, which has thwarted President Barack Obama’s plans to close the detention center, which the Bush administration opened on Jan. 11, 2002, with 20 captives. Congress has used its spending oversight authority both to forbid the White House from financing trials of Guantánamo captives on U.S. soil and to block the acquisition of a state prison in Illinois to hold captives currently held in Cuba who would not be put on trial — a sort of Guantánamo North. The latest defense bill adopted by Congress moved to mandate military detention for most future al Qaida cases. The White House withdrew a veto threat on the eve of passage, and then Obama signed it into law with a “signing statement” that suggested he could lawfully ignore it. On paper, at least, the Obama administration would be set to release almost half the current captives at Guantánamo. The 2009 Task Force Review concluded that about 80 of the 171 detainees now held at Guantánamo could be let go if their home country was stable enough to help resettle them or if a foreign country could safely give them a new start. But Congress has made it nearly impossible to transfer captives anywhere. Legislation passed since Obama took office has created a series of roadblocks that mean that only a federal court order or a national security waiver issued by Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta could trump Congress and permit the release of a detainee to another country.

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Political Capital – GOP Plan is massively unpopular with House Republicans – they empirically block all new legislation McAuliff, Huffington Post, 6-14-13 [Michael, “Guantanamo Bay To Stay Open As House Blocks Bill To Close Infamous Prison,” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/14/guantanamo-bayclose_n_3438347.html accessed 7-6-13 UR] A worsening hunger strike and a fresh plea by President Barack Obama to close the Guantanamo Bay prison fell on deaf ears in Congress Friday, as the House of Representatives voted to keep the increasingly infamous jail open. The House voted to make it harder for Obama to begin shifting inmates, adding a restriction to the National Defense Authorization Act of 2014 that bars any of the roughly 56 prisoners who have been cleared by military and intelligence officials to be sent to Yemen from being transferred there for one year. Some 30 other Gitmo inmates of the 166 kept there have also been cleared for release. "The Defense Department should not transfer detainees to Yemen because they represent some of the most dangerous terrorists known in the world," said Rep. Jackie Walorski (R-Ind.), who sponsored the fresh ban on shipping anyone out of Gitmo. Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), who offered a competing amendment to create a plan to close Gitmo, found the new restriction especially ironic, noting that federal authorities believe the Yemeni detainees are safe enough to be set free. "Not everybody that we rounded up and took to Guantanamo, unfortunately, turned out to be the very dangerous terrorists that we thought they were," Smith said, adding that continuing to hold them -- at a facility costing $1.6 million a year for each inmate -- was not sensible. "Determining that if there is any minimimal threat whatsoever we're simply going to hold them forever is, well, quite frankly, un-American. That is contrary to our values to say we're going to hold somebody indefinitely -- I gather forever -- because we think there might possibly be some risk," Smith said. "That's not the way the Constitution is supposed to work." Walorski's amendment passed, 236 to 188. Smith's, also backed by Reps. Jim Moran (D-Va.) and Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), failed 174 to 249 after Republicans argued that it was simply too dangerous to send terrorsim suspects to the United States. "These terrorist detainees pose a very real danger to our security in America. They mean us real harm," said Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), a veteran of the Iraq war who called closing Gitmo "appeasement." "Who are these detainees? They are not innocent goat herders swept up by marauding United States military, of which I was a part, and of which I detained numerous potential terrorists," said Rep. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), referring to his service in Iraq and Afghanistan. Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.) argued that moving the prisoners to the United States would paint targets for terrorists "on every elementary school, every shopping mall, every small business" in the area where they end up being housed. "It's important that we come together, unified, and send a message to the president," Forbes said. "We may not be able to stop every terrorist from coming to U.S. soil, but we can stop these terrorists." Smith countered that there are already more than 300 terrorists jailed in the United States. "We have Ramzi Yousef. We have the blind sheik [Omar Abdel-Rahman]," Smith said, referring to the two 1993 World Trade Center bombing masterminds. "We have some of the most notorious terrorists in the world housed here already, safely and securely." The House votes run contrary not just to what the president asked for, but also to the hopes of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which voted Thursday in its version of the NDAA to ease restrictions on transferring prisoners.

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Republicans hate the plan Bobic, assistant editor of Talking Points Memo, 11 [Igor, 5/11/13, TPM, “Senate Republicans Vow to Keep Guantanamo Bay Open”, http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/05/senate-republicansvow-to-keep-guantanamo-bay-open.php, accessed: 7/6/13, ML] In response to the Obama administration’s renewed efforts to close the Guantanamo Bay prison, Senate Republicans introduced legislation on Wednesday that would codify the detention facility as the primary location or current and future detainees. “Attorney General Holder and President Obama: Guantanamo Bay is not going to close,” Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said at a press conference introducing the bill. “I respect Holder, but let me say categorically there is no pathway forward when it comes to closing Guantanamo in the foreseeable future.” The state-of-the-art military facility has long been a focal point of intense domestic and international criticism over U.S. interrogation practices and indefinite detention. President Obama pledged to close the prison via executive order upon taking office, but his plans have been stymied from the start by tough opposition in Congress. The legislation, dubbed the “Detaining Terrorists to Secure America Act,” would prohibit funding for construction of additional detainment facilities in the United States and restrict the transfer of detainees to foreign countries. Republicans pushed back against criticism that the prison’s clouded past posed a threat to the security of the country, arguing that Guantanamo remained a vital national security asset, especially for intelligence. “Whatever image problems that linger around Guantanamo Bay pale in comparison to the risk of not having a prison,” Graham said. “The options are getting limited for our special forces. Without a jail, they are pushed to kill people that would they would otherwise like to capture.”

Republicans oppose giving back Guantanamo Herb, staff writer for the The Hill, 6/22/13 [Jeremy, covering national security and defense, The Hill, “Obama’s Guantánamo push hits wall of resistance in Congress”, http://thehill.com/blogs/defcon-hill/policy-and-strategy/307181-obamas-gitmopush-hits-wall-of-resistance-in-congress#ixzz2YKCWtX4X, accessed: 7/6/13, ML] Obama announced to great fanfare last month that he was restarting the effort to close the prison by transferring detainees cleared for release. He followed up this week by appointing a new envoy at the State Department to focus on the effort. But Congress moved quickly to thwart Obama’s plans. The House voted against lifting restrictions on moving detainees to the United States and approved an amendment that prevents the president from using funds to return some detainees to Yemen. Meanwhile, an amendment from Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) that would have lifted the restrictions on transfers from Guantanamo was rejected, with 21 Democrats and all but two Republicans voting against it. “It’s a very big problem, I think a lot of [lawmakers] would like to not have to think about it,” said Andrea Prasow, communications director for Human Rights Watch. “I find it incredibly depressing that’s the state of our politics right now.” Guantánamo became a campaign issue in 2010 after Obama first attempted to close the detention facility and hold a trial for 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in New York City. Smith said Republicans have been successful at tying support of Guantánamo with being tough on terror, which he said was false. “The Republicans have done a pretty masterful job of using scare tactics,” Smith said.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 92 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core “Republicans have equated the two and said if you’re for closing Guantánamo you don’t take the threat [of terrorism] seriously. I don’t think that’s a fair equation, but that’s what they’ve put out there, and that’s what makes some people nervous.”

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Political Capital – Senate Democrats Closing Guantanamo is extremely unpopular with key Senate Democrats Cassata, Associated Press, 7-5-13 [Donna, “Obama's toughest sell on Guantanamo: Senate Dems,” Lexis, accessed 7-6-13 UR] President Barack Obama's hardest sell in his renewed push to close the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, may be members of his own party moderate Senate Democrats facing tough re-election bids next year in the strongly Republican South. Obama has stepped up the pressure to shutter the naval facility, driven in part by his revised counterterrorism strategy and the 4-month-old stain of the government force-feeding Guantanamo prisoners on hunger strikes to prevent them from starving to death. Civil liberties groups and liberals have slammed Obama for failing to fulfill his 2008 campaign promise to close the installation and find another home for the 166 terror suspects being held there indefinitely. Republicans and some Democrats in Congress have repeatedly resisted the president's attempts to close the facility, arguing that the prisoners are too dangerous to be moved to U.S. soil, that Guantanamo is a perfectly adequate prison and that the administration has failed to offer a viable alternative. White House counterterrorism adviser Lisa Monaco lobbied House members in advance of several votes last month to no avail. The House delivered strong votes to keep Guantanamo open and to prevent Obama from transferring detainees to Yemen. Separately, the president's recent appointment of a special envoy on Guantanamo, Cliff Sloan, has met with a collective shrug on Capitol Hill. In the coming weeks, the Senate will again vote on the future of Guantanamo. All signs point to a bipartisan statement to keep the facility open despite a recent vow to end detention at the installation by two national security leaders Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and John McCain, R-Ariz. "When you go out, you talk to average Americans about it, they want to keep them there, they want to keep the terrorists there, they don't necessarily want to hold them here," said Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., a fierce proponent of keeping Guantanamo open. Ayotte, who plans to push legislation on a sweeping defense policy bill later this summer, is likely to attract support from Republicans as well as several Democrats looking ahead to tight Senate races next year in Arkansas, Louisiana and North Carolina. Votes on the detention center will give these Democrats a high-profile chance to split with a president who is extremely unpopular in parts of the South. Consider Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas, one of the most vulnerable incumbents in next year's congressional elections. Last November, he was one of nine Democrats to vote for prohibiting the use of any money to transfer terror suspects from Guantanamo, backing an amendment by Ayotte. The Senate easily passed the measure, 54-41, as part of the defense policy bill. Last month, a potential Republican challenger to Pryor, Arkansas Rep. Tom Cotton, was one of a handful of speakers during House debate on Guantanamo. Obama is pushing to transfer approved detainees there are 86 to their home countries and lift a ban on transfers to Yemen. Fifty-six of the 86 are from Yemen. Cotton, an Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran, pleaded with his colleagues to "ensure that terrorists at Guantanamo Bay do not escape back onto the battlefronts of the war on terror." Asked recently whether he favors keeping Guantanamo opened or closed, Pryor said simply, "Open." Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu, another Democrat who voted last year to keep the facility open, indicated she's unlikely to change her position.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 94 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core "Honestly, I have mixed feelings about it," she said in a recent interview. "First of all, it's hard to imagine that people should be detained indefinitely without formal charges being brought. On the other hand, you know, some of the people there are potential serious threats to national security." Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan of North Carolina, who faces re-election next year, also voted with Pryor and Landrieu to keep Guantanamo open. Her office had no comment on how she might vote later this summer.

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Unpopular – Public Massive public and political opposition to the plan Catalini, National Journal political writer, 13 [Michael, 5/30/13, National Journal, “Political Barriers Stand Between Obama and Closing Guantanamo Facility”, http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/political-barriers-stand-between-obama-and-closingguantanamo-facility-20130503, accessed: 7/6/13, ML] The last time President Obama tried to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center, Congress stopped him abruptly. The Senate did what it rarely does: It voted in bipartisan fashion, blocking his attempt at funding the closure. Four years later, and the political barriers that blocked the president from closing the camp that now houses 166 detainees are as immovable as ever. Moving the prisoners to facilities in the U.S., a solution the administration suggested, proved to be a political minefield in 2009. Most Americans oppose closing the base, according to a polls, and congressional leaders have balked at taking action. The Cuban camp is grabbing headlines again because of a hunger strike among the detainees. Nearly 100 have stopped eating, and the military is forcing them to eat by placing tubes through their noses, the Associated Press reported. The president reconfirmed his opposition to the camp, responding to a question about the recent hunger strikes at Guantanamo Bay with regret in his voice. “Well, it is not a surprise to me that we've got problems in Guantanamo, which is why, when I was campaigning in 2007 and 2008 and when I was elected in 2008, I said we need to close Guantanamo. I continue to believe that we've got to close Guantanamo,” he said. Obama blamed his failure to follow through on a campaign promise on lawmakers. “Now, Congress determined that they would not let us close it,” he said. Despite Obama’s desire to close the base and his pledge this week to “go back to this,” he touched on a political reality: Lawmakers are not inclined to touch the issue. "The president stated that the reason Guantanamo has not closed was because of Congress. That's true," Majority Leader Harry Reid told reporters last month, declining to elaborate. The stakes for Obama on this issue are high when it comes to his liberal base, who would like to see him display the courage of his convictions and close the camp. But the political will is lacking, outside a small contingent of lawmakers, including Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois and five other liberal Democrats who sided with Obama in 2009, and left-leaning opinion writers. Congressional Democrats, unlike Obama, will have to face voters again. And closing the camp is deeply unpopular. A Washington Post/ABC News poll in February 2012 showed that 70 percent of Americans wanted to keep the camp open to detain “terrorist suspects,” and in a 2009 Gallup Poll, a majority said they would be upset if it shut down. In 2009, the Senate voted 90-6 to block the president’s efforts at closing the camp. Obama had signed an order seeking to close the detention center, but the Senate’s vote denied the administration the $80 million needed to fund the closure. Closing the camp in Cuba and bringing the detainees into the United States grates against the political sensibilities of many lawmakers. Jim Manley, a Democratic strategist who served as Reid’s spokesman at the time, remembers the debate very well. “I'm still not sure that there's much of an appetite among Democrats on the Hill to try and deal with this issue once and for all,” Manley said in an interview.

Public pressure makes it politically unpopular to shut down Reilly, Huffington Post, 13

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 96 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core [Ryan J., covers the Justice Department and the Supreme Court, Huffington Post, 2-16-13, “Obama's Guantanamo Is Never Going To Close, So Everyone Might As Well Get Comfortable “,http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/16/obama-guantanamo_n_2618503.html, accessed: 7/6/13, ML] Today, however, the detention center at Guantanamo appears less likely than ever to close. There are 166 people currently imprisoned, down from a high of 684 in 2003. But those who remain are likely to do so indefinitely. Effectively banned from the continental U.S. by Congress, disowned by their home countries and unwelcome pretty much everywhere else, they have no place to go. In addition to the seven Guantanamo detainees currently facing charges -- including the five charged in relation to the 9/11 attacks -- 24 may face charges in the future. Three current detainees have already been convicted in military tribunals: one was sentenced to life in prison, one is scheduled to be released pending testimony in another case and one has had his sentencing delayed for four years. Of the rest, however, the U.S. has designated 86 detainees for release but can't actually set them free. Thirty are from Yemen, and the U.S. won't send them back there while it remains a hotbed of terrorism. No country is willing to accept the others. And it's a political nonstarter to release them into the U.S. In 2010, Obama's Guantanamo Task Force determined that another 46 were “too dangerous to transfer but not feasible for prosecution.” And so they remain stuck here, in limbo. Obama has periodically reiterated his intention to close the detention center, most recently during an appearance on "The Daily Show" with Jon Stewart in October. But the public pressure on him to do so has largely died down, as tales of detainee abuse at the hands of CIA interrogators fade into the past and the media turns its attention to new fronts in the war on terrorism, such as the administration's drone program. The truth is that nobody is really in a hurry to close Guantanamo. Defense attorneys, whose ultimate goal is to keep their clients alive, certainly aren’t in a rush, and have adopted a strategy of throwing up procedural objections that often slow the court’s already glacial pace. Prosecutors, anxious to avoid any possible legal challenges that could come up on appeal, are moving deliberately to make sure they’re dotting every “i” and crossing every “t.” Last month, the Obama administration shuttered the State Department office tasked with planning Guantanamo's closure.

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Popular – Congress Bipartisan Congressional support for the plan is growing with Obama’s push Metzker, Inter Press Service, 6-26-13 [Jared, “U.S.: RIGHTS ADVOCATES SEE PROGRESS TOWARD CLOSING GUANTANAMO,” Lexis, accessed 7-6-13 UR] Groups promoting human rights here are "cautiously optimistic" that U.S. President Barack Obama's renewed pledge to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay will be fulfilled. That optimism is due in part to the language of this year's proposed U.S. National Defence Authorisation Act (NDAA), a massive annual appropriations bill that funds much of the U.S. military and is currently being debated in Congress. "It feels like there is momentum building toward achieving a bipartisan consensus," Dixon Osburn, director of the law and security program for Human Rights First, a Washington advocacy group, told IPS. "I'm certainly more optimistic on this than I have been for the last several years." In its current form, the 2014 NDAA would give the executive branch, through the secretary of defence, greater authority to remove detainees from the prison, either to transfer them to other facilities or to release them altogether. It would also unblock transfers of detainees to the United States. The NDAA recently passed through the Senate Armed Service Committee with the provisions related to Guantanamo left intact. These provisions, which would help pave the way for an eventual shutdown of the prison, are expected to be the subject of fierce debate when the Senate votes on the full bill sometime in the coming months. The current push to close the controversial detention centre is being spearheaded by a renewed pledge made by Obama in late April. At that time, the president spoke in no uncertain terms against the continued existence of the facility, which he had originally pledged to close down at the start of his first term, in 2009. "It's not sustainableathe notion that we're going to continue to keep over 100 individuals in a no-man's land in perpetuity," Obama stated in April, noting that U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been or are being wound down. "The idea that we would still maintain forever a group of individuals who have not been tried - that is contrary to who we are, it is contrary to our interests, and it needs to stop." Since that renewed call, powerful members of Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, have come out forcefully in favor of supporting Obama's efforts to close down the prison. Earlier this month, Senators John McCain and Dianne Feinstein (the former a Republican and the latter a Democrat) joined White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough on a trip to Guantanamo, afterward releasing a statement advocating its termination. "We continue to believe that it is in our national interest to end detention at Guantanamo, with a safe and orderly transition of the detainees to other locations," the statement noted. "We intend to work, with a plan by Congress and the administration together, to take the steps necessary to make that happen."

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Aid

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Unpopular – Cuba Aid Link – Aid Scrutinized Aid to hostile countries is highly scrutinized – ensuring politicization of the plan Congressional Documents and Publications, 6/27/13 [Quoting Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Republican Representative from Florida, “Ecuador's Cancellation of Trade Pact and Offer of $23 Million to U.S. for "Human Rights Training" is Laughable, Says Ros-Lehtinen,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] (WASHINGTON) - U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Chairman of the Middle East and North Africa Subcommittee, made the following statement regarding Ecuador's decision to cancel the renewal of its trade pact with the United States and its offer of $23 million to provide human rights training to the U.S. Statement by Ros-Lehtinen: "Due to the fact that Congress has strongly signaled its reluctance to renew the trade preferences with Ecuador, Rafael Correa saw the writing on the wall and has decided to cancel our trade deal. This unilateral act is further proof that Ecuadorian leader does not want close ties with the United States and only wishes to sabotage our bilateral relationship in order to save face following pressure from our government for Correa to refuse asylum to Edward Snowden. "Then as if to add insult to injury, Correa has also reportedly offered the U.S. $23 million for 'human rights training.' This is perhaps the most laughable move by Correa to date, as it is he and his government who are in need of training in the protection and respect of fundamental basic human rights and democratic freedoms. This, after all, comes from the mini-Chavez who earlier this year launched an international campaign to weaken the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and who has consistently attempted to silence free speech and the independent media. I urge the Obama Administration to send a clear message to Correa that his ill-considered actions will not go without consequences and reexamine all foreign aid that goes directly to this reckless government."

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Venezuela Links

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AT – Evidence Assumes Chavez Relations with Venezuela face rocky road—Maduro will continue Chavez’s controversial policies CNN Wire 3/6/13 (Elise Labott, CNN Foreign Affairs Reporter, March 6th 2013, CNN Wire, “U.S.-Venezuela relations likely to remain tense after Chavez,” Lexis, Accessed 7/5/13, JC) But in the words of one senior official, the outreach to Caracas has been a "rocky road." Talks have been short on substance and never left U.S. officials with the feeling Venezuela was interested in mending fences. Maduro's first news conference, a good portion of which was devoted to railing against the United States, was not very encouraging. As he prepares to stand in upcoming elections to replace Chavez, Maduro's anti-American rhetoric is dismissed in the United States as political jockeying to shore up his political base. This tried-and-true method of using America as straw man worked for Chavez, which is why U.S. officials acknowledge that the campaign season not be the best time to break new ground or expect tangible progress. Officials say they will continue to speak out in favor of a more productive relationship between the two countries, but the ball, officials say, is firmly in Venezuela's court. "The opportunities are not there yet for the U.S. to engage" says Carl Meacham of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "For the next month or so, Maduro has to show he is even more Chavez than Chavez was. That means he is going to be more anti-American, more anti-capitalist, more anti-systemic. As far as a rapprochement, I don't see it coming anytime soon." How Venezuela conducts those elections will be a major test. For years Washington had accused Chavez and his supporters of abusing the electoral system by intimidating opposition and controlling the media during his 14-year rule. Now, the United States has made clear it expects a free and fair election in accordance with Venezuela's Constitution and charters. While Venezuela's relationship with the United States revolved around Chavez, it is unlikely his death will dramatically affect ties in the near term. If, as expected, Maduro wins the presidency, the new boss will likely be the same as the old one. "Chavez's supporters and their Chavismo ideological movement were dealt a blow with the death of their charismatic leader, but his ministers have been preparing for this transition, and the challenge to all sides will be measured in weeks and months, not days" said Dan Restrepo, who served as an adviser to Obama at the National Security Council during his first term. With crime at an all-time high, continued drug-trafficking and a faltering oil sector, Meacham says the new Venezuelan government will be looking inward for the foreseeable future. "The U.S. doesn't want to be in a situation where it is viewed at all as getting involved in domestic affairs of Venezuela," he says. "If Maduro wins, he will be trying to keep the focus on domestic issues, and that could put the resolve of Chavismo to the test. And that could mean the hardest days between the U.S. and Venezuela is not behind us, but ahead of us."

Relations are just as divisive now as they were with Chavez in power Global Post 5/2/13 [Girish Gupta, Staff Writer, May 2nd 2013, “5 signs Venezuela-US relations are still rocky after Chavez,” http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/americas/venezuela/130501/signs-venezuela-uswashington-rocky-relations, Accessed 7/4/13, CB]

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 102 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core CARACAS, Venezuela — Washington remains the only major government that has not yet recognized the results of Venezuela’s Apr. 14 vote, which election officials here said showed a razor-thin win by Nicolas Maduro. For Maduro, it seems, there’s no love lost. “Take your eyes off Venezuela, [US Secretary of State] John Kerry,” he said on state television. “We don’t care about your recognition.” His mentor Hugo Chavez was famous for hours-long televised verbal thrashings against the US “imperialists,” even as the superpower became chief buyer of Venezuela’s state-owned oil. Chavez's vitriol climaxed before the United Nations in New York when, a day after a speech by thenPresident George W. Bush, he said: “The devil came here yesterday. … It smells of sulfur still." Now, with Maduro in charge, many are watching for the same fiery language. What the world is seeing may be somewhat confusing: Venezuela’s government has locked up and kicked out alleged American spies on the one hand, and offered conciliatory messages to Washington on the other. After the country's disputed election, officials agreed to a partial vote recount one minute, but lawmakers got in fistfights with the opposition the next. Perhaps what we’re seeing is a nuanced style that Maduro, a 50-year-old former foreign minister, will employ to carry on the late Comandante’s socialist movement. Whatever it is, there are signs that Washington and Caracas' relations are in for a rocky road. Here are a few of them. 1. The expulsion: Just hours before Maduro solemnly announced Chavez’s death, the government expelled two US diplomats, accusing them of attempting to destabilize the country. Here he is (in Spanish) making the announcement. Less than a week later, Washington expelled two Venezuelan diplomats in a tit-for-tat move. The countries have not had ambassadorial-level links since 2010.

Political polarization over Venezuela is increasing despite Chavez’s death Schultz, The International writer, 3/17/13 (Kylie, The International, “The Rocky U.S.-Venezuela Relationship: What Both Countries Could Learn,” http://www.theinternational.org/articles/370-the-rocky-us-venezuela-relationship-wh, Accessed 7/9/13) While the United States sent a representative, Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), the Obama administration itself offered no condolences. “At this challenging time of President Hugo Chavez’s passing, the United States reaffirms its support for the Venezuelan people and its interest in developing a constructive relationship with the Venezuelan government,” said a statement released by the White House. “As Venezuela begins a new chapter in its history, the United States remains committed to policies that promote democratic principles, the rule of law, and respect for human rights.” Criticized by many Chavez supporters for its unsympathetic and, some claim, contemptible tone, the White House statement and the reactions it has elicited are representative of the divide between the United States and Venezuela which emerged during Chavez’s presidency. The influence and standing of the United States in Latin America has decreased in recent years as domestic inequality and political polarization in America rise . There seem but few signs that Chavez’s death will spark a shift in U.S.-Venezuelan relations. As Venezuela enters into the post-Chavez era with a struggling economy, high inflation, and some of the worst crime rates in the world, why do both countries continue to demonize one another?

Chavez’s successor only magnifies the controversy Washington Post 3/6/13

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 103 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core (Washington Post Opinions, “A misguided U.S. strategy for Venezuela,” http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-03-06/opinions/37497866_1_nicolas-maduro-apartments-andappliances-henrique-capriles, Accessed 7/9/13) ANTICIPATING THE death of Hugo Chavez, the Obama administration began reaching out months ago to his designated successor, Nicolas Maduro, in the hope of bettering U.S.-Venezuelan relations. On Tuesday, that strategy absorbed a body blow : Hours before revealing that Mr. Chavez had died of cancer, Mr. Maduro tried to blame the United States for his illness, and he expelled two U.S. military attaches on charges of “proposing destabilizing plans” to the armed forces. So much for the “reset” with Caracas. The ludicrous and crude propaganda launched by Mr. Maduro was a sign that Mr. Chavez’s successors will be more thuggish and less politically adept than he was — and, if anything, more inclined to scapegoat the United States and Venezuela’s democratic opposition for the horrendous problems the caudillo leaves behind.

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Engagement

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Unpopular – Flip Flop Plan’s unpopular for a laundry list of reasons, and it’s a flip flop for Obama Sullivan, Congressional Research Service specialist in Latin American affairs, 13 (Mark P., 1/10/13, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, Accessed 7/9/13) U.S. Policy The United States traditionally has had close relations with Venezuela, a major supplier of foreign oil to the United States, but there has been significant friction with the Chávez government. For several years, U.S. officials have expressed concerns about human rights, Venezuela’s military arms purchases (largely from Russia), its relations with Cuba and Iran, its efforts to export its brand of populism to other Latin American countries, and the use of Venezuelan territory by Colombian guerrilla and paramilitary forces. Declining Venezuelan cooperation on antidrug and antiterrorism efforts also has been a U.S. concern. Since 2005, Venezuela has been designated annually (by President Bush and President Obama ) as a country that has failed to adhere to its international anti-drug obligations. Since 2006, the De partment of State has prohibited the sale of defense articles and services to Venezuela because of lack of cooperation on antiterrorism efforts.

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Political Capitala – Republicans Political inertia in Congress – right will criticize US-Venezuela relations because of Chavez’s legacy Lobe, Inter Press Service 3/7/13 (Jim Lobe, March 7th 2013, Inter Press Service, “U.S.: Hoping for some rapprochement after Chávez,” Lexis, Accessed 7/5/13, JC) At the same time, however, Shifter warned that the White House itself will likely move very slowly, so as not to provoke right-wingers in Congress who greeted Chávez's long-awaited demise with undiluted enthusiasm. They called, among other things, for the administration to retaliate for the two expulsions, a step which State Department officials said they were reviewing Wednesday. "Hugo Chávez was a tyrant who forced the people of Venezuela to live in fear," said Rep. Ed Royce, who has just succeeded the fiercely anti-Chávez and anti-Castro Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen as chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. "His death dents the alliance of anti-U.S. leftist leaders in South America. Good riddance to this dictator." "The problem on the U.S. side of the bilateral relationship is going to be some members of Congress who will be very critical of any sign of rapprochement between the administration and Maduro," Shifter said. "And they're not going to want to fight with members of Congress over Venezuela. So they're going to try to explore these openings but will be quite cautious and careful about doing so."

Republicans see engagement as acceptance of corrupt democracy – causes GOP backlash Ros-Lehtinen, House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee Chair, 3/14/13 [Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Republican, Florida,, March 14th 2013, The Washington Times, “ROSLEHTINEN: Venezuela after Chavez: What comes next?,” http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/mar/14/venezuela-after-chavez-what-comes-next/, Accessed 7/6/13, CB] Venezuela is a pivotal national security interest for the United States. It is one of the largest foreign suppliers of crude oil to the United States and is a strategic foothold that continues to pose a threat to our interests in the region. Chavez was instrumental in bringing the threat of narcoterrorism, illicit activities by foreign terrorist organizations and the Iranian regime, including elements of Hezbollah, to the Western Hemisphere. Chavez’s cronies have made it abundantly clear that they do not wish to cooperate with U.S. law enforcement officials on terrorism and countering the narcotics trade. This was made clear once again as the new leadership in Venezuela expelled two U.S. Air Force attaches shortly before Chavez’s death. This unwarranted, provocative action was reciprocated last week when two Venezuelan diplomats were expelled from Washington. Still, there is more to be done. In a post-Chavez era, much attention is being focused on new elections and a call for democratic order. However, elections for the sake of elections do not constitute a true democracy. Venezuela's National Electoral Council is extremely corrupt and colludes with Chavez loyalists, who aim to intimidate the masses in Venezuela by controlling the media and judicial system. A free, fair and transparent election cannot be conducted if the same players continue to control the already tainted electoral process. The authoritarian regime cannot be allowed to simply shift control from one despot to another in an effort to maintain its iron grip over the Venezuelan people.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 107 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core The United States’ role in the post-Chavez era should be to support democratic order by continuing to promote the Venezuelan civil society and ensuring that their rights are respected. The freedomhungry people of Venezuela fear that the United States is too weak to counter interim President Nicolas Maduro. Support for pro-democracy leaders cannot be accomplished if the Obama administration continues to cozy up to their oppressors and refuses to draw a line in the sand for Mr. Maduro, demanding an end to these undemocratic policies. Last year, it was reported that the Obama administration was seeking to exchange ambassadors in an attempt to normalize relations between the countries. The U.S. State Department’s approach was extremely premature, and it, unfortunately, legitimized Mr. Maduro without even questioning whether the Venezuelan Constitution was being upheld. The Obama administration continued to send mixed messages and to undermine the opposition by sending a delegation to attend Chavez’s funeral services last week, alongside enemies of the United States, such as Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Words matter, but actions matter more, and this decision not only sends mixed signals to the people of Venezuela, but reiterates the failed policy of attempting to re-establish diplomatic relations. It is in our best interest if political and economic reforms come to Venezuela, but all signs currently point to the contrary. As the leader of the Chavista movement, Mr. Maduro could potentially be worse for the Venezuelan people and for U.S. national security interests. Mr. Maduro still controls all branches of government, stifles free speech and was indoctrinated with socialist ideology. He has traveled to Tehran and has strong ties with Iran, supports the Assad regime in Syria and has become a lap dog for Cuba’s Castro brothers. In January, the Castros orchestrated the violation of the Venezuelan Constitution when Chavez did not take the oath of office. The U.S. State Department responded that it is up to the Venezuelan people to decide if there was a violation, and that it would not interpret the constitution. However, those sentiments were nowhere to be found in 2009 when the State Department led the charge against the people of Honduras, helped expel Honduras from the Organization of American States, and did not recognize Honduras’ constitutional authorities. Why the double standard? Democratic rights under the InterAmerican Democratic Charter cannot be selective; they must be uniform. The United States should be telling the leaders of Venezuela that they need to respect the constitution, abide by the Inter-American Democratic Charter and uphold democratic principles. These democratic processes can only be enforced if the Venezuelan leadership thinks that there will be serious repercussions if they do not take responsible actions to fulfill their obligations. This is an opportunity for the United States and responsible nations to demonstrate a commitment to restoring true democracy to Venezuela, and I hope the opportunity isn’t missed.

Engagement unpopular – The U.S. wants Venezuela to make the first move De Córdoba & Muñoz, Wall Street Journal, 13 [José de Córdoba and Sara Muñoz, Staff writers covering Latin America, January 11th 2013, The Wall Street Journal, “Venezuela, U.S. Start Talks to Mend Ties,” http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324581504578235911777903292.html, Accessed 7/7/13, CB] Improving relations between the U.S. and the country with the world's biggest oil reserves could be a long, hard slog. Mr. Chávez has led a motley crew of like-minded Latin American leaders, and has cultivated close ties with U.S. foes like Iran's President Mahmoud Ahm adinejad. Mr. Chávez famously called President George W. Bush a "devil" on the floor of the United Nations before the assembled leaders in 2006. Two years later, he tossed the U.S. ambassador to Caracas, Patrick Duddy, out of the country. The embassy has been without a top envoy since Venezuela refused

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 108 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core to accept another proposed U.S. envoy in 2010, leading the U.S. to revoke the visa of Venezuela's ambassador in Washington, Bernardo Álvarez. Mr. Chávez has also gone after President Barack Obama, once calling him an "ignoramus," after Mr. Obama criticized Mr. Chávez's alleged links to Colombian guerrillas. But both sides have cautiously reached out to each other since then. During their talk in November, Mr. Maduro was interested in the possibility of exchanging ambassadors again, U.S. officials say. Mr. Maduro said this month that the contacts had been made "with the authorization" of Mr. Chávez. For its part, the U.S. prefers to move slowly. Before restoring ambassadors, it would like to see Venezuelan instances of cooperation, U.S. officials say. They say they would like to beef up the number of antidrug agents in the country as a first step. "It is just going to take two to tango," Ms. Nuland said. Other areas the U.S. would like to see progress on are counterterrorism cooperation and in resolving commercial disputes involving U.S. companies in Venezuela, some of which have been nationalized, and many of which sometimes have difficulty getting dollars from Venezuela's government to pay for needed imports and repatriate profits. Since the initial contact, Venezuelan diplomats and U.S. officials have continued the dialogue in Washington. But the deterioration of Mr. Chávez's health had slowed progress, U.S. officials say. Few expect Mr. Chávez to recover from his illness. Both sides remain deeply suspicious of the other. Many Republicans in Congress are opposed to trying to forge a new relationship with the Venezuelan government. On the Venezuelan side, Mr. Maduro or any other potential successor to Mr. Chávez is likely to try to claim the populist's revolutionary mantle and mimic his anti-U.S. rhetoric.

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Unpopular – Anti-Americanism Recognition of Venezuela is unpopular—Maduro’s anti-American rhetoric and questioned electoral legitimacy The Washington Times 5/6/13 (Cheryl K. Chumley, May 6, 2013, The Washington Times, “Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro: President Obama’s ‘the grand chief of devils’,” http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/6/venezuelasnicolas-maduro-president-obamas-grand-c/, Accessed 7/4/13, JC) Venezuela-U.S. relations took another hit over the weekend, after President Obama called “ridiculous” the notion of an American detained in the country as a spy and government heads lashed back, demanding the White House quit its meddling. Venezuela is detaining Tim Tracy, 35, an American they say they’ve been tracking since 2012 and accuse of posing as a filmmaker to plot an uprising with anti-government factions. Mr. Obama scoffed at those claims — and Interior Minister Miguel Rodriguez Torres suggested the White House butt out, Reuters reported. “When you want to do intelligence work in another country, all those big powers who do this type of spying, they often use the façade of a filmmaker, documentary-maker, photographer or journalist,” he said, Reuters reported. “Because with that façade, they can go anywhere, penetrate any place.” Newly seated president Nicolas Maduro, meanwhile, is said to be infuriated by Mr. Obama’s comments. In formal remarks issued over the week, Mr. Maduro — the deceased Hugo Chavez’s handpicked socialist successor — referred to Mr. Obama as “the grand chief of devils.” This isn’t the first time Mr. Maduro suggested the United States back off its criticisms of Venezuela. Mr. Maduro was elected by the slimmest of margins, prompting U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to publicly advocate a recount — and bringing down more fiery rhetoric from the Venezuela leader.

Security concerns mean that any issues will be spun as Obama capitulating to antiAmerican interests, causing a political firestorm LA Times, 12 [Paul West, Staff Writer, July 11th 2012, “Romney, echoing Sen. Rubio, sees Venezuelan threat to U.S. security,” http://articles.latimes.com/2012/jul/11/news/la-pn-romney-echoing-rubio-sees-venezuelanthreat-to-us-security-20120711, accessed 7/4/13, CB] Is Venezuela’s cancer-ridden strongman Hugo Chavez a serious threat to the national security of the United States? Mitt Romney thinks so. And the Republican presidential candidate sharply attacked President Obama on Wednesday for appearing to think otherwise — a hard-line salvo likely to resonate loudest in the southern part of the swing state of Florida, where conservative Cuban Americans are a potent voting bloc. What Obama actually stated, in a brief White House interview this week with a Spanish-language radio and TV journalist, did not, on its face, appear all that incendiary. In fact, his remarks were in line with the long-standing view of both his administration and the administration of Republican President George W. Bush: that Chavez, despite his virulent anti-Americanism and dealings with unsavory regimes around the world, hasn’t had a serious impact on the national security of the United States.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 110 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core That’s not to say that the last two U.S. administrations haven’t been aware of Chavez’s increasing relations with state sponsors of terrorism, specifically Iran, which was the subject of a question posed to the president on Monday by Oscar Haza of Miami’s WJAN-TV. "We're always concerned about Iran engaging in destabilizing activity around the globe. But overall my sense is that what Mr. Chavez has done over the last several years has not had a serious national security impact on us," Obama said in an interview that aired Tuesday night. "We have to be vigilant. My main concern when it comes to Venezuela is having the Venezuelan people have a voice in their affairs, and that you end up ultimately having fair and free elections, which we don't always see." Quick to jump on the president’s words was Sen. Marco Rubio, a Cuban American from south Florida who Romney says he’s vetting as a possible vice-presidential running mate. Rubio, in a statement early Wednesday, charged that Obama had been "living under a rock when it comes to recognizing the national security threat posed by Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez.” While crediting the Obama State Department for having expelled a Venezuelan diplomat earlier this year, after a report that the woman had taken part in discussions about possible cyber attacks against the U.S., the Republican senator said that Obama “continues to display an alarmingly naïve understanding of the challenges and opportunities we face in the Western Hemisphere.” A few hours later, Romney himself joined the criticism, deploring what he described as Obama’s “stunning and shocking comment.” "It is disturbing to see him downplaying the threat posed to U.S. interests by a regime that openly wishes us ill,” said Romney. Chavez "is seeking to lead — together with the Castros — a destabilizing, anti-democratic and anti-American 'Bolivarian Revolution’ across Latin America.” Later, in an interview on Fox, Romney repeated the criticism. “I was stunned by his comments and shocked by them,” Romney said. “The idea that this nation, that this president, doesn’t pose a national security threat to this country is simply naïve. It’s an extraordinary admission on the part of this president to be completely out of touch with what is happening in Latin America… This is a very misguided and misdirected thought, ” he said.

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Unpopular – Bad Relations Anti-Americanism has made relations hostile – we can’t even exchange ambassadors Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. 23, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] Developments in 2010. In February 2010, then-Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Dennis Blair testified before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on the annual threat assessment of the U.S. intelligence community. According to Blair, President “Chávez continues to impose an authoritarian populist political model in Venezuela that undermines democratic institutions.” Blair maintained that with regard to foreign policy, “Chávez’s regional influence may have peaked, but he is likely to support likeminded political allies and movements in neighboring countries and seek to undermine moderate, pro-U.S. governments.” Blair maintained that “Chávez and his allies are likely to oppose nearly every U.S. policy initiative in the region, including the expansion of free trade, counter drug and counterterrorism cooperation, military training, and security initiatives, and even U.S. assistance programs.”73 In August 2010, President Chávez criticized comments by U.S. Ambassador-designate to Venezuela Larry Palmer for his responses to questions for record for his nomination before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that touched on Cuba’s influence in the Venezuelan military and ties between members of the Venezuelan government and the FARC.74 The Venezuelan government maintained that it would not accept Palmer as U.S. Ambassador in Caracas, and on December 20, 2010, officially revoked its agreement for the appointment of Palmer as Ambassador. The State Department responded on December 27, 2010, by revoking the diplomatic visa of Ambassador Bernardo Alvarez. The full Senate did not act on Palmer’s nomination by the end of the 111th Congress, so the nomination was sent back to the President in December 2010. No further action has been taken to restore ambassadors.

Nobody believes in engagement – relations have tanked in recent years Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.31, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] By September 2008, however, U.S. relations with Venezuela took a significant turn for the worse when Venezuela expelled U.S. Ambassador Patrick Duddy and the U.S. responded in kind with Venezuelan Ambassador Bernardo Alvarez. Also in September, U.S. officials criticized Venezuela’s efforts against drug trafficking, and President Bush determined, for the fourth year in a row, that Venezuela had failed demonstrably to adhere to its obligations under international narcotics control agreements. U.S. Treasury Department officials also froze the assets of two high-ranking Venezuelan government officials and the former interior minister for allegedly helping the FARC with weapons and drug trafficking. Under the Obama Administration, Venezuela and the United States announced an agreement on June 25, 2009, for the return of respective ambassadors. While some observers are hopeful that the return of ambassadors will mark an improvement in relations, others emphasize continued U.S. concerns about the Venezuelan government’s treatment of the news media and political opposition and about interference in the affairs of other countries in the region. (See “Obama Administration Policy” below.)

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Unpopular – Too Soft Legislators want a hard line stance against Venezuela—arms embargo proves Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.49, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] U.S. officials have expressed concerns over the past several years about Venezuela’s lack of cooperation on antiterrorism efforts, its relations with Cuba and Iran, and President Chávez’s sympathetic statements for Colombian terrorist groups. Since May 2006, the Secretary of State has made an annual determination that Venezuela has not been “cooperating fully with United States antiterrorism efforts” pursuant to Section 40A of the Arms Export Control Act (P.L. 90629). As a result, the United States has imposed an arms embargo on Venezuela since 2006, which ended all U.S. commercial arms sales and re-transfers to Venezuela. When the State Department issued its first determination in 2006, it was based on Venezuela’s near lack of antiterrorism cooperation over the previous year, citing its support for Iraqi insurgents and Iran’s development of nuclear capabilities, the country’s status as a safe haven for Colombian and Basque terrorist groups, and its effort to derail hemispheric efforts to advance counter-terrorism policies in the OAS.

The U.S. is transitioning to a more hardline policy to respond to violations in democracy and drug trafficking Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. 23-24, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] Developments in 2011. In February 2011, Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper testified about President Chávez’s waning influence in Latin America. According to Clapper, “deteriorating economic conditions in Venezuela and Chávez’s declining popularity at home and abroad have limited his ability to exert influence beyond his core group of allies.”75 Also in February 2011 congressional testimony, then Assistant Secretary of State Arturo Valenzuela criticized the December 2010 action of Venezuela’s outgoing National Assembly for its approval of a law that delegated legislative authority to the executive for 18 months. Valenzuela maintained that the action undermined the authority of the incoming National Assembly and circumscribed its popular will. He maintained that the action “violates the doctrine of the separation of powers and therefore contravenes the Inter-American Democratic Charter.”76 On May 11, 2011, the Department of State determined for the sixth consecutive year that Venezuela was not cooperating fully with U.S. antiterrorism efforts. This determination was made pursuant to Section 40A of the Arms Export Control Act (P.L. 90-629) and allowed for the continuation of the U.S. arms embargo on Venezuela since 2006. On May 24, 2011, the State Department also sanctioned the Venezuelan oil company, Petróleos de Venezuela (PdVSA), pursuant to the Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Disinvestment Act of 2010 (P.L. 111-195) for providing two shipments of reformate, an additive used in gasoline, to Iran, between December 2010 and March 2011. The shipments were valued at around $50 million. Under the sanctions, PdVSA is prohibited from competing for U.S. government procurement contracts, securing financing from the Export-Import Bank, and obtaining U.S. export licenses. The sanctions specifically exclude PdVSA subsidiaries (Citgo) and do not prohibit the export of oil to the United States.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 114 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core In September 2011, as part of the annual narcotics certification process, President Obama again determined that Venezuela had “failed demonstrably” to meet its obligations under international counternarcotics measures. This marked the seventh consecutive annual designation of Venezuela in this category. The justification accompanying the determination maintained that “individual “members of the government and security forces security forces were credibly reported to have engaged in or facilitated drug trafficking activities.”77 The justification noted some positive steps taken by the Venezuelan government in the past year, including the transfer of several major drug traffickers to the United States and other drug traffickers to third countries and a bilateral counternarcotics agreement with Colombia.

Engagement is unpopular – instead, sanctions are being used to contain concerning policies Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. 43, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] U.S. officials have expressed concerns over the past several years about Venezuela’s lack of cooperation on antiterrorism efforts, President Chávez’s sympathetic statements for Colombian terrorist groups (the FARC and ELN), and Venezuela’s relations with Cuba and Iran. Since May 2006, the Secretary of State has made an annual determination that Venezuela has not been “cooperating fully with United States antiterrorism efforts” pursuant to Section 40A of the Arms Export Control Act (P.L. 90-629).143 As a result, the United States has imposed an arms embargo on Venezuela since 2006, which prohibits all U.S. commercial arms sales and retransfers to Venezuela. For several years, U.S. officials also expressed concern that Venezuelan citizenship, identity, and travel documents were easy to obtain, making the country a potentially attractive way-station for terrorists. In June 2011 congressional testimony, State Department officials again expressed concern about “Venezuela’s relations with Iran, its support for the FARC, [and] its lackluster cooperation on counterterrorism.”144 Colombian Terrorist Groups145 To date, the United States has imposed financial sanctions against seven current or former Venezuelan government and military officials for providing support to the FARC. As noted above, in September 2008, the Treasury Department froze the assets of two senior intelligence officials—General Hugo Carvajal and General Henry Rangel—and the former interior minister, Ramón Rodríguez Chacín, for allegedly helping the FARC with weapons and drug trafficking.146 General Rangel was appointed by President Chávez as defense minister in January 2012, an action that raised concern among U.S. policymakers. As noted above, Rangel stepped down in October 2012, and went on to win the governorship of the Venezuelan state of Trujillo in December 2012 elections while Rodríguez Chacín also was elected as governor of the state of Guárico in December. In September 2011, the Treasury Department imposed financial sanctions on four more Venezuelan officials for acting for or on behalf of the FARC, often in direct support of its narcotics and arms trafficking activities. (Also see “Counternarcotics Issues” above.)

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Unpopular – Terrorism Plan unpopular – Terrorism is seen as a bigger priority toward Venezuela Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.49-50, Accessed 7/5/13, CB] U.S. officials have expressed concerns over the past several years about Venezuela’s lack of cooperation on antiterrorism efforts, its relations with Cuba and Iran, and President Chávez’s sympathetic statements for Colombian terrorist groups. Since May 2006, the Secretary of State has made an annual determination that Venezuela has not been “cooperating fully with United States antiterrorism efforts” pursuant to Section 40A of the Arms Export Control Act (P.L. 90629). As a result, the United States has imposed an arms embargo on Venezuela since 2006, which ended all U.S. commercial arms sales and re-transfers to Venezuela. When the State Department issued its first determination in 2006, it was based on Venezuela’s near lack of antiterrorism cooperation over the previous year, citing its support for Iraqi insurgents and Iran’s development of nuclear capabilities, the country’s status as a safe haven for Colombian and Basque terrorist groups, and its effort to derail hemispheric efforts to advance counter-terrorism policies in the OAS. The State Department’s April 2009 Country Reports on Terrorism maintained that while Venezuela President Hugo Chávez’s ideological sympathy for the FARC and the ELN had limited Venezuelan cooperation with Colombia in combating terrorism, President Chávez publicly changed course in June 2008 and called on the FARC to unconditionally release all hostages, declaring that armed struggle is “out of place” in modern Latin America. In July 2008, the Venezuelan military detained a senior FARC official and handed him over to Colombian authorities. Nevertheless, in September 2008, the Treasury Department froze the assets of two senior Venezuelan intelligence officials—General Hugo Carvajal and General Henry Rangel— and the former interior minister, Ramón Rodríguez Chacín, for allegedly helping the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) with weapons and drug trafficking.173 Information on captured computer files from Colombia’s March 2008 raid of a FARC camp in Ecuador had raised questions about potential support of the FARC by the Chávez government. Venezuelan officials have dismissed the data as having been fabricated even though Interpol verified in May 2008 that the files had not been tampered with since they were seized. On June 6, 2008, two Venezuelan nationals (one a national guard sergeant) and two Colombians were arrested in eastern Colombia for gun-running. The four were captured with some 40,000 rounds of ammunition allegedly destined for the FARC. In the April 2009 terrorism report, the State Department stated that the FARC, ELN, and remnants of the AUC often crossed into Venezuelan territory to rest and regroup as well as to extort protection money and kidnap Venezuelans in order to finance their operations. According to the report, the Venezuelan government also did not systematically police its country’s border with Colombia to prevent the movement of armed groups or to interdict the flow of narcotics. Some limited amounts of weapons and ammunition from official Venezuelan stocks and facilities were reported to have ended up in the hands of Colombian terrorist groups. As noted above, the Swedish government questioned Venezuela in late July on how FARC had obtained Swedish made antitank rocket launchers that had been sold to Venezuela in the 1980s. The State Department terrorism report also cited two other concerns about Venezuela. First, as noted in the past, Venezuelan citizenship, identity, and travel documents remained easy to obtain, making the country a potentially attractive way-station for terrorists. Second, the report noted that

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 116 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core passengers on weekly flights connecting Tehran and Damascus with Caracas were subject only to cursory immigration and customs controls in Caracas.

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Unpopular – Snowden Engagement with Venezuela will be massively unpopular—Democrats and Republicans both backlash because of Snowden The Huffington Post 6/24/13 (Eric Yaverbaum, CEO Ericho Communications¶ “All Republicans and Democrats Agree That Snowden Is a Traitorous Villain, Except All the Ones That Don't... Right or Left Finally Not Relevant!,” Lexis, Accessed 7/7/13, JC) Few figures in living memory have been as acutely polarizing as Eric Snowden. For many across the country, the issue is assuredly black and white. The former Booz Allen Hamilton contractor who leaked top-secret information about the NSA's data gathering capabilities with programs code-named PRISM and Boundless Informant [1]has been both damned a traitor and heralded a messiah. To his detractors, Snowden is an American Judas: he swore allegiance to his country and was given the responsibility to safeguard its secrets. Nevertheless, he fled the country as a turncoat carrying top-secret files on a flash drive. Claiming it was for his own safety, Snowden decided to spill the beans in Hong Kong, an "autonomous" region of the Communist "People's Republic" of China, where he provided extensive interviews to Chinese newspapers [2]and leaked confidential documents. Through social media,[3] he broadcast incriminatory messages about the Land of the Free to every corner of the globe. As of this writing, Snowden is living as a jet set celebrity while a fugitive from the American government. According to the news[4], he plans on making a pit stop in Moscow, the seat of a modern-day dictator, on his way towards an unknown destination. Rumor has it that Snowden is seeking political asylum in a "free" country like Venezuela to protect him from extradition or rendition to the Home of the Brave. By law, the National Security Agency is charged with the collection and analysis of foreign communication and signals intelligence. In the age of Big Data and exponentially growing Internet, theirs is an extraordinary responsibility. All three branches of the American government, including officials from every party, have authorized programs designed to prevent disaster from occurring. For the purposes of safeguarding national security and American interests, the NSA and its elected oversight committees have, for decades, carefully shrouded the spy agency's futuristic capabilities with near-complete secrecy. Eric Snowden unilaterally decided to divulge these top-secret operational details to the world. In one fell swoop, the mystery that once protected and promulgated NSA operations has vanished. Snowden's data leaks and subsequent interviews with the media and, in all likelihood, with inquiring foreign intelligence agencies has already resulted in devastating consequences for American relations abroad. The stature and influence of our diplomatic corps at the State Department[5] and the reputation of our clandestine services have been traumatically damaged[6]. To the Anti-Snowden camp, in an age of both nationless terrorism and an uneasy détente with rogue states, Eric Snowden committed sins unforgivable: he aided the enemy, furnishing every radical organization in the world with blueprints to the most valuable components of the American defense infrastructure. Perhaps worse, he gifted untold measures of political capital to our enemies and provided ready-made propaganda that is sure to foment antiAmerican attitudes and destructive behavior. As a result, it should come as no surprise that elected officials across the board condemn Snowden. In fact, the Anti-Snowden crowd is perhaps the most diverse collective in American politics: it is made up of people from every wing of every party. Liberal lions and ultra-conservatives are, for the first time since 9/11, standing together to angrily shake their fists and mutter promises of a righteous, vengeful justice. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham has declared Snowden a traitor and recently declared "I hope we'll chase him to the ends of the Earth.[7]" House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi was booed after describing Snowden as a criminal at a liberal conference in San Jose, California, near her home district. Her response was to lecture the crowd, "...you don't have the responsibility for the security of the

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 118 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core United States. Those of us who do have to strike a difference balance.[8]" Both Republican Congressman Peter King and Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein have accused Snowden of treason[9], yet they are diametrically opposed on so many other topics[10]. Given this perspective, it's astonishing that millions of American citizens are celebrating this "self-evident treason." Huge masses of Democrats and Republicans alike are united in support of what some consider to be virulently anti-American activity.

Snowden makes US-Venezuelan economic relations politically unpopular Negroponte, Latin America Initiative Brookings senior fellow, 7/2/13 (Diana Villiers Negroponte, July 2, 2013, Brookings, “Consequences for Venezuela if Maduro Offers Asylum to Edward Snowden,” Accessed 7/4/13, JC) Within these relations, Secretary of State Kerry met with Foreign Minister Elías Jaua on the margins of the recent OAS meeting in Guatemala. The report of the meeting indicated that Kerry was firm and insisted that improvements had to be made in specific areas before diplomatic relations at the Ambassadorial level could resume. Among those areas of collaboration was Venezuelan permission for Drug Enforcement Agents to carry out counter-narcotics investigations and improvement of airport security. Without serious progress in these areas, relations with Washington would not improve. More recently, the State Department has sent the message to Jaua through his Charge d’Affaire in Washington, Calixto Ortega, that the grant of asylum to Snowden would jeopardize all bilateral projects. In appointing Ortega to Washington, bilateral relations had begun to improve. “Ortega has a lot of knowledge of U.S. society, and we know that he will contribute a lot towards increasing dialogue…We want to have the best ties with all the world’s governments, and the U.S. government, but on the basis of respect. There can be no threats,” said Maduro in his April 24th statement reported by www.venezuelanalysis.com. “I have decided to name Calixto Ortega so that dialogue with U.S. society can increase, with the universities, the academic world, the social and union world, the Afro-American community, the Latino community, Congress, senators, representatives, the economic, trade and energy sectors.” Ortega, the former Venezuelan minister to the Latin American parliament was well received at the State Department and hope exists in Washington that bilateral relations can improve on a steady and pragmatic basis. However, flying Snowden to Venezuela and granting him asylum will blow apart the prospects for improved relations. The recently formed Continental Coalition of Social Movements in support of the Bolivarian Alliance (ALBA) may rejoice that Snowden can operate and speak freely in Venezuela, but the prospects of dialogue with U.S. economic, trade and energy sectors will fizzle out. Without U.S. support, few nations will step in to help meet Venezuela’s rising debt repayments and falling foreign reserves. In deciding whether to give Snowden a way out of Moscow, Maduro must balance the economic wellbeing of Venezuela against the short term notoriety of saving Snowden.

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Unpopular – Snowden – Going to Venezuela Snowden will accept asylum in Venezuela Washington Times 7/2/13 (Valerie Richardson, July 2nd 2013, Washington Times, “Venezuela’s President Maduro defends Edward Snowden: ‘He did not kill anyone’,” http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jul/2/venezuelas-president-maduro-defends-edwardsnowden/?page=all, Accessed 7/4/13, JC) Meanwhile, Mr. Snowden’s increasingly desperate bids for asylum to escape prosecution on espionage charges could lead him back to America — specifically, South America. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro defended the accused leaker to Russian reporters Tuesday during a visit to Moscow to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin. “He did not kill anyone and did not plant a bomb,” said Mr. Maduro, according to the Interfax news agency. “What he did was tell a great truth in an effort to prevent wars. He deserves protection under international and humanitarian law.”

Venezuela defied US on Snowden Global Post 7/5/13 (July 5, 2013, Global Post, “Venezuela offers asylum to U.S. fugitive Snowden,” http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/thomson-reuters/130705/venezuelas-maduro-offers-asylumsnowden, Accessed 7/6/13, JC) CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro offered asylum to former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden in defiance of Washington, which is demanding his arrest for divulging details of secret U.S. spy programs. Snowden, 30, is believed to be holed up in the transit area of Moscow's Sheremetyevo international airport and has been trying to find a country that would take him since he landed from Hong Kong on June 23. "In the name of America's dignity ... I have decided to offer humanitarian asylum to Edward Snowden," Maduro told a military parade marking Venezuela's independence day. "He is a young man who has told the truth, in the spirit of rebellion, about the United States spying on the whole world."

Snowden’s asylum makes Venezuela a hot-button issue Bloomberg 7/6/13 [Anatoly Kurmanaev and Nathan Crooks, July 6th 2013, “Venezuela Leads Latin American Shelter Offers to Snowden,” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-06/venezuela-offers-asylum-to-u-sfugitive-edward-snowden.html, Accessed 7/6/13, CB] Venezuela’s offer was matched by Bolivia and Nicaragua, which opened their doors to the 30-year-old behind leaks on top-secret U.S. National Security Agency programs that collect telephone and Internet data. The U.S. pursuit of Snowden has roiled international relations. “We will give asylum to this North American, who is persecuted by his compatriots, if he asks us. We are not afraid,” Bolivian President Evo Morales was quoted as saying by the Bolivian state news agency in Chipaya, Oruro today.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 120 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Morales said the offer is “justified protest” against four European countries that denied him flyover permission on U.S-fed suspicion that his plane carried Snowden from Moscow on July 2. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said yesterday he would receive Snowden “circumstances permitting,” in comments broadcast on Venezuelan state television. Maduro, Ortega and Morales didn’t say if they would issue travel documents to him. ‘Consequences’ “These leaders have made their point. They are clearly taking the plane incident seriously,” Diego Moya-Ocampos, a Latin America analyst at consulting firm IHS Global Insight, said by phone from London today. “There are going to be consequences, but they are willing to take that risk.” Snowden remains in limbo at an airport in Moscow after withdrawing his request for asylum in Russia. He has instead sought refuge in 26 other countries, including Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua, according to the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks. Snowden, whose U.S. passport was revoked, can’t leave the Moscow airport transit zone without a new travel document. He dropped his request for asylum in Russia after President Vladimir Putin said July 1 that the American must stop hurting U.S. interests if he wants to remain there.

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Unpopular – Iran Democrats and Republicans hate engagement with Venezuela—viewed as concession to Iranian ally Bowman, VOA News, 12 (Michael Bowman, February 16th 2012, “U.S. Congress Warns Venezuela over Ties with Iran,” http://www.thecuttingedgenews.com/index.php?article=72042&pageid=17&pagename=News, Accessed 7/7/13, JC) U.S. senators are warning Latin American nations against deepening financial and military ties with Iran, pledging heightened U.S. vigilance of Iranian activities in the Western Hemisphere. The Senate's Foreign Relations Subcommittee took a close look on February 16 at Tehran’s dealings with Latin America. Iran’s increasingly isolated regime retains friends in Latin America, most notably Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. U.S. Democratic Senator Robert Menendez had a stern message for the region. “Unfortunately, there are some countries in this hemisphere that, for political or financial gain, have courted Iranian overtures. They proceed at their own risk: the risk of sanctions from the United States, and the risk of abetting a terrorist state,” he said. Republican Senator Marco Rubio echoed that message. “The leaders of these [Latin American] countries are playing with fire,” Rubio said. Researcher Douglas Farah said Iran's intentions in Latin America are twofold. “To develop the capacity and capability to wreak havoc in Latin America and possibly the U.S. homeland, if the Iranian leadership views this as necessary to the survival of its nuclear program, and to develop and expand the ability to blunt international sanctions that are crippling the regime’s economic life,” Farah said. Of particular concern: Iran’s quest for raw nuclear materials and what U.S. National Intelligence Director James Clapper recently described as Iran’s increasing willingness to mount attacks on U.S. soil.

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Unpopular – Oil Venezuelan oil interests are unpopular in Congress – oil diplomacy is used to undermine the U.S. in the region Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.47-48, Accessed 7/5/13, CB] Since 2005, President Chávez has used so-called “oil diplomacy” to provide oil to Caribbean Basin nations on preferential terms in a program known as PetroCaribe, prompting U.S. concern that Venezuela is using these programs to increase its influence in the region. Under the program, Venezuela initially offered to supply 190,000 barrels per day of oil to the region on preferential terms with 50% of the oil financed over 25 years at an annual interest rate of 1%. At a July 2008 PetroCaribe summit, President Chávez announced that up to 60% of the oil could be financed while oil prices remained over $100 a barrel, and this would rise to 70% financed if oil prices rise to over $150 a barrel. Most Caribbean nations are members, with the exception of Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago. Cuba, a major beneficiary, receives over 90,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil under the program. In Central America, Nicaragua and Honduras joined PetroCaribe in 2007 and Guatemala joined in July 2008. PetroCaribe also has the goal of putting in place a regional supply, refining, and transportation and storage network, and establishing a development fund for those countries participating in the program. In addition to these preferential oil arrangements, Venezuela is investing in energy sectors in several Latin American countries. Chávez has pledged to invest $1.5 billion in Bolivia’s gas industry. Ecuador and Venezuela have signed agreements for joint development in oil, gas, refining, and petrochemical sectors. In 2005, PdVSA signed an agreement to build an oil refinery in northeastern Brazil. Construction on the 200,000 bpd refinery began in September 2007, and is to be supplied with oil from both Brazil and Venezuela when it begins operations in 2010. Colombia and Venezuela signed an agreement in July 2006 initiating a gas pipeline project that would initially supply gas to Venezuela from northern Colombia, and then reverse the flow once Venezuela develops its own natural gas reserves. Argentina and Venezuela also announced an alliance in July 2006 involving cooperation on hydrocarbon exploration and development in both countries. In Cuba, PdVSA helped refurbish an oil refinery in Cienfuegos, and has signed an exploration and production agreement with Cupet, Cuba’s state-oil company.166 The potential use of Venezuela’s windfall oil profits abroad to influence activities in other Latin American countries was highlighted in December 2007 when three Venezuelans—Franklin Duran, Moises Maionica, and Carlos Kauffmann—and one Uruguayan national were arrested and charged in U.S. federal court in Miami with acting and conspiring to act as agents of the Venezuelan government without prior notification to the U.S. Attorney General. (A fifth foreign national wanted in the case, Antonio José Canchica Gomez, reportedly a Venezuelan intelligence official, remains at large.) All four defendants were alleged to have conspired in a scheme to conceal the source and destination and the role of the Venezuelan government in the attempted delivery of $800,000 to Argentina by a U.S. businessman, Guido Alejandro Antonini Wilson. The funds were alleged to be destined for the presidential campaign of Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. High-level Venezuelan officials also were alleged to be involved in the matter, including from the Office of the Vice President and the Intelligence and Preventative Services Directorate (DISIP).167 Ultimately three of the four defendants facing trial—Maionica, Kauffmann, and Wanseele—pled guilty, while Duran was tried and convicted in early November 2008 and later sentenced to four years.

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The oil sector hates Venezuelan management of hydrocarbons Mufson, Washington Post 13 [Steven Mufson, Staff Writer, March 7th 2013, “The politics of oil, post-'Chavismo',” lexis, Accessed 7/6/13, CB] Five years ago, a full-page ad blasting Exxon Mobil appeared in the Venezuelan newspaper Ultimas Noticias. Drawings of drops of oil went from black at the top of the page to red at the bottom. "Exxon turns oil into blood," the bold-face text declared. Addressing "Exxtranjero" - the Spanish word for foreigner, with an extra "x" - it used a slogan from the Spanish Civil War that roughly translates as "you will not pass." The ad summed up the combative relationship the late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez had with some international oil companies and how he used his country's vast oil riches as a political tool and weapon. Abroad, he pushed for crude prices of $100 a barrel. At home, subsidies have kept fuel prices down around 8 cents a gallon. "He's a charmer. He's a liar," said one oil industry executive who knew Chavez, speaking on condition of anonymity to protect business relationships. "He's done a lot to improve the lot of his people. He ruined the oil industry." Few analysts expect much change from his vice president and potential successor, Nicolas Maduro, who would need to bolster his domestic base. The state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA), once regarded as one of the world's best, has become the government's social-spending arm while investment in oil fields has lagged. The year before Chavez became president, Venezuela's oil production reached 3.5 million barrels a day. Then it slumped so badly that even after a modest recovery, it averaged only 2.5 million barrels a day last year. Meanwhile PDVSA, even after purging thousands of experienced engineers and managers during a labor dispute, has grown to about 99,000 employees, according to a report from the Eurasia Group consulting firm. And half of its staggering $36 billion in debt is held by China. "PDVSA is a shadow of its former self," said David Goldwyn, a consultant and formerly the State Department's special envoy and coordinator for international energy affairs under Hillary Rodham Clinton. "The refineries are [in] shambles. Fields are in decline. New investment is stagnant." Chavez also raised the state oil company's share in production projects to 60 percent, and while most companies cut new deals, a couple, including Exxon Mobil, went to court. Only historically high crude oil prices of about $100 a barrel have saved the country's economy from ruin. Revenue stayed high even though the heavily subsidized domestic consumption has jumped 39 percent since 2001 and exports dropped by nearly half to 1.7 million barrels a day. While condemning the United States and wooing countries such as Russia and Iran, Chavez still relied heavily on U.S. Gulf Coast refineries that were among the few capable of handling Venezuela's thick, low-quality crude oil. About half of Venezuela's crude ends up in the United States. But if the Keystone XL pipeline is built, similar-quality crude from Canada's oil sands could push out Venezuelan petroleum. "I think Chavez will be remembered for politicizing a once professional national oil company and managing to increase control but decrease production, miss the [liquefied natural gas] boom, and open the U.S. refining sector for Canadian oil," Goldwyn said. Referring to Canada's rival oil industry center, Goldwyn said, "He should be a hero in Calgary." Venezuela was a founding member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, and Chavez pushed for lower production and higher prices. But he wielded little power in the cartel, which is dominated by the Persian Gulf producers. Chavez still used oil as a tool of his foreign policy.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 124 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core "Venezuela is currently giving away around one third of its oil production at below-market prices, which together account for an estimated $20 billion in lost revenue per year," said a report by the Eurasia Group, equal to 6.5 percent of gross domestic product. The firm estimated that Venezuela shipped around 200,000 barrels a day to Caribbean and Central American countries in 2012 and 115,000 barrels a day to Cuba. In addition, Venezuela is sending more oil to China - about half a million barrels a day, according to the Eurasia Group - in part to meet its heavy interest payments on debt held by China. Few analysts expect change in the Chavez oil policies soon. "I doubt that the opening of the petroleum sector is in the cards, especially in the short term," said Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue. "Maduro will have to tread carefully, and reforming PDVSA could risk support within Chavismo [the name given to Chavez's political movement]. On the other hand, if the economic situation becomes completely untenable and Maduro eventually faces the choice of a greater opening or losing political control, he might opt for the former, however reluctantly." A report by Daniel Kerner, an analyst at the Eurasia Group, said, "Under a successor government, PDVSA would likely remain a key source of financing for the government's social programs, infringing on its investment capacity." "A Maduro administration is unlikely to significantly alter any of these programs," Kerner added. "In fact, in a context where the president would likely have lower political capital than Chavez and would likely face significant economic challenges, he would be even more reliant on maintaining such programs for his own political capital."

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Unpopular – Freedom of the Press Action toward Venezuela unpopular – freedom of the press violations Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.11-12, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] The OAS Office of the Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression expressed concern in late December 2006 about Venezuela’s decision and its effect on freedom of expression. OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza issued a statement on January 5, 2007, expressing concern that Venezuela’s decision not to renew the license of Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) gave the appearance of censorship. He expressed hope that the action would be reversed by the Venezuelan government.25 The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights expressed concern about freedom of expression in Venezuela and called on the Venezuelan government to protect pluralism in the media.26 Numerous human rights also organizations denounced Venezuela’s decision not to renew RCTV’s license as a violation of freedom of speech. These included the Inter-American Press Association, Reporters Without Borders, the Committee to Protect Journalists, the Instituto Prensa y Sociedad, and Human Rights Watch, which maintained that the government’s decision was politically motivated and was a serious setback for freedom of expression.27 Thousands of protestors marched in Caracas at events in April and May 2007 denouncing the government decision, but the government followed through with its decision and RCTV ceased its public broadcasting on May 27. The closure of RCTV prompted protests, primarily by students who oppose the government’s action as a violation of freedom of their civil rights. The strength and endurance of the student-led protests appear to have taken the government by surprise. Polls reportedly show that more than 70% of Venezuelans disagree with President Chávez’s decision to close RCTV.28 Nevertheless, the government has threatened legal action against another private television station, Globovisión, accusing it of inciting assassination attempts against President Chávez. Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro has asserted that the United States is behind plans to destabilize Venezuela. Several countries, including the United States, spoke out against Venezuela’s action. The U.S. Senate approved S.Res. 211 (Lugar) on May 24, 2007 by unanimous consent expressing profound concerns regarding freedom of expression in Venezuela and the government’s decision not to renew the license of RCTV. In the aftermath of RCTV’s closure, the State Department issued a statement calling on Venezuela to reverse its policies that limit freedom of expression.29 The European Parliament adopted a resolution on May 24, 2007, expressing concern about Venezuela’s action, and calling for the government to ensure equal treatment under the law for all media. On May 31, 2007, the Brazilian Senate issued a strong statement calling for President Chávez to review his decision. The Chilean Senate also supported a resolution against the closure of RCTV. At the OAS General Assembly meeting held in Panama June 3-5, 2007, several nations, such as Canada, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Peru, in addition to the United States, spoke out for freedom of the press. Ultimately, however, the OAS did not approve a resolution specifically criticizing Venezuela for its actions, but adopted a resolution reaffirming the right to freedom of expression and calling upon member states to respect and ensure respect for this right.30

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Unpopular – Human Rights Engagement is unpopular – Venezuela routinely disobeys human rights requests Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.25-26, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] In March 2007, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) issued a statement expressing concern about the human rights situation in Venezuela and appealing to the government to allow an IACHR representative to visit the country. The Commission stated that in the last years it “has observed a gradual deterioration of the constitutional order that has compromised the full enjoyment of human rights” and expressed concern about freedom of expression in the country.68 In its 2007 annual report, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights highlights the difficulties that human rights defenders face in Venezuela, including attacks and threats on their life, and other obstacles such as public discrediting by state officials.69 Some observers are concerned that Chávez is using his political strength to push toward authoritarian rule. Human Rights Watch maintains that the Chávez government dealt a severe blow to judicial independence by packing the Supreme Court with his supporters under a new law that expanded the court from 20 to 32 justices. Since 2004, according to Human Rights Watch, the packed Court has fired hundreds of provisional judges and granted to permanent judgeships to about 1,000 others.70 The Chávez government enacted a broadcast media law in December 2004 that could allow the government to restrict news coverage that is critical of the government, while in March 2005 it amended Venezuela’s criminal code to broaden laws that punish “disrespect for government authorities.” The IACHR and human rights groups such as the Committee to Protect Journalists, Reporters Without Borders, and the Inter-American Press Association maintain that these measures have restricted freedom of expression, with newspapers and broadcasters practicing self-censorship. (Also see “RCTV Closure and Public Reaction” above.) In September 2008, Human Rights Watch issued an extensive report examining setbacks in human rights protections and practices under the Chávez government. The report states that under President Chávez, the Venezuelan government has: tolerated, encouraged, and engaged in wideranging acts of discrimination against political opponents and critics; undermined freedom of expression through a variety of measures aimed at reshaping media content and control; sought to remake the country’s labor movement in ways that violate basic principles of freedom of association; and undermined its own ability to address the country’s long-standing human rights problems through its adversarial approach to local rights advocates and civil society organizations. The report makes recommendations for the Venezuelan government to take actions in each of these areas in order to promote a more inclusive democracy.71 In an immediate response to the release of the Human Rights Watch report, the Venezuelan government expelled two staff members of the human rights organization visiting the country on September 18, 2008, an action that was condemned by numerous human rights groups throughout Latin America.72 On September 26, 2008, 41 members of the U.S. House of Representatives wrote to President Chávez expressing their outrage over the expulsion of the Human Rights Watch staff, and urging the President to embrace the recommendations of the report and strengthen the promotion of human rights, democratic institutions, and political pluralism in the country. In late November 2008, the Washington-based Due Process of Law Foundation issued a report criticizing the imprisonment of eight police officials accused of murder in April 2002 during a massive opposition demonstration that led to the temporary ouster of President Chávez. The report alleged violation of the police officials’ due process and raised concerns about the

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 127 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core independence of the judges in the case.7

Venezuela causes fights in Congress because of their terrible human rights track record Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. 28, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] An extensive Human Rights Watch report on Venezuela issued in July 2012 maintains that the human rights situation in the country has become even more precarious in recent years.88 It noted that the pro-Chávez majority in the National Assembly approved legislation in 2010 expanding the government’s powers to limit free speech and punish its critics. It asserts that the Supreme Court “has explicitly rejected the principle that the judiciary should serve as a check on presidential power, while joining with the president in dismissing the authority of the InterAmerican system of human rights.” For almost a decade, President Chávez has not allowed the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to visit the country, while in July 2012 he announced that Venezuela would withdraw from the jurisdiction of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. The report contends that “the accumulation of power in the executive, the removal of institutional safeguards, and the erosion of human rights guarantees have given the Chávez government free reign to intimidate, censor, and prosecute Venezuelans who criticize the president or thwart his political agenda.” The State Department’s 2011 human rights report (issued in May 2012) maintains that the “principal human rights abuses reported during the year included government actions to impede freedom of expression and criminalize dissent.”89 According to the State Department, the Venezuelan government harassed and intimidated privately owned television stations, other media outlets, and journalists. The government was reported to have thwarted judicial independence, and to have used the judiciary to intimidate and selectively prosecute political, union, business, and civil society leaders critical of the government. The State Department report also cites other human rights problems such as unlawful killings; torture and degrading treatment; prison violence and harsh prison conditions; inadequate juvenile detention centers; arbitrary arrests and detentions; police corruption and impunity; interference with property rights; and threats against domestic nongovernmental organizations. The significant problem of prison violence was highlighted once again on August 19, 2012, when a clash between gangs at a prison in Miranda state reportedly resulted in at least 25 deaths.

Venezuela unpopular—Human Rights Violations and Drug Trafficking Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.1-2, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] On October 3, 2008, Venezuelan military intelligence officials detained retired General Raúl Baduel, and prohibited him from leaving the country on charges of corruption during his tenure as defense minister. A former Chávez supporter, Baduel has become a staunch critic of the President. Chávez opponents maintain that the action against Baduel was intended to intimidate the opposition before the state and municipal elections scheduled for November 23. On September 26, 2008, 41 members of the U.S. House of Representatives wrote to President

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 128 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Chávez expressing their outrage over the expulsion of two Human Rights Watch staff, and urging the President to embrace the recommendations of the report and strengthen the promotion of human rights, democratic institutions, and political pluralism in the country. On September 18, 2008, Human Rights Watch issued an extensive report examining setbacks in human rights protections and practices under the Chávez government. Late in the evening, the Venezuelan government expelled two Human Rights Watch employees visiting the country, an action that was condemned by numerous human rights groups throughout Latin America. The full report, “A Decade Under Chávez, Political Intolerance and Lost Opportunities for Advancing Human Rights in Venezuela, ” is available at http://hrw.org/reports/2008/venezuela0908/. On September 16, 2008, for the fourth year in a row, President Bush determined that Venezuela had failed demonstrably to adhere to its obligations under international narcotics control agreements, but waived sanctions to allow the continuation of U.S. foreign assistance to support civil society programs and community development programs. On September 12, 2008, the U.S. Treasury Department froze the assets of two senior Venezuelan intelligence officials and the former interior minister for allegedly helping the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) with weapons and drug trafficking. The State Department also declared Venezuela’s U.S. Ambassador Bernardo Alvarez persona non grata. On September 11, 2008, President Chávez announced that he was expelling the U.S. Ambassador to Venezuela, Patrick Duddy, and alleged that the Venezuelan government had foiled a U.S.backed conspiracy to assassinate him. Chávez also announced that he was recalling the Venezuelan Ambassador to the United States, Bernardo Alvarez.

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Popular – Chavez’s Death Plan popular—US officials see Maduro’s leadership as an opportunity to improve relations LA Times 3/6/13 (Paul Richter and Chris Kraul, March 6, 2013, Los Angeles Times, “U.S.-Venezuela ties may warm postChavez,” http://articles.latimes.com/2013/mar/06/world/la-fg-us-venezuela-20130306, Accessed 7/5/13, JC) Though Chavez's immediate successors probably won't jettison his socialist domestic policy, those in position to take over don't appear to have the same hunger for regional leadership or the skill to take on such a role, say current and former U.S. officials and other analysts. That could make the relationship with Washington less rancorous, if not exactly warm. "Chavez had a map in his mind of how he wanted to pursue his revolutionary project around the world," said Stephen Johnson, a top Pentagon policymaker on Latin America during the George W. Bush administration. "It's hard to imagine that his successor is going to have the same determination or selfconfidence in those areas." On Tuesday, the first indication of the future was not particularly comforting. Nicolas Maduro, Chavez's vice president and designated heir, announced on national TV that American military attache David Delmonaco must leave the country within 24 hours for "proposing destabilizing plans" to members of Venezuela's armed forces. Maduro also implied that the U.S. was at fault for Chavez's illness and said he would set up a scientific commission to investigate. Later, a U.S. Air Force assistant attache was also expelled. But over time, analysts say, Maduro's track record has not reflected the same fiery nature as that of Chavez. Though Maduro, as foreign minister, worked to separate Venezuela further from the United States, building stronger ties with Cuba, Russia and China, he doesn't have Chavez's forceful personality, analysts say. He echoes Chavez's hard-line views about U.S. influence worldwide as well as other key points of Venezuela's foreign policy, but U.S. officials see him as a deal maker rather than an antagonist, and some have even praised his affability. Apparently with Chavez's blessing, Maduro recently showed signs of wanting to explore what might be gained by better relations with the United States: In November, he began talks with Roberta Jacobson, assistant secretary of State for Latin America.

Plan has bipartisan support—Congress seeks to use Chavez’s death to recast USVenezuela relations Fox News 3/16/13 (March 6, 2013, Fox News, “Obama, US lawmakers see 'new chapter' in Venezuela after Chavez's death,” http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/03/06/obama-us-supports-venezuelan-people-as-begin-newchapter-after-chavez/#ixzz2YDbABErH, Accessed 7/5/13, JC) U.S. officials quickly cast Hugo Chavez's death as an opportunity for America to rebuild a relationship with Venezuela and for the country itself to pursue “meaningful democratic reforms," with President Obama heralding a "new chapter" in the Latin American country's history. Chavez, who had been battling cancer since 2011, died Tuesday after 14 years in power. An election is expected to be held in 30 days – the transition marks one of the first major challenges for newly appointed Secretary of State John Kerry. Obama kept a measured tone in a statement released Tuesday evening.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 130 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core "At this challenging time of President Hugo Chavez’s passing, the United States reaffirms its support for the Venezuelan people and its interest in developing a constructive relationship with the Venezuelan government," Obama said. "As Venezuela begins a new chapter in its history, the United States remains committed to policies that promote democratic principles, the rule of law, and respect for human rights. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill were less reserved. “Hugo Chavez was a tyrant who forced the people of Venezuela to live in fear,” Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in a written statement. “His death dents the alliance of anti-U.S. leftist leaders in South America. Good riddance to this dictator.” He said that, while not guaranteed, “closer U.S. relations with this key country in our Hemisphere are now possible.” Royce’s Democratic counterpart on the committee, Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., also said Chavez’s death is an “opportunity” for the people of Venezuela to “chart a new course.” “This is a moment to review and renew our relationships with Venezuela and nations throughout the Americas based upon fundamentally shared values that bind our entire hemisphere,” he said. Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., expressed hope for a peaceful transition “with real, meaningful democratic reforms.”

Their cards are outdated—Chavez’s death creates a political opportunity to strengthen relations Samay Live 3/6/13 (March 6, 2013, Samay Live,¶ “Obama: After Chavez, U.S. open to constructive ties with Venezuela,” Lexis, Accessed 7/4/13, JC) However, Congressman Mike Rogers, Chairman of the Huse Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence alleged that Chavez was a destabilising force in Latin America. "Hugo Chavez was a destabilising force in Latin America,and an obstacle to progress in the region. I hope his death provides an opportunity for a new chapter in US-Venezuelan relations," he said. Congressman, Ed Royce, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, described his death as good riddance to a dictator. "Hugo Chavez was a tyrant who forced the people of Venezuela to live in fear. His death dents the alliance of anti-US leftist leaders in South America. Good riddance to this dictator," Royce said. Senator Robert Menendez, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, hoped that will be a free and fair election now. "Hugo Chavez ruled Venezuela with an iron hand and his passing has left a political void that we hope will be filled peacefully and through a constitutional and democratic process, grounded in the Venezuelan constitution and adhering to the Inter-American Democratic Charter," he said. "With free and fair elections, Venezuela can begin to restore its once robust democracy and ensure respect for the human, political and civil rights of its people," Menendez added.

Stronger cooperation with Maduro is popular—the US seeks bilateral improvements in human rights and democracy Sullivan, Congressional Research Service specialist in Latin American Affairs, 4/9/13 (Mark P. Sullivan Specialist in Latin American Affairs, April 9, 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Hugo Chávez’s Death: Implications for Venezuela and U.S. Relations,” p. 6, http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R42989.pdf, Accessed 7/4/13, JC) Despite tensions in relations, the Obama Administration maintains that it remains committed to

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 131 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core seeking constructive engagement with Venezuela, focusing on such areas as anti-drug and counterterrorism efforts. In the aftermath of President Chávez’s reelection in October 2012, the White House, while acknowledging differences with President Chávez, congratulated the Venezuelan people on the high level of participation and the relatively peaceful election process. Subsequently, in November 2012, the State Department’s Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Roberta Jacobson, engaged in a conversation with Vice President Maduro about improving bilateral relations, including greater cooperation on counternarcotics issues. In early January 2013, the State Department reiterated that the United States remained open to dialogue with Venezuela on a range of issues of mutual interest. In light of the setback in President Chávez’s health, a State Department spokesman maintained on January 9, 2013, that “regardless of what happens politically in Venezuela, if the Venezuelan government and if the Venezuelan people want to move forward with us, we think there is a path that’s possible.”11 In response to President Chávez’s death, President Obama issued the following statement: At this challenging time of President Hugo Chávez’s passing, the United States reaffirms its support for the Venezuelan people and its interest in developing a constructive relationship with the Venezuelan government. As Venezuela begins a new chapter in its history, the United States remains committed to policies that promote democratic principles, the rule of law, and respect for human rights.12 While the President’s statement did not offer traditional condolences, the State Department maintains that it expressed U.S. sympathy to Chávez’s family and to the Venezuelan people.13 Many Latin American and other foreign leaders have expressed their condolences to Venezuela on Chávez’s passing. The White House statement focused on the U.S. interest in getting cooperative bilateral relations back on track while at the same time reiterating that the United States is committed to promoting democratic practices and respect for human rights. A number of other statements by Members of Congress also expressed hope for a new era in U.S.-Venezuelan relations.

Chavez’s death kills political opposition to the plan Clarke, Salt of the Earth magazine staff, 3/25/13 (Kevin, MA in International Studies from DePaul University, “Chavez Death Brings New Chance For U.S.-Venezuela Engagement,” http://americamagazine.org/issue/chavez-death-brings-new-chance-usvenezuela-engagement, Accessed 7/9/13) Father Carnes said Chávez’s passing offers an opportunity for the United States, politically and economically, to revive its relationship with Venezuela. Occasionally “capricious and doctrinaire,” Chávez was “someone the United States had a hard time negotiating with,” according to Father Carnes. Whether his designated political heir, Vice President Nicholas Maduro, or an opposition candidate, most likely Henrique Capriles Radonski, governor of the Venezuelan state of Miranda, is elected to replace Chávez, Father Carnes expects a more pragmatic and less confrontational leadership to emerge. That could mean improved ties not just with Venezuela but throughout the region, he said, and a possible opening for renewed U.S. investment and partnership with the Venezuelan state oil industry . Despite Chávez’s notorious distaste for U.S. political leaders, under his leadership Venezuela remained one of the largest suppliers of oil to the United States. This is likely to continue.

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Popular – Democracy Promotion Engagement would be popular—spun as promoting democracy Agence France-Presse, 13 [March 5th 2013, Agence France-Presse, “Obama on the death of Hugo Chavez: We support the Venezuelan people,” http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/03/05/obama-on-the-death-of-hugo-chavez-wesupport-the-venezuelan-people/, Accessed 7/5/13, CB] President Barack Obama said within hours of the death of American foe President Hugo Chavez Tuesday that the United States was interested in a “constructive” future relationship with Venezuela. Antipathy in the US Congress towards the leftist champion Chavez, who died after a long battle with cancer, meanwhile bubbled up quickly, with lawmakers branding him a tyrant and one top Republican bluntly saying “good riddance.” “At this challenging time of President Hugo Chavez’s passing, the United States reaffirms its support for the Venezuelan people and its interest in developing a constructive relationship with the Venezuelan government,” Obama said. “As Venezuela begins a new chapter in its history, the United States remains committed to policies that promote democratic principles, the rule of law, and respect for human rights,” he said in a short written statement. While Obama’s statement was measured, as would be expected of a head of state, reactions to Chavez’s death in Congress were more vituperative. “For over a decade Chavez had used corruption, intimidation, manipulation, and brutal tactics to rule over the Venezuelan people,” said veteran Republican congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. “Chavez misruled Venezuela with an iron grip on the government, economy, and the courts as he routinely bullied the media and the opposition to deny the people of Venezuela their basic freedoms. “Today, his death marks the end of this tyrannical rule but the road to democracy for the Venezuelan people is still very much uncertain.” Robert Menendez, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Chavez had ruled with an “iron hand” and left a “political void.” “With free and fair elections, Venezuela can begin to restore its once robust democracy and ensure respect for the human, political and civil rights of its people,” he said. Ed Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, branded Chavez a “tyrant” who forced his people to live in fear. “His death dents the alliance of anti-US leftist leaders in South America. Good riddance to this dictator,” Royce said in a statement. “Venezuela once had a strong democratic tradition and was close to the United States. “Chavez’s death sets the stage for fresh elections. While not guaranteed, closer US relations with his key country in our hemisphere are now possible.”

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Popular – Drug Trade Engagement Popular- seen as necessary to help fight the drug trade Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. 37, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] In its March 2012 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR), the State Department contended that Venezuela was one of the preferred trafficking routes for the transit of cocaine out of South America because of a porous border with Colombia, a weak judicial system, inconsistent international counternarcotics cooperation, generally permissive law enforcement, and a corrupt political environment. The illicit drugs transiting Venezuela are destined for the Eastern Caribbean, Central America, United States, Western Africa, and Europe. The report maintained that U.S. government estimates of cocaine transiting through Venezuela were 161-212 metric tons (compared to 250 metric tons noted in the 2011 INCSR). According to the 2012 INCSR, Venezuela’s National Anti-Drug Office (ONA), Venezuela seized 42 metric tons in 2011 (down from 63 metric tons in 2010), with 62% cocaine and 37% marijuana. In 2011, Venezuela also deported three fugitives wanted on drug charges to the United States: in March, Gloria Rojas Valencia, allegedly working for Los Zetas (a violent Mexican drug trafficking organization) in Venezuela; in September, Lionel Scott Harris, a U.S. citizen; and in December, Maximiliano Bonilla Orozco, also known as “Valenciano,” one of Colombia’s top drug traffickers. The State Department maintained in the INCSR that that “the United States remains prepared to deepen cooperation with Venezuela to help counter the increasing flow of cocaine and other illegal drugs.” As in the past, the State Department reiterated that cooperation could be improved through formal reengagement between Venezuelan and U.S. law enforcement agencies and the signing of the outstanding addendum to the 1978 Bilateral Counternarcotics MOU that was negotiated in 2005, which would provide funds for joint counternarcotics projects and demand reduction programs. The INCSR proffered that bilateral cooperation could also include counternarcotics and anti-money laundering training programs for law enforcement and other officials; Venezuelan participation in the U.S. Coast Guard’s International Port Security Program; and activation of the Container Inspection Facility at Puerto Cabello that was partially funded by the United States in 2004. According to the INCSR, “these cooperative activities would increase the exchange of information that could lead to arrests, help dismantle organized criminal networks, aid in the prosecution of criminals engaged in narcotrafficking, and stem the flow of illicit drugs transiting Venezuelan airspace, land, and sea.”

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Popular – Offset Iran Engagement is popular- perceived as a way to balance Iran’s influence Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. 44, Accessed 7/9/13, CB] Over the past several years, there has been concern among policymakers about Iran’s growing interest and activities in Latin America, particularly its relations with Venezuela under President Chávez, although there has been disagreement over the extent and significance of Iran’s relations with the region. The January 2012 visit by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on a four nation tour to Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Venezuela increased concerns of some policymakers about Iran’s efforts to deepen ties with Latin America. In legislative action, the 112th Congress approved the Countering Iran in the Western Hemisphere Act of 2012 (P.L. 112-220, H.R. 3783) in 2012, which the President signed into law on December 28, 2012. The House had approved the bill, amended, by voice vote on September 19, 2012, and the Senate had approved the measure, amended, by voice vote on December 12, 2012. As enacted, the law requires the Secretary of State to conduct an assessment within 180 days of the “threats posed to the United States by Iran’s growing presence and activity in the Western Hemisphere” and a strategy to address these threats. The bill also states that “it shall be the policy of the United States to use a comprehensive government-wide strategy to counter Iran’s growing hostile presence and activity in the Western Hemisphere by working together with United States allies and partners in the region to mutually deter threats to United States interests by the Government of Iran, the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), the IRGC’s Qods Force, and Hezbollah.”

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Aid

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Unpopular – Congress Congress resents foreign aid to Venezuela—Republican lash-out proves PolitiFact 11 (2/9/11, “Ted Poe decries U.S. aid to Venezuela, Cuba,” http://www.politifact.com/truth-ometer/statements/2011/mar/23/ted-poe/ted-poe-decries-us-aid-venezuela-cuba/, Accessed 7/6/13, JC) In a House floor speech on Feb. 9, 2011, Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, took aim at American aid to foreign countries. Poe has introduced a bill to require separate votes on aiding specific countries, thus ending the practice of bundling foreign aid into a single bill. "Maybe it’s time to reconsider our foreign aid that we send to countries throughout the world," Poe said in the floor speech, which has attracted attention in conservative circles on the Internet. "There are about 192 foreign countries in the world, … and we give foreign aid to over 150 of them." Poe proceeded to name some examples of countries where many Americans might be uncomfortable sending taxpayer money, including Egypt, Pakistan, Russia and China. But two of the nation’s in Poe’s speech caught our eye -- Venezuela and Cuba. Critics of Venezuela’s leader, Hugo Chavez, call him a dictator. Meanwhile, Cuba has been a communist country for decades, led by Fidel Castro and now his brother Raul. In its widely followed rankings, the group Freedom House rates Venezuela toward the bottom of the nations it classifies as "partly free," while Cuba sits at the lower end of its "not free" scale. And both nations have strained relations with the United States. So Poe suggested these as two examples of what’s wrong with U.S. foreign aid. "We give money to Venezuela. Why do we give money to Chavez and Venezuela? He hates the United States. He defies our president, makes fun of our nation. We don’t need to give him any foreign aid. We give $20 million to Cuba. Why do we give money to Cuba? Americans can’t even go to Cuba. It’s off-limits. It’s a communist country. But we’re dumping money over there."

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Unpopular – Venezuela/Cuba Aid Link – Aid Scrutinized Aid to hostile countries is highly scrutinized – ensuring politicization of the plan Congressional Documents and Publications, 6/27/13 [Quoting Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Republican Representative from Florida, “Ecuador's Cancellation of Trade Pact and Offer of $23 Million to U.S. for "Human Rights Training" is Laughable, Says Ros-Lehtinen,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] (WASHINGTON) - U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Chairman of the Middle East and North Africa Subcommittee, made the following statement regarding Ecuador's decision to cancel the renewal of its trade pact with the United States and its offer of $23 million to provide human rights training to the U.S. Statement by Ros-Lehtinen: "Due to the fact that Congress has strongly signaled its reluctance to renew the trade preferences with Ecuador, Rafael Correa saw the writing on the wall and has decided to cancel our trade deal. This unilateral act is further proof that Ecuadorian leader does not want close ties with the United States and only wishes to sabotage our bilateral relationship in order to save face following pressure from our government for Correa to refuse asylum to Edward Snowden. "Then as if to add insult to injury, Correa has also reportedly offered the U.S. $23 million for 'human rights training.' This is perhaps the most laughable move by Correa to date, as it is he and his government who are in need of training in the protection and respect of fundamental basic human rights and democratic freedoms. This, after all, comes from the mini-Chavez who earlier this year launched an international campaign to weaken the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and who has consistently attempted to silence free speech and the independent media. I urge the Obama Administration to send a clear message to Correa that his ill-considered actions will not go without consequences and reexamine all foreign aid that goes directly to this reckless government."

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Trade

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Unpopular – Trade Venezuelan trade is unpopular—viewed as undemocratic and sympathetic to US threats Mares, Institute of the Americas chair for InterAmerican affairs, 12 (David R. Mares ¶ Institute of the Americas Chair for InterAmerican Affairs, University of California, San Diego1/19/12, Council on Foreign Relations, “Panel 3 – Case Studies: United States: United States– Venezuela,” https://mailattachment.googleusercontent.com/attachment/u/0/?ui=2&ik=aa9064a958&view=att&th=13fbac8b177fdf fb&attid=0.1&disp=inline&realattid=f_hiuolwyt1&safe=1&zw&saduie=AG9B_P8YfR1U9wXX9fQFoLrT5TW&sadet=1373228451191&sads=VLwXoBSOI396qMlA5a1FX7Khnrs, Accessed 7/7/13, JC) The current political relationship decreases bilateral trade because Chávez seeks to build counter-balancing relations with US rivals and only has oil to attract them. The relationship with China in particular is important because the Chinese are also willing to provide tens of billions of dollars in credit to the Chávez government to spend as it sees fit, with Venezuelan oil in payment. In addition, Chávez diverts a small quantity of oil to subsidized sales to the Caribbean and Central America to gain allies. These diversions for political reasons result in a lower quantity available for market driven purchases, as are those of the US. The US Congress does have a small group of anti-Chavista legislators who demand that the US embargo Venezuelan oil, and emphasize the undemocratic nature of the Chávez government and its Chinese, Russian and Iranian ties as threats to US national security. A few think tanks (e.g., the Inter-American Security Watch) and interest groups are promoting these views. But so far they do not have a large following in the Legislative and the Executive branches, where a lower profile in opposing Chávez is perceived to be more effective, or at least less damaging to overall US interests.

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Mexico Links

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Generic

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Link Magnifier/AT – Link Turns Can’t generate a link turn – the plan will always be spun negatively Starr, USC US-Mexico Network director, 9 (Pamela K., university fellow at the USC Center on Public Diplomacy and an associate professor of teaching in the School of International Relations and in Public Diplomacy, April 2009, Pacific Council on International Policy, “Mexico and the United States: A Window of Opportunity?” http://www.pacificcouncil.org/document.doc?id=35, Accessed 7/9/13) Actively work to redefi ne Mexico – in the minds of policy makers and of U.S. citizens – as an opportunity rather than a problem. As long as Americans think of Mexico as mostly a source of problems for the United States, mustering congressional support for policies that advance U.S. national interests by “helping Mexico” will remain a hard sell . This redefi nition should include an expansion of cultural and educational exchanges between the two countries, enlisting celebrities as informal diplomats, and promoting contact and communication among non-governmental actors on both sides of the border. Potentially most important, Washington must carefully guard its rhetoric about Mexico to avoid disparaging statements that ultimately do harm to U.S. national interests.

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Soft on Drugs Link Magnifier Plan gets negatively spun as anti-drug trafficking Shear, New York Times White House correspondent, & Archibold, New York Times bureau chief for Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean, 5/4/13 (Michael D., M.A. degree in public policy from the John F. Kennedy School at Harvard University, and Randal C., New York Times, “In Latin America, U.S. Focus Shifts From Drug War to Economy,” http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/05/world/americas/in-latin-america-us-shifts-focus-from-drug-war-toeconomy.html?pagewanted=all, Accessed 7/9/13) Last week, Mr. Obama returned to capitals in Latin America with a vastly different message. Relationships with countries racked by drug violence and organized crime should focus more on economic development and less on the endless battles against drug traffickers and organized crime capos that have left few clear victors. The countries, Mexico in particular, need to set their own course on security, with the United States playing more of a backing role. That approach runs the risk of being seen as kowtowing to governments more concerned about their public image than the underlying problems tarnishing it. Mexico, which is eager to play up its economic growth, has mounted an aggressive effort to play down its crime problems, going as far as to encourage the news media to avoid certain slang words in reports. “The problem will not just go away,” said Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue. “It needs to be tackled head-on, with a comprehensive strategy that includes but goes beyond stimulating economic growth and alleviating poverty. “Obama becomes vulnerable to the charge of downplaying the region’s overriding issue, and the chief obstacle to economic progress,” he added. “It is fine to change the narrative from security to economics as long as the reality on the ground reflects and fits with the new story line.” Administration officials insist that Mr. Obama remains cleareyed about the security challenges, but the new emphasis corresponds with a change in focus by the Mexican government. The new Mexican president, Enrique Peña Nieto, took office in December vowing to reduce the violence that exploded under the militarized approach to the drug war adopted by his predecessor, Felipe Calderón. That effort left about 60,000 Mexicans dead and appears not to have significantly damaged the drug-trafficking industry. In addition to a focus on reducing violence, which some critics have interpreted as taking a softer line on the drug gangs, Mr. Peña Nieto has also moved to reduce American involvement in law enforcement south of the border. With friction and mistrust between American and Mexican law enforcement agencies growing, Mr. Obama suggested that the United States would no longer seek to dominate the security agenda. “It is obviously up to the Mexican people to determine their security structures and how it engages with other nations, including the United States,” he said, standing next to Mr. Peña Nieto on Thursday in Mexico City. “But the main point I made to the president is that we support the Mexican government’s focus on reducing violence, and we look forward to continuing our good cooperation in any way that the Mexican government deems appropriate.” In some ways, conceding leadership of the drug fight to Mexico hews to a guiding principle of Mr. Obama’s foreign policy, in which American supremacy is played down, at least publicly, in favor of a multilateral approach. But that philosophy could collide with the concerns of lawmakers in Washington, who have expressed frustration with what they see as a lack of clarity in Mexico’s security plans. And security analysts say the entrenched corruption in Mexican law enforcement has long clouded the partnership with their American counterparts. Putting Mexico in the driver’s seat on security marks a shift in a balance of power that has always tipped to the United States and, analysts said, will carry political risk as Congress negotiates an immigration bill that is expected to include provisions for tighter border security. “If there is a perception in the U.S. Congress that security cooperation is weakening, that could play into the hands of those who oppose immigration reform,” said Vanda

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 144 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Felbab-Brown, a counternarcotics expert at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “Realistically, the border is as tight as could be and there have been few spillovers of the violence from Mexico into the U.S.,” she added, but perceptions count in Washington “and can be easily distorted .” “Drugs today are not very important to the U.S. public over all,” she added, “but they are important to committed drug warriors who are politically powerful.”

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Human Rights Link Magnifier Funding Mexico unpopular – human rights issues Seelke, Congressional Research Service Latin American Affairs specialist, 1-29-13 [Clare Ribando, 1-29-13, Congressional Research Service, “Mexico and the 112th Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32724.pdf, p.21-24, accessed 7-5-13, MSG] There have been ongoing concerns about the human rights records of Mexico’s federal, state, and municipal police. For the past several years, State Department’s human rights reports covering Mexico have cited credible reports of police involvement in extrajudicial killings, kidnappings for ransom, and torture.83 While abuses are most common at the municipal and state level, where corruption and police collaboration with criminal groups often occurs, federal forces—including the Federal Police—have also committed serious abuses. Individuals are most vulnerable to police abuses after they have been arbitrarily detained and before they are transferred to the custody of prosecutors, or while they are being held inpreventive detention. Some 43% of Mexican inmates are reportedly in pretrial detention.84 The Calderón government sought to combat police corruption and human rights abuses through increased vetting of federal forces; the creation of a national police registry to prevent corrupt police from being rehired; the use of internal affairs units; and the provision of human rights training. In 2012, the government also announced new protocols on the use of force and how detentions are to be handled that were designed to prevent abuses. A January 2009 public security law codified vetting requirements and professional standards for state police to be met by 2013, but progress toward meeting those standards has been uneven. With a few exceptions, efforts to reform municipal police forces have lagged behind. There has also been increasing concern that the Mexican military, which is less accountable to civilian authorities than the police, is committing more human rights abuses since it is has been tasked with carrying out public security functions. A November 2011 Human Rights Watch (HRW) report maintains that cases of torture, enforced disappearances, and extrajudicial killings have increased significantly in states where federal authorities have been deployed to fight organized crime.85 According to Mexico’s Human Rights Commission (CNDH), the number of complaints of human rights abuses by Mexico’s National Defense Secretariat (SEDENA) increased from 182 in 2006 to a peak of 1800 in 2009 before falling slightly to 1,695 in 2011. The Trans-Border Institute has found that the number of abuses by SEDENA forces that have been investigated and documented by CNDH has also declined since 2008-2009, particularly in areas where large-scale deployments have been scaled back.86 In contrast, complaints of abuses against the Secretariat of the Navy (SEMAR) reported to CNDH increased by 150% from 2010 to 2011 as its forces became more heavily involved in anti-DTO efforts.87 While troubling, only a small percentage of those allegations have resulted in the CNDH issuing recommendations for corrective action to SEDENA or SEMAR, which those agencies say they have largely accepted and acted upon.88 A June 2011 constitutional amendment gave CNDH the authority to force entities that refuse to respond to its recommendations to appear before the Mexican Congress. In addition to expressing concerns about current human rights abuses, Mexican and international human rights groups have criticized the Mexican government for failing to hold military and police officials accountable for past abuses.89 In addition to taking steps to reform the police and judiciary, the Calderón government took some steps to comply with rulings by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) that cases of military abuses against civilians should be tried in civilian courts. While a few dozen cases90 were transferred to civilian jurisdiction and former President Calderón asked SEDENA and SEMAR to work with the Attorney General to accelerate transfers, most cases were still processed in the military justice system.91 Military prosecutors have opened thousands of

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 146 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core investigations into allegations of human rights abuses as a result of complaints filed with the CNDH, with few having resulted in convictions.92 A reform of Article 57 of the military justice code was submitted by then-President Calderón in October 2010 mandating that at least certain human rights violations be investigated and prosecuted in civilian courts. A more comprehensive proposal that required that all cases of alleged military human rights violations be transferred to the civilian justice system was approved by the Mexican Senate’s Justice Commission in April 2012; however, the bill was subsequently blocked from coming to a vote. In September 2012, another proposal to reform Article 57 was presented in the Mexican Senate, but not enacted. Enacting a reform of Article 57 of the military justice code may become more urgent now for the Peña Nieto Administration now that Mexico’s Supreme Court is in the process of establishing binding legal precedent for determining jurisdiction in cases involving alleged military human rights violations against civilians. Human rights defenders and journalists have been particularly vulnerable to abuses by organized crime, sometimes acting in collusion with corrupt government authorities. Recently, several prominent human rights defenders have been harassed, attacked, and even killed, including members of the high-profile Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity led by Javier Sicilia. Increasing violent crimes targeting journalists, combined with high levels of impunity for the perpetrators of those crimes, have made Mexico the most dangerous country in the Western Hemisphere for journalists. Crimes against journalists range from harassment, to extortion, to kidnapping and murder. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has documented 58 murders of journalists and at least 10 cases of journalists disappearing in Mexico since 2000. Threats from organized crime groups have made journalists and editors fearful of covering crimerelated stories, and in some areas coverage of the DTOs’ activities have been shut down.93 The Calderón government and the Mexican Congress took some steps to better protect human rights defenders and journalists, but many human rights organizations have called upon the Peña Nieto Administration to do more. The Calderón government established a special prosecutor within the Attorney General’s Office to attend to crimes against freedom of expression and created mechanisms to provide increased protection for journalists and human rights defenders. Those mechanisms have yet to be effectively implemented. The Mexican Congress enacted a law to make crimes against journalists a federal offense and a law to require the federal government to provide protection to journalists and human rights defenders who are “at risk” of being victimized and to their families. Another law approved by the Congress in 2012, but not promulgated by the Calderón government, would require the state to track victims of organized crime and provide assistance to victims and their families. Human rights organizations expressed satisfaction after President Peña Nieto signed that law, commonly referred to as the “victims’ law,” in January 2013, but said that the real test of his government’s commitment to human rights will be in how that and other laws are implemented. Human Rights Conditions on U.S. Assistance to Mexico In 2008, Congress debated whether human rights conditions should be placed on Mérida assistance beyond the requirements in §620J of the Foreign Assistance Act (FAA) of 1961. That section was re-designated as §620M and amended by the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2012 (P.L. 112-74). It states that an individual or unit of a foreign country’s security forces is prohibited from receiving assistance if the Secretary of State receives “credible evidence” that an individual or unit has committed “a gross violation of human rights.” The FY2008 Supplemental Appropriations Act (P.L. 110-252), which provided the first tranche of Mérida funding, had less stringent human rights conditions than had been proposed earlier, largely due to Mexico’s concerns that some of the conditions would violate its national sovereignty. The conditions required that 15% of INCLE and Foreign Military Financing (FMF) assistance be withheld until the Secretary of State reports in writing that Mexico is taking action in four human rights areas: 1. improving transparency and accountability of federal police forces; 2. establishing a mechanism for regular consultations among relevant Mexican government authorities, Mexican human rights organizations, and other relevant Mexican civil society organizations, to make

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 147 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core consultations concerning implementation of the Mérida Initiative in accordance with Mexican and international law; 3. ensuring that civilian prosecutors and judicial authorities are investigating and prosecuting, in accordance with Mexican and international law, members of the federal police and military forces who have been credibly alleged to have committed violations of human rights, and the federal police and military forces are fully cooperating with the investigations; and 4. enforcing the prohibition, in accordance with Mexican and international law, on the use of testimony obtained through torture or other ill-treatment. Similar human rights conditions were included in FY2009-FY2011 appropriations measures that funded the Mérida Initiative.95 However, the first two conditions are not included in the 15% withholding requirement in the FY2012 Consolidated Appropriations Act (P.L. 112-74). As previously mentioned, Congress has yet to pass a final FY2013 appropriations measure. It remains to be seen whether an omnibus bill would include the conditions on aid to Mexico that are in the Senate Appropriations Committee’s version of the FY2013 foreign operations ppropriations measure S. 3241 (S.Rept. 112172). Those conditions would retain the condition related to torture, as well as require the State Department to report that Mexico has reformed its military justice code and is requiring police and military officials to immediately transfer detainees to civilian judicial authorities. Thus far, the State Department has submitted three 15% progress reports on Mexico to congressional appropriators (in August 2009, September 2010, and August 2012) that have met the statutory requirements for FY2008FY2012 Mérida funds that had been on hold to be released. Nevertheless, the State Department has twice elected to hold back some funding pending further progress in key areas of concern. In the September 2010 report, for example, the State Department elected to hold back $26 million in FY2010 supplemental funds as a matter of policy until further progress was made in the areas of transparency and combating impunity.96 Those funds were not obligated until the fall of 2011. In the August 2012 report, the State Department again decided to hold back all of the FY2012 funding that would have been subject to the conditions (roughly $18 million) as a matter of policy until it can work with Mexican authorities to determine steps to address key human rights challenges. Those include: improving the ability of Mexico’s civilian institutions to investigate and prosecute cases of human rights abuses; enhancing enforcement of prohibitions against torture and other mistreatment; and strengthening protection for human rights defenders.97

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Engagement Links

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Politically Divisive Economic engagement with Mexico is politically divisive Wilson, Associate at the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 13 (Christopher E., January, “A U.S.-Mexico Economic Alliance: Policy Options for a Competitive Region,” p. 5, http://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/new_ideas_us_mexico_relations.pdf, Accessed 7/9/13) At a time when Mexico is poised to experience robust economic growth, a manufacturing renaissance is underway in North America and bilateral trade is booming, the United States and Mexico have an important choice to make: sit back and reap the moderate and perhaps temporal benefits coming naturally from the evolving global context , or implement a robust agenda to improve the competitiveness of North America for the long term . Given that job creation and economic growth in both the United States and Mexico are at stake, the choice should be simple, but a limited understanding about the magnitude, nature and depth of the U.S.-Mexico economic relationship among the public and many policymakers has made serious action to support regional exporters more politically divisive than it ought to be.

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Popular – Cultural Ties Policies with Mexico are popular – Cultural relations Jacobson, U.S. State Department Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, 6-18-13 [Roberta, 6-18-13, FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE WESTERN HEMISPHERE SUBCOMMITTEE UNITED STATES SENATE, “TESTIMONY OF ROBERTA S. JACOBSON,” p.5, Lexis, MSG] The people-to-people ties that bind Mexico to the United States are strong ¶ and deep, and they enrich both countries. One in 10 Americans – more than 30 ¶ million people – is of Mexican heritage. A robust Mexican-American community ¶ in the United States contributes to our culture, our values, our politics, and our ¶ social structures. Some 20 million Americans travel to Mexico every year for ¶ tourism, business, or study. The cities and towns along our common border are ¶ interconnected. Mexico is home to the largest expatriate community of American ¶ citizens in the world –more than one million people. These ties bring us together ¶ as families, neighbors, and friends, and contribute to our mutual understanding. ¶

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Foreign Aid

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Popular – Congress Mexican foreign aid is popular – consensus in Congress Meyer, Latin American Affairs Analyst, & Sullivan, Latin American Affairs Specialist, 12 [Peter and Mark, 6-26-12, Congressional Research Service, “U.S. Foreign Assistance to Latin America and the Caribbean: Recent Trends and FY2013 Appropriations,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R42582.pdf, accessed, 7-5-13 MSG] Some Members have expressed concerns about the Administration’s 9% proposed decrease for Latin America and the Caribbean, questioning whether the resources requested are adequate to address U.S. interests in the region. There appears to be broad agreement between Congress and the Administration regarding the importance of maintaining assistance for citizen security and counter-narcotics efforts in Mexico, Colombia, Central America and the Caribbean. Some Members, however, have expressed concerns about declines in assistance for these programs. Assistance for Haiti’s recovery also appears to be a point of consensus, although some Members have called for adequate monitoring to ensure transparency and accountability in the assistance program.64

Aid to Mexico is popular- FY2013 allocation proves Seelke, Congressional Research Service Mexico Analyst, 13 [Clare, 1-29-13, Congressional Research Service, “Mexico and the 112th Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32724.pdf, accessed 7-7-13, MSG] The 112th Congress maintained an active interest in Mexico. The Obama Administration asked for $269.5 million in assistance for Mexico in its FY2013 budget request. The Senate and House Appropriations Committees’ versions of the FY2013 foreign aid measure, S. 3241 and H.R. 5857, each recommend increases in aid to Mexico, with human rights conditions similar to P.L. 112-74. Congress held oversight hearings, issued reports, and introduced legislation on how to bolster the Mérida Initiative and on related U.S. domestic efforts to combat gun trafficking, money laundering, and drug demand.

Strong congressional support for aid to Mexico Seelke, Congressional Research Service Mexico Analyst, 13 [Clare, 1-29-13, Congressional Research Service, “Mexico and the 112th Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32724.pdf, accessed 7-7-13, MSG] There appears to be strong support in both the Senate and House for maintaining U.S. support to ¶ Mexico provided through Mérida Initiative accounts. The Administration’s FY2013 budget ¶ request asked for $234 million in Mérida assistance for Mexico: $199 million in the International ¶ Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INCLE) account and $35 million in the Economic Support Fund (ESF) account. The Senate Appropriations Committee’s version of the FY2013 foreign ¶ operations appropriations measure, S. 3241 (S.Rept. 112-172), would have met the request for ¶ INCLE and provided $10 million in additional ESF for economic development projects in the ¶ border region. S. 3241 included restrictions on aid to the Mexican military and police. The House ¶ Appropriations Committee’s version of the bill, H.R. 5857 (H.Rept. 112-494), would have ¶ increased INCLE funding by $49 million to match the FY2012 enacted level for that account and ¶ met the request for ESF.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 153 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core In the absence of a final FY2013 foreign appropriations measure, Congress passed a continuing ¶ resolution, H.J.Res. 117, to fund most foreign aid programs—including assistance to Mexico—at ¶ FY2012 levels plus 0.6% through March 27, 2013.

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Trade

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Politically Divisive - NAFTA NAFTA proves economic engagement sparks divisive debates over job losses Villarreal and Fergusson, Congressional Research Service specialists in International Trade and Finance, 2/21/13 (M. Angeles and Ian F., Congressional Research Service, “NAFTA at 20: Overview and Trade Effects,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R42965.pdf, Accessed 7/9/13) NAFTA was controversial when first proposed , mostly because it was the first FTA involving two wealthy, developed countries and a developing country. The political debate surrounding the agreement was divisive with proponents arguing that the agreement would help generate thousands of jobs and reduce income disparit y in the region, while opponents warned that the agreement would cause huge job losses in the United States as companies moved production to Mexico to lower costs. In reality, NAFTA did not cause the huge job losses feared by the critics or the large economic gains predicted by supporters. The net overall effect of NAFTA on the U.S. economy appears to have been relatively modest, primarily because trade with Canada and Mexico account for a small percentage of U.S. GDP. However, there were worker and firm adjustment costs as the three countries adjusted to more open trade and investment among their economies.

NAFTA is extremely unpopular in the U.S. – past committees prove Villarreal and Fergusson, international trade and finance specialists, 2/21/13 [Angeles and Ian, 2-21-13, Congressional Research Service, “NAFTA at 20: Overview and Trade Effects,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R42965.pdf, accessed 7-4-13, HG] The 113th Congress faces numerous issues related to international trade. Canada and Mexico are the first and third largest U.S. trading partners, respectively. With the two countries participating in the negotiations to conclude a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) free trade agreement among the United States and 10 other countries, policy issues related to NAFTA continue to be of interest for Congress. If negotiations progress, a TPP agreement could affect the rules and market access commitments governing North American trade and investment since NAFTA entered into force. A related trade policy issue in which the effects of NAFTA may be explored is the possible renewal of Trade Promotion Authority (TPA; formerly known as “fast-track authority”) to provide expedited procedures for the consideration of bills to implement trade agreements. NAFTA was controversial when first proposed, mostly because it was the first FTA involving two wealthy, developed countries and a developing country. The political debate surrounding the agreement was divisive with proponents arguing that the agreement would help generate thousands of jobs and reduce income disparity in the region, while opponents warned that the agreement would cause huge job losses in the United States as companies moved production to Mexico to lower costs. In reality, NAFTA did not cause the huge job losses feared by the critics or the large economic gains predicted by supporters. The net overall effect of NAFTA on the U.S. economy appears to have been relatively modest, primarily because trade with Canada and Mexico account for a small percentage of U.S. GDP. However, there were worker and firm adjustment costs as the three countries adjusted to more open trade and investment among their economies.

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NAFTA is unpopular because it hurts farmers and leads to environmental degradation Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative, 11 [4-17-11, Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative, “Is NAFTA Good for Mexico and the United States?,” http://danielsethics.mgt.unm.edu/pdf/NAFTA%20DI.pdf, accessed 7-5-13, HG] The early 1990s was a favorable time for trade unions, seeing some of the most powerful nations in the world joining forces: The European Union (EU) and South America’s Mercado Común del Sur (MERCOSUR) were formed in 1992 and 1991, respectively. The framework for what would later become NAFTA was laid in 1988, when discussions began concerning a trade union between the United States and Canada. This measure was deeply unpopular with many constituents in Canada and Mexico, who feared that NAFTA would hurt many groups, including small farmers, and would lead to environmental degradation. Before President Clinton sent the bill to the House of Representatives, he added clauses protecting American workers as well as environmental regulations. Still, many opponents of NAFTA in all participating countries maintain that the agreement does not do enough to protect workers, and that environmental regulations are difficult to enforce internationally.

NAFTA plan popular arguments are inaccurate – previous administrations had to lie to get it to pass Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative, 11 [4-17-11, Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative, “Is NAFTA Good for Mexico and the United States?,” http://danielsethics.mgt.unm.edu/pdf/NAFTA%20DI.pdf, accessed 7-5-13, HG] Additionally, the economy was the soft underbelly of the Bush administration’s election campaign, not helped by Gulf War expenditures and the hang-over from Cold War excesses. Hence the Republicans tried to overstate the economic benefits of NAFTA to win votes in the areas most likely to be affected by the free-trade agreement, such as fruit and vegetable farmers in Florida and California, who feared their interests were being ‘chunked out the window.’[28] Support from business leaders was predictably linked to expanding market opportunities in Mexico as a result of free-trade. Big businesses not only provide more votes, but they also provide electoral campaign money, and thus their approval, demonstrated by the endorsement of NAFTA by the Coalition for Trade Expansion (CTE) was an important political consideration for the ‘openly politicized’[29] Bush administration who Clarkson claims was merely ‘expressing the demands of its private-sector interests.’[30] However, free-trade leaves blue-collar workers in particular vulnerable, as low-skilled labour-intensive industries are naturally attracted to cheap labour, an abundant Mexican commodity. Economist Harley Shaiken sums up this argument, asking ‘why should companies invest in a high skill, high wage strategy in the United States, when a high skill, low wage strategy is available in Mexico?’[31] The Bush administration attempted to assuage these fears by announcing plans for re-education and retraining programmes for those workers displaced by NAFTA, but this emotive issue was quickly pounced on by opponents.

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Unpopular – Unions Trade agreement with Mexico unpopular- hurts domestic production and American workers UAW, 12 [Ron, 1-13-12, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, “Japan's Expression of Interest in the Proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Trade Agreement,” http://www.uaw.org/sites/default/files/UAW%20Comments%20on%20Japan%20&%20TPP.pdf, accessed 7-5-13, MSG] While the United States is currently negotiating the trade agreement that covers relationships with eight other countries—Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam—the Obama Administration has repeatedly expressed its goal of building "an agreement that expands out progressively to include countries across the Asia-Pacific region." UAW has serious concerns regarding the premature expansion of the TPP negotiations to include Japan, Mexico, Canada, or any other nation, before our negotiators first demonstrate an ability to formulate and successfully negotiate a "transformative agreement for the 21SI Century," that will produce genuine benefits for American workers and increase domestic production. The primary goal must be to maximize employment opportunity for workers, not simply to maximize profits for multinational corporations looking to further globalize their supply chains.

Trade with Mexico is unpopular – unions do not like it Perez-Rocha, Foreign Policy in Focus, & Trew, Foreign Policy in Focus, 12 [Manuel and Stuart, 6-26-12, Foreing Policy in Focus, “Don’t Expand NAFTA,” http://www.fpif.org/articles/dont_expand_nafta, accessed 7-5-13, MSG] With Canada and Mexico joining the TPP, the agreement is looking more and more like a substitute for the FTAA. So it is not surprising that opposition to the TPP is growing as quickly as it did against that former attempt to expand the neoliberal model throughout the Western hemisphere. The intense secrecy of the TPP negotiations is not helping the Obama administration make its case. In their statement, North American unions “call on our governments to work with us to include in the TPP provisions to ensure strong worker protections, a healthy environment, safe food and products, and the ability to regulate financial and other markets to avoid future global economic crises.” But the truth is that only big business is partaking in consultations, with 600 lobbyists having exclusive passwords to online versions of the negotiating text. A majority of Democratic representatives (132 out of 191) have expressed that they are “troubled that important policy decisions are being made without full input from Congress.” They have written to U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk to urge him and his staff to “engage in broader and deeper consultations with members of the full range of committees of Congress whose jurisdiction touches on the wide-ranging issues involved, and to ensure there is ample opportunity for Congress to have input on critical policies that will have broad ramifications for years to come." In their letter, the representatives also challenge “the lack of transparency of the treaty negotiation process, and the failure of negotiators to meaningfully consult with states on the far-reaching impact of trade agreements on state and local laws, even when binding on our states, is of grave concern to us.” U.S. Senators, for their part, have also sent a letter complaining of the lack of congressional access to the negotiations. What openness and transparency can we in Canada and Mexico expect when the decision to join the TPP, under humiliating conditions, was made without any public consultation?

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Unpopular – Jobs Trade with Mexico unpopular- hurts U.S. and Mexican jobs- NAFTA proves Aguilar, Texas Tribune, 12 [Julian, 12-7-12, Texas Tribune, “After 20 Years, NAFTA Draws Praise and Controversy,” http://www.texastribune.org/texas-mexico-border-news/texas-mexico-border/twenty-years-nafta-drawspraise-and-controversy/, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] But opponents of trade pacts say that NAFTA has resulted in a loss of manufacturing and shipping jobs in the U.S. and in less oversight of production. They say that NAFTA has also caused the displacement of Mexican agricultural workers into other sectors, or forced them to immigrate illegally to the United States. “There have been huge disparities in the number of people entering the workforce and the number of jobs available,” said Timothy A. Wise, the policy research director at the Global Development and Environment Institute at Tufts University. “That resulted in the huge migration problem despite the increased enforcement.”

Mexican trade unpopular- NAFTA proves free trade policies hurt jobs and development Aguilar, Texas Tribune, 12 [Julian, 12-7-12, Texas Tribune, “After 20 Years, NAFTA Draws Praise and Controversy,” http://www.texastribune.org/texas-mexico-border-news/texas-mexico-border/twenty-years-nafta-drawspraise-and-controversy/, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] Public Citizen, a nonprofit advocacy group with offices in Washington and Austin, cites U.S. Department of Labor data to support what it says is a negative impact on the American workforce because of rising imports or off shoring production. In Texas alone, Public Citizen reported, there have been almost 2,500 companies whose workers or union affiliates have filed petitions with the department for training or temporary assistance under its Trade Adjustment Assistance program. Wise said that although NAFTA made Mexico a manufacturing giant, the pact provides examples of what countries with emerging economies should avoid. Free trade policies, commonly referred to in Mexico as neoliberalism, should be scrutinized less for the tariffs they eliminate and more for how they work as development strategies. “It was a striking and dramatic failure compared to other countries that did not follow such paths,” he said. Wise acknowledged Mexico’s increase in manufacturing jobs, but he said they were not at the level needed to account for losses in other industries, like grain production. “Foreign investment quadrupled, trade overall tripled, so that’s a measure of success,” he said. "What it didn’t produce is jobs and development.” The end result is that Mexico’s growth rates were lower than other emerging economies that were in similar stages of development, he said. A key reason is that while foreign investment surged, domestic investment in Mexico dipped. “When everybody touts the benefits of foreign investment coming in, they discount the fact that domestic investment was displaced,” Wise said. “Investment in the economy was well below the levels that were needed to stimulate dynamic growth. In China they are investing 35 percent dynamic growth, and economists say you need 25 percent or more, Mexico is at 19 percent.” Robert Pastor, the director at the Center for North American Studies at American University, said job losses and gains under NAFTA can be credited to a universal element in global commerce: competition.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 160 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core “NAFTA or globalization increases competition which, by definition, has winners and losers,” he said. “The people who lose are those who are not very well educated. This is true, not just because of trade, but because of automation and technological change and of a lot of structural change in the economy.”

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Popular – Trade Trade with Mexico is popular- Mexico & The U.S. are economically interdependent Jacobson, U.S. State Department Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, 6-18-13 [Roberta, 6-18-13, FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE WESTERN HEMISPHERE SUBCOMMITTEE UNITED STATES SENATE, “TESTIMONY OF ROBERTA S. JACOBSON,” p.2, Lexis, MSG] The United States and Mexico share one of the world's most vibrant and mutually beneficial economic relationships. Our economic links are the linchpin of our overall relationship. We are partners in an integrated enterprise whose success depends on us working together. Given the high degree of intra-industry trade, much of what we import consists of U.S. exports to Mexico processed further in Mexico. U.S. companies have more than $91 billion invested in Mexico, while Mexican companies are increasing their investment in the American economy, currently nearly $27.9 billion. It is difficult to overstate the importance of our trade relationship with Mexico. In 2012, two-way merchandise trade reached nearly $500 billion and services trade was $39 billion in 2011. Mexico is our second largest export market and third largest overall trading partner. We sell more to Mexico than we do to Brazil, Russia, India, and China combined. The United States is Mexico's largest trading partner. Together with Canada, Mexico and the United States comprise one of the most successful and competitive economic platforms in the world today. We have taken steps to strengthen that trading relationship. Last October, the United States and eight other countries welcomed Mexico (and Canada) to join the negotiations for the Trans- Pacific Partnership (TPP). TPP is a high-standard, 21st century trade agreement that includes countries from one of the fastest- growing regions in the world.

Trade with Mexico popular with economists and policymakers- NAFTA proves Aguilar, Texas Tribune, 12 [Julian, 12-7-12, Texas Tribune, “After 20 Years, NAFTA Draws Praise and Controversy,” http://www.texastribune.org/texas-mexico-border-news/texas-mexico-border/twenty-years-nafta-drawspraise-and-controversy/, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] The pact has benefited all three members. In 2010, the U.S. had $918 billion in two-way trade with Canada and Mexico, according to U.S. Trade Rep. Ron Kirk’s office. Economists say that progress has come despite enhanced global security measures following the Sept. 11 attacks and an eruption of drug-related violence in Mexico. During a recent symposium here, economists and policymakers celebrated NAFTA’s success and brainstormed on how build on it and bolster economic output. The symposium concluded with a clear message: The future is wide open. “We must continue to build upon NAFTA and think more as a region in order to be more competitive globally,” said Gerónimo Gutiérrez, the managing director of the North American Development Bank, which was created by the governments of Mexico and the U.S. after NAFTA’s inception and helps finance and develop infrastructure projects on the border.

Trade with Mexico popular- doesn’t actually cause job loss and increases trade Aguilar, Texas Tribune, 12

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 162 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core [Julian, 12-7-12, Texas Tribune, “After 20 Years, NAFTA Draws Praise and Controversy,” http://www.texastribune.org/texas-mexico-border-news/texas-mexico-border/twenty-years-nafta-drawspraise-and-controversy/, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] Supporters say NAFTA was not conceived to solve domestic problems for any member country. Instead, they say, the growth in the nations’ GDPs speaks to the pact’s positive effects. They include the creation of 6 million jobs in the U.S. as a result of NAFTA policies, more than $500 billion in goods and services traded between the U.S. and Mexico, and the ports of Laredo and El Paso being among the United States’ busiest. Through September, about $172.5 billion in trade with Mexico passed through the Laredo port and about $65 billion through El Paso, according to U.S. census data analyzed by WorldCity, which tracks global trade patterns. Canada remains the country’s top partner, with $462.3 billion in trade during the same time frame, ahead of China, which is at $389.7 billion and Mexico, with $369.5 billion. “I don’t think that NAFTA was created to alleviate every single social problem in Mexico. It could not, and it has not,” Gutiérrez said. “I think that Mexico would be worse off if it wasn’t for NAFTA today.”

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Oil & Gas

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Political Capital – Oil & Gas Cooperation with Mexican hydrocarbon industry controversial – sparks debate Montes, Wall Street Journal, 6/18/13 [Juan, 6-18-13, Wall Street Journal, “Mexico in Talks to Open Energy Sector to private Companies,” http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324520904578551810770396702.html, accessed 7-6-13, HG] The proposal, not yet released publicly, could fall short of what some oil companies would like to see. For instance, officials said companies may not get paid in oil itself, but rather in cash for oil at market prices. The restriction is aimed at appeasing Mexican nationalists who fret about the symbolism of handing over the country's oil. Officials insist Pemex will remain in state hands and that the state will continue to own the country's hydrocarbon resources. But the changes, if passed, would be a huge step forward for a country that has among the world's most restrictive energy laws. Experts say only North Korea has a more closed energy market. "If they finally do it, this would undoubtedly be a game-changing reform," said Carlos Elizondo, a political analyst at Mexico's CIDE college and research institute. "That's the kind of change in the oil sector that every government in Mexico has dreamed of, and hasn't been able to do, for the last 20 years."

Gas and oil pipelines are controversial – make environmentalists angry Stevenson, Huffington Post, 6-18-13 [Aiko, 6-18-13, Huffington Post, “Obama 2.0: The Climate Rescue Plan,” lexis, accessed 7-4-13, MSG] Hints at Obama's second-term green agenda come four months after the president vowed to tackle the problem during his stirring State of the Union address. But, any plan that Obama does have will not be enough to placate environmentalists if he decides to approve the controversial Keystone XL pipeline. Dubbed as the "fuse to the largest carbon bomb[15] on the planet", the project hopes to transport "dirty" oil from the Canadian tar sands down to refineries in New Mexico. Such oil releases far more carbon emissions than conventional fossil fuels because it requires huge amounts of energy to both extract and transport.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 165 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Political Capital – Offshore Drilling Expanded offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico causes political backlash Hobson, National Journal energy and environmental correspondent, 12 [Margret, 4-18-12, E&E Publishing, “Obama’s Development Plans Gain Little Political Traction in Years since Gulf Spill,” http://www.eenews.net/stories/1059963022, accessed 7-4-13, HG] That report criticized Congress for failing to adopt new oil spill safety laws but praised the Interior Department and industry for making progress in improving offshore oil development safety, environmental protection and oil spill preparation. An environmental group was less complimentary. A report yesterday by Oceana charged that the measures adopted by government and industry are "woefully inadequate." As the 2012 presidential campaign heats up and gasoline prices remain stuck near $4 per gallon, Obama's offshore oil development policies aren't winning him any political capital . The environmental community hates the drilling proposals . The Republicans and oil industry officials complain that the White House hasn't gone far enough. And independent voters are confused by the president's rhetoric. According to the GOP political firm Resurgent Republic, independent voters in Colorado and Virginia don't understand what Obama's "all of the above" energy mantra means. The report said, however, that once the policy was "described as oil, gas, coal, nuclear power, solar and other alternative energies, participants became enthusiastic and view such a strategy as credible and necessary to becoming more energy independent." A recent Gallup poll indicated that American voters are polarized on energy issues. The survey found that 47 percent of the public believes energy development is more important than environmental protection, while 41 percent of the public ranks protecting the environment as a bigger priority. In that political climate, Obama's offshore oil development policies are not likely to affect the nation's most conservative or liberal voters, noted Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics. "The environmentalists have no place to go except Obama, and Obama isn't going to convince any conservatives or Republicans to back him" based on his oil and gas proposals, Sabato said. "He's obviously aiming at swing independents," Sabato added. "He's trying to show that he's pursuing a middle path, the one many independents like. Maybe it will work."

Controversial offshore drilling is hugely unpopular with Congress and causes backlash from Democrats Geman, energy and environment reporter for the Hill, 10 [Ben, 4-1-10, The Hill, “Obama’s Offshore Drilling Push Shakes Up Congressional Fight Over Climate Change”, http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/90137-drilling-push-shakes-up-climate-fight-, accessed 7-7-13, HG] President Barack Obama’s offshore drilling proposal has shaken up the Capitol Hill climate change fight.

The White House has been emphasizing its support for nuclear power and oil drilling as it courts Republican — and centrist Democratic — endorsements of greenhouse gas emissions curbs. 
 Under the administration plan, the Interior Department will proceed with a lease sale for companies interested in drilling 50 miles off the Virginia coast before 2012. Leasing off the coasts of other midAtlantic and Southeastern states would be authorized in Interior’s 2012-2017 program.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 166 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core The White House is also calling for opening a major swath of the eastern Gulf of Mexico, which is mostly off-limits under a 2006 Gulf drilling law. While most of the drilling proposal can be undertaken using executive power, expanded drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico would require congressional approval. That will surely play a role in the fight over energy and climate legislation that Democrats hope to bring to the floor. Republicans called Obama’s plan too narrow, as it closes off or delays leasing or sales in other areas. The energy consulting firm ClearView Energy Partners, in a research note Wednesday, said the limits of the White House plan give architects of the Senate energy and climate bill an opening to woo new support. “One obvious implication of today’s announcement: delaying and canceling OCS [Outer Continental Shelf] sales gives lawmakers the opportunity to ‘sweeten’ a climate bill by restoring or accelerating sales,” ClearView states. But the White House and the architects of Senate legislation — Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) — risk losing support among liberal Democrats and environmentalists as they seek expanded drilling. For instance, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) attacked the plan Wednesday. “Drilling off the Virginia coast would endanger many of New Jersey’s beaches and vibrant coastal economies,” Lautenberg said in a prepared statement. Environmental groups that are on board with efforts to craft a compromise climate change and energy bill — such as the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council — also slammed the proposal.

Both the GOP and Democrats are highly polarized on offshore drilling – causes backlash Geman, energy and environment reporter for the Hill, 10 [Ben, 4-1-10, The Hill, “Obama’s Offshore Drilling Push Shakes Up Congressional Fight Over Climate Change”, http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/90137-drilling-push-shakes-up-climate-fight-, accessed 7-7-13, HG] Republicans were generally lukewarm — at best — to the Obama administration plan Wednesday, and many attacked the proposal, calling it too modest. The plan also scuttles some proposed Alaska lease sales. White House spokesman Bill Burton largely deflected questions Wednesday about whether the drilling push would help the push for climate change legislation. “I would say that it’s obviously a part of the climate legislation and the entire package that the president is working with Congress to move forward,” he said when asked about the implications of the drilling plan on the Capitol Hill climate change debate. “So I would say that this is mostly about coming through on a promise that he made to the American people that he would have a comprehensive energy plan that would include some increased domestic production of energy but also some big investments in renewable technology, as well as finding ways to promote efficiency and things like that. So all these things are connected,” he added. Something else to watch: Several lawmakers who support wider offshore drilling want the Senate energy and climate bill to give coastal states a nice cut of what could be billions of dollars in leasing and royalty revenue. Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), a centrist swing vote in the climate fight, on Wednesday applauded the plan to proceed with leasing off Virginia’s coast — but reiterated his call for Virginia to receive a share of the money. “This policy should be coupled with a fair and equitable formula for profit-sharing between the federal and state government in order to attract well-paying jobs to the commonwealth and support a range of

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 167 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core projects, from clean energy development to transportation infrastructure to coastal restoration,” Webb said.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 168 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Political Capital – Transboundary Agreement Technical cooperation in Mexico’s energy infrastructure is politically controversial Committee on Foreign Relations 12 (Standing committee of the United States Senate, 12/21/12, U.S. Government Printing Office, “Oil, Mexico, and the Transboundary Agreement,” http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CPRT112SPRT77567/html/CPRT-112SPRT77567.htm, Accessed 7/9/13) The TBA further contains requirements of data sharing and notification of likely reserves between the United States and Mexico, opening the opportunity for increased government-to- government collaboration on strategic energy policy choices. Mexico and the United States are relatively less advanced in effective communication and linkages of our energy systems than we are in less politically-controversial economic areas. Improved ties can improve understanding and galvanize cooperation in often unexpected ways. In the immediate term, closer oil sector communication will be beneficial in case of accidents in the Gulf of Mexico or in case of significant disruptions to global oil supplies.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 169 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Popular – Offshore Drilling Bipartisan Energy reform and continued offshore drilling popular – jobs and energy security Kelley, Research Analyst at Energy Acuity, 12 [Mike, 9-7-12, Energy Acuity, “Energy Policy’s Impact on the 2012 Presidential Debate”, http://www.energyacuity.com/blog/bid/217770/Energy-Policy-s-Impact-on-the-2012-Presidential-Race, accessed 7-7-13, HG] A recent report by the Congressional Budget Office cites 70% of the nation’s oil and gas reserves as available for drilling already, making it unclear as to the extent to which Romney’s plan will increase actual energy yields (3). An emphasis in off-shore exploration is expected to bolster our nation’s fuel production but we must remain mindful of the potential for disaster, as shown by the recent Deepwater Horizon tragedy. Romney notes that exploration in the Mid-Atlantic, which is currently prohibited, has received continuous bipartisan support (4). It’s worth noting that this support is from Virginia State Senators, whose responsibility is primarily to their constituents. Sen. Jim Webb (D) mentions improvements to his commonwealth’s economy as a primary reason to support development in the MidAtlantic. When discussing national energy policy, this inherent danger of porkbarrel politics, the allocation of federal funds for use in largely localized projects, cannot be ignored. Even still, at our current pace of development, the EIA (Energy Information Administration) predicts the US can eliminate its net imports of natural gas and reduce imports of oil to 38% by 2020. A majority of the necessary oil imports remaining will be sourced from Canada and Mexico, an idea that has continually attracted bipartisan support (5). If we’re going to be approaching North American energy independence by 2020 anyways, than the question becomes whether the actions proposed by Romney to further accelerate domestic production are worth the potential externalities. One key factor in achieving energy independence not discussed in this report is the fate of existing CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) standards. President Obama implemented standards in May 2010 which aim to achieve a fuel economy of 34.5 mpg in model year 2016 vehicles. The EIA cites these new standards as a contributing factor to the 124,000 barrel per day decrease in US gasoline consumption during the first quarter of 2012 as compared to 2011. In an effort to continue this positive trend, this summer President Obama implemented new standards aimed at improving nationwide fuel economy for 2017-2025 (54.5 mpg in model year 2025 vehicles) (6). The EIA predicts this new measure will save 1.4 million barrels of oil per day by 2035 when compared to a simple extension of the 2012-2016 standards (7). This decision has been received with staunch opposition from the Republican Party, including the new Presidential hopeful. Romney has been open in his opposition of the CAFE standards, stating that they “hurt domestic automakers and provided a benefit to some of the foreign automakers” (8). Not only would Romney be expected to rescind the new standards but could repeal the 2012-2016 standards which have already had a tangible effect on foreign oil imports. Despite these accusations, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration expects these standards to reduce our consumption of oil by 4 billion barrels and the BlueGreen Alliance predicts an additional 570,000 jobs by 2030 as a result of this policy (9). Certainly these standards present an opportunity to increase our energy independence without the risks of increasing offshore drilling or opening federal lands for exploration.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 170 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Offshore drilling and cooperation in the Gulf is popular and supported by policymakers – willing to cooperate on environmental standards Hiar, former staff writer for the Center for Public Integrity, the Huffington Post, and PBS MediaShift, 1/23/13 [Corbin, 1-23-13, SNL Electric Utility Report, “New congressional push for oil, gas revenue sharing includes renewable energy,” Lexis, accessed 7-4-13, HG] In addition to the renewable measures, the bill's authors are considering other options to gain Democratic support. For Landrieu; Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va.; and other lawmakers in states with the potential for offshore oil and gas drilling, the bill would immediately entitle their constituents to between 27.5% and 37.5% of energy production revenues, instead of having to wait until 2017 for the second phase of the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act to take effect. Landrieu, whose state has already collected more than $6 million from phase one of the revenue-sharing law, is also pushing to remove the $500 million annual revenue cap included in the 2006 measure. "It's there for budget scoring reasons," Dillon said. "But that's something that's being discussed." The bill's sponsors also may be open to considering popular measures that were used to push previous attempts at revenue sharing. Dillon said the authors would "be happy" to revisit the issue of offshore drilling safety, but he said that since the reform measure died in 2011, the DOI and the Obama administration "were able to do a lot of those things they wanted to do administratively." He said, "So we're not sure at this moment if there's any need for legislation." The clean energy trust fund also may be on the table. Murkowski also has talked to Wyden about "taking another look at how we finance deployment of new technologies," Dillon said. However, he cautioned that "we are still working with co-sponsors and Landrieu on the revenue sharing, so the details may change, but this is just what the outline looks like at this moment." Reaction to the prospective legislation from industry groups across the spectrum has so far been cautiously optimistic. The American Petroleum Institute supports expanded offshore oil and gas production, "and state revenue sharing should be a part of that equation," the trade group's upstream director, Erik Milito, said in an email. Solar Energy Industries Association President Rhone Resch said in an email that, "in general, we are supportive of revenue sharing between the federal and state governments as it has worked well for other energy sectors." The American Wind Energy Association did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has approved 18 solar energy projects on federal land that, if built, will produce more than 6,100 MW of power, according to DOI figures. Since 2009, seven wind projects worth nearly 3,900 MW also have been approved; 566 MW of wind energy had been approved on federal land prior to that. The bill's sponsors remain confident that their efforts to broaden the appeal of revenue sharing to more states and constituencies will help this latest measure secure passage in the 113th Congress. "We want to move this legislation," Dillon said. "This isn't a message bill; this is something we think is important to actually accomplish."

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Popular – Oil & Gas Development There’s bipartisan support for oil and gas development Straessle, API Spokesman, 6-5-13 [Brian, 6-05-13, American Petroleum Institute, “Support for Expanding Offshore Energy Development Is Broad, Bipartisan”, http://www.api.org/news-and-media/news/newsitems/2013/june-2013/support-forexpanding-offshore-energy-development-is-broad-bipartisan, accessed 7-05-13, AMS] There is broad and bipartisan support from the public and policymakers at the state and federal level for expanding access to offshore oil and natural gas development, API Director of Upstream & Industry Operations Erik Milito told reporters this afternoon: “The United States has an opportunity that few nations ever get. We have a chance to be a dominant player in global energy markets and guarantee our energy security for decades ahead. Achieving this feat must include tapping into oil and natural gas resources off our coasts in the Atlantic, Pacific, the Arctic and eastern Gulf of Mexico. “There is broad support from both policymakers and the public, and we need to begin taking the steps to ensure the nation’s long-term energy security. Offshore oil and natural gas production is a long-term effort that requires long-term planning. “We urge President Obama to work with Congress, the states and the industry to take advantage of the valuable opportunity presented by expanding access to offshore energy production and by expanding revenue sharing for coastal states. The benefits for American families, businesses, and our long-term energy security are too great to let this opportunity slip away.”

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Popular – Transboundary Agreement Mexican oil agreement is bipartisan Crooks and Thomson, Financial Times, 12 [Ed and Adam, 2-20-12, Financial Times, “US and Mexico in landmark oil deal,” http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0e0d550a-5bec-11e1-841c-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2YOVL63EL, accessed 7-7-13, MSG] However, the agreement is a signal of the commitment by the US and Mexico to accelerate the development of their resources. It also includes a plan for joint safety inspections by US and Mexican regulators of oil and gas projects along the maritime boundary, a priority for the US following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster. Most analysts agree that increased US oil production would have little effect on fuel prices, which are set in world markets. But, the rising price of petrol in the US, driven by tension with Iran, has become an issue that is being highlighted by Republicans. That has added to the pressure on the Obama administration to be seen to be moving to help increase oil supplies. Ken Salazar, US secretary of the interior, described the deal as a “win-win” for the US and Mexico. The agreement follows a joint commitment made in May 2010 by Barack Obama, US president, and Felipe Calderón, president of Mexico. The Obama administration has been pushing for increased oil and gas production in the US, albeit not at the pace sought by the industry and many Republicans. The administration was criticised for suspending deepwater drilling in the gulf for six months after the BP spill, and for regulators’ slow pace in subsequently issuing permits. However, the administration has since moved to sell more drilling rights in the gulf, and is on track to allow oil exploration in the Arctic waters of Alaska this summer.

There’s bipartisan support for the Agreement Rep. Duncan, Republican-South Carolina, 7-3-13 [Jeff, 7-03-13, The Washington Times, “DUNCAN: A step toward American energy independence”, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jul/3/a-step-toward-american-energy-independence/, accessed 7-05-13, AMS] It is in order to free and grow our energy economy that the House recently passed H.R. 1613, the Outer Continental Shelf Transboundary Hydrocarbon Agreement. This legislation would implement a first-of-its-kind agreement with the government of Mexico to develop shared resources located between our two countries in the Gulf of Mexico. It would open roughly 1.5 million acres in the Gulf for production, and it would help create American jobs and grow our economy in the process. According to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the U.S. State Department, these areas are estimated to contain 172 million barrels of oil and 304 billion cubic feet of natural gas, a considerable amount that will lessen our dependence on Middle Eastern sources of energy. The agreement also prioritizes safety by requiring that all operations in the region conform to U.S. safety standards, and it establishes a framework for possible future arrangements with neighboring countries such as Canada. Simply put, this legislation is a win-win for our country and received bipartisan support in committee and on the House floor. In fact, a recent editorial in the Greenville

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 173 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core News stated, “the subject of energy security demands and invites bipartisanship; it is difficult to disagree on a bill that clearly benefits everyone involved.”

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Popular – Oil Lobby Plan’s popular with oil and gas lobbies – outweighs the link Porretto, Associated Press, 9 (John, 6/19/9, Associated Press, “Oil lobby floods D.C.,” http://www.telegram.com/article/20090619/NEWS/906190443/1002, Accessed 7/9/13) HOUSTON — Oil and gas companies have accelerated their spending on lobbying faster than any other industry, training their gusher of profits on Washington to fight new taxes on drilling and slow efforts to move the nation off fossil fuels. The industry spent $44.5 million lobbying Congress and federal agencies in the first three months of this year, on pace to shatter last year's record . Only the drug industry spent more. Last year's total of $129 million was up 73 percent from two years earlier. That's a faster clip than any other major industry, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. From the late 1990s through the first half of this decade, the oil industry spent roughly $50 million to $60 million a year on lobbying. It ramped up lobbying in 2006, when Democrats retook Congress, and further as President Barack Obama took office. “They're under attack, they're ramping up their operations and they've got money to spend,” said Tyson Slocum, who runs the energy program at watchdog group Public Citizen. “They're in a much better position than other industries to draw upon financial resources for their lobbying effort.” Billions of dollars in oil profits in recent years have made the industry a target for new and higher taxes on exploration and drilling. Oil companies and refiners are also trying to blunt the impact of costly climate change legislation pushed by Obama. While most oil and gas executives acknowledge the nation needs cleaner energy, they say lawmakers are misguided about how quickly it can happen. They warn that taxes and tighter rules on exploration could cripple the industry before new technology is developed. Complex issues like that “require additional communication and effort to ensure lawmakers understand our positions,” said Alan Jeffers, a spokesman for Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest publicly traded oil company. Exxon Mobil was the biggest spender in the first quarter, pumping $9.3 million into Washington — three times what it spent a year ago, according to House disclosure reports. In its House filing, Exxon noted it lobbied on high-profile topics such as climate and tax legislation, as well as provisions regarding the chemical industry, education and health care. Combined, the three largest U.S. oil companies — Exxon, Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips — spent about $22 million on lobbying in the first quarter. Smaller, independent companies that produce the bulk of the nation's crude and natural gas are spending millions, too. They're spending more even as profits have subsided. The big three U.S. oil companies spent just $12.4 million on lobbying in the fourth quarter. First-quarter spending on lobbying by the oil industry trailed only drugmakers and health products companies, which spent $66.6 million. “I can tell you, I've had substantially more visits than usual,” said Rep. Gene Green, whose south Texas district is in the heart of oil country. Among his callers, he said, have been representatives of ConocoPhillips and Exxon Mobil to discuss climate-change legislation and other matters. To a degree, the investment appears to be paying off. On Wednesday, a Senate committee voted to lift a ban on drilling across a vast area in the eastern Gulf of Mexico. The provision, which the industry pushed for, is included in a bill that would expand the use of renewable energy sources such as wind and solar. The bill now goes to the full Senate. Democrats from oil states have also managed to get rid of a provision in an anti-pollution bill to require refiners to meet a standard on low-carbon motor fuel. Refiners say the bill would still be devastating to business. Most major industries have increased what they spend on lobbying, but no one has done so at a faster clip over the past two years than oil and gas companies, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. The enormous amount of money funneled to Washington by energy companies comes after some members of Congress suggested slapping the big

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 175 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core oil companies with a windfall profits tax last year, when Americans were seething over $4-a-gallon gas. Democrats — who also took the majority of state legislatures and governorships in 2006 — traditionally have not been as cozy with the oil sector as Republicans, and the energy lobby has spent the past few years trying to make inroads. “You'll often see a correlation between spending and an industry or company that's in the hot seat,” said Sheila Krumholz, the Center for Responsive Politics' executive director. “That will be enough to get them to hire additional guns and direct more money to lobbying.”

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 176 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Trafficking

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 177 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Unopular – Trafficking Enforcement More resources for trafficking assistance will spark debate – members of Congress do not want more investment Seelke, Congressional Research Service Latin American Affairs specialist, 1-29-13 [Clare Ribando, 1-29-13, Congressional Research Service, “Mexico and the 112th Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32724.pdf, p.20-21, accessed 7-5-13, MSG] Mexican and bilateral investigations and prosecutions against human trafficking have intensified since Mexico reformed its federal criminal procedure code to criminalize trafficking in late 2007. All of Mexico's states have enacted code reforms that criminalize at least some forms of human trafficking. Since 2007, the State Department has removed Mexico from its human trafficking watch list and ranked it as a "Tier 2" country (the second-best out of four categories) in its annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) reports, reflecting this progress. According to the State Department’s TIP report covering 2011, Mexico convicted 14 sex traffickers in 2011, but did not report any convictions for forced labor. Observers maintain that the number of prosecutions recorded is low relative to the scale of the human trafficking problem in Mexico. The Mexican Congress recently approved a new law against trafficking that amends the 2007 federal anti-TIP law and includes prison sentences of up to 40 years for people convicted of sexual exploitation. Yet the Congress also cut funding for anti-TIP efforts and for the Attorney General's Office in 2012. Many Mexican law enforcement activities with respect to combating alien smuggling and human trafficking receive some degree of U.S. financial support. One way to increase Mexico's role in migration enforcement may be for Congress to consider additional investments in these programs. The United States also could include migration control as an explicit priority within other existing programs, such as the Mérida Initiative. On the other hand, Mexico is already among the largest recipients of U.S. anti-TIP assistance in the Western Hemisphere, and some Members of Congress may be reluctant to invest more resources in such programs.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 178 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Immigration

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 179 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Controversial Immigration is a hot button issue Tweney, Venture Beat, 6-30-13 [Dylan, 6-30-13, Venture Beat, “Silicon Valley immigration reformers set their sights on Congress,” http://venturebeat.com/2013/06/30/immigration-reformers-target-congress/, accessed 7-5-13, MSG] Now that the Senate has passed the controversial immigration reform bill, Silicon Valley companies and their lobbyists are targeting the next hurdle: the House of Representatives. Up next: a July 10 meeting for the House Republican Conference, which lobbyists hope will shed some light on immigration reform’s chances in the House. Immigration reform faces a much bigger challenge in the Republican-controlled House than it did in the Democratic-led Senate. Still, the Senate’s immigration bill was a carefully-crafted bipartisan effort, so there is some cause for Silicon Valley to be hopeful. Hopeful, that is, because opening the doors to more skilled immigrants is key to the technology industry’s success, many believe. Many voices have been mobilized to speak out in favor of increasing immigration quotas for foreigners who have computer skills, including a new lobbying group, FWD.us, that is backed by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and other tech industry titans. Immigrants not only help fill the ranks of technical employees at many Silicon Valley companies, they have also founded nearly half of the Fortune 500. Meanwhile, other countries, such as Canada, have created ‘startup visa’ programs to encourage entrepreneurship among immigrants. But it’s a political hot-button issue. To get the bill passed, tradeoffs may include an even more beefed-up border with Mexico, more immigration enforcement, and maybe even a biometric database tracking every American.

Immigration unpopular- bill unpopular in the Senate Espo, Associated Press Special Correspondent, 6-25-13 [David, 6-25-13, Associated Press, “GOP divided on immigration; House uncertain,” lexis, accessed 7-413, MSG] "I believe a large bipartisan vote will wake up our colleagues ... in the House," Schumer said shortly before the Senate inserted a requirement for 20,000 new Border Patrol agents and a total of 700 miles of fencing along the border with Mexico. "Hopefully, as congressmen look how their senators voted, they will be influenced by it." In the key Senate showdown so far, 15 Republicans voted to advance the legislation that toughens border security at the same time it creates a chance at citizenship for 11 million immigrants living in the United States illegally. Another 27 voted to keep the bill bottled up. Republicans who voted to block the legislation generally did so after saying it would not deliver on its promise of operational control of the border. "When you look at it, it doesn't, and they know it," Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., said of the bill's backers, who quickly disputed the charge. A political pattern emerged, as well. Among Republicans who are seeking a new term next year and as a result face the risk of a primary challenge, only three voted with supporters of the measure. Eight did not, a group that includes the party's two top leaders in the Senate, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and John Cornyn of Texas, as well as Sessions, who has been one of the bill's principal opponents across three weeks of debate.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 180 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core While party leaders long have looked to immigration legislation as a way to broaden appeal among Hispanic voters, individual members of Congress report a different perspective. "It's hard to argue with the polling they've been getting from the national level," Texas Republican Rep. Kenny Marchant said recently, referring to polls that show support for border security along with legalization. Yet in his own district in the suburbs west of Dallas, he said, proposals along the lines of the Senate bill are "very unpopular."

Immigration is unpopular—Republicans do not think it is money well spent Mascaro, Tribune Washington Bureau, & Bennett, Tribune Washington Bureau, 621-13 [Lisa and Brian, 6-21-13, The Baltimore Sun, “'Border surge' eyed to lift bill; Senate's $30B plan would boost drones, agents -- and maybe GOP votes,” lexis, accessed 7-4-13, MSG] WASHINGTON -- The Senate is poised to approve an immigration proposal that would indelibly change security at the U.S. border with Mexico, doubling the number of Border Patrol agents and tripling the number of drones -- a $30 billion plan designed to win the votes of as many as 15 Republican senators with a military-style buildup. The plan would add so many new agents to the Border Patrol -- 20,000 -- that if all were deployed at once, they could be stationed roughly every 250 feet from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. Spending that amount -- more than four times what senators initially proposed -- would also be a boost to defense contractors and an economic stimulus for border communities. The proposed "border surge" at a time of budget austerity and record low numbers of illegal crossings had even backers expressing doubts. But they said it would provide political protection to allow Republicans to vote for a measure that remains unpopular with many of their constituents. "I don't know if it's money well spent," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who helped negotiate the new agreement. "It's important that we do this to give people confidence we have border security, so in that respect, I think it's well spent."

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Unpopular – Open Borders Absent tougher border security an immigration bill is dead on arrival—open borders have no chance with House Republicans Breitbart News 7/8/13 (Mike Flynn, “HOUSE UNLIKELY TO PASS A 'PATHWAY' TO ANYTHING,” http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/07/08/house-is-not-going-to-pass-a-pathway-toanything, Accessed 7/11/13, JC) Now that the Senate has passed its amnesty legislation, attention turns next to the House, which returns Monday for three weeks of work before the month-long August recess. Supporters of the Senate bill had hoped action on the issue in that chamber would put pressure on the House to act. Speaker Boehner, however, has already said the Senate bill is DOA in the House. The most likely outcome is the passage of narrow legislation focused primarily on border security and enforcement. The foundational flaw in the Senate bill is that it trades nearly-immediate legalization for a promise of increased security and enforcement in the future. Obama's decision last week to ignore, for at least one year, a major provision of ObamaCare shows the folly of that bargain. If the Obama Administration won't enforce laws it supported, what chance is there that it will enforce provisions it either doesn't support or believes are unnecessary? The strongest security and enforcement mechanisms are worthless if the Administration simply chooses to ignore them. Rep. Steve King told Breitbart News, "What's the point of passing news laws if Obama isn't going to enforce them?" The only certainty provided in the Senate bill is a multi-year "pathway to citizenship." Some in the House have discussed a "pathway to legalization," that would allow current illegal immigrants to remain in the country but not have the opportunity to become citizens. Many activists consider either "path" amnesty. Without assurances that the border will be secured and enforcement increased, opposition to any "pathway" will intensify. Of the fourteen GOP Senators who voted for the amnesty bill, only three are up for reelection next year. In the House, every member of the GOP caucus is up for reelection. For the overwhelming majority, a primary challenge is the only thing that could knock them out of Congress. For many, it would be political suicide to support anything resembling the Senate bill. Members of Congress are not in the habit of committing political suicide.

Open borders immigration reform is political suicide—even the moderate GOP’s support collapses without stronger enforcement Crouere, Bayou Buzz staff, 6/14/13 (Jeff, Bayou Buzz, “Kevorkian Rubio’s immigration reform is political suicide,” http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:zSOqVWi9p2YJ:www.bayoubuzz.com/buzz/ite m/488125-kevorkian-rubio%E2%80%99s-immigration-reform-is-politicalsuicide+&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us, Accessed 7/11/13, JC) It is clear why Democrats like Obama support the bill. They know that once 11-20 million illegal immigrants are given the right to vote, the vast majority will support the Democratic Party. Yet, why are Rubio and other Republican moderates supporting this bill? The negative ramifications for the GOP could be quite severe. In the last election, 77 percent of Hispanic voters cast their ballot for Barack Obama. If this bill is passed, red states like Texas will become blue and then the GOP can forget

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 182 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core about ever winning another presidential election. It seems like Rubio has a death wish for the Republican Party. It is why columnist Ann Coulter calls him “the Jack Kevorkian of the Republican party.” Besides the obvious political ramifications, there are many, many reasons for conservatives to oppose the immigration reform bill. It will legalize the millions of undocumented aliens first before any consideration of border security. In an interview last Sunday on Univision, the Spanish language TV network, Rubio said “First comes the legalization, then come the measures to secure the border, and then comes the process of permanent residence. What we're talking about here is the system of permanent residence. Regarding the legalization, the enormous majority of my colleagues have accepted that it has to happen and that it has to happen at the same time we begin the measures regarding [border] security. It is not conditional. The legalization is not conditional.”

Open borders is unpopular, especially in border towns D’Ottavio, the Examiner, 9 [Kari, 1-4-9, The Examiner, “Open Borders Are Dangerous”, http://www.examiner.com/article/openborders-are-dangerous, accessed 7-10-13, HG] Illegal immigration into the United States is massive in scale. More than 10 million undocumented aliens, which is a conservative estimate, currently reside in the U.S., and that population grows every year. It is a sign of how dangerous our borders are. Many illegal aliens come to America primarily for better jobs; however, they also weaken the legal and national security environment. When 3 out of every 100 people in America are undocumented, or documented with forged and faked papers, there is a serious security problem. The presence of millions of undocumented migrants distorts the law, consumes resources, and effectively creates a cover for terrorists and criminals. Where does Barack Obama stand on the border fence? Obama voted for the fence but since that time has joined Clinton in de-emphasizing his support, which is unpopular in border towns.

Opening the border is unpopular- cartels and low wages Zieve, Political Commentator, 7 [Sher, 6-21-7, Renew America, “Military warns personnel don't go to Mexico while Senate pushes open borders,” http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/zieve/070621, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] While President Bush and US Senators continue to fiddle with their open borders amnesty policy, also known as the "Immigration Reform" bill, the US military is warning its personnel and civilian employees not to enter Mexican border towns. Chillingly, this warning also includes US towns located along our southern border. Towns on the Mexican side of the border, and perhaps those on the US side as well, are increasingly being controlled by Mexican drug lords and their cartels. These same drug lords have placed death-bounties on both our US border patrol agents and US military personnel. Unconscionably, our leftist mainstream media is neither reporting this nor the facts that open warfare is occurring, on a daily basis, along large portions of the US-Mexico border. Mexican illegals are, on a regular basis, burning down portions of the ecologically-sensitive Coronado National Forest to create diversions; so that drug dealers and other illegals can cross unfettered into the United States. Where is the outrage from the supposed environmentalists? It's nonexistent. Are the arsonists accepted because they're assumed to be from the politically-correct race — no matter what they do? Apparently so.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 183 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Note: Despite the arson and increasing warfare at our southern border, our politicians are still working to bypass the American people and pass their Illegal Alien Amnesty bill. What are they thinking — or better yet, smoking? With the exception of our elite political and business leaders, the Senate Amnesty Bill will — ultimately — help no one. As illegal-turned-legal workers enter the US, in even greater numbers, wages for US citizens will be driven down, members of the US middle class will become fewer and fewer and a new and permanent lower-class structure will have been firmly established upon our shores. Can the Patron-peon scenario be far behind? After our Congress and President have imbued the current illegals in our country with legal status, said illegals-now-legal will demand somewhat higher wages. Business will then need even more impoverished workers to fill the lower-lower class worker pool. So, illegal entry will continue — aided and abetted by our politicians. It is a never ending cycle of the intentional planned destruction of the United States of America — by those who are sworn to protect it — for the promises of power and larger bank accounts; or additional holdings in the Caymans. Power and money corrupt and there are always those in line begging to be corrupted. We now hear them on and in the media virtually every day. The current Amnesty Bill also calls for the construction of 370 miles of border fence. HUH??? The Secure Fence Act of 2006, which was passed and funded by Congress, already provides for the building of 700 miles of security fencing along our southern border! Congress is — yet again — ignoring a law that is currently in place in order to attempt to pass a more feckless one. The Senate is simply trying to force their Amnesty Bill upon the American people by trying to convince them that without it there will be no security fence built.

Opening the border is unpopular- fear of spillover violence Associated Press, 11 [12-11-11, Fox News, “U.S. Proposes Unmanned Border Entry With Mexico,” http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/12/11/us-proposes-unmanned-border-entry-with-mexico/, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] BIG BEND NATIONAL PARK, Texas – The bloody drug war in Mexico shows no sign of relenting. Neither do calls for tighter border security amid rising fears of spillover violence. This hardly seems a time the U.S. would be willing to allow people to cross the border legally from Mexico without a customs officer in sight. But in this rugged, remote West Texas terrain where wading across the shallow Rio Grande undetected is all too easy, federal authorities are touting a proposal to open an unmanned port of entry as a security upgrade. By the spring, kiosks could open up in Big Bend National Park allowing people from the tiny Mexican town of Boquillas del Carmen to scan their identity documents and talk to a customs officer in another location, at least 100 miles away. The crossing, which would be the nation's first such port of entry with Mexico, has sparked opposition from some who see it as counterintuitive in these days of heightened border security. Supporters say the crossing would give the isolated Mexican town long-awaited access to U.S. commerce, improve conservation efforts and be an unlikely target for criminal operations.

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Political Capital

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Political Capital Definition Political capital is the combined resources available to the president to influence lawmakers Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N., & Vimal, Presidential Studies Quarterly, 41: 488-503, September 2011, “Opportunism in Polarization: Presidential Success in Senate Key Votes, 1953-2008”, p. 489, footnote 2, Wiley, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] (2.) To elaborate, we conceptualize "political capital" as selective-incentives presidents control and may allocate to induce changes in lawmakers' votes. So, even as tactical applications may vary for example, arm-twisting, brow-beating, horse-trading, etc.--all reflect the same underlying purpose: allocating the presidency's unique reservoir of persuasive resources bargaining with particular lawmakers.

Political capital involves being cooperative and rewarding Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco] In the following we employ the omnibus concept of ‘presidential political capital’ to¶ capture this conception of presidents’ positive power as persuasive bargaining.¶ 1¶ Specifi-¶ cally, we define presidents’ political capital as the class of tactics White House officials¶ employ to induce changes in lawmakers’ behavior.¶ 2¶ Importantly, this conception of presi-¶ dents’ positive power as persuasive bargaining not only meshes with previous scholarship¶ on lobbying (see, e.g., Austen-Smith and Wright (1994), Groseclose and Snyder (1996),¶ Krehbiel (1998: ch. 7), and Snyder (1991)), but also presidential practice.¶ 3¶ For exam-¶ ple, Goodwin recounts how President Lyndon Johnson routinely allocated ‘rewards’ to ‘cooperative’ members :¶ The rewards themselves (and the withholding of rewards)¶ ...¶ might be something as unobtrusive as receiving an invitation to join the President in a walk around the White House¶ grounds, knowing that pictures of the event would be sent to hometown newspapers¶ ...¶ [or¶ something as pointed as] public works projects, military bases, educational research grants,¶ poverty projects, appointments of local men to national commissions, the granting of pardons,¶ and more. (Goodwin, 1991: 237)

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Political Capital Key to Agenda Policymaking requires horse trading – President must use political capital to secure agenda Ryan, Political scientist & University of the West Indies University Director of the Institute of Social and Economic Studies, 9 (Selwyn, 1-18-9, Trinidad Express, "Obama and political capital," Trinidad Express, http://www.trinidadexpress.com/index.pl/article_opinion?id=161426968, accessed 7-15-10) One of the "realities" that Obama has to face is that American politics is not a winner-take-all system. It is pluralistic vertically and horizontally, and getting anything done politically, even when the President and the Congress are controlled by the same party, requires groups to negotiate, bargain and engage in serious horse trading. No one takes orders from the President who can only use moral or political suasion and promises of future support for policies or projects. The system was in fact deliberately engineered to prevent overbearing majorities from conspiring to tyrannise minorities. The system is not only institutionally diverse and plural, but socially and geographically so. As James Madison put it in Federalist No 10, one of the foundation documents of republicanism in America, basic institutions check other basic institutions, classes and interests check other classes and interests, and regions do the same. All are grounded in their own power bases which they use to fend off challengers. The coalitions change from issue to issue, and there is no such thing as party discipline which translated, means you do what I the leader say you do.

Political capital determines success of the President’s agenda Light, Brookings Center for Public Service founding director, 99 (Paul Charles, New York University Professor of Public Service, The President’s Agenda: Domestic Policy Choice from Kennedy to Clinton, p. 25-26, Google Books, http://books.google.com/books?id=vuWJHWdgstsC&printsec=frontcover&dq=the+Presidents+Agenda& hl=en&ei=X2FATOLRFIWKlwflvLHxDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCwQ 6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=the%20Presidents%20Agenda&f=false, accessed 7-15-10) In chapter 2, I will consider just how capital affects the basic parameters of the domestic agenda. Though the internal resources are important contributors to timing and size, capital remains the cirtical factor. That conclusion will become essential in understanding the domestic agenda. Whatever the President’s personal expertise, character, or skills, capital is the most important resource. In the past, presidential scholars have focused on individual factors in discussing White House decisions, personality being the dominant factor. Yet, given low levels in presidential capital, even the most positive and most active executive could make little impact. A president can be skilled, charming, charismatic, a veritable legislative wizard, but if he does not have the basic congressional strength, his domestic agenda will be severely restricted – capital affects both the number and the content of the President’s priorities. Thus, it is capital that determines whether the President will have the opportunity to offer a detailed domestic program, whether he will be restricted to a series of limited initiatives and vetoes. Capital sets the basic parameters of the agenda, determining the size of the agenda and guiding the criteria for choice. Regardless of the President’s personality, capital is the central force behind the domestic agenda.

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Political support key to agenda – collapse of support crushes agenda Ornstein, American Enterprise Institute fellow and political analyst, 3 (Norman J., Roll Call, 9-10-3, “As Issues Pile Up; Bush Needs New Approach With Hill”, Lexis) When a president operates with sky-high approval and a reputation as a winner no matter what the odds, he has immense leverage with Members of Congress who fear his wrath and assume he will prevail. When he stumbles, the assumptions change, and the ability to exercise power attenuates.

Policymaking requires compromise Barrett & Eshbaugh-Soha, University of North Texas, 7 [Andrew W. & Matthew, March, Political Research Quarterly, Vol. 60, No. 1, “Presidential Success on the Substance of Legislation”, pp. 100-112, Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4623810, Accessed: 7-15-10) Congress as an institution depends upon the willingness of its members to compromise to produce legislation (Elving 1995). The lawmaking process is protracted and complicated with dozens of opportuni- ties for unsatisfied legislators to kill legislation, including simple inaction by committee chairs or party leaders. With more than five hundred individu- als divided into two legislative bodies, little can be accomplished without building majority coalitions through bargaining and compromise. Presidents, however, are only one among several cues that legislators use to decide how to vote (Kingdon 1981), with much coalition building taking place independent of presidential involvement (Arnold 1990). Moreover, presidents must overcome several obstacles unique to their office when attempting to build congressional coalitions (Edwards 2000). These include, but are not limited to, the president's limited tenure in office as well as a different electoral clock and constituency than members of Congress. Each of these provides different incentives for presi- dents and legislators to bargain, compromise, and ultimately agree on legislative language. The hierarchical nature of the executive, in contrast to the more decentralized legislature, also exacerbates presidential responsibility and accountability while obscuring that of Congress. Given the difficulty of the lawmaking process itself and the unique obstacles facing the president in building congressional coalitions, presidents will likely be forced to make concessions on most bills they support, as they bargain with legisla- tors to secure their passage. Therefore, we hypothesize that presidents will need to compromise on the substance of legislation before they sign most bills into law.

The President has a limited capability to pass his agenda. Passing items like the plan take away from his ability to pass other legislation Feehery, former House Speaker Hastert staffer and Feehery Group president, 9 (John, Feehery Group is a Washington-based advocacy firm, 7-21-9, CNN, “Commentary: Obama enters 'The Matrix'” www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/07/21/feehery.obama.matrix/index.html, accessed 7-16-10)

And, indeed, the Congress has its own rules that make quick legislative action, no matter how popular with the American people, hard to achieve. The Obama agenda is breathtaking in its scope and eye-popping in its cost. He seeks to completely recast the health care, energy, financial services and automobile sectors of this country, as he seeks to make the tax code more progressive, retirement programs more sustainable, and the immigration system more welcoming to immigrants. And he also wants to stimulate the economy and get us out of what some people are calling the "Great Recession." But can it all get done, and in a form that makes his political base happy? The president insists that he can get this all done, and his

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chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, has implied that the financial crisis has actually given the White House more momentum to get it all done. But history tells a different story. Congress has its own code, and cracking that code usually means taking into account five different factors. These five factors are: Money: It may seem trite, but the biggest factor in determining the size and scope of a legislative agenda is how much money -- and more importantly, the perception of how much money -- is available for the government to use. Bill Clinton's legislative agenda was necessarily limited because his budget constraints made it difficult to spend money on big things. George Bush, who inherited a fairly large budget surplus, had money to burn, which allowed him to pass a prescription drug benefit. President Obama has no money, which means that if he wants to pass a big new entitlement like a health care public option, he will have to make the Congress take the painful step of raising a lot of taxes. Time: The legislative calendar is simply not that long. A new administration has a little less than a year to pass its big-ticket items, mostly because it is very hard to get major initiatives done in an election year. Take away the three months it takes to hire key staff, a couple of months for the various congressional recesses, and you have about six months to really legislate. Since Congress is supposed to use some time to pass its annual spending bills (there are 12 that need to be passed each year, not counting supplemental spending bills), time for big initiatives is actually very limited. Each day the president takes time to travel overseas or to throw out the first pitch at an All Star game, he is taking time away from making contacts with legislators whose support is crucial for the president's agenda. Time is not a limitless resource on Capitol Hill. Political capital: A president enters office with the highest popularity ratings he will ever get (barring a war or some other calamity that brings the country together), which is why most presidents try to pass as much as possible as early as possible in their administrations. The most famous example of that was Franklin Roosevelt's Hundred Days. But there are other examples. Ronald Reagan moved his agenda very early in his administration, George Bush passed his tax proposals and the No Child Left Behind law very early in his White House. They understood the principle that it is important to strike while the iron is hot. President Bush famously misunderstood this principle when he said that he was going to use the "political capital" gained in his re-election to pass Social Security reform. What he failed to understand was that as soon as he won re-election, he was a lame duck in the eyes of the Congress, and he had no political capital. President Obama believes he has a lot of political capital, and perhaps he does. But each day he is in office, his political capital reserve is declining. And each time he goes to the well to pass things like "cap and trade" makes it more difficult for him to pass his more important priorities like health care. Focus: Congress can walk and chew gum at the same time. But focus is essential to achieving results. Presidential focus quite often moves off the domestic agenda and into the wider world of diplomacy. But that can spell greater political danger for a president and his party. George H.W. Bush spent most of his presidency winning a war against Iraq and successfully concluded the Cold War conflict with the Soviet Union. But neither of those foreign policy successes helped him win re-election. His son, George W. Bush, understood that he had to keep a tight focus on the economy and one big domestic policy item (education), and while the war on terror did end up dominating his presidency, Bush never forgot to focus on his domestic achievements. The biggest danger to President Obama is not just foreign entanglements, it is also competing domestic priorities that threaten to undermine his ability to get big things done. For example, the House vote on cap and trade has made it very hard for conservative and moderate Democrats to join with Speaker Nancy Pelosi on a more important health care bill.

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Presidential negotiating key to agenda Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 28-29, ProQuest, AMS] The Politics of Economics Political organizations that represent established economic interests capitalize on contentious public beliefs and the dispersal of government power. They wield resources and ongoing relationships of advantage sharing and threats of political retribution to guide and, if necessary, pressure members of Congress and administration officials to redirect, delay, or reject policies that threaten their interests. Ronald Reagan's wide-ranging efforts to shrink federal government responsibilities and funding was subsequently checked or reduced as organized interests effectively used judicial oversight and congressional alliances (Bickers and Stein 1995). Seeking change from the opposite ideological direction, Obama faced formidable opposition to programs that would primarily benefit a large, diffuse, and comparatively unorganized target population - namely, recipients of health care expansion. Anticipating deadlock and potential defeat, he and his allies adapted to this imbalanced organizational combat zone by striking compromises with stakeholders in the financial and health care industries (Jacobs and King 2009, 2010). Although strong public support can augment the White House's bargaining position, strategic presidents enhance their probability of success by adjusting their positions, giving some ground to legislators and well-organized interests with the sway to obstruct them (Burnam 2010; Dickinson 2008). In 2009-10, President Obama and his allies adjusted their policy positions on health care reform, balancing their commitment to comprehensive reform against the strategic need to secure support or acquiescence of powerful economic interests and their allies (Jacobs and Skocpol 2012).

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AT – Political Capital Theory Flawed Political capital is finite and the theory is true Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N., & Vimal, Presidential Studies Quarterly, 41: 488-503, September 2011, “Opportunism in Polarization: Presidential Success in Senate Key Votes, 1953-2008”, p. 491-2, Wiley, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] Returning to our model and its implications, we see a prerequisite to presidential influence is the president's willingness and ability to spend political capital lobbying lawmakers. When a president either chooses not to get involved (A = 0) or lacks political capital to spend (B = 0), the pivotal senator will propose and pass her preferred bill. In such circumstances, the chamber's preference distribution does not matter; the president will have no influence. In other circumstances--ones commonplace since Franklin D. Roosevelt entered the Oval Office--the president not only seeks to exert influence on Capitol Hill, but also wields some political capital to invest to that end. We now turn to these cases and in doing so uncover how presidents' influence turns on more than his supply of political capital and the location of the pivotal voter; it also depends on the level ideological polarization. Let us explain.

Political capital increases lobbying power and the odds for passage – studies prove Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N., & Vimal, Presidential Studies Quarterly, 41: 488-503, September 2011, “Opportunism in Polarization: Presidential Success in Senate Key Votes, 1953-2008”, p. 492, Wiley, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] Below we illustrate this general finding for three archetype distributions--one unimodal, one uniform, and one bimodal--as shown in Figure 2 and defined in Appendix A. Note that, although these three archetype distributions vary substantially in terms of polarization, from low (unimodal) to moderate (uniform) to high (bimodal), they all have the same median voter, which allows us to isolate the impact of ideological polarization per se, independent of the pivotal voter's preference. Put differently, comparing presidents' influence across these three distributions reveals how polarization (or lack thereof) affects presidents' legislative influence (or lack thereof), all else equal. Figure 3 displays the president's influence on the policy outcome given these different levels of congressional polarization, assuming the president's goal is to achieve an outcome as far to the right as possible (toward 1/2). Perhaps the most obvious result is that presidents endowed with political capital and executing a vote-centered strategy can always improve their prospects for success by lobbying. Across all three distributions, even modest supplies of political capital permit the president to pull the outcome toward his preferred outcome. And, of course, added supplies of political capital only serve to further enhance presidents' policy-making influence.

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Political capital theory true – leverage is used to curb public support in favor of the President, and to assert policies Ponder, Drury University’s Political Science Professor, 12 (Daniel E., June 2012, Presidential Studies Quarterly, “Presidential Leverage and the Politics of Policy Formulation,” 42, no. 2, p. 304-5, YGS) Presidents can use leverage strategically so as to maximize their power potential. The notion of the president’s public standing to attitudes toward government as a whole derives in part from Stephen Skowronek’s observation that “Presidents stand preeminent in American politics when government has been most thoroughly discredited, and when political resistance to presidency is weakest, presidents tend to remake the government wholesale” (1993, 37). Indeed, at one level, presidential leverage can be conceived of as having a familial resemblance to Skowronek’s “warrant” for power, by which he means a kind of license or authority to put political power into action (1993, esp. chaps. 2 and 3). Skowronek argues that these warrants are contingent on the political time in which presidents’ serve. Leverage is similar in that it systematically measures or quantifies this contingency and identifies when a president truly does “stand preeminent” in American politics. This state of affairs obtains when leverage is high. When government action (or inaction) has left the public wanting, distrustful, and/or skeptical of political action, presidents may enjoy leverage over competing institutions and thus feel emboldened to increase the variety of their public policy proposals, perhaps realizing increased policy success in the legislative arena. Presidential leverage conveys how presidents (via the imperfect measure of presidential approval) fare in the presence of public attitudes in the other institutions of government, with specific reference to trust in government. When the public lacks trust in other institutions and the president is able to rise above those institutions, he builds distance between himself and the beleaguered institutions of government; on the downside, he may sense he has more of a warrant for action than is actually the case (see Schlesinger 1973; Skowronek 1993).9 Similar too is Charles O. Jones’s consideration of “leeway.” Jones sees leeway as “essentially an exercise in capitalizing on the conspicuous features of separationism . . . encouraged in post-World War II politics by the frequency of split party government” (2000, 6). Leeway is similar to Skowronek’s warrants in that they both imply that presidents can use structural and institutional contexts to forge their own paths, perhaps working outside the boundaries of what might be acceptable or predictable. Leverage focuses on the public dimension of presidential action, and presidents with considerable leverage can further veer “off course” and take advantage of the “feeling,” however temporary, that they are “first among equals” with the leverage to set the course of American politics.10 Leverage, broadly conceived, derives from and builds upon these insights into presidential authority. I conceive it not as antagonistic to “warrants” or “leeway,” but rather as part of a cumulative process that helps explain presidential action where presidents can assert, however intuitively, leverage over the course of American politics and public policy.

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AT – PC Theory Flawed [Hirsh version] They say political capital theory flawed – group 1. Theory is true- president only has a certain amount of tangible and intangible resources at his disposal. If one bill is unpopular, then the president has to use both kinds of his resources to get the bill through Congress. 2. Hirsh says the critical flaw in political capital theory is that it is easily overestimated – not relevant in the context of fiat. The plan passes regardless and doesn’t affect Obama’s decision to push or not push the agenda item. Doesn’t matter how much political capitalObama perceives he has, only matters how much is necessary to pass the agenda item. Hirsh does conclude that momentum and mandate power can help the President pass bills. 3. Hirsh assumes political capital must be quantifiable to be spent. Other qualitative factors of political capital like mandate rhetoric have empirically been successful in increasing presidential influence: Eisenhower and Reagan prove. 4. Political capital is meaningful to legislation – Hirsh accepts political capital theory—he uses it to qualify the support a president can expect Hirsh, National Journal Chief Correspondent, 13 [Michael, Updated: May 30, 2013 | 12:26 a.m., February 7, 2013 | 8:10 p.m., “There’s No Such Thing as Political Capital”, http://www.nationaljournal.com/magazine/there-s-no-such-thing-as-political-capital20130207, accessed 7-10-13, AFB] The point is not that “political capital” is a meaningless term. Often it is a synonym for “mandate” or “momentum” in the aftermath of a decisive election—and just about every politician ever elected has tried to claim more of a mandate than he actually has. Certainly, Obama can say that because he was elected and Romney wasn’t, he has a better claim on the country’s mood and direction. Many pundits still defend political capital as a useful metaphor at least. “It’s an unquantifiable but meaningful concept,” says Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute. “You can’t really look at a president and say he’s got 37 ounces of political capital. But the fact is, it’s a concept that matters, if you have popularity and some momentum on your side.”

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5. Obama gets the blame for all legislation – he signs it and puts it into action – that means he only has a finite amount of capital that he can spend pushing legislation – people won’t cooperate over controversial issues when the president is unpopular 6. Hirsh assumes that legislators are cemented in their views if they look at something in isolation- that’s false. There is a large contingent that can be persuaded if Obama influential enough on the Hill. This is proven by Republican Senators who have crossed party lines, like Susan Collins from Maine, or Mark Kirk from Illinois 7. He also cites LBJ, Bush, Obama, Lincoln, and FDR as examples but all of them prove that political capital theory is true- all of them used time and resources and their credibility to try to persuade members of Congress and the public on controversial issues and had a limited amount of it to spend. All of these presidents had successes and failures due to political capital or the lack of political capital. 8. The atmosphere can’t change that much in a few weeks like Hirsh says – if the president has to lobby and irritates key politicians, nothing would change so drastically in a few weeks – It would take years 9. Polarization means PC works – ideology has never been the sole reason Obama has been unable to pass legislation – Obama can use PC on the pivotal voters who care about the substance of the bill to get it passed – empirically true. 10. There is no alternative – even their authors concede that passivity is worse than persuasion because it is perceived as weak. That means persuasion is the best way of pushing legislation. 11. He’s wrong – Republicans can’t win the Latino Vote – means no compromise and no momentum Tomasky, Daily Beast special correspondent, 6/28/13 [Michael, Daily Beast, “Get Ready for More GOP Race Baiting”, http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/06/28/get-ready-for-more-goprace-baiting.html, accessed: 7/9/13, ML] The situation is this. The immigration reform bill passed the Senate yesterday. It will now go to the House. A few weeks ago, as I read things, there were occasional and tepid signals that the House would not take up the Senate bill. Now, by contrast, those signals are frequent and full-throated. For example, yesterday Peter Roskam, a deputy GOP whip in the House, said this: “It is a pipe dream to think that [the Senate] bill is going to go to the floor and be voted on. The House is going to move through in a more deliberative process.” “Deliberative process” probably means, in this case, killing the legislation. House conservatives, National Journal reports, are increasingly bullish on the idea that they may be able to persuade John Boehner to drop the whole thing.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 195 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Sean Trende, the conservative movement’s heavily asterisked answer to Nate Silver (that is to say, Silver got everything right, and Trende got everything wrong), came out with an analysis this week, headlined “Does GOP Have to Pass Immigration Reform?,” showing that by golly no, it doesn’t. You can jump over there yourself and study all his charts and graphs, but the long and short of it is something like this. Black turnout and Democratic support have both been unusually high in the last two elections, which is true; Democrats have been steadily losing white voters, which is also true; if you move black turnout back down to 2004-ish levels and bump up GOP margins among whites (by what strikes me as a wildly optimistic amount), you reach White Valhalla. Somehow or another, under Trende’s “racial polarization scenario,” it’ll be 2044 before the Democrats again capture 270 electoral votes. Thus is the heat of Schlafly’s rhetoric cooled and given fresh substance via the dispassionate tools of statistics. Karl Rove says this is bunk. He wrote in The Wall Street Journal yesterday that to win the White House without more Latino support, a Republican candidate would have to equal Ronald Reagan’s 1984 total among whites, which was 63 percent. Rove thinks this unlikely—Trende thinks it’s pessimistic— and counsels some Latino reach-out (naturally, none of them ever says anything about black reach-out). The party used to listen to Rove, but most of them have zoomed well past him to the twilight zone of the far, far right. These Republicans and the people they represent—that is, the sliver of people they care about representing—don’t want any outreach. They almost certainly won’t let a path to citizenship get through the House. And they’ll attack minorities in other ways, too. It’s been mostly civil rights advocates who’ve denounced the Supreme Court’s Voting Rights Act decision, and one can obviously see why. But trust me, that decision, as Bloomberg’s Josh Green shrewdly noted the day it came down, is a “poisoned chalice” for the GOP. Why? Just look at what’s already happened since the decision was announced—the party is launching voter-suppression drives in six of the nine freshly liberated states. All the states, of course, are down South. These drives might “work.” But they will attract an enormous amount of negative publicity, and they’ll probably induce massive backlashes and counter-movements. This effort will lead to even greater distrust of the GOP by people of color, and it will reinforce the captive Southern-ness of the party, making it even more Southern than it already is. And Republicans won’t stop, because they can’t stop. Race baiting is their crack pipe. And here’s the worst part of this story. If the House Republicans kill immigration reform, and Republican parties across the South double down to keep blacks from voting, then they really will need to jack up the white vote—and especially the old white vote—in a huge way to be competitive in 2016 and beyond. Well, they’re not going to do that by mailing out Lawrence Welk CDs. They’re going to run heavily divisive and racialized campaigns , worse than we’ve ever seen out of Nixon or anyone. Their only hope of victory will be to make a prophet of Trende—that is, reduce the Democrats’ share of the white vote to something in the mid- to low-30 percent range. That probably can’t happen, but there’s only one way it might. Run the most racially inflamed campaign imaginable.

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AT – Political Capital Not Key Best studies go neg – capital is key Beckmann and McGann, UC Irvine political science professors, 8 (Matthew N. and Anthony J., Reader in Government at the University of Essex, Journal of Theoretical Politics 20(2):201, DOI: 10.1177/0951629807085818, “Navigating the Legislative Divide: Polarization, Presidents, and Policymaking in the United States,” http://jtp.sagepub.com) Here we propose a theory that casts some early rays of light onto the policy consequences of polarization in Congress. Building from a simple theoretical model in which the president seeks to promote his preferred policies in the Senate (see Snyder, 1991; Groseclose, 1996), we assess differences in the chamber’s preference distribution – from normal to unanimous to bimodal – as well as the ‘political capital’ at the president’s disposal.2 Results show that absent the president, ideological polarization makes amassing the votes needed to beat the status quo difficult, so gridlock frequently prevails. The same is true when the president lacks political capital to spend. However, when endowed with abundant capital , facing a polarized legislature enables presidents to pass policies closer to their ideal than would have been possible in an assembly characterized by greater ideological homogeneity. Hence the familiar prediction of blanket ‘gridlock’ is overblown . Instead, comparative statics show that the consequences of ideological polarization in Congress are conditional: they depend on the nature of the preference distribution, the involvement of the president, and the political capi- tal at his disposal.

Political capital is real and effective – specifically this Congress Roarty, National Journal politics writer, 2-21-13 [Alex, 2-21-13, The Atlantic, “There's Reason to Be Optimistic About Congress—Seriously,” http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/02/theres-reason-to-be-optimistic-about-congressseriously/273393/, accessed 7-9-13, MSG] Nevertheless, this is a new congressional session, and Boren's pessimism might possibly be proved wrong. For the first time in a decade, if not longer, conditions are aligned for bipartisan deal-making, raising hopes that Congress might actually do something and satisfy the wishes of millions of Americans hungry for action. "I am pleased with the signs I see in Congress today to try to make deals," said Lee Hamilton, who was a veteran Democratic House member from Indiana. "There are threads of it -- it's not a fabric yet -- but there are threads, and that's encouraging." In today's context, defining success is important -- and requires a healthy dose of both skepticism and pragmatism. There's little hope that this Congress can reverse the -- exacerbated by, among other things, powerful special interests and partisan media -- that has gripped Washington. The forces that drove Rep. Boren out of Congress remain potent, and the legislative atmosphere on Capitol Hill is still toxic. Instead of a long-term course correction, the question is whether Republican leaders in the House, President Obama, and Senate Democrats can facilitate a reprieve -- if only to show the public that the institution is still functional. Cutting a deal with the broad backing of both parties isn't a question so much of relieving those pressures as of learning to pass laws in spite of them. Favorable Conditions The makeup of the 113th Congress and the occupant of the White House make conditions riper for bipartisan legislation than at any time since President George W. Bush's first years in office. Since

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 197 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core then, Washington has been in the grip of one of two dynamics: Either one party has held Congress and the presidency, or one party, possessing limited power, has had little interest in passing consequential legislation. The latter was the case last session, when Republicans controlled only the House. In most cases, they used this chamber to approve legislation, such as Rep. Paul Ryan's eponymous budget, that helped define the party's agenda but had no chance of gaining approval in the Senate (much less withstanding a veto from the White House). They were trying to wait out a president whom they believed would be sent packing in 2013. Democrats were in a similar position from 2007 to 2009, when they controlled Congress but wanted to wait out Bush's tenure. The lack of bipartisanship, of course, didn't prevent major legislation from becoming law over the past 10 years. But when Democrats controlled Washington and passed the Affordable Care Act in 2010, or similarly empowered Republicans approved Medicare Part D in 2003, they didn't need the backing of the other party -- and by and large didn't get it. This session is different. Neither party has unilateral control, and yet there is an appetite, in the first year of Obama's second term, to make a serious attempt to legislate. The last time Capitol Hill saw something similar came in 2001 and 2002. Republicans suddenly lost the Senate when Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont defected from the GOP in the early summer, but Congress still overwhelmingly approved the No Child Left Behind Act months later (although the first round of Bush's tax cuts passed with only a dozen or so Democrats on board in each chamber). Later, the parties worked together to approve a slew of national security issues after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. But drawing comparisons to that period is difficult because of 9/11; and, besides, most of Bush's term is hardly associated with bipartisan comity. The better parallel -- and the experience current optimists point to -- is 1996 and 1997, which bridges the end of President Clinton's first term and the beginning of his second. That two-year span saw agreements on a series of important issues, ranging from two big-ticket items (welfare reform and a balanced-budget agreement) to lesser-known achievements (such as raising the minimum wage). The similarity between that period and now extends beyond the split control of government. Only a year earlier, Republicans had ridden the "revolution" of 1994 into control of Congress, when they promised to push their agenda whether Clinton approved or not. But the party ultimately dealt with political setbacks, none more damaging than the government shutdown of 1996. The public blamed Republicans, and afterward Clinton never again trailed GOP presidential nominee Bob Dole (who was Senate majority leader at the time of the shutdown) in a head-to-head matchup, according to preelection polls. Boehner's Challenge Public opinion might once again be pulling against Republicans, burnt as they were by Obama's reelection and their unexpected losses in the Senate. In a January poll by The Wall Street Journal and NBC News, 49 percent of adults disapproved of the GOP -- and only 26 percent approved. It was the worst rating for Republicans since 2008. Just as the Republicans in Clinton's time decided their political survival depended on coming to the table, the GOP of today might do the same. "Republicans overplayed the government shutdown, and President Clinton won that battle," said Dan Glickman, a former House member who was Clinton's Agriculture secretary. "And, with that, he effectively used the bully pulpit to control the agenda. He gave a lot of cover for people to vote for him. It's not the only factor, but members of Congress are much [more] likely to support a president when the people at home are inclined to support the president." How much Obama's broad popularity matters to most GOP House members is debatable. With many of the president's supporters packed into heavily Democratic urban districts, most Republicans represent safely red districts. (In November, Mitt Romney won 227 congressional districts, a majority, despite losing by 4 percentage points in the national vote.) But Obama's standing could weigh more heavily on House Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor than on their followers; Cantor has recently attempted to rebrand the party with a softer image. While their charges' interests are more parochial, they have the national party's

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 198 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core image to worry about. Popular opinion could prod the two leaders to reach agreements with Obama, especially on emotional issues such as gun control and immigration. Or, at the very least, public pressure could work to ease the disagreements that make even basic government action difficult -- a factor that might have been at work when House Republicans engineered a threemonth delay of the debt ceiling. "They're hearing the message outside the Beltway that 'we elected you people to make things work,'" said John Breaux, the former longtime Democratic senator from Louisiana. The onus falls particularly hard on Boehner, whose struggles to control his conference are well documented. More than any other player in Washington, he will determine whether anything gets done this year. How he decides to proceed could rest on how frequently he's willing to leave conservative colleagues out in the cold and, consequently, how far he's willing to risk his speakership. The good of the party, and not his seat of power, propelled Boehner's decision to bring the superstorm Sandy relief bill to a vote earlier this year, when it passed with just a minority of support from Republicans. That combination -- Democrats and the moderate wing of the House GOP -- is the pathway to enacting a sweeping set of bipartisan agreements. A week after the storm vote, a large bipartisan majority passed a three-month extension of the debt ceiling. "It is hard to see this Congress being viewed as a bipartisan one, but we have seen a glimmer of light on the recent bipartisan vote to extend the debt ceiling," said Ron Bonjean, a onetime aide to the Republican leadership. Obama's Duty Maintaining that momentum in the House won't be easy, and it could require Obama's personal leadership. Getting Boehner to take such a perilous route could depend in large part on successful cajoling from the president. And on this subject -- the relationships among Washington's top leaders -- discussion of a deal being cut becomes sharply pessimistic.

Political capital is specifically true in close cases - publicizing the issues and polarization makes it work Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N., & Vimal, Presidential Studies Quarterly, 41: 488-503, September 2011, “Opportunism in Polarization: Presidential Success in Senate Key Votes, 1953-2008”, p. 498-9, Wiley, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] The final important piece in our theoretical model--presidents' political capital--also finds support in these analyses, though the results here are less reliable. Presidents operating under the specter of strong economy and high approval ratings get an important, albeit moderate, increase in their chances for prevailing on "key" Senate roll-call votes (b = .10, se = .06, p < .10). Figure 4 displays the substantive implications of these results in the context of polarization, showing that going from the lower third of political capital to the upper third increases presidents' chances for success by 8 percentage points (in a setting like 2008). Thus, political capital's impact does provide an important boost to presidents' success on Capitol Hill, but it is certainly not potent enough to overcome basic congressional realities. Political capital is just strong enough to put a presidential thumb on the congressional scales, which often will not matter, but can in close cases. Lastly, two of the control variables are particularly noteworthy. The first is the president's public declaration of his preferred outcome (b = .64, se = .26, p < .05), which shows that presidents fare far better on publicized positions--24 points better, holding all else at its 2008 values. While this relationship may partly be causal, it is more likely reflects the fact that presidents tend to publicize popular policies (see Canes-Wrone 2005) and also that public statements are symptomatic of a broader lobbying campaign (see Beckmann 2010). The other significant control variable is the one accounting for nonideological polarization changes occurring in Washington over the last 50 years (a

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 199 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core secular trend captured by the natural log of the number of Congresses since the 83rd). Results for this variable show more recent senators have been more willing to defeat the president on key, contested roll-call votes, all else equal (b = -0.42, se = 0.13, p < .05). To the extent senators' ideological polarization has intertwined with the postwar Washington's more politicized environment, it has muted presidents' ability to exploit centrist senators' increased isolation. All told, the multiple regression results corroborate the basic model and its principal hypothesis: ideological polarization around that pivotal voter's position provides presidents with a better opportunity to win key roll-call votes. This is especially true if the president is backed by high public approval and buoyed by a strong economy. By contrast, a president confronting a far-off pivotal voter surrounded by like-minded colleagues has few options for achieving legislative success, regardless of his political potency.

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AT – Political Capital Not Key – Ideology and/or Little Effect [Dickinson, Beckmann & Kumar] Political capital key – polarization allows political capital to be concentrated – increases chances of passage Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N., & Vimal, Presidential Studies Quarterly, 41: 488-503, September 2011, “Opportunism in Polarization: Presidential Success in Senate Key Votes, 1953-2008”, p. 488-9, Wiley, accessed: 7/8/13, ML]

That Congress has experienced increased polarization is clear, and burgeoning is the literature investigating its causes and consequences. Here we examine a counterintuitive wrinkle on the latter. Drawing from a simple game-theoretic model in which a president strategically allocates scarce “political capital” to induce changes in legislators’ votes, we show congressional polarization can actually improve a president’s prospects for winning key roll-call votes—a hypothesis that emerges inasmuch as polarization enables presidents to concentrate their resources lobbying fewer members (compared to a more homogenous chamber). We test this hypothesis by investigating presidents’ success on Congressional Quarterly’s “key” Senate roll-call votes, 1953-2008. That the last half-century has seen increased polarization in Washington is clear. Holders of most key posts and key votes just a few decades back, conservative Democrats and liberal Republicans are now few and far between, so much so that one scribe recently referred to the former as “endangered species” and the latter as “essentially extinct” (Roll Call, October 27, 2005). Replacing these moderates have been resolute ideologues and loyal partisans (Fleisher and Bond 2004; McCarty, Poole, and Rosenthal 2006; Poole and Rosenthal 1984; 1997; Sinclair 2006; Theriault 2008). Plainly, Jim Hightower’s aphorism that “There’s nothing in the middle of the road but yellow stripes and dead armadillos” remains instructive, and more so with each passing year. In light of Congress’s increasingly polarized character, a burgeoning literature has sought to uncover the causes and consequences. While a myriad of factors have been identified as contributing to congressional polarization (Brady and Han 2007; Carson et al. 2007; Fleisher and Bond 2004; Jacobson 2000; Ladewig 2010; McCarty, Poole, and Rosenthal 2006; Poole and Rosenthal 1997; Sinclair 2006; Stonecash, Brewer, and Mariani 2003; Theriault 2008), the hypothesized effect is comparatively clear: legislative gridlock. Partisan polarization (via divided government) is thought to engender gridlock by promoting posturing over compromising (Gilmour 1995; Groseclose and McCarty 2001; Lee 2009; Sinclair 2006), and ideological polarization is predicted to encourage gridlock by reducing the range of status quos that can be beat by a coalition preferring something else (Brady and Volden 1998; Krehbiel 1998). But, of course, gridlock is not an all-or-nothing proposition. Although polarization certainly inhibits lawmaking (Barrett et al. 1997; Binder 1999, 2003; Coleman 1999; Howell et al. 2000; Jones 2001; Kelly 1993), significant laws continue to pass— underunified and divided government, and even in the face of substantial polarization (see

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esp. Mayhew 2005). This article considers these exceptions to the general rule. Specifically, building on Snyder (1991) (see also, Beckmann and McGann 2008; Groseclose and Snyder 1996) we develop a simple game-theoretic model in which the president allocates scarce political capital to induce changes in senators’ votes and, in turn, show how a polarized chamber, compared to one with more homogenous preferences, can actually improve a president’s prospects for winning important roll-call votes and passing preferred legislation. We test this hypothesis against data on presidents’ success on key Senate roll-call votes from 1953 to 2008.1

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Political capital allows the president to appear more bipartisan, increasing Congressional influence – bypasses ideologies Villalabos et al., University of Texas at El Paso Political Science Assistant Professor, 12 [José D., Justin S. Vaughn, Boise State University Assistant Professor of Political Science, Julia R. Arazi, Marquette University Assistant Professor of Political Science, September 2012, “Politics or Policy? How Rhetoric Matters to Presidential Leadership of Congress,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 42, no. 3, Center for the Study of the Presidency, p. 554-5, Proquest, accessed 7-8-13, UR] The second category of presidential messages moves away from the electoral logic of mandate rhetoric and toward the normative ethos of bipartisanship. In this category, rather than grounding an argument in a perceived mandate, the president makes the case for his policy proposal by highlighting efforts for having (or having had) the two major parties (and, thus, the two elected institutions) come together over common bonds— despite their political differences—to work on behalf of the public good. The logic here is quite different, as presidential messages of bipartisanship frequently contain within them not implicit threats but explicit pleas as well as references to evidence of bipartisan partnership. Furthermore, with these appeals for unity comes an incentive for congres- sional support: shared credit. The president who “goes bipartisan” is also the president who invites members from the other side of the aisle to Rose Garden bill-signing ceremonies and compliments rather than rebukes partisan opponents during subsequent State of the Union reflections. A president who complements his policy proposal messages with bipartisan rheto- ric is not, however, necessarily a benevolent, nonstrategic actor. As Coleman and Manna (2007, 401) note, “arguably weakening partisan loyalties in the public and an electoral base somewhat independent of fellow partisans in Congress provide presidents with incentives to portray themselves in their communications as above the political fray and virtually above or outside the system of partisanship and elections altogether.” Indeed, in their study of presidential partisan rhetoric, Coleman and Manna find that the relative degree of partisanship (or bipartisanship) in a presidential speech is driven by strategy, with the strength of a presidential embrace or snub of partisanship determined by the president’s political situation.6 This conclusion squares with case study work done by Neustadt (1960) and Bonds (2002), whose analyses of Harry Truman’s attempt to sell the Marshall Plan to Congress presents a bipartisan strategy rooted not in normative considerations, but rather in political pragmatism, in this case due to the political weaknesses of Truman’s successor presidency.7 Indeed, as Neustadt (1960, 54) contends, “The plain fact is that Truman had to play bipartisanship as he did or lose the game.” Similarly, in an article that argues “bipartisanship is every bit as political as partisanship,” Trubowitz and Mellow (2005, 433) add that bipartisan rhetoric is also motivated by a president’s strategic desire to court swing voters while demonstrating political independence.8 Accordingly, we hypothesize the following: H2: As presidential appeals bipartisanship increase, Presidential success in Congress will increase.

Polarization increases political capital’s effectiveness – 50 years of data prove Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N., & Vimal, Presidential Studies Quarterly, 41: 488-503, September 2011, “Opportunism in Polarization: Presidential Success in Senate Key Votes, 1953-2008”, p. 492-4, Wiley, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] But beyond these basic results is the more intriguing insight: as polarization grows, increasing are the president's policy returns on lobbying investments. By allowing the president to focus his political

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 203 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core resources on only a handful of swing voters, polarization permits presidents to exert greater influence than would be possible in a chamber packed with so-called centrists. Consequently, given some level of political capital, the president exerts the least influence in the nonpolarized (unimodal) legislature and the greatest influence in the polarized (bimodal) one.4 Again, this illustration just affirms the general result proved earlier: all else equal, ideological polarization around the pivotal voter improves presidents' prospects for exerting influence, prevailing on key votes, and securing legislative success.

Ideology not definitively key – political capital works and policy preference varies for each person Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] Obviously, this basic model depicts a more or less non-partisan policymaking pro-¶ cess. This is because pivotal voters choose which way to vote based on their policy pref erences (rather than their party affiliations) and because neither presidents nor opposing¶ leaders can be restricted, by rule, from proposing alternatives. We think this non-partisan¶ approach is instructive for at least two reasons. First, it is unclear whether, or at least¶ to what extent, cartel theory applies in the Senate. Second, even in the House, Cox and¶ McCubbins (2005) have shown that the foremost limitation to the majority party’s negative agenda control comes when the president proposes and promotes his initiatives.¶ As such, we believe our non-partisan model of presidential coalition building affords¶ insights to both partisan (e.g. Cox and McCubbins (1993, 2005)) and non-partisan (e.g.¶ Brady and Volden (1998) and Krehbiel (1998)) models of US lawmaking. It helps spec-ify the mechanisms by which presidents augment the majority party’s negative agenda¶ control during unified government and occasionally ‘roll’ it during divided government.

Polarization is what political capital more effective – allows Obama to concentrate his resources Beckmann and McGann, UC Irvine political science professors, 8 (Matthew N. and Anthony J., Reader in Government at the University of Essex, Journal of Theoretical Politics 20(2):201, DOI: 10.1177/0951629807085818, “Navigating the Legislative Divide: Polarization, Presidents, and Policymaking in the United States,” http://jtp.sagepub.com) We can generalize these findings to the case where the president needs to target more than one vote, as would be the case in this example if a super-majority was required. If the president needs n votes to pass measure o1 and C(o, si Þ is linear, then he will need to pay 2n times the cost of a median senator. In this case it is not clear that it is cheaper for the president to get his measure passed in the polarized case; it depends on the number of votes he has to buy. In the polarized case each vote is relatively expensive, so if the president has to buy many votes, it may be more expensive than in a more homogenous case. Polarization’s advantage to the president, after all, was that it allowed him to concentrate his resources on the few senators who will have a very significant effect. Therefore, polarization generally works to the president’s advantage pro- vided the president is in a situation where winning over a few voters can signifi- cantly change the outcome (i.e. the polarization is distributed around the pivotal voter). If many members are clustered at the pivot point, any additional polariza- tion will limit presidential influence, produce policy stalemate, and reinforce legislative gridlock. Discussion By all indications, the partisan and ideological polarization that has come to

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 204 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core characterize officials in Washington shows no signs of abating. If anything, it appears that the schism between liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans, will only continue to grow. The simple but important question that many have asked is, so what? How does polarization affect the policymaking process and the outcomes that result? While Mayhew’s initial study proved important laws continue to prevail even in the face of divided government and polarization, subsequent research has indicated that partisan and ideological polarization does encourage legislative gridlock, which, in turn, privileges the status quo. This happens partly by germinating partisanship and posturing over negotiation and compromise, and partly by leaving ideologically distant pivotal voters unable to find an alternative they prefer even when they seek compromise and negotiate sincerely. By contrast, we theorize that polarization’s impact on US lawmaking is conditional. Instead of hypothesizing gridlock monotonically increases with polari- zation, our model predicts polarization’s policymaking impact depends on three elements: the default preference of the pivotal voter, the extent of polarization around the pivotal voter, and the president’s willingness (and ability) to spend his capital to win. Depending on the particular constellation of these factors, predictions range from the familiar one of gridlock on through to a president who not only avoids stalemate, but actually signs into law bills that are closer to his preference than we would otherwise expect. Drawing from this model, then, a more nuanced view of presidential influ- ence emerges. Assuming today’s White House officials are eager to promote the president’s legislative agenda, we can now see when those efforts are likely to pay off – namely, when the president enjoys ample political capital and confronts a polarized legislature (i.e. one where there are few legislators sitting between the pivotal voter and some point much closer to the president). Con- versely, when the president does not get involved or lacks political capital when he does, all the conventional wisdom about pivotal voters and gridlock holds. Also, any president promoting his agenda before a homogenous Senate (say, one characterized by a normal distribution of preferences) is highly constrained by its predispositions. Therefore, as future researchers revisit presidents’ potential influence in Congress, accounting for its conditional nature should provide more discriminating results and permit more judicious inferences.

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AT – Political Capital Not Key [Beckmann & Kumar] The aff is misreading Beckmann and Kumar – they both conclude neg – here’s the intro to prior to their article Bond, Texas A&M political science professor and Fleisher, Fordham political science professor, 11 [Jon and Richard, 9-1-11, Presidential Studies Quarterly, “Editor’s Introduction”, 3, Volume: 41, p. 437-8, HG] Another recurring theme is the effect of party polarization on presidential congressional relations. In "Opportunism in Polarization: Presidential Success in Senate Key Votes, 1953-2008," Matthew N. Beckmann and Vimal Kumar incorporate party polarization into the analysis of political capital. They challenge the conventional view that party polarization reduces the effectiveness of presidential bargaining. Testing hypotheses from a parsimonious game-theoretic model, Beckman and Kumar offer theoretical and empirical evidence that if parties in Congress are polarized, the allocation of scarce "political capital" can actually improve a president's prospects for winning roll-call votes. The key to understanding this counterintuitive result is that polarization enables presidents to concentrate scarce resources lobbying fewer members.

Beckmann concludes negative – presidential influence is a key part of successful legislation Relyea, Congressional Research Service, 11 [Harold C., December 2011, “Pushing the Agenda: Presidential Leadership in U.S. Lawmaking, 19532004,” Presidential Studies Quarterly, Volume: 41, pg. 844-845, Proquest, accessed 7-9-13, MSG] Matthew Beckmann of the University of California at Irvine provides an interesting empirical analysis of presidential leadership in lawmaking for the period from the Eisenhower through the Bush II administrations. He notes that the key to a president's legislative leadership is strategy, not resolve (p. 2), and concludes that the greatest source of influence for postwar presidents comes "in the legislative early game, not the legislative endgame" (p. 2). Presidents who are strategically adept work to get specific issues on the congressional calendar and, then, maneuver to insure that certain proposals rise up as alternatives. Beckmann suggests that the best route for constructing winning coalitions consists of "mobilizing leading allies, determining opponents, and circumventing endgame floor fights altogether," rather than the typical path of gathering support from "centrist" lawmakers (p. 2). In the end, he finds "that presidents' legislative influence is real, often substantial, and, to date, greatly underestimated" (p. 3). The author's assessment is organized into six chapters. Chapter 1 consists of his introductory overview, as briefly summarized above. Chapter 2 presents a theory of positive presidential power, focusing on the Bush II administration's 2001 tax cut efforts in the Senate. Here, Beckmann attributes the White House's success to its targeted strategy of lobbying and bargaining with allies, key opponents, and swing voters. He cautions that although this is only one example, it represents what a president's aides can achieve when they maximize lobbying techniques for the purpose of advancing agenda-centered and vote-centered strategies (p. 104). Reviewing the 195 3-2004 record of what he considers to be key votes for presidential legislative success in Chapter 4, the author proposes a new method for evaluating the potential impact of presidents on these votes. The two most significant elements are (1) personal involvement of the president and (2)

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 206 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core the extent of his influence at the earliest stages in the legislative process, at the point of fashioning legislation (p. 126). In Chapter 5 , after testing "whether presidents' influence held up even after accounting for a myriad of rival explanations, including congressional composition, political context, and issue specifics, as well as simple random chance" (p. 148), Beckmann asserts that the evidence showed presidents to be powerful, but not all powerful, players in federal policymaking. When the president decides that some particular policy initiative deserves his administration's backing, it is a great boon to the chances that a new law will supplant the old one. Yet also as predicted, this potential is constrained by Congress' pivotal voters, limited by political environment, and variable by issue. Furthermore, although the president's involvement greatly increases the likelihood that a winning congressional coalition will be assembled, it is no guarantee. Indeed, the nature of presidential leadership in lawmaking is that, while it generally helps win key votes and pass preferred laws, it may not in any particular case. (p. 149) In closing, the author observes that "integral to appraising any president's legacy is examining how effectively he recognizes and capitalizes on his office's potential" but that equally as important as any policy outcome is the value of healthy, substantive debate in Congress, as well as the related one of pressuring members to clearly explain their positions on issues (p.l6l). This is a useful and methodologically valuable contribution to the quantitative study of presidentialcongressional relations. It is a well-written and well-reasoned account, which likely will have classroom value as a research model as well as for its contribution to the understanding of presidential leadership in lawmaking.

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AT – Political Capital Not Key at Beginning Political capital is most valuable at the beginning stages of the bill Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] We agree. In fact, our model shows that presidents may intercede at an earlier point¶ in the policymaking process by executing a second strategy: an agenda-centered strategy.¶ The essence of this lobbying option is to get opposing leaders to cut a ‘deal’ with the¶ White House that is better than the president could get from exclusively lobbying pivotal¶ voters. The core insight is that inasmuch as concentrating the president’s lobbying on¶ leading opponents (rather than spreading it across an interval of pivotal voters) induces¶ those leaders to pull their punches, that is, not offer a rival to the president’s position or¶ at least something close to it, then this president-sponsored ‘deal’ need only be viewed as¶ better than the status quo in the pivotal voter’s eyes (see Romer and Rosenthal (1978)).

Political capital key early on – Influencing behind-the-scenes early gets legislation passed Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] Fortunately for those inside the West Wing, some researchers paint a more optimistic¶ picture regarding presidents’ potential for passing important planks of their legislative¶ agenda. Covington et al. (1995), Barrett and Eshbaugh-Soha (2007), Edwards III and¶ Barrett (2000), Kellerman (1984), Light (1982), Peterson (1990), and Rudalevige (2002)¶ all observe that presidents secure greater support for their ‘priority’ items, and when they¶ exert ‘effort’ pushing them. In addition, Covington (1987) concludes that White House officials can occasionally win greater support among legislators by working behind the scenes , while Canes-Wrone (2001, 2005) shows that presidents can induce support from a recalcitrant Congress by strategically ‘going public’ when advocating popular proposals (see also Kernell (1993)). Sullivan (1987, 1988) finds that presidents can amass winning¶ congressional coalitions by changing members’ positions as a bill moves through the¶ legislative process. However, even among these relative optimists, the prescription for presidents appears¶ to be an ephemeral combination of luck and effort, not a systematic strategy. In discussing¶ the challenge for a president looking to push legislation on Capitol Hill, Samuel Kernell¶ offers a comparable assessment. He writes, The number and variety of choices place great demands upon [presidents’] strategic calculation,¶ so much so that pluralist leadership must be understood as an art...an ability to sense ‘right¶ choices’. (Kernell, 1993: 36) Furthermore, the seemingly paradoxical findings noted above, that is, a general (if mod-¶ est) pattern of president-supported legislative success on passage and policy content, but¶ not on ‘key’ roll-call votes, remain unexplained.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 208 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core This paper aims to demystify the White House’s legislative strategies, both their logic¶ and their effects. Developing a non-cooperative game in which the president allocates scarce ‘political capital’ to induce changes in legislators’ behavior, we deduce two lobby-ing strategies White House officials may execute and, in turn, investigate their impact on¶ the laws that result. Interestingly, we theorize that presidents’ foremost influence comesfrom bargaining with congressional leaders over policy alternatives before bills reach the¶ floor, not bargaining with pivotal voters for their support once they do. Precisely because¶ so much of the presidents’ influence comes in the legislative earlygame (rather than the¶ endgame), we theorize that typical roll-call-based tests of presidents’ legislative influence¶ have missed most of it.

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Political Capital Finite Political capital is finite and key to sway undecided pivotal voters Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] Of course, presidential political capital is a scarce commodity with a floating value.¶ Even a favorably situated president enjoys only a finite supply of political capital; he¶ can only promise or pressure so much. What is more, this capital ebbs and flows as¶ realities and/or perceptions change. So, similarly to Edwards (1989), we believe presidents’ bargaining resources cannot fundamentally alter legislators’ predispositions, but¶ rather operate ‘at the margins’ of US lawmaking, however important those margins may¶ be (see also Bond and Fleisher (1990), Peterson (1990), Kingdon (1989), Jones (1994),¶ and Rudalevige (2002)). Indeed, our aim is to explicate those margins and show how¶ presidents may systematically influence them.

Political capital works but diminishing returns makes it finite Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] Figure 2 illustrates the president’s influence on the policy outcome from vote-centered¶ lobbying when the president’s goal is to get an outcome as close to his ideal¶ p¶ (which we¶ assume equals one for illustrative purposes). Several points are noteworthy, starting with¶ the simple one that if the president does not have any political capital, he proposes the¶ pivotal/median voter’s predisposition, which passes. By contrast, inasmuch as the president has capital and allocates it rationally to swing¶ voters, he can now propose (and pass) bills closer to his ideal. This vote-centered lob-¶ bying influence, however, yields decreasing policy returns for each additional unit of¶ political capital spent, a result that emerges first because the president must induce more¶ and more pivotal voters to move as he gets closer and closer to his ideal, and second,¶ because we model legislators as requiring increasing amounts of political capital for each¶ move away from their ideal policy.

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AT – No Persuasion (Klein) 1. No internal link – the majority of Klein’s article is talking about big speeches like Obama’s jobs speech and the State of the Union – our internal link is political capital, not “going public”

2. Klein admits no alternative – passivity more dangerous Klein, Washington Post columnist, 12 [Ezra, 3-19-12, The New Yorker, “The Unpersuaded: Who Listens to a President?”, http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/03/19/120319fa_fact_klein?currentPage=all, accessed 7-8-13, HG] After three years in Washington, David Axelrod, who served as the chief strategist for President Obama’s 2008 campaign, agrees. “Some folks in politics believe this is all just a rhetorical game, but when you’re governing it’s not,” he says. “People are viewing their lives through the lens of their own experience, not waiting for you to describe to them what they’re seeing or feeling.” Paul Begala, who helped set the message in the Clinton White House, puts it more piquantly: “The Titanic had an iceberg problem. It did not have a communications problem. Right now, the President has a jobs problem. If Obama had fourper-cent unemployment, he would be on Mt. Rushmore already and people would look at Nancy Pelosi like Lady Gaga.” The question, Begala says, is: What is the alternative to Presidential persuasion? “If you don’t try it at all, it guarantees you won’t persuade anybody,” he says. “And, to put it simply, your people in Congress and in the country will hate you if you don’t.” That’s the real dilemma for the modern White House. Aggressive, public leadership is typically ineffective and, during periods of divided government, can actually make matters worse. But passivity is even more dangerous. In that case, you’re not getting anything done and you look like you’re not even trying.

3. Klein’s argument is flawed – focused too narrowly in specific speeches, and has no alt – Passivity on presidential agenda is worse—perceived as weakness Drum, Mother Jones staff, 12 (Kevin, 3/12/12, Mother Jones, “Presidents and the Bully Pulpit,” http://www.motherjones.com/kevindrum/2012/03/presidents-and-bully-pulpit, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) Do presidents really have the power to persuade? Citing the work of political scientists George Edward and Frances Lee, Ezra Klein writes in the New Yorker this week that they don't. Not much, anyway. When presidents talk, he argues, all they really do is polarize: instead of persuading, they simply make partisan divides even starker. So if you didn't have much of an opinion about contraceptive coverage a month ago, you probably do now — and thanks to President Obama's intervention, you're now for it if you're a Democrat and against it if you're a Republican: [1] Edwards’s work suggests that Presidential persuasion isn’t effective with the public. Lee’s work suggests that Presidential persuasion might actually have an anti-persuasive effect on the opposing party in Congress. And, because our system of government usually requires at least some members of the opposition to work with the President if anything is to get done, that suggests that the President’s attempts at persuasion might have the perverse effect of making it harder for him to govern.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 211 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core ....The question, [Paul] Begala says, is: What is the alternative to Presidential persuasion? “If you don’t try it at all, it guarantees you won’t persuade anybody,” he says. “And, to put it simply, your people in Congress and in the country will hate you if you don’t.” That’s the real dilemma for the modern White House. Aggressive, public leadership is typically ineffective and, during periods of divided government, can actually make matters worse. But passivity is even more dangerous. In that case, you’re not getting anything done and you look like you’re not even trying. The entire essay is worth a read. It's surprisingly persuasive. And yet, that bolded passage makes a key point: even if presidential speeches don't accomplish much, we really don't know if shutting up would be any better. After all, we've never had a modern president who specialized in shutting up. And since it's not a trait likely to lead to the Oval Office, we probably never will. I also think that Ezra doesn't really grapple with the strongest arguments on the other side. For one thing, although there are examples of presidential offensives that failed (George Bush on Social Security privatization), there are also example of presidential offensives that succeeded (George Bush on going to war with Iraq). The same is true for broader themes. For example, Edwards found that "surveys of public opinion have found that support for regulatory programs and spending on health care, welfare, urban problems, education, environmental protection and aid to minorities increased rather than decreased during Reagan’s tenure." OK. But what about the notion that tax cuts are good for the economy? The public may have already been primed to believe this by the tax revolts of the late '70s, but I'll bet Reagan did a lot to cement public opinion on the subject. And the Republican tax jihad has been one of the most influential political movements of the past three decades. More generally, I think it's a mistake to focus narrowly on presidential speeches about specific pieces of legislation. Maybe those really don't do any good. But presidents do have the ability to rally their own troops, and that matters. That's largely what Obama has done in the contraception debate. Presidents also have the ability to set agendas. Nobody was talking about invading Iraq until George Bush revved up his marketing campaign in 2002, and after that it suddenly seemed like the most natural thing in the world to a lot of people. Beyond that, it's too cramped to think of the bully pulpit as just the president, just giving a few speeches. It's more than that. It's a president mobilizing his party and his supporters and doing it over the course of years. That's harder to measure, and I can't prove that presidents have as much influence there as I think they do. But I confess that I think they do. Truman made containment national policy for 40 years, JFK made the moon program a bipartisan national aspiration, Nixon made workingclass resentment the driving spirit of the Republican Party, Reagan channeled the rising tide of the Christian right and turned that resentment into the modern-day culture wars, and George Bush forged a bipartisan consensus that the threat of terrorism justifies nearly any defense. It's true that in all of these cases presidents were working with public opinion, not against it, but I think it's also true that different presidents might have shaped different consensuses. Maybe I'm protesting too much. I actually think Ezra has the better of the argument here. But even if public opinion can rarely be directly challenged and turned around, it can be molded and channeled. Presidents and their party machines can influence which latent issues stay dormant and which ones become national obsessions. They can take advantage of events in ways that others can't. After all, talking is what human beings do. It's hard to credit the idea that it never really accomplishes anything.

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Flip-Flop Internal Link Flip-flops wreck political capital Cohen, Fordham University political science professor, 97 (Jeffrey E., 1997, Presidential Responsiveness and Public Policy Making, p. 123) A president cannot, without good reason, alter his policy stance. And even if he has good reason to change his policy position on an issue, he may have to bear some costs from doing so. The public and other political elites may view him as waffling, indecisive, weak, uncommitted, and/or duplicitous. This seems very much to be one of the major charges against Bill Clinton’s presidency. After abandoning his campaign promise of a middle-class tax cut because of budget deficit pressures, Clinton reoffered a tax cut in the wake of the devastating 1994 midterm elections, in which his party lost control of Congress. From being publicly cool toward the North American Free Trade pact during his presidential election campaign, he became an ardent promoter of that policy once in the Oval Office. From these, and many other occasions, Clinton has developed an image of a waffling politician, one who is forever changing his mind, perennially trying to stake out the most popular position with the public and not necessarily a president who is able to lead.

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Public

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Public Popularity Key to Agenda The president’s agenda lives and dies by the polls – public approval is crucial Gregg, Clarion political science professor, 97 (Gary, THE PRESIDENTIAL REPUBLIC, 1997, p. 143-44) But if presidential power thrives by the polls, it might also die by the polls. While popular presidents tend to get much of what they want and are willing to fight for, unpopular presidents are trapped and constrained by the polls. As a senior aide to President Carter mused about that president's problems with Congress controlled by his own party, "When the President is low in public opinion polls, the members of Congress see little hazard in bucking him...They read the polls and from that they feel secure in turning their backs on the President with political impunity." Unquestionably, the success of the President’s policies bear a tremendous relationship to his popularity in the polls. Without effective public relations, modern presidents and their programs whither on the vine of public opinion.

Public opinion has a strong influence on the passage of legislation Barrett & Eshbaugh-Soha, University of North Texas, 7 [Andrew W. & Matthew, March, Political Research Quarterly, Vol. 60, No. 1, “Presidential Success on the Substance of Legislation”, pp. 100-112, Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4623810, Accessed: 7-15-10) Public attitudes also should influence the presi- dent's bargaining position. Despite evidence to the contrary (Bond and Fleisher 1990; Collier and Sullivan 1995), presidents, White House staff, and legislators believe that public approval is important to the president's success in Congress (Edwards 1997; Neustadt 1960; Rivers and Rose 1985). Theoretically, public support will improve the president's bargain- ing position as members of Congress will not want to risk alienating their constituents by opposing a popu- lar president's policy preferences. Therefore, we hypothesize that the higher his level of approval, the more a final statute will reflect the president's policy preferences.

Public opinion polls influence presidential agenda Sparrow, University of Texas at Austin government professor, 8 (Bartholomew H., “Who Speaks for the People? The President, the Press, and Public Opinion in the United States”, 10-13-8, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Volume 38, Issue 4, Pages 578-592, Wiley InterScience, accessed 7-8-9) Public opinion serves as a metric of presidential leadership with respect to presidential approval ratings. Presidents and their advisors use public opinion not as an absolute guide, but rather for tactical purposes, and instrumentally, for reaching particular political ends (Jacobs and Shapiro 2000). In general, political analysts conceive of public opinion as a channel or guide for policy makers, boundaries beyond which they cannot go but which also offer leeway in terms of the exact path policy makers take. Public opinion serves as a "permissive limit" for policy makers (Almond 1950; Key 1961; Sobel 2001).

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Bully Pulpit Key to Agenda The president needs the bully pulpit—public support key to policies Edwards, Texas A&M University distinguished professor of political science, et al 8 (George C. III, Jordan Chair in Presidential Studies, former Olin Professor of American Government at Oxford, former John Adams Fellow at the University of London, associate Member of Nuffield College at the University of Oxford and former director of The Center for Presidential Studies; Martin P. Wattenberg, University of California Irvine professor of political science; and Robert L. Lineberry, University of Houston political science professor; Pearson, Government in America: People, Politics and Policy, Chapter 13: The Presidency, http://wps.ablongman.com/long_edwards_ga_12/33/8517/2180364.cw/, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) Perhaps the greatest challenge to any president is to obtain and maintain the public's support. Because presidents are rarely in a position to command others to comply with their wishes, they must rely on persuasion. The necessity of public support leads the White House to employ public relations techniques similar to those used to publicize products. Much of the energy the White House devotes to public relations is aimed at increasing the president's public approval. The reason is simple: the higher the president stands in the polls, the easier it is to persuade others to support presidential initiatives. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, citizens seem to focus on the president's efforts and stands on issues rather than on personality ("popularity") or simply how presidential policies affect them (the "pocketbook"). Job-related personal characteristics of the president, such as integrity and leadership skills, also play an important role in influencing presidential approval. Commentators on the presidency often refer to it as a "bully pulpit," implying that presidents can persuade or even mobilize the public to support their policies if they are skilled enough communicators. Presidents frequently do attempt to obtain public support for their policies with speeches over the radio or television or speeches to large groups. All presidents since Truman have had media advice from experts on such matters as lighting, makeup, stage settings, camera angles, and even clothing.

Obama can use the bully pulpit effectively—media coverage Washington Post 11 (Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blake, 7/11/11, “Battling the bully pulpit¶ ,” http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/battling-the-bullypulpit/2011/07/10/gIQAI1oz7H_blog.html, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) Obama’s heightened public profile is a reminder of the power of the presidency. Obama knows that when he holds a press conference, every cable network will carry it live in its entirety — and then spend the remainder of the day poring over every pronouncement. That level of coverage ensures that Obama can drive whatever message he likes into the public consciousness. Boehner, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and even the Republicans running for president in 2012 can’t hope to match that sort of presidential bully pulpit. (Don’t forget how President Bill Clinton used the bully pulpit to score a political win over thenHouse Speaker Newt Gingrich during the government shutdown of 1995/1996.)

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The bully pulpit matters—presidential mobilization of his own party drives items on his agenda Drum, Mother Jones staff, 12 (Kevin, 3/12/12, Mother Jones, “Presidents and the Bully Pulpit,” http://www.motherjones.com/kevindrum/2012/03/presidents-and-bully-pulpit, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) More generally, I think it's a mistake to focus narrowly on presidential speeches about specific pieces of legislation. Maybe those really don't do any good. But presidents do have the ability to rally their own troops, and that matters. That's largely what Obama has done in the contraception debate. Presidents also have the ability to set agendas. Nobody was talking about invading Iraq until George Bush revved up his marketing campaign in 2002, and after that it suddenly seemed like the most natural thing in the world to a lot of people. Beyond that, it's too cramped to think of the bully pulpit as just the president, just giving a few speeches. It's more than that. It's a president mobilizing his party and his supporters and doing it over the course of years. That's harder to measure, and I can't prove that presidents have as much influence there as I think they do. But I confess that I think they do. Truman made containment national policy for 40 years, JFK made the moon program a bipartisan national aspiration, Nixon made working-class resentment the driving spirit of the Republican Party, Reagan channeled the rising tide of the Christian right and turned that resentment into the modern-day culture wars, and George Bush forged a bipartisan consensus that the threat of terrorism justifies nearly any defense. It's true that in all of these cases presidents were working with public opinion, not against it, but I think it's also true that different presidents might have shaped different consensuses.

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Tea Party – Clout The Tea Party controls the GOP – Bachmann’s rise proves Holland, Irish Times, 11 (Steve, 6-27-11, “Tea Party luminary Bachmann begins Republican presidential selection bid” The Irish Times, Lexis, Accessed July 6, 2011, EJONES) CONSERVATIVE FIREBRAND Michele Bachmann will test the limits of how far a favourite of the Tea Party movement can go when she formally launches her campaign for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination today. The Minnesota congresswoman, who promises to cut spending, shrink the government and repeal President Obama s 2010 healthcare overhaul law, may well pull the Republican campaign toward the right in her bid for an upset victory. After months of flirting with a run, Ms Bachmann (55) enters the Republican campaign with an event in her home town of Waterloo, Iowa. Her strong performance at a New Hampshire debate two weeks ago has given her a boost. A Des Moines Registerpoll issued on Saturday of likely participants in the state s Republican presidential caucuses showed her in second place, with 22 per cent support, right behind former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, with 23 per cent. Interviewed on the Fox News Company Dossier Sundayprogramme, she was confronted with what the interviewer called past verbal gaffes and mis-statements of fact, and he asked her: Are you a flake? That would be insulting, to say something like that, because I m a serious person, Ms Bachmann responded, listing her achievements as a former tax lawyer with a postdoctorate degree in federal tax law, a state lawmaker and businesswoman. Her rise is proof that the Tea Party conservative movement remains a potent force after helping Republicans win control of the House in elections in November. The Tea Party was wildly successful because it was not personality driven, said Republican strategist Scott Reed. Bachmann s challenge is to harness that energy and score an early state victory. Ms Bachmann will be vying with conservative rivals such as former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty in Iowa, where social conservatives play a major role in Republican politics. Her presence could dampen the chances that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin will make a late entry into the campaign, since their messages resonate with the same conservative voters. Unlike Ms Palin, Ms Bachmann holds public office and has a role in the Republican Party, as head of the Tea Party House caucus. Ms Bachmann s brand of conservatism has generated such proposed legislation as the Light Bulb Freedom of Choice Act that would prevent the government from requiring Americans to use energy-efficient light bulbs. The question for me is whether she can get any establishment support, said Republican strategist Matt Mackowiak. We know she has Tea Party support. But the question is, can she gain credibility with the establishment, governors, senators, senior members of the party in and out of office. Ms Bachmann has rejected as scare tactics warnings of economic catastrophe if lawmakers don t approve raising the US debt ceiling. I have no intention of voting to raise the debt ceiling because, right now, the federal government continues to spend more money than what it takes in, she told CBS. (Reuters)

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Tea Party – Clout – AT - Inexperience The Tea Party was trained – they now have effective methods Zernike, New York Times, 11 (Kate, 6-27-11, “Tea Party to Come Up With Debt-Cutting Proposals” The New York Times, June 27, 201, Lexis, Accessed July 5, 2011, EJONES) While the Tea Party movement has led the charge for cutting the national debt, its supporters have often struggled to explain how, exactly, they would do so. Now some are out to change that, joining a Tea Party debt commission that plans to hold hearings over the summer, in the hopes of delivering recommendations to lawmakers by January. The commission is being organized by FreedomWorks, the libertarian advocacy group that helped grow the Tea Party movement and mobilize it for the midterm elections. And its recommendations are likely to line up with the goals of that group, which in turn tend to reflect those of libertarian organizations like the Cato Institute. (FreedomWorks' motto is Lower Taxes, Less Government, More Freedom, and it has worked against environmental regulations and for increased privatization of health care.) ''If you look if you look at the landscape in Washington, D.C., there's a lot of Democrats who control two-thirds of the process who are now sitting on their hands, waiting to point fingers at Republicans who propose something, and there's too many Republicans who are afraid that the public won't understand a serious proposal to solve the budget deficit,'' said Matt Kibbe, the group's president.''We think, like with the first days of the Tea Party movement, that the only way we will ever reduce the debt and balance the budget is if America beats Washington and Tea Party activists take over this process, take over the public debate and engage the American people in the hard work of making tough choices.'' FreedomWorks held training for about 150 activists from 30 states at its headquarters in Washington over the weekend, with sessions dedicated to educating them about the budget proposals by Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky and Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, both Republicans who strongly embrace libertarian economic principles. The activists, along with FreedomWorks staff, came up with parameters for their budget proposals, declaring that they would have to balance the federal budget within 10 years, reduce federal spending to 18 percent of the gross domestic product, reduce the national debt to no more than 66 percent of the G.D.P., assume that revenue accounts for no more than 19 percent of the G.D.P., reduce federal spending by at least $300 billion in the first year and reduce federal spending by at least $9 trillion over 10 years.

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Interest Groups Internal Link The president needs interest groups to shape political coalitions—key to promoting the agenda Cohen, Fordham University political science professor, 12 (Jeffrey E., PhD in political science from University of Michigan, September 2012, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 42, Issue 3, “Interest Groups and Political Approval,” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1741-5705.2012.03988.x/abstract, p. 451-452, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) The direct effect of issue position on approval is important for another reason. It¶ demonstrates that approval is not solely a function of valence issues, but also of positional¶ issues, which has implications for presidential representation and accountability. ¶ Presidents, based on these findings, are held accountable for the policy direction that they¶ steer as well as whether their chosen policies work well or not. In selecting policies to¶ pursue, presidents thus have to consider not only how well the policy works, but who will¶ be receptive to differing policy approaches. Some issues, in particular positional issues,¶ may not have uniform impacts on voters—some will win or benefit from the course the¶ president selects, while others will lose. In thinking about the course to select on positional issues, presidents may enlist and¶ target some interest groups. Especially in an era of polarized parties and fragmented¶ media, presidents may face extra difficulty in building support coalitions. In this political¶ climate, interest groups become increasingly important for presidential coalition building¶ efforts. With this in mind, the second question raised in the article was whether¶ interest groups can influence member attitudes about the president. Using the 2006 CCES, I found that membership in an interest group that was¶ aligned with the parties or ideology was associated with approval of the president.¶ However, we should not expect all groups to affect members’ political opinions. The¶ information that interest groups provide to members will have greater impact on hard as¶ opposed to easy issues. Comparing group membership for issues characterized as easier¶ (abortion, the Iraq War) versus harder (Social Reform, the environment), this is what the¶ analysis found. When an issue is hard, interest group membership tightens the linkage¶ between that issue and presidential approval.

Presidential power limited by partisanship and media bias—now rely on interest groups to shape public opinion Cohen, Fordham University political science professor, 12 (Jeffrey E., PhD in political science from University of Michigan, September 2012, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 42, Issue 3, “Interest Groups and Political Approval,” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1741-5705.2012.03988.x/abstract, p. 432, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) This article asks whether interest groups can affect their members’ evaluation of the¶ president. Recent research suggest the growing importance of interest group support to¶ presidents, especially as the parties have polarized and the media have fragmented, two¶ trends that limit the ability of presidents to generate support in the public at-large¶ (Cohen 2008, 2010; Holmes 2008). Party polarization reduces the likelihood that¶ opposition party members will support the president ( Bond and Fleisher 2001; Jacobson¶ 2007; Newman and Siegle 2010). A fragmented media reduces the size of the audience¶ for

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 220 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core presidential communications, simultaneously forcing the president to compete with¶ other media voices for the public’s attention (Baum and Kernell 1999; Young and¶ Perkins 2005). As a consequence, presidents have turned to other sources for support, like interest¶ groups. The literature on presidential-interest groups ties, however, focuses primarily on¶ institutional-level linkages, for instance, the willingness of interest groups as organizations¶ to support the president, to coordinate their congressional lobbying efforts with¶ the president’s, etc. (Loomis 2009; Peterson 1992; Pika 1991, 1999, 2009). Although¶ knowledge of the institutional linkages between presidents and interest groups is scant,¶ even less is known about the factors associated with the ability of the president to¶ generate support from members of interest groups, or even whether interest group¶ membership is relevant to member opinions about the president. Scholars believe that interest groups may influence opinions on issues: “Citizens’¶ judgments about . . . issues rely crucially on the descriptions and rhetorical representations¶ of political elites and other information sources, including the media and interest¶ groups” ( Joslyn and Haider-Markel 2002, 690). Several studies suggest a linkage¶ between group membership and approval of the president.

Interest groups control public opinion of president on policy implementation— grants voter support on hard issues Cohen, Fordham University political science professor, 12 (Jeffrey E., PhD in political science from University of Michigan, September 2012, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 42, Issue 3, “Interest Groups and Political Approval,” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1741-5705.2012.03988.x/abstract, p. 434-435, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) Type of issue will mediate the effect of group media on member’s approval of the¶ president. Carmines and Stimson’s (1980) distinction between “easy” and “hard” issues¶ provides a good starting place for understanding how issue characteristics mediate the¶ effect of specialized group media on members. Carmines and Stimson’s conceptualization¶ of an easy versus hard issue refers to the inherent qualities of the issue. Since their¶ introduction of the concept, studies have offered alternative ways of distinguishing easy¶ versus hard issues. To Carmines and Stimson, an easy issue evokes a “gut reaction” from the voter; little¶ effort or thought is required to take a stance on it. Easy issues are more likely to be¶ symbolic, have been on the agenda for a long time, and deal more with policy ends than¶ means (1980, 80). In contrast, hard issues are more complex and technical than easy ones,¶ debate often centers on policy means and implementation rather than ends, and the issue¶ may have arrived recently on the political agenda. Carmines and Stimson demonstrate¶ that more informed and politically sophisticated voters weigh hard issues more heavily in¶ their vote choice than less informed and sophisticated voters.3 We are more likely to observe interest group effects on member approval on hard as¶ opposed to easy issues. The general news media are likely to cover easy issues voluminously.¶ In fact, high news coverage levels help make an issue easier for voters. Hard issues¶ may not receive as much general news media attention. The technical and complex nature¶ of many hard issues renders them more difficult for the general news media to provide in¶ depth and detailed coverage. Although technical debates may involve intense conflicts,¶ such debates may be very dry or abstract, attributes that news organizations, concerned¶ about paying subscribers, do not think will attract subscribers as much as the clash of¶ personalities or political gain, themes often important in news coverage. Interest groups¶ communications do not suffer these limitations on issue coverage and may have incentives,¶ primarily member interest and the mobilization of members, to cover hard issues in greater depth than found in the general news medial. By doing so, they provide¶ members with information not generally available from the general news media.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 221 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core If the general news media cover an issue profusely and in depth, which is likely the¶ case for many easy issues, communications from the interest group’s specialized media¶ may not add to the member’s store of information and may not “prime” or “frame” the¶ issue beyond the effects due to exposure to general news coverage. If the issue is easy, the¶ advocacy presented in the group’s specialized media may have little impact on member¶ understanding of the issue and/or the implications of the president’s action. However,¶ when the issue is not covered much or in depth in the general news media, generally the¶ case for hard issues, interest group media provide new information to its members,¶ information that they would not necessarily possess otherwise or would find very costly¶ to collect and process. And the issue advocacy found in the interest group media may be¶ especially helpful for the member in interpreting, making sense of, the issue and the¶ president’s action on the issue. This is more likely for hard than easy issues.

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AT – Winners Win

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Not a Win Contentious debate ensures plan is not perceived as a victory Mann, Brookings Governance Studies senior fellow, 10 [Thomas, Brookings, November, “American Politics on the Eve of the Midterm Elections”, http://www.brookings.edu/articles/2010/11_midterm_elections_mann.aspx, accessed 6-20-11] The well-documented successes of the financial stabilisation and stimulus initiatives are invisible to a public reacting to the here and now, not to the counterfactual of how much worse it might have been. The painfully slow recovery from the global financial crisis and Great Recession have led most Americans to believe these programmes have failed and as a consequence they judge the President and Congress harshly. HIGHLY POLARISED That perception of failure has been magnified by the highly contentious process by which Obama’s initiatives have been adopted in Congress. America has in recent years developed a highly polarised party system, with striking ideological differences between the parties and unusual unity within each. But these parliamentary-like parties operate in a governmental system in which majorities are unable readily to put their programmes in place. Republicans adopted a strategy of consistent, unified, and aggressive opposition to every major component of the President’s agenda, eschewing negotiation, bargaining and compromise, even on matters of great national import. The Senate filibuster has been the indispensable weapon in killing, weakening, slowing, or discrediting all major legislation proposed by the Democratic majority.

Link outweighs “winners win” turn Silber, Political Science PhD, 7 [Marissa Silber, Political Science PhD Student at the University of Florida, Prepared for delivery at the 2007 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, August 30th-September 2nd, 2007, “WHAT MAKES A PRESIDENT QUACK? UNDERSTANDING LAME DUCK STATUS THROUGH THE EYES OF THE MEDIA AND POLITICIANS,” http://convention3.allacademic.com/meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/2/1/0/8/9/p210893_index.html, Accessed 7/9/12, THW] Important to the discussion of political capital is whether or not it can be replenished over a term. If a President expends political capital on his agenda, can it be replaced? Light suggests that “capital declines over time – public approval consistently falls: midterm losses occur” (31). Capital can be rebuilt, but only to a limited extent. The decline of capital makes it difficult to access information, recruit more expertise and maintain energy. If a lame duck President can be defined by a loss of political capital, this paper helps determine if such capital can be replenished or if a lame duck can accomplish little. Before determining this, a definition of a lame duck President must be developed.

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Winners Win Theory Flawed Winners win isn’t true for Obama Galston, Brookings, Governance Studies, Senior Fellow 10 (William, 11-4-10, “President Barack Obama’s Two Years: Policy Accomplishments, Political Difficulties”, Brookings , http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2010/11/04-obama-galston, accessed 7-9-12 FFF) Second, the administration believed that success would breed success—that the momentum from one legislative victory would spill over into the next. The reverse was closer to the truth: with each difficult vote, it became harder to persuade Democrats from swing districts and states to cast the next one. In the event, House members who feared that they would pay a heavy price if they supported cap-and-trade legislation turned out to have a better grasp of political fundamentals than did administration strategists.

Winners win theory is false - Congress too polarized Mann, Brookings, Governance Studies, Senior Fellow 10’ (Thomas E, November 2010, “AMERICAN POLITICS ON THE EVE OF THE MIDTERM ELECTIONS”, Brookings, http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CEwQFjAA&url=http% 3A%2F%2Fwww.brookings.edu%2F~%2Fmedia%2FFiles%2Frc%2Farticles%2F2010%2F11_midterm_ elections_mann%2F11_midterm_elections_mann.pdf&ei=QaL7T6qvO8WhrAGpwNyLCQ&usg=AFQjC NHgxxtq3WWIhoKbhRhv2P1Q0oPtjw, accessed 7-9-12 FFF) That perception of failure has been magnified by the highly contentious process by which Obama’s initiatives have been adopted in Congress. America has in recent years developed a highly polarised party system, with striking ideological differences between the parties and unusual unity within each. But these parliamentary-like parties operate in a governmental system in which majorities are unable readily to put their programmes in place. Republicans adopted a strategy of consistent, unified, and aggressive opposition to every major component of the President’s agenda, eschewing negotiation, bargaining and compromise, even on matters of great national import. The Senate filibuster has been the indispensable weapon in killing, weakening, slowing, or discrediting all major legislation proposed by the Democratic majority.

Health care disproves winners win Galston, Brookings Institute Governance Studies Senior Fellow, 10 [William A., Senior Fellow of Governance Studies @ Brookings, 11/4/10, Brookings Institute, “President Barack Obama’s First Two Years: Policy Accomplishments, Political Difficulties,” http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2010/11/04-obama-galston , Accessed 7/9/13] The legislative process that produced the health care bill was especially damaging. It lasted much too long and featured side-deals with interest groups and individual senators, made in full public view. Much of the public was dismayed by what it saw. Worse, the seemingly endless health care debate strengthened the view that the president’s agenda was poorly aligned with the economic concerns of the American people. Because the administration never persuaded the public that health reform

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 225 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core was vital to our economic future, the entire effort came to be seen as diversionary, even antidemocratic. The health reform bill was surely a moral success; it may turn out to be a policy success; but it is hard to avoid the conclusion that it was—and remains—a political liability. Indeed, most of the Obama agenda turned out to be very unpopular. Of five major policy initiatives undertaken during the first two years, only one—financial regulatory reform—enjoyed majority support. In a September 2010 Gallup survey, 52 percent of the people disapproved of the economic stimulus, 56 percent disapproved of both the auto rescue and the health care bill, and an even larger majority—61 percent— rejected the bailout of financial institutions.[v] Democrats’ hopes that the people would change their minds about the party’s signature issue—universal health insurance—after the bill passed were not fulfilled. (It remains to be seen whether sentiment will change in coming years as provisions of the bill are phased in—that is, if they survive what will no doubt be stiff challenges in both Congress and the states.)

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Winners Win Backfires Winners win isn’t true – going public backfires –raising the salience hurts the president Klein, Washington Post columnist, 3-19-12 [Ezra, New Yorker, “The Unpersuaded? Who listens to a President?”, http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/03/19/120319fa_fact_klein?currentPage=all, accessed 7-8-13, MSG] Representative Jim Cooper, a Democrat from Tennessee, takes Lee’s thesis even further. “The more high-profile the communication effort, the less likely it is to succeed,” he says. “In education reform, I think Obama has done brilliantly, largely because it’s out of the press. But on higherprofile things, like deficit reduction, he’s had a much tougher time.” Edwards’s work suggests that Presidential persuasion isn’t effective with the public. Lee’s work suggests that Presidential persuasion might actually have an anti-persuasive effect on the opposing party in Congress. And, because our system of government usually requires at least some members of the opposition to work with the President if anything is to get done, that suggests that the President’s attempts at persuasion might have the perverse effect of making it harder for him to govern. [Lee = Frances Lee, political science professor at the University of Maryland]

Hostile political climate means even wins are losses for Obama Baker, New York Times White House correspondent, 10 [Peter Baker, foreign policy reporter, 10/12/10, NYT, “Education of a President,” http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/magazine/17obama-t.html, Accessed 7/9/13] But it is possible to win the inside game and lose the outside game. In their darkest moments, White House aides wonder aloud whether it is even possible for a modern president to succeed, no matter how many bills he signs. Everything seems to conspire against the idea: an implacable opposition with little if any real interest in collaboration, a news media saturated with triviality and conflict, a culture that demands solutions yesterday, a societal cynicism that holds leadership in low regard. Some White House aides who were ready to carve a new spot on Mount Rushmore for their boss two years ago privately concede now that he cannot be another Abraham Lincoln after all. In this environment, they have increasingly concluded, it may be that every modern president is going to be, at best, average. “We’re all a lot more cynical now,” one aide told me. The easy answer is to blame the Republicans, and White House aides do that with exuberance. But they are also looking at their own misjudgments, the hubris that led them to think they really could defy the laws of politics. “It’s not that we believed our own press or press releases, but there was definitely a sense at the beginning that we could really change Washington,” another White House official told me. “ ‘Arrogance’ isn’t the right word, but we were overconfident.” The biggest miscalculation in the minds of most Obama advisers was the assumption that he could bridge a polarized capital and forge genuinely bipartisan coalitions. While Republican leaders resolved to stand against Obama, his early efforts to woo the opposition also struck many as halfhearted. “If anybody thought the Republicans were just going to roll over, we were just terribly mistaken,” former Senator Tom Daschle, a mentor and an outside adviser to Obama, told me. “I’m not sure anybody really thought that, but I think we kind of hoped the Republicans would go away. And obviously they didn’t do that.” Senator Dick Durbin, the No. 2

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 227 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Democrat in the upper chamber and Obama’s ally from Illinois, said the Republicans were to blame for the absence of bipartisanship. “I think his fate was sealed,” Durbin said. “Once the Republicans decided they would close ranks to defeat him, that just made it extremely difficult and dragged it out for a longer period of time. The American people have a limited attention span. Once you convince them there’s a problem, they want a solution.” Gov. Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania, though, is among the Democrats who grade Obama harshly for not being more nimble in the face of opposition. “B-plus, A-minus on substantive accomplishments,” he told me, “and a D-plus or C-minus on communication.” The health care legislation is “an incredible achievement” and the stimulus program was “absolutely, unqualifiedly, enormously successful,” in Rendell’s judgment, yet Obama allowed them to be tarnished by critics. “They lost the communications battle on both major initiatives, and they lost it early,” said Rendell, an ardent Hillary Clinton backer who later became an Obama supporter. “We didn’t use the president in either stimulus or health care until we had lost the spin battle.”

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Media Undermines Winners Win Media framing undercuts the effectiveness of presidential promotions Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 23-24, ProQuest, AMS] The Media Filter Obama's persistent, substantive and in-depth comments raise an intriguing question: why would shrewd observers conclude that Obama did little to rally the public behind the ACA when he was "going public," as presidency research predicts? The answer lies less with Obama and his lack of effort than with America's information system. Table 2 shows that the national press of record only covered 45% of all Obama's statements on health reform. Its reporting was even scarcer after the ACA's passage, when its coverage dropped to 20% . In other words, at the moment when Americans most needed to learn about the ACA's contents, only one out of five of Obama's addresses about health reform was conveyed to the country. Even the limited coverage of Obama's speeches about health reform often avoided in-depth reporting on the substantive components of reform in favor of conveying conflict among politicians and their strategic schemes. More than two-thirds of all press stories focused on tactical maneuvering for power and advantage; only 13% primarily reported the policy content of the president's addresses; and the remaining portion conveyed both the policy and politics of reform.5 Take, for example, Obama's momentous January 2010 State of the Union plea to continue to pursue reform after Scott Brown's startling win of Ted Kennedy's senate seat. To a coveted national audience, he made the case for the economic, fiscal, and moral urgency of action and outlined his approach to "protect every American from the worst practices of the insurance industry," expand access by "giv[ing] small businesses and uninsured Americans a chance to choose an affordable health care plan," and "require every insurance plan to cover preventive care" (Obama 2010). The coverage by the New York Times (Stolberg 2010) never mentioned his reforms to establish insurance company regulations, greater affordability, and improved access to prevention. Instead, the coverage focused nearly uniformly on political intrigue: Obama's address was framed as "com[ing] at a particularly rocky point in his presidency," presenting a contrasting with his campaign "promise to change the culture of Washington," and beating up on both parties in Congress - he was presented as "chastis[ing] Republicans for working in lock-step against him and . . . warn[ing] Democrats to stiffen their political spines." For those who only learned of the president's speech through the media, they would likely be unaware of the tangible reforms that were in the works and might be reasonably cynical of Washington playing politics with their lives (Cappella and Jamieson 1997). The media's muted coverage of health reform and preoccupation with conflict and intrigue frustrated Obama, as it had his predecessors including George W Bush, who derisively referred to the press as "the filter." The "virtues of this legislation for Americans with insurance and Americans without it," Obama opined, "have been entirely obscured by fear and distraction" both by opponents and by press reports that "breathlessly declar[e] what something means for a political party, without really talking much about what it means for a country." The combination of a well -funded and carefully honed opposition and the media's incomplete and selective reporting of Obama's public promotions contributed to public ambivalence and confusion about health reform - the end-state that has alarmed the President's critics. Six out of 10 Americans report not knowing enough about the personal impact of ACA, and most remain unaware of the core features of the law - nearly all of which enjoy majority backing even among people who identify as Republicans,

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 229 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core according to Kaiser Family Foundation surveys.7 Nonetheless, the public is divided or a bit opposed to reform, with favorable and unfavorable views generally in the 40% range in 26 Kaiser surveys since ACA was signed into law.8

The media portrays politics as a stage for wins and losses crowding out vital dissemination of policy, this undermines presidential promotion Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 25-26, ProQuest, AMS] Presidential Communications -within the Information System Obama joins a large pool of presidents who sought to capitalize on their unrivalled access to the media and to the presidency's enormous capacities for promotion but failed to impact public opinion as they desired. President George W Bush devoted enormous effort and resources to rallying the country to support the Iraq War and to back his efforts to partially privatize Social Security; neither campaign moved public opinion in the directions he sought (Edwards 2007). Bill Clinton launched an ambitious public push for health reform in 1993 and was rewarded with stronger public opposition within a year of unveiling his proposal. Four components of the information system constrain and condition the effectiveness of White House promotion. First, the effectiveness of presidential appeals depends on how the media process them based on their organizational incentives and processes. The media's search for audience and pursuit of general (if unevenly embraced) norms of informing the public motivate journalists and editors to report on public affairs in ways that will attract and entertain (Graber and Holyk 2011). What the president says - no matter who he is and what gilded words he chooses - will routinely be subject to selective and refracted coverage by editors and reporters who choose (based on their own incentives and norms) what to cover, how to frame it, and who to use as sources (Just 201 1; Patterson 1994). The communications revolution - cable stations and social media networking as well as online news sites and news-aggregating services - have atomized the shared public square into numerous, disconnected cubbyholes that reinforce existing perceptions and attitudes and resist presidential appeals (Shapiro and Jacobs 2011). In addition to erecting new hurdles to presidential persuasion, the information revolution has further complicated presidential promotions by reducing audience size and segmenting it; presidential failure has promoted them to redirect their appeals from broad national audiences to narrower subgroups of partisans, local communities, and other slices of voters (Baum and Kernell 1999; Cohen 2009; Wattenberg 2004). The second component is the intersection of the media and politics, and the media's close coverage of political conflict (Patterson 1994). The fixation of the traditional print and broadcast media with political conflict and strategy may be lamentable from the perspective of public education, but it accurately reflects partisan polarization that, for instance, defined the ACA's legislative journey - no Republicans voted for it while Democrats overwhelming backed it - as well as earlier health reform episodes (Cappella and Jamieson 1997). Indeed, the media reacts to presidential promotions not by passively accepting them but by portraying them as staged orchestrations and by expanding coverage of opponents (Jacobs 2010). The third component is the public's existing set of attitudes and style of information processing. From the start, the president's promotions face outright suspicion from a large proportion of the country that affiliates with the opposing party. Worse, today's historic polarization nearly ensures potent opposition to White House initiatives and sophisticated countermobilization strategies (Cameron and Park 201 1 ; Jacobs and Shapiro 2000). For presidents, their promotions contend with ingrained patterns of information processing in which oppositional framings bypass critical cognitive

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 230 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core inspection (Druckman 2004; Strickland, Taber, and Lodge 201 1). The health reform episode illustrates what political psychologists call "motivated reasoning": warnings by reform opponents about "death panels" and personal threats, which the media extensively reported, had the effect of priming many Americans to retrieve entrenched partisan beliefs and attitudes about government and to grow uncertain about, or turn against, reform. Fourth, the design of policy has powerful and potentially enduring effects on public attitudes and behaviors that are difficult for presidents to override (Mettler and Soss 2004). In the case of health reform, the public's muted awareness and evaluations of the ACA were in part a function of the law's policy design and, in particular, the decision of lawmakers to delay implementation of tangible benefits to 2014 and to rely on "submerged" policy tools (such as tax subsidies and the state option to avoid or mute the government's public involvement in operating the new insurance programs) (Mettler 2011). In short, presidents face enormous hurdles in delivering their message through the information system. The mutually reinforcing incentives of the information system routinely work to crowd out meaningful reporting on policy and feeds cynicism about the purpose of government (Cappella and Jamieson 1997).

Institutional and informational systems restrict the power of presidential promotion Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 24-25, ProQuest, AMS] Putting Public Presidency in Context Disciplinary borrowings from the field of the "public presidency" have feasted on the "public" dimension of White House promotions but overlooked the second component, which references the seminal shift from studying the individual of the president to investigating the institution oí the presidency. The field's research finds that the origins, forms, and conditional effects of presidential promotions are a function of both the organizational processes of the executive office as well as broader sets of relationships with the country's information system, institutional contexts, and organizational rivals. The case of health reform spotlights the analytic significance of situating personal presidential behavior within the institutional and organizational contexts of American politics. What is striking about Obama's handling of health reform is not that he failed to make frequent and compelling public presentation - a failure that could be attributed to his personal flaws and limitations. Rather, what stands out is that he did devote substantial time and resources to public promotion and still was unable to produce favorable press coverage and public opinion. The answer to this puzzle can be found in the institutional and informational systems that impose structural limits on White House promotions and open up opportunities for strategic choices to capitalize on the capacities of the presidency and exploit the weaknesses of opponents. Although a detailed analysis is not feasible, I outline core features of America's broader political context that condition the effects of presidential promotions.

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Going Public Doesn’t Influence Congress Presidential promotion doesn’t translate to legislative outcomes – even if public gets on board Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 26-27 ProQuest, AMS] Institutions and Interests Trump Presidential Appeals Presidency research delivers a double blow to exaggerated claims about the general efficacy of presidential promotions: not only do they rarely deliver what the White House and its supporters expect, but the preoccupation with them distracts from the dominant dynamics of policy making entrenched institutional and organizational processes. Put another way, even if presidents (including Obama) impact public opinion as they desire, rigorous research provides no reasonable grounds to a general expectation that legislative outcomes (including health reform) are likely to meaningfully change in ways that would avoid compromises, delays, and deadlocks. Of particular importance are interbranch relations. They drive national decision making and routinely blunt or override the personal appeals of presidents for public support, helping to account for the selectivity and contingency of presidential efforts to move public opinion. Presidents can barnstorm the country to champion their proposals, but their success in Congress is largely a function of its partisan composition: fellow partisans generally support the White House, legislators in the opposing party usually oppose the administration, and the probability of both tendencies has increased as partisan polarization has widened (Bond and Fleisher 1990; Edwards 1989; Jacobson 2003). The biggest factor in the passage of comprehensive national health reform was unified Democratic Party control of the legislative and executive branches and the largest congressional majorities in decades. Fellow partisans regularly support presidents as a general rule, but even this bond does not guarantee White House success: one party does not typically control both lawmaking branches (as Obama discovered after the 2010 midterm elections) and presidents face resistance from fellow partisans who do not share their philosophical orientation (as exhibited by the splits within the Democratic Party over health reform in 2009-10). These structural features, and not Obama's personal temperament or promotional skills, set the parameters of what was feasible. While partisan and ideological forces predispose certain legislative outcomes, the institutional rules and procedures of Congress influence the form, pace, and tenor of lawmaking. One set of picket fences consist of the increasing and broadening use of the 60-vote filibuster requirement that the opposition deploys to bog down and block legislation (Bondurant 201 1). On health reform, the filibuster required the votes of all 58 Democrats and two independents, empowering each senator to bargain for goodies under the threat of withholding his or her support and sending reform to defeat. The infamous "Cornhusker Kickback" was struck to secure one of the final Democratic votes for the ACA - Nebraska's Ben Nelson. Adding still more opportunity for delay, deadlock, and doom were legislative budget rules that positioned the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) as the official scorekeeper on the revenue and costs of new legislation. (See Jacobs and Skocpol 2012 for detailed discussion of these dynamics.) Presidential promotional efforts to dictate the pace, form, and disposition of legislation are routinely trumped by the durable and thorough-going influences of a turbo-charged system of institutional warfare.

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“Going public” doesn’t solve the link – health care proves – Obama’s persistent promotion of health care failed to rally support Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 16-17, ProQuest, AMS] The tendency of well-developed research fields to overfill is well known; a corresponding challenge is the tendency to misunderstand or misapply that research by scholars plowing different plots. The mistaken or incomplete interpretation of research on the public presidency presents a particularly egregious case of poor harvesting. Although political observers and scholars outside the public presidency field project "going public" as a highly influential weapon, scholars in the field converge on modest expectations in which presidential promotions have limited, selective, and conditional effects. This pattern is illustrated through content analyses of Barack Obama's speeches and the media's coverage of them. The findings correspond with the expectations of the public presidency field: Obama conducted extensive public promotions of his signature legislative accomplishment-health reform-and his efforts failed to move media coverage, public opinion, or the legislative process. As research on the public presidency expands its scope and reach, there is a growing opportunity to correct its misapplications and, more positively, to build an unusually diverse research community that spans political theory and the social sciences. Doug Arnold (1982) distinguished between "overtilled" and "undertilled" areas of research in American politics. His purpose was to encourage a reallocation of scholarly labor from extensively studied areas with low and diminishing yields of new knowledge to fields that have "largely been abandoned, although they still offer great promise, [or have] . . . never been well cultivated at all" (92). Attention to the allocation of research labor needs to be complemented by scrutiny of another dimension the harvesting and distribution of research outside fields and subfields to the broader discipline devoted to studying politics and policy. Though these research fields tend to produce veritable warehouses of findings, they are poorly understood or misapplied by scholars plowing different plots. In these cases, the misallocation problem that Arnold identified becomes compounded by a breakdown in the distribution system that delivers the fruits of labor to scholarly consumers. Gaps between the specialized research of particular fields or subfields (what I refer to as "field research") and broader disciplinary learning put researchers at risk of adopting assumptions and theoretical expectations about fields outside their areas of expertise that have been proven flawed or false. Such underharvesting raises questions about the way the political science community operates and the degree to which that community generates new knowledge through cumulative processes of learning and interaction. The purpose of this article is to use research on the promotional presidency to stimulate a discussion about cross-field engagement and intellectual dialogue within political science. As an enormous body of research on the U.S. president's public promotions piles up, political observers and scholars outside the presidency field continue to mistakenly or incompletely interpret the research and, in cases where they do not draw on political science research at all, they have been prone to adopt unfounded assumptions. Initial critical assessments of Barack Obama's first term in office, and specifically his public promotion of health reform, illustrate this general pattern, and pose a revealing puzzle: Obama engaged in public promotion and his efforts failed to move public opinion or the legislative process. While Obama's sobering experience with health reform may be surprising to popular commentators and some political scientists, it is consistent (as I discuss shortly) with a large body of presidency research - throwing the underharvesting challenge into relief. Understanding the conditional nature of presidential promotion requires appreciation for the interaction of agency and structure. White House appeals for public support often collide with structural constraints cemented into America's institutional and informational systems. Yet,

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 233 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core institutions and interests also open up choices for strategic presidents who can adjust to lure allies and skillfully persuade them to deploy their institution resources to serve the president's agenda.

“Going public” has little effect on Congress – only targeted groups achieve minimal effects Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 18-19, ProQuest, AMS] This research also challenges the causal chain in which "going public" is expected to mobilize public support that, in turn, pressures members of Congress and other policy makers to adopt the president's policies. Investigations repeatedly report that presidential promotions have limited impacts on Congress. Presidents who rely on orchestrated appeals frequently find themselves exerting only "marginal" influence on lawmaking (Bond and Fleisher 1990; Edwards 1989, 2007) and victims of squandered political capital, frustrated public expectations, and potentially missed opportunities for privately negotiated pacts (Baum 2004; Jacobs and Shapiro 2000; Jerit 2008). While extensive research suggests minimal effects of presidential promotion, it does not justify "writing off presidential leadership as totally ineffective" (Tedin, Rottinghaus, and Rodgers 201 1, 506). A more precise distillation of the research is that presidential appeals fall short of White House objectives but can exert modest selective influence under certain conditions. Modest influence by presidents has been detected in discrete components of the policy process, specifically in agendasetting, where a president can moderately elevate Americans' attention to his initiatives, even though he is unable to exclude other issues (Cohen 1982, 1995; Edwards and Barrett 2000; Peterson I99O). The White House may enjoy more influence when it has shifted from seeking to influence "the nation" to targeting subgroups of party activists, local communities, and discrete voting blocs (Cohen 2009; Druckman and Jacobs 201 1; Tedin, Rottinghaus, and Rodgers 2011; Wattenberg 2004). These selective effects tend to be a bit more likely under conditions of relatively muted public opposition and countermobilization (Cameron and Park 2011) and elevated public support (CanesWrone 2001, 2006; Page and Shapiro 1984).

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Going Public Doesn’t Influence Public Presidential promotion is ineffective in creating a mindset shift amongst the public Jacobs, Humphrey School Center for the Study of Politics and Governance director & University of Minnesota political science professor, 13 [Lawrence R. Jacobs, “The Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions”, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 43 Issue 1, P. 18, ProQuest, AMS] Research on the Public Presidency and Disciplinary Presumptions Over the past three decades, the expanding field of presidential research has developed more sophisticated and diverse analytic approaches, and devoted enormous time and effort to studying the president's widening commitment to promote himself and his policies to Americans and thereby go "over the heads" of Washington lawmakers and power brokers. This shift produced the large and vibrant subfield of the "public presidency" (Edwards 1983), which has developed in two broad directions. The first is a meticulous charting of the frequency of "going public" as well as its forms and audiences (Kernell 1986). Researchers trace the rise of the public presidency to changing norms of governance and speech (Tulis 1987), to the dissipation of power and the onset of policy paralysis (Kernell 1986), and to communications strategies that are geared toward mobilizing public support in order to augment scarce political resources and satisfy voter expectations (Jacobs and Shapiro 2000). The second strand is a rigorous examination of the effects of presidential public promotions, which generally - though not uniformly - stresses the limits on White House efforts to mold Americans to their designs. George Edwards enjoys the distinction of both helping to launch the "public presidency" field (1983) and documenting its ineffectiveness in manufacturing public preferences or higher approval ratings (1996a, 1996b, 2??3, 2007). Recent summaries of "minimal effects" research confirm that "evidence is mounting that presidents find difficulty in leading public opinion" (Tedin, Rottinghaus, and Rodgers 2011, 506) and that their "effectiveness [is] more problematic [than often assumed]" (Cameron and Park 2011, 443).

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AT – Winners Win [Hirsh version] They say Winners Win but1. Winner’s win is not true. Political capital is not regenerated from a political win and it is finite. If Obama goes through heated debate he will have to invest lots of energy and debate which will irritate people that he needs later – he has to expend something to get a bill passed 2. Illogical- If winner’s win was true, then presidents would never lose because they would always generate more capital after a win which would just lead them always winning. 3. There’s a massive inconsistency in his argument- he says Johnson was able to gain momentum by immediately attacking the biggest controversies, but then acknowledges that Obama was completely drained by the passage of Obamacare- that disproves that wins carry over 4. Hirsh outlines no threshold to winning – does it have to be double-digit majority or a landslide? Can it be a very marginal win? Who has to perceive it as a win? How many wins can Obama get until he loses? 5. Hirsch bases his winners win arguments on LBJ’s presidency – political theories have changed – new congress, different times and a new president makes PC necessary because Obama can’t force their way through bills

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6. And Hirsh interprets it the wrong way – he says that people will want to get on the winning side after the passage of a tough bill, but it goes the other way – if he looks unpopular pushing legislation, people will want to get off the losing side and will turn against him. Even if bandwagoning is true, Midterm elections make bandwagoning impossible—no republican will let Obama twist there arm – it’s a matter of Obama’s influence. 7. Winners win is false on controversial issues—Hirsh’s analysis on loss of political capital after the health care debacle proves that even if victories on easy bills sustain Obama’s influence, it’s not true for divisive issues. The plan crushes his momentum and at worst, means the plan can’t garner offense off the link turn. 8. Obama’s also the focal point of political issues – no one knows other government figures and shown in the media – when he pushes unpopular legislation, congress and the public blame him 9. The only empirical defense of this claim is about Lyndon B. Johnson, but it also says that his political wins concerned issues that appealed to public consciousness- if anything, it just means that public opinion matters to political capital, not that wins build unstoppable momentum 10. FDR proves winner’s win is not true- he politically won with New Deal programs but couldn’t pack the Supreme Court- also proves PC is limited Hirsh, National Journal Chief Correspondent, 13 [Michael, Updated: May 30, 2013 | 12:26 a.m., February 7, 2013 | 8:10 p.m., “There’s No Such Thing as Political Capital”, http://www.nationaljournal.com/magazine/there-s-no-such-thing-as-political-capital20130207, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] Consider, as another example, the storied political career of President Franklin Roosevelt. Because the mood was ripe for dramatic change in the depths of the Great Depression, FDR was able to push an astonishing array of New Deal programs through a largely compliant Congress, assuming what some described as near-dictatorial powers. But in his second term, full of confidence because of a landslide victory in 1936 that brought in unprecedented Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, Roosevelt overreached with his infamous Court-packing proposal. All of a sudden, the political capital that experts thought was limitless disappeared. FDR’s plan to expand the Supreme Court by putting in his judicial allies abruptly created an unanticipated wall of opposition from newly reunited Republicans and conservative Southern Democrats. FDR thus inadvertently handed back to Congress, especially to the Senate, the power and influence he had seized in his first term. Sure, Roosevelt had loads of popularity and momentum in 1937. He seemed to have a bank vault full of political capital. But, once again, a president simply chose to take on the wrong issue at the wrong time; this time, instead of most of the political interests in the country aligning his way, they opposed him. Roosevelt didn’t fully recover until World War II, despite two more election victories.

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Theory Neg

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Generic Politics Good Their interpretation of fiat is a voter for fairness and education: 1. Fairness: Politics DA is at the heart of why most plans haven’t been done – we should be able to talk about the real world political ramifications. 2. Education: talking about the political process allows us to become better decision makers. It also allows us to have in-depth knowledge about the topic and models real-world Congressional discussion of the plan.

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AT – Bottom of the Docket Political process begins as soon as the plan is passed, which also triggers the expenditure of political capital in Congressional meetings and votes, ensuring a link to the plan. Docket is not a real thing – Obama pushes what he thinks he can pass at the moment. Their interpretation of fiat is a voter for fairness and education: 1. Neg ground: this interpretation can make any DA nonunique. 2. Makes the aff a moving target – they can only defend the interpretation of fiat of the 1AC. 3. Education: Politics DA is at the core of why most plans haven’t been done – it’s key to test the real world political ramifications, which increases in-depth knowledge of the topic.

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AT – Winding Way Political process triggers the expenditure of political capital in Congressional meetings and votes. Their interpretation of fiat is a voter for fairness and education: 1. Fairness: Politics DA is at the heart of why most plans haven’t been done – we should be able to talk about the real world political ramifications 2. Education: talking about the political process allows us to become better decision makers. It also allows us to have in-depth knowledge about the topic and models real-world Congressional discussion of the plan.

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AT – No Backlash Link arguments prove there is backlash and political reactions to the plan. Their interpretation of fiat is a voter for fairness and education: 1. Education: talking about the political process allows us to become better decision makers. It also allows us to have in-depth knowledge about the topic and models real-world Congressional discussion of the plan. 2. Fairness: the same interpretation could be extended to no link out of all DAs – steals core neg ground.

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AT – Vote No This round isn’t a proxy congressional debate. The format does not model Congress. Their interpretation of debate is bad: 1. Infinitely regressive: All DAs would hypothetically be triggered or inevitable just by the neg just introducing them in the round – takes out the majority of core neg ground. 2. Education: the plan can’t be fully tested without DAs, so policymaking knowledge is lost.

3. Voter for fairness and education.

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AT – Non-Intrinsic Obama has to spend political capital to pass the plan – that is the 1NC ____________ link evidence. Political capital expenditure proves the DA is intrinsic. Intrinsicness arguments are bad for debate: 1. Infinitely Regressive: their interpretation means all DAs can hypothetically be solved by an external policy option or intervening actor. 2. Neg Ground: analyzing political consequences is key to fully testing the plan. Their interpretation excludes all politics DAs, which are at the core of neg ground. 3. Education: Politics DA is key to test the real world political ramifications, which increases indepth knowledge of the topic. 4. Voter for fairness and education.

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AT – Fiat Solves the Link The aff gets the minimum amount of fiat necessary. They can fiat the plan is passed, but they can’t fiat the political process of the plan. Their interpretation of fiat is a voter for fairness and education: 1. Real-world Education: talking about the political process allows us to become better decision makers. It also allows us to have in-depth knowledge about the topic and models real-world Congressional discussion of the plan. 2. Fairness: Politics DAs are at the core of neg ground. Don’t let them spike out of real world process implications with an arbitrary definition of fiat that provides no educational benefit – we could never win a link to a DA with this interp of fiat.

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Aff Answers

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Link Uniqueness

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Congressional Backlash Now Congress bashing Obama on foreign policy now Roberts, The Guardian, 13 [Dan Roberts, Staff Writer, The Guardian, May 30th 2013, “Obama's cautious approach to Syrian intervention sparks growing criticism,” Lexis, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] Foreign policy has long been where second-term US presidents turn when they run out of political clout back home. But for Barack Obama, accusations of drift and inaction on the domestic front are only compounded by his lack of progress internationally, particularly when it comes to the biggest challenge of all: preventing war in Syria from fatally destabilising the Middle East. For months now, the White House has sought to tread a cautious line over Syria's bitter civil war resisting pressure from Europe and Israel to intervene militarily over alleged chemical weapons use by the Syrian government and pushing instead for a negotiated departure for President Assad. Given the recent US track record on regime change and alleged weapons of mass destruction, many international observers are no doubt relieved it has so far opted to take a back seat this time. But as the continued slaughter in Syria begins to threaten peace across the region, a growing question in Washington and other Western capitals is whether Obama's caution reflects a prudent understanding of the pitfalls of intervention or a failure to get on top of events? Criticism from Republican hawks such as John McCain is to be expected, but even some of the administration's closest advisers are now wondering aloud whether the White House needs a plan B. Fred Hof, who was Hillary Clinton's special representative on Syria until last September, warns that relying exclusively on open-ended peace talks risks preventing the west from acting more directly. "For a long time after Vietnam our government was paralysed with doubt; we are seeing that process again in the wake of the catastrophic war in Iraq," ambassador Hof told a conference at the United States Institute of Peace on Wednesday. "We have a government that believes that whatever we do it can only make things worse. What this ignores is how bad things are now." Part of the problem, argues Hof, is that other powers such as Russia, Iran and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah are much more determined to prop up Assad than the West is to support the rebels. "This is a war that Iran and Hezbollah have decided not to lose," he says. "We are not yet seeing that level of resolve on behalf of the US administration."

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Mexico Engagement Now Mexican energy fights now Kasperowicz, The Hill, 13 [Pete, 6-27-13, The Hill, “House votes to implement US-Mexico offshore energy deal,” http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/308263-house-votes-to-implement-us-mexico-offshoreenergy-deal, accessed 7-7-13, MSG] The House on Thursday passed a bill that would implement a U.S.-Mexico agreement on offshore energy development on the countries' maritime border despite opposition from Democrats who called it an attack on the Dodd-Frank financial reform law. Members voted 256-171 in favor of the bill, with 28 Democrats voting with Republicans to implement the deal approved by the Obama administration. Several Democrats said during debate that they support the 2012 agreement between the U.S. and Mexico. But they pointed out that the legislation includes language that would waive a provision of Dodd-Frank that requires companies to disclose payments made to foreign governments. Republicans said this waiver is needed because Mexico has not decided how it would receive royalties from energy development under the agreement. "This would create a potential conflict because Mexico has yet to decide how they will collect royalties and could potentially set regulatory measures that prohibit disclosure of payments," House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (R-Wash.) said. "This would then block American workers from being able to develop these resources. "Waiving the Dodd-Frank requirement is necessary in order to help protect jobs American jobs and American-made energy in this instance," he added. "Without it, foreign-controlled energy companies could develop this American energy resource, and the royalty payments to Mexico would still be undisclosed and kept private." Democrats rejected this and called it an attempt to dismantle Dodd-Frank. Rep. Peter DeFazio (DOre.) said the language is "totally unnecessary" and added that the provision waives Dodd-Frank's reporting rules for all offshore energy deals between the U.S. and a foreign government.

There’s economic engagement now—should have triggered the link Valencia, Global Voices political analyst, 13 [Robert, 5-20-13, World Policy, “U.S. and Latin America: Economic Cooperation without Militarization?,” http://www.worldpolicy.org/blog/2013/05/20/us-and-latin-america-economiccooperation-without-militarization, accessed 7-7-13, MSG] President Obama’s meeting with Mexico’s President Enrique Peña Nieto centered on the historic economic relationship between the two countries, and furthered their conversation on economic and commercial initiatives as well as immigration issues. Additionally, Peña Nieto highlighted Mexico’s economic growth and the necessity for bolstering student exchange. Both leaders agreed to create an economic team led by Vice President Joe Biden and Mexican Secretary of the Treasury Luis Videgaray. They resolved to create projects to improve infrastructure and security along the 3,000 kilometer-long border, one of the world’s largest.

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Venezuela Engagement Now The link is non-unique—USAID and the State Department already have multiple programs for engagement in Venezuela Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 9 [Mark P., July 28th 2009, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Political Conditions and U.S. Policy,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL32488.pdf, p.38, Accessed 7/8/13, CB] U.S. Funding for Democracy Projects The United States has funded democracy-related projects in Venezuela for a number of years through a variety of programs funded by the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). USAID, through its Office of Transition Initiatives, has funded democracy projects in Venezuela since 2002, with the goals of strengthening democratic institutions, promoting space for dialogue, and encouraging citizens’ participation in democratic processes. Transitions Initiatives (TI) funding in recent years was $5 million in FY2005, $3.7 million in FY2006, $3 million in FY2007, $3.6 million in FY2008, and an estimated $2 million in FY2009. According to USAID, the funding supports projects implemented by five U.S. organizations: Development Alternatives Inc, which focuses on dialogue, public debate, citizen participation and leadership training; the International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute, which offer technical assistance for political parties; Freedom House, which provides technical support to human rights groups; and the Pan-American Development Foundation, which provides support to civil society.130 The State Department has supported democracy projects in Venezuela largely through Economic Support Funds (ESF), but also recently through Development Assistance (DA) funding. In recent years, the following amounts have been provided: in FY2004, $1.497 million in ESF; in FY2005, $2.4 million in ESF; in FY2007, $1.6 million in ESF; and in FY2008, $6.5 million in DA and almost $3 million in ESF. For FY2009, an estimated $5 million in ESF will be provided for democracy projects, while the FY2010 request is for $6 million in ESF

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Link Answers

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Foreign Policy

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Foreign Policy – Public Doesn’t Care No link – Public opinion shifts are temporary—foreign policy especially prone to slippage Edwards, Texas A&M University distinguished professor of political science, 6 (George C. III, Jordan Chair in Presidential Studies, former Olin Professor of American Government at Oxford, former John Adams Fellow at the University of London, associate Member of Nuffield College at the University of Oxford and former director of The Center for Presidential Studies, On Deaf Ears: The Limits of the Bully Pulpit, p. 168-169, Google Books, Accessed 7/10/13, JC) In addition, opinion changes that occur may well be likely to be temporary. Even under unusual circumstances when people have participated in intense deliberations with fellow citizens and listened to the testimony of¶ politicians and policy experts, changes of opinion have been found to be largely temporary.41 Members of the public who are the easiest to sway in the short run are those without crystallized opinions. However, as issues fade into the background or positions on issues are confronted with the realities of daily life or with a better understanding of the implications of support for the president for basic values, opinions that were altered in response to presidential leadership may quickly be forgotten. This slippage is especially likely to occur in foreign policy, the area in which the president's influence on public opinion may be greatest.

The American public is unaware the US foreign policy budget and how it functions Brzezinski, former National Security Advisor, 12 [Zbigniew, Press Freedom, “Ignorance of international affairs: It’s a major problem for America”, http://worldjournalism.wordpress.com/2012/02/15/ignorance-of-international-affairs-its-a-major-problemfor-america/, accessed: 7/10/13, ML] The United States is still the 500-pound gorilla when it comes to foreign affairs. Yet the American people are woefully (and some seem blissfully) ignorant of the rest of the world. “American exceptionalism” is not a foreign policy. The rest of the world is catching up economically. That does not mean the USA is declining in absolute terms, rather it means we are getting more peers in the world instead of clients. It also means that simplistic soundbites (and the acceptance of those soundbites without a critical eye) about throwing American military weight around is dangerous. While most people think the share of the U.S. non-military foreign affairs budget is anywhere from 15-27 percent of the U.S. budget; and these same people think 10 percent is “just about right,” the real number is closer to 1 percent. And that covers all development aid and the operation expenses of the TOTAL State Department, including salaries and the costs of running embassies and consulates around the world. (Oh, and Defense is about 15 percent.) Efforts to cut the international affairs budgets are really more a means to withdraw peaceful way to help people and solve international problems. Once that is done all is left is either isolationism or regular use of the military. And to be honest, isolationism doesn’t work in a global economy and I would rather spend money than blood to solve problems. But why is the international affairs budget such an easy target? Bottom line: There is no constituency for it. Most of the American people are ignorant of not only the foreign affairs budget but also of the rest of the world. And the American media don’t help much by limiting its coverage of global events and by not providing context to most of the stories that are published/aired.

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American culture breeds ignorance in terms of foreign policy awareness Griffen, Cambridge Chronicle Reporter, 12 [Richard, 2/25/12, Cambridge Chronicle “Americans ignorance of foreign politics hurts U.S. foreign policy”, http://www.wickedlocal.com/cambridge/news/x1353889296/Griffin-Americans-ignorance-offoreign-politics-hurts-U-S-foreign-policy, accessed” 7/10/13, ML] Now in his 80s, Brzezinski shows himself articulate and dignified as he evaluates our international situation. His new book, “Strategic Vision,” gives a detailed picture of his current worldview. But the PBS interview covers much ground in a short time. One conviction of Brzezinski made a special impact on me, and made me wish to draw readers’ attention to it. Brzezinski characterizes the American public’s understanding of world affairs as “abysmal.” We are probably the least informed country in the world, he says. And one of the main reasons why this hurts us is this: “We can only conduct a foreign policy that the public supports.” It saddens me to find Brzezinski’s charge quite correct. We all know people who know little or nothing beyond our borders. Nor do these same citizens much care. Pop culture has created an alternate reality in our country. Widespread rejection of newspapers, especially among young people, condemns many among us to ignorance, despite the information riches of the Internet. Though our country still plays a major role in the world, the time is coming, Brzezinski says, when that will change. Already, we “can no longer dictate to the world, or be the determining player of everything that is important on the global scene.”

Non-crisis foreign policy issues fade from public attention quickly—too complex and long term to capture interest Knecht, University of Denver professor, and Weatherford, UC Santa Barbara professor, 6 (T. Knecht and ¶ M. S. Weatherford, International Studies Quarterly (2006) 50, ¶ “Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: The¶ Stages of Presidential Decision Making,” p. 710, http://clas.georgetown.edu/files/Knecht%20and%20Weatherford%20Public%20Opinion%20and%20Fore ign%20Policy.pdf, Accessed 7/10/13, JC) While research on noncrisis cases is limited, we note that these issues share traits¶ with typical domestic politics issues, and we hypothesize that the public’s attentiveness to noncrisis foreign policy issues will trace an ‘‘issue attention cycle.’’ Unlike¶ crises that are high in human drama and capable of holding the public’s attention,¶ noncrisis issues develop over a long time, typically involve complex substantive¶ trade offs, and entail lengthy coalition building before a solution is reached.¶ Downs’s (1972; cf. Vasquez and Mansbach 1983; Vasquez 1985; Bosso 1989) study¶ of environmental politics shows that the pattern of attention to such issues follows a¶ stylized cycle, in which the public exhibits ‘‘alarmed discovery’’ at the introduction¶ of a new issue, resulting in a high level of attention and public demands for government to ‘‘do something’’ about the problem. Peak attentiveness is not sustained¶ long, however, as the public becomes disillusioned or bored with the problem, and¶ concern focuses elsewhere. As Downs writes, American public attention rarely remains sharply focused upon any one domestic¶ issue for very longFeven if it involves a continuing problem of crucial importance to society. Instead, a systematic ‘‘issue-attention cycle’’ seems strongly to¶ influence public attitudes and behavior concerning most key domestic problems.¶ Each of these problems suddenly leaps into prominence, remains there for a¶

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 255 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core short time, and then—though still largely unresolved—gradually fades from the¶ center of public attention (Downs 1972:38).

The majority of the public is ignorant of foreign policy – studies prove Houghton, UCF Forum, Columnist 5-8-13 [David Houghton, 5-08-13, University of Central Florida Forum, “U.S. Foreign Policy Can be Only as Good as Public's Understanding of World Affairs”, http://today.ucf.edu/u-s-foreign-policy-can-be-onlyas-good-as-publics-understanding-of-world-affairs/, accessed, 7-10-13 AMS] Poll after poll shows that most Americans are woefully ignorant about foreign policy and the rest of the world. In a 2006 Roper poll, only 37 percent of young Americans could place Iraq on a map – just three years after we invaded that country. An astonishing 88 percent couldn’t place Afghanistan, four years into that war that is still ongoing. In 2003, 53 percent of Americans believed Saddam Hussein was personally involved in 9/11, according to a CBS/New York Times poll, and according to Newsweek – which administered an official citizenship test in 2011 to ”natural born” citizens – an astonishing 73 percent of Americans could not identify Communism as America’s main concern during the Cold War. And perhaps most surprisingly, according to a 2011 Marist poll, nearly 25 percent of Americans don’t know that the United States declared its independence from England. Public ignorance has potentially very grave consequences for American foreign policy. Should we be invading places that many Americans cannot even pinpoint on a map? Should we be allowing our presidents to wage foreign wars without our knowledge? In 1964, the issue of Vietnam was hardly mentioned during the presidential election campaign, except that Lyndon Johnson claimed he would never send “American boys” over to Vietnam. But the following year – and largely in secrecy – the Johnson administration began a slow-motion escalation of the war. It would ultimately cost 58,000 Americans, and probably millions of Vietnamese, their lives. In the 1980s the Reagan administration waged a secret war against the government of Nicaragua, hidden from Congress and the American people. And we may need only look at recent drone attacks in Yemen, Pakistan and Afghanistan to surmise that the same thing is happening again now. In one unexplained attack in 2011, which has never been completely explained, a U.S. drone in Yemen attacked and killed a U.S.-born teenager, Abdulrahman Anwar Al-Aulaqi, who had not been accused of anything but his father was the inciter of hatred against Americans via the internet. Some advocate an elitist approach to American foreign policy. The 18th century British Member of Parliament Edmund Burke articulated this approach to political leadership, arguing that elected officials must employ their own judgment and experience to determine what policy is best for the country. Some question whether our leaders know best. Hardly anybody was clamoring for war with Iraq until President George W. Bush made weapons of mass destruction a justification for it. In the subsequent war, 4,000 Americans and probably well over 100,000 Iraqis lost their lives. In a democracy, elected officials are supposed to be the delegates of the people. And here lies the significance of popular ignorance of American foreign policy: it makes a delegate-style approach harder, since an electorate that doesn’t inform itself about the issues cannot possibly hope to guide what leaders do, and cannot hope to prevent the kind of blunders with which some American foreign policy has been littered. The answer, in a word, is education. This is why I teach American foreign policy. As Zbigniew Brzezinski, former national security advisor for President Carter, said: “We are a democracy. We can only have as good a foreign policy as the public’s understanding of world affairs.”

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 256 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core When it comes to the big things, ordinary Americans usually have it about right. They may not be highly informed about geography or history or strategy, but their support for key facets of American foreign policy has been fairly stable over time. Survey trends show solid and stable support for U.S. international involvement and participation, for instance, and the general public usually offers mostly reasoned responses to foreign policy problems, at least after the fact. And when we take the time to inform ourselves about what is happening, we usually react logically to situations such as unsuccessful wars. In Plato’s The Republic – centuries later a model for many of the ideas of the radical Iranian cleric Ayatollah Khomeini – the Greek philosopher presented a stark, anti-democratic vision of the world in which only the ”learned” and the knowledgeable were permitted to rule. The rest of us were assumed to live in the darkness of ”the cave.” An uninformed mass public truly empowers the Platonists of American foreign policy – those such as diplomat George Kennan, political scientist Gabriel Almond and journalist Walter Lippmann, all of whom believed that top decision-makers should be left alone to make foreign policy as they see fit, without the checks and balances of ”the herd.” But that kind of thinking brought us the Bay of Pigs. It brought us Watergate. It brought us Vietnam and Iraq, before public opinion turned against what policymakers were doing. And today they are waging wars without our knowledge for which our children may one day pay the price. The less we know, the more we place American foreign policy in the hands of those who want to make foreign policy without troubling themselves with our input or burdening themselves with the terrible costs of war.

Unless it has a substantial impact on their life, the general public will not pay attention to foreign policy Davidson 4-6-13 [Lawrence Davidson, 4-06-13, “The Whys of American Ignorance”, http://consortiumnews.com/2013/04/06/the-whys-of-american-ignorance/, accessed, 7-10-13 AMS] In 2008, Rick Shenkman, the Editor-in-Chief of the History News Network, published a book entitled Just How Stupid Are We? Facing the Truth about the American Voter. In it he demonstrated, among other things, that most Americans were: (1) ignorant about major international events, (2) knew little about how their own government runs and who runs it, (3) were nonetheless willing to accept government positions and policies even though a moderate amount of critical thought suggested they were bad for the country, and (4) were readily swayed by stereotyping, simplistic solutions, irrational fears and public relations babble. Shenkman spent 256 pages documenting these claims, using a great number of polls and surveys from very reputable sources. Indeed, in the end it is hard to argue with his data. So, what can we say about this? One thing that can be said is that this is not an abnormal state of affairs. As has been suggested in prior analyses, ignorance of non-local affairs (often leading to inaccurate assumptions, passive acceptance of authority, and illogical actions) is, in fact, a default position for any population. To put it another way, the majority of any population will pay little or no attention to news stories or government actions that do not appear to impact their lives or the lives of close associates. If something non-local happens that is brought to their attention by the media, they will passively accept government explanations and simplistic solutions. The primary issue is “does it impact my life?” If it does, people will pay attention. If it appears not to, they won’t pay attention. For instance, in Shenkman’s book unfavorable comparisons are sometimes made between Americans and Europeans. Americans often are said to be much more ignorant about world geography than are Europeans.

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Americans don’t care about foreign affairs – domestic issues take precedent Hoge, editor for Foreign Affairs, 10 [Jim, 7-12-10, Foreign Affairs, “Why Americans Don’t Care about Foreign Policy”, http://bigthink.com/videos/why-americans-dont-care-about-foreign-policy, accessed 7-10-13, HG] The reasons why the American public over a long span of time, 100, 150, 200 years has been mostly disinterested or at least only casually interested in what is going on in the rest of the world is that we were developing a whole continent here. We had our own major mission, which was manifest destiny to the other coast. We had two huge oceans on either side of us and up to our north we had a very benign neighbor and to our south while there are immigration problems and so on from a national security point of view that has been very benign, so there were far fewer reasons why we would be engaged than if you lived in a smaller country in Europe where they were always in conflict over one thing or another for hundreds and hundreds of years. 9/11 did indeed change this because it is the first time since the War of 1812 that the United States actually had foreign hostile activity within its own borders and what 9/11 did among many other things is to suddenly make the American public aware that in the modern world of globalization both of security weaponry as well as economics and culture was no longer sort of invulnerable to the plights and the conflicts and the tensions and the angers elsewhere in the world, that those oceans, those two benign north and south borders were only now a smaller part of the story, so that did indeed create a greater interest, but primarily the American public’s interests in foreign affairs waxes and wanes dependent on how much they think a crisis is about to affect us at home. During the Cold War years, the 50 years or so of the Cold War the atomic… the bulletin of the atomic science used to have a clock and they would show the secondhand getting or the firsthand getting closer and closer to midnight whenever the Soviet Union United States got into a first class clash, the biggest one being of course over Cuba. Every time that happened the interest in international affairs zoomed to the top. As soon as things calmed down again it disappeared again and they worried about local problems and so on. The same thing to a certain extent has happened since 9/11. There is not the same level of acute interest now that there was then, but globalization has also meant there are other reasons to be interested in what is going on in the world besides the security question. There is the prosperity of the country, which now is dependent on a highly internationalized economic system, so I think we’re better off than we were and when polls are taken for key things like do you think the UN is a necessary institution and set of processes, the answer invariably is yes. It’s a reluctant answer. They wish it wasn’t so. They’re not enthusiastic and they know all the problems of the UN, but they don’t take an isolationist position that we would be better off without it. Some politicians from usually the extremes of one party or another still try to sell the idea that a fortress America would work, just have a strong military, a strong economy, stay out of everybody else’s business and we’ll be okay. That is not an opinion that anymore captures a large public. They don’t believe it is realistic. They don’t believe that you can have a prosperous America, a safe America just by staying within some sort of continental fortress so to speak.

Americans are not concerned with international affairs Sledge, Huffington Post, 12 [Matt, 9-17-12, Huffington Post, “Mitt Romney On Foreign Policy: Americans Don't Care About China, Russia, Iran,” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/17/mitt-romney-foreign-policy_n_1891481.html, accessed 7-10-13, MSG] But in a closed-door fundraiser with donors that occurred at least three weeks ago, Romney apparently conceded that Americans "are not concentrated at all" on international hot spots like China, Russia, and Iran.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 258 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Based on public opinion polls, Romney may have been spot-on in his private moment of candor: Voters say they are far less concerned about international affairs than bread-and-butter economic issues. That has held true even after the American ambassador to Libya was killed in a violent attack last week.

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Foreign Policy – No Perception Public doesn’t perceive foreign policy—overly complex system with no perceived impact on individuals’ lives Davidson, West Chester University history professor, 9 (Lawrence, 1/9/2009, Foreign Policy, Inc.: Privatizing America's National Interest, p. 23-24, Google Books, Accessed 7/10/13, JC) The problem of public ignorance of and disinterest in the world abroad is compounded by the average citizen’s general political apathy. Just as many people are not interested in foreign affairs, many are not, beyond their regional sphere, seriously interested in domestic political affairs either. The further away people go from their home base, the more they feel an ultimate indifference toward political events. This observation is most relevant when times are settled and no collective problems transcending the local are evident. On the other hand, it is certainly true that some people like to discuss politics on a broader level, but such conversations usually end with the shaking of the head or the shrugging of the shoulders. There is a pervasive feeling that one can do about as much about nonlocal politics as one can do about the weather. Thus, the citizens of New Hampshire will show very little interest in a California gubernatorial election (unless one of the candidates is a famous movie star). And, when it comes to national elections, there is an undeniable problem of a pervasive political apathy and alienation reducing the number of citizens who bother to vote. As a consequence, the United States ranks 139th out of 172 democratic countries in voter turnout.1 This posture of nonparticipation in politics—what Michael Caprini and Scott Keeter call "thin democracy's—only further confirms citizens in their localism. This ubiquitous public orientation means that one must be careful not to exaggerate the meaning of polls purporting to tell us what people think about politics or¶ foreign policy, even when those polls are conducted with statistical sophistication. There is a difference between answering questions relatively honestly over the phone and believing that the subject matter is important enough to affect one's daily life. Once more, feelings of political indifference and alienation are not unusual in a country with a large and complex political system with little or no room for votes of no confidence, third parties, and doable recall efforts. To influence and take advantage of the structures of power, one must be motivated to master the bureaucratic maze and myriad rules of the system. And few are so motivated. As a result, the United States is not primarily a democracy of individuals.

No perception of US foreign policy means the government can do whatever they want Raimondo, Antiwar.com editorial director, 13 [Justin, 1/28/13, Anti-War, “America’s Foreign Policy: Why Should You Care?”, http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2013/01/27/americas-foreign-policy-why-should-you-care/, accessed: 7/10/13, ML] Every once in a while it’s worth it to recall just why we’re doing this: that is, why we here at Antiwar.com spend our days reporting on events in obscure countries no normal person has ever heard of, tracking the pronouncements of politicians and foreign policy wonks, and exposing the War Party’s latest schemes. It is, frankly, a thankless and exhausting task, and the problem is that one often loses sight of the forest for the trees. Our days are spent asking and trying to answer questions such as: How long will the French linger in Mali? Will Chuck Hagel be confirmed? Is the CIA secretly supporting rebels in Syria? Will the

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 260 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Magnitsky Act lead to a new cold war with Russia? What often gets lost is the answer to the question: Why should we care? Americans, being a naturally "isolationist" lot, tend to ignore events overseas unless there is some immediate and tangible impact on their everyday lives – and not even wars in which we are involved necessarily qualify. It took years of occupying Iraq before the American people noticed we had been lied into that costly war, and over a decade before anybody began asking what we thought we were doing in Afghanistan. This means that our political class, left to their own devices, has pretty much of a free rein when it comes to meddling in the affairs of other countries – not because Americans approve of such activities, but because they generally are unaware it’s even happening. Once they do become aware it’s usually too late to do much about it, because the very fact that’s it’s come up on their radar means it’s already backfired.

People don’t perceive foreign policy Drezner, Tufts international politics professor, 12 [Daniel, 9/20/13, NYT, “Why Presidents Love Foreign Affairs”, http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/why-presidents-love-foreign-affairs/, accessed: 7/10/13, ML] I was being generous with the “5 percent” appellation. Poll after poll shows that when Americans are asked what they consider the most important issue in presidential campaigns, an overwhelming majority choose the economy. Answers related to foreign policy or national security typically yield between 3 and 5 percent. Many pollsters don’t even bother asking about international issues because it seems manifestly obvious that they’re not terribly important. When pollsters prod Americans about their foreign policy views, the results are clear: they want the government to focus less on the rest of the world. Politicians are not blind to these numbers. Short of a war or other violent attacks on American installations, foreign policy rarely takes center stage during presidential elections. Presidential candidates almost always campaign on how they intend to jump-start the economy. It must be maddening to voters, then, that about a year or two after they are elected, presidents seem to devote an ever increasing amount of time to the rest of the world. The Balkans appeared to consume the Clinton administration. George W. Bush launched two wars during his tenure. Barack Obama has devoted a considerable amount of his time to revamping counterterrorism policies, rebalancing attention to the Pacific Rim, prosecuting a war in Libya — and killing Osama bin Laden. As the September 11th attacks demonstrate, most of the time presidents don’t pick the foreign policy issues they want to tackle – the issues choose them.Reuters As the September 11th attacks demonstrate, most of the time presidents don’t pick the foreign policy issues they want to tackle – the issues choose them. Why do presidents campaign as economic wizards but govern as foreign policy leaders? The first thing to realize is that presidents are not doing this on purpose. Their focus on foreign policy actually reveals the constraints on the modern American presidency. On most big economic matters, presidents cannot act alone. Congress has to approve things like budgets and taxes, and in case you haven’t noticed, Congress has become increasingly sclerotic. During the 1950s, for example, Congress passed an average of 800 laws per session; in the post-cold-war era, that figure has declined to fewer than 400. Based on the 112th Congress, that figure will continue to decline in the future. The party not in the White House has been increasingly obstructionist — and if you doubt this, look up the filibuster statistics. Any president trying to accomplish something with Congressional approval either needs a majority of the House and 60 votes in the Senate, or needs to compromise with an opposition

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 261 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core party ever further away on the ideological spectrum. Short of a landslide, presidents have a brief honeymoon period in which to push major domestic policy initiatives through Congress. If presidents seem to be ever more constrained in their domestic policy making, in foreign affairs the executive branch has far more leeway. Sure, Congress has to approve treaties and budgets, but they are reluctant to challenge the executive branch on most national security matters. The Bush administration was able to implement the Iraq surge despite skeptical majorities in both houses of Congress. The Obama administration authorized the use of force in Libya without even notifying Congress. Neither policy was terribly popular with the American people, yet both presidents were able to do what they wanted. Indeed, invoking national security seems to eliminate a disturbing number of institutional impediments for the executive branch. The National Security Agency can admit that it violated the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of illegal search and seizure without much in the way of political or legal blowback. Of course, all of this presumes that presidents can control the international environment. This is an utter fantasy. As the 9/11 attacks made clear, small groups of actors can be responsible for large conflagrations. The pretext for the recent attacks on American embassies and consulates across the Middle East was a cartoonish YouTube video. If that is the bar for inciting action against American interests, then any intelligence agency would drown in possible provocations. Most of the time presidents don’t pick the foreign policy issues they want to tackle — the issues choose them. America remains the world’s pre-eminent power. This means that whenever something happens somewhere in the world, the expectation is that the United States will be part of the policy solution. When presidents are reluctant to intervene, they are attacked by domestic and foreign adversaries as being weak, passive or “leading from behind.” It’s precisely because presidents have so much more leeway to do what they want in the global realm that I now vote based on foreign policy. Mistakes in international affairs can lead to incalculable losses in blood and treasure. Paradoxically, if Americans suddenly started to vote based on national security issues, presidents would have to start to care about the domestic political consequences of their overseas actions.

Studies suggest the public doesn’t perceive foreign policy, Morss, global finance expert, 5-26-13 [Elliott R. Morss, For several years, he worked in the Fiscal Affairs Department of the International Monetary Fund. He later helped establish Development Alternatives, Inc. (dai.com), a firm that became the largest contractor to the U.S. foreign assistance program (AID). Since his first IMF assignment in Ghana in 1966, he has worked in 45 countries. He has been the President of the Asia-Pacific Group, a British Virgin Islands for profit company with investments in Cambodia, China, and Myanmar. With Dr. Zhu Jia-Ming, he established Green China, an American NGO with the mission to increase the dialogue in China on the trade-offs between economic growth and environmental preservation, 5-25-13, “Are Americans Apathetic and Ignorant? What Surveys Tell Us”, http://www.morssglobalfinance.com/areamericans-apathetic-and-ignorant-what-surveys-tell-us/, accessed, 7-10-13 AMS] Introduction For more than a year, I have been documenting that special interests groups rather than the will of the people determine what the US does domestically and internationally. It does not matter whether it is health policy, bank reform, global warming/energy policy, or where/when the US launches the next war: special interests end up deciding what is done. But there is another important issue: Elected officials are supposed to represent the “will of the people; Question: Do Americans’ have a “will” or are they ignorant/apathetic about government actions? Sadly, there is much evidence supporting the ignorance/apathy hypothesis. The evidence is presented below. US Foreign Policy

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 262 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Gabriel Almond[1] and others have documented that most Americans have little idea of what is happening in the rest of the world or US foreign policy and. A study was made of how US citizens’ knowledge of what is happening in other countries compares with other nations[2]. The conclusion: Germans are most informed followed by Britain, Canada, and France. Americans had the least knowledge. To work effectively, democracies require an informed public. A recent poll found that large US minorities continue to believe that Iraq was providing support to al Qaeda and that Iraq had a weapons of mass destruction (WMD) program or actual WMDs. Before the war, 26% of Americans believed Iraq either had actual WMDs or had a major program to produce them (21%). After the US went in, 16% of Americans said they were found in Iraq. 46% thought Iraq gave al Qaeda substantial support (31%) or thought it was directly involved in 9/11 (15%). When it comes to US foreign policy, the evidence is clear: Americans know very little. That means they will go along with what special interest groups tell political leaders to do.

The publics knowledge of foreign policy is structurally declining, and is easily subject to misinformation Forbis, 5-9-13 [Meaghan Forbis, 5-9-13, St. Andrews Foreign Affairs Review, “How Much Don’t You Know? The Epidemic of American Ignorance”, http://foreignaffairsreview.co.uk/2013/05/american-ignoranc/, accessed, 7-10-13 AMS] The Boston Marathon Bombings, on the 15th of April, sparked a vicious manhunt that ended in the capture of one young Chechen and the killing of his brother. Across the Internet, people speculated wildly about the identity of the bombers, casting wild accusations against various minority groups and falsely identifying several suspects from photos of the scene. One young man, 22- year- old Sunil Tripathi, was found dead the week after web vigilantes singled him out as the bomber. But even once the identity of the genuine perpetrators was released, many Americans were still mired in misinformation. Matt Binder, on his blog, Public Shaming: Tweets of Privilege, compiled a collection of screenshots from Twitter and Facebook, where Americans both young and old demanded retribution against the Czechoslovakians for the Boston Bombings. However, as any rational, intelligent person will tell you, the bombers were not from Czechoslovakia. Nor, in fact, were they from the Czech Republic. A Chechen is someone from Chechnya, a region in southwest Russia. While this delightful little mix-up may seem like the mere blundering of some Wi-Fi-enabled buffoons, the confusion was actually serious enough to warrant a statement from Petr Gandalovic, the Czech Ambassador to the United States. When American public ignorance reaches the point where a foreign ambassador feels the need to intervene, something’s got to give. The Pew Research Center, in the latest update of its semi-annual News IQ study, discovered that only 7% of the people surveyed could correctly answer all 13 questions posed. The questions, on various topics, covered both domestic and foreign affairs. Only half of the subjects, Americans ranging from age 18 on, with varying degrees of education, could identify Syria on a map of the Middle East. A full 43% could not pick the flag of the People’s Republic of China out of a lineup. A third didn’t recognize the euro symbol. Only two-thirds of the people asked could identify the current Secretary of State, John Kerry. In a world where the United States remains unequivocally the reigning world power, how can her citizens remain so blatantly ignorant? According to an earlier, more comprehensive study by the Pew Research Center, American news literacy has maintained a constant decline since 1989. With the advent of the 24- hour news cycle and the onset of mass social media, you would expect Americans to be more informed about their world. Unfortunately, you can’t give a bear a fishing rod and expect him to use it to catch a fish.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 263 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Even when people do make the effort to inform themselves, they often neglect to think critically about the information they’re being deluged with. Misinformation is a constant problem within both social media and professional news making. Fact-checking is often shunted aside to make room for more exciting spins. The two Chechen bombers, who were literally from the Caucasus, were identified over and over as non-Caucasian, due in part to them being Muslim. Americans would rather see two brownskinned boys as villains than two white ones. Even though the FBI stated in their official press release that their suspects were white, the media and the public determinedly pictured the brothers as otherwise. Perhaps because Americans are so comfortable characterizing terrorists as dark-skinned, turban-wearing men from the Middle East, that thinking of the bombers as identical to themselves was just a step too far. It’s difficult to change your mental image of something, difficult to realign your worldview. In his 2008 article for the Washington Post, Shankar Vendantam said, “misinformation can exercise a ghostly influence on people’s minds after it has been debunked— even among people who recognize it as misinformation.” Because Americans find it easier to accept the information given them than to look critically at their own world, it is difficult for truth to invade the national consciousness. So what, though? Americans are stupid, everyone knows that. It’s a stereotype not many have actively tried to debunk. But here’s the rub: the American people who can’t think for themselves, who are reticent to immerse themselves in current affairs, who can’t tell Chechnya from Czechoslovakia, that’s the same American people who, every four years, elect the leader of the free world. That’s the same American people who peacefully overthrow their own government on a regular basis. It’s the same American people who control both the world’s largest economy and the world’s most powerful military. Do you want the most powerful country in the world to be run by mass ignorance?

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Venezuela

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Link Non-Unique Obama has already engaged with Venezuela with no fight Sullivan, Congressional Research Service Specialist in Latin American Affairs, 13 [Mark P., January 10th 2013, Congressional Research Service, “Venezuela: Issues for Congress,” http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R40938.pdf, p. iv, Accessed 7/6/13, CB] The United States traditionally has had close relations with Venezuela, a major supplier of foreign ¶ oil, but there has been friction in relations under the Chávez government. Over the years, U.S. ¶ officials have expressed concerns about human rights, Venezuela’s military arms purchases, its ¶ relations with Iran, and its efforts to export its brand of populism to other Latin American ¶ countries. Declining cooperation on anti-drug and anti-terrorism efforts has been a major concern. ¶ The United States has imposed sanctions: on several Venezuelan government and military ¶ officials for allegedly helping the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) with drug ¶ and weapons trafficking; on three Venezuelan companies for providing support to Iran; and on ¶ several Venezuelan individuals for providing support to Hezbollah. Despite tensions in relations, ¶ the Obama Administration remains committed to seeking constructive engagement with ¶ Venezuela , focusing on such areas as anti-drug and counter-terrorism efforts. In the aftermath of ¶ President Chávez’s reelection, the White House, while acknowledging differences with President ¶ Chávez, congratulated the Venezuelan people on the high level of participation and the relatively ¶ peaceful election process

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Spin

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Mandate Wins Presidential mandate rhetoric has the power to decide Congressional action – empirically true through American presidential history Villalabos et al., University of Texas at El Paso Political Science Assistant Professor, 12 [José D., Justin S. Vaughn, Boise State University Assistant Professor of Political Science, Julia R. Arazi, Marquette University Assistant Professor of Political Science, September 2012, “Politics or Policy? How Rhetoric Matters to Presidential Leadership of Congress,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 42, no. 3, Center for the Study of the Presidency, p. 553-4, Proquest, accessed 7-8-13, UR] The first category of appeals, mandate rhetoric, concerns the president’s rhetorical embrace of electoral logic. This type of message is in some ways the inverse of the going public model put forward by Kernell (1986). That is, rather than going to the public to sell a message in order to coerce reluctant members of Congress into voting for the president’s preferred policy initiative, this type of appeal grounds the president’s pref- erence in the logic of a presumptive mandate. Presidential capacity to invoke an issue- based mandate in the context of a policy debate has historical origins in the rhetoric of Andrew Jackson, who suggested that the 1832 election had conferred a mandate for the elimination of the Second Bank of the United States (Ellis and Kirk 1995). Scholars also refer to the idea of a presidential mandate, conferred through the president’s election victory as well as the success of the president’s party, as a component of constitutional changes (e.g., Landy and Milkis 2000). The relationship between issue-based mandates and presidential policy success informs several modern-era case studies as well. Ackerman (1998, 267) attributes Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s (FDR’s) ability to effect a “constitu- tional moment” to the “triggering election” of 1936 and suggests a parallel with the Civil War era. Historical accounts of Lyndon Johnson’s ambitious (and largely successful) policy proposals after the 1964 election emphasize the role of mandates in producing legislative victories (Conkin 1986; Goodwin 1976). Finally, Ronald Reagan’s policy success has been linked to the construction of a mandate for conservative policies (Grossback, Peterson, and Stimson 2006; Jones 2005). In recent years, political scientists have brought increasingly sophisticated analyti- cal techniques to the study of how and why mandates impact the political system. For example, Conley (2001) argues that presidential mandate claims, when made by presi- dents with a genuine claim to an issue-based electoral mandate, have the potential to be effective in winning interbranch conflicts over policy. Conley highlights the success of these claims for several modern presidents, including Dwight Eisenhower, Lyndon Johnson, and Ronald Reagan. Using formal models as well as case studies, Conley’s rational choice contribution suggests that mandate claims serve as a useful communica- tion strategy under two conditions: when the president has won a majority of votes and when a policy issue was the driving factor behind the election results. However, other scholars define the mandate and its credibility differently. Grossback, Peterson, and Stimson (2005, 2006), for instance, find that Congress responds more readily to signals in the electorate about a mandate than to presidential claims. Elsewhere, upon examining presidential mandate claims from 1929 through 2005, Azari (2007) finds that mandate claims are frequently, though not exclusively, used in association with presidential proposals that do not succeed, such as FDR’s court-packing plan, Bill Clinton’s health care reform proposal, and George W. Bush’s Social Security reform proposal.5 Clearly, the empirical evidence concerning mandate politics is mixed, allowing only the most tenta- tive and cautious conclusions that presidential mandate rhetoric matters to congressional policy action. For our purposes, we follow the general logic that when presidents incorporate public preferences into their arguments for their policy proposals, it should

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 268 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core increase the likelihood of congressional support for such policies. Accordingly, we hypothesize the following: H1: As presidential references to a mandate increase, Presidential success in Congress will increase.

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Expertise Wins Engagement with in-field experts over policymaking reduces skepticism among legislators and magnifies the power of political capital Villalabos et al., University of Texas at El Paso Political Science Professor, 12 [José D., Justin S. Vaughn, Boise State University Assistant Professor of Political Science, Julia R. Arazi, Marquette University Assistant Professor of Political Science, September 2012, “Politics or Policy? How Rhetoric Matters to Presidential Leadership of Congress,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 42, no. 3, Center for the Study of the Presidency, p. 556-7, Proquest, accessed 7-8-13, UR] Finally, the fourth category of presidential policy proposal messages concerns not neces- sarily the way the president sells an initiative, but rather the substantive quality of the legislative proposal being put forward. Presidents can earn greater policy credibility when they seek an enhanced level of involvement by policy experts, particularly those involved in the administration and implementation of existing law. By putting forward policy initiatives developed using the input of experts, such as key agency officials, presidents are also communicating to members of Congress about both the quality of the proposal and the degree to which the president has delegated the policy-crafting task not to his political subordinates, but rather to bureaucratic experts who are more neutral and policy competent. In accordance with the recent work by Villalobos (2008, forthcoming), we posit that agency input provides presidential policy development with expertise and objectiv- ity, process transparency, cooperative consultation with Congress, and agency support, which should markedly increase presidential policy-making success in Congress. The involvement of agency actors in the policy development phase provides presidents with a degree of bureaucratic expertise9 that is more objective than the advice of the president’s inner circle and that legislators—particularly partisan opponents of the president—are therefore relatively less likely to oppose (Villalobos 2008, forthcoming).10 Agency actors are generally more objective than White House staffers because they are less likely to view policy options primarily through an ideological lens and instead base much of their preferences on bureaucratic expertise accumulated from years of policy learning and institutional memory, which provides them with an authoritative knowledge of govern- ment procedures and folkways (Weko 1995; Wolf 1999). Agency involvement at the policy development stage also allows members of Congress to more openly observe and take part in the policy-making process, which helps legitimize policy initiatives in the eyes of legislators prior to their proposal. According to Rudalevige (2002, 150), “Members of Congress know less about an item being crafted in the White House than they do about a departmental production, and have less reason to believe that the information they do receive from EOP [Executive Office of the President] sources is reliable.” Given that congressional committees often hold hearings to ascertain whether a policy initiative represents a valid policy solution, presidential policy proposals with agency support are therefore less likely to generate skepticism among legislators. Consequently, by attaining the input of agency actors, the president thus signals to members of Congress that a given policy proposal has endured the scrutiny as well as earned the support of the very people responsible for its eventual implementation.

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Internal Link Answers

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Winners Win

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Winners Win & No Internal Link Political capital arguments are flawed – other variables – winners win more likely Hirsh, National Journal chief correspondent, 13 [Michael, 2-9-13, National Journal, "There’s No Such Thing as Political Capital," www.nationaljournal.com/magazine/there-s-no-such-thing-as-political-capital-20130207, accessed 7-913] On Tuesday, in his State of the Union address, President Obama will do what every president does this time of year. For about 60 minutes, he will lay out a sprawling and ambitious wish list highlighted by gun control and immigration reform, climate change and debt reduction. In response, the pundits will do what they always do this time of year: They will talk about how unrealistic most of the proposals are, discussions often informed by sagacious reckonings of how much “political capital” Obama possesses to push his program through. Most of this talk will have no bearing on what actually happens over the next four years. Consider this: Three months ago, just before the November election, if someone had talked seriously about Obama having enough political capital to oversee passage of both immigration reform and gun-control legislation at the beginning of his second term—even after winning the election by 4 percentage points and 5 million votes (the actual final tally)—this person would have been called crazy and stripped of his pundit’s license. (It doesn’t exist, but it ought to.) In his first term, in a starkly polarized country, the president had been so frustrated by GOP resistance that he finally issued a limited executive order last August permitting immigrants who entered the country illegally as children to work without fear of deportation for at least two years. Obama didn’t dare to even bring up gun control, a Democratic “third rail” that has cost the party elections and that actually might have been even less popular on the right than the president’s health care law. And yet, for reasons that have very little to do with Obama’s personal prestige or popularity—variously put in terms of a “mandate” or “political capital”—chances are fair that both will now happen. What changed? In the case of gun control, of course, it wasn’t the election. It was the horror of the 20 first-graders who were slaughtered in Newtown, Conn., in mid-December. The sickening reality of little girls and boys riddled with bullets from a high-capacity assault weapon seemed to precipitate a sudden tipping point in the national conscience. One thing changed after another. Wayne LaPierre of the National Rifle Association marginalized himself with poorly chosen comments soon after the massacre. The progun lobby, once a phalanx of opposition, began to fissure into reasonables and crazies. Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., who was shot in the head two years ago and is still struggling to speak and walk, started a PAC with her husband to appeal to the moderate middle of gun owners. Then she gave riveting and poignant testimony to the Senate, challenging lawmakers: “Be bold.” As a result, momentum has appeared to build around some kind of a plan to curtail sales of the most dangerous weapons and ammunition and the way people are permitted to buy them. It’s impossible to say now whether such a bill will pass and, if it does, whether it will make anything more than cosmetic changes to gun laws. But one thing is clear: The political tectonics have shifted dramatically in very little time. Whole new possibilities exist now that didn’t a few weeks ago. Meanwhile, the Republican members of the Senate’s so-called Gang of Eight are pushing hard for a new spirit of compromise on immigration reform, a sharp change after an election year in which the GOP standard-bearer declared he would make life so miserable for the 11 million illegal immigrants in the U.S. that they would “self-deport.” But this turnaround has very little to do with Obama’s personal influence—his political mandate, as it were. It has almost entirely to do with just two numbers: 71 and 27. That’s 71 percent for Obama, 27 percent for Mitt Romney, the breakdown of the Hispanic vote in the 2012 presidential election. Obama drove home his advantage by giving a speech

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 273 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core on immigration reform on Jan. 29 at a Hispanic-dominated high school in Nevada, a swing state he won by a surprising 8 percentage points in November. But the movement on immigration has mainly come out of the Republican Party’s recent introspection, and the realization by its more thoughtful members, such as Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, that without such a shift the party may be facing demographic death in a country where the 2010 census showed, for the first time, that white births have fallen into the minority. It’s got nothing to do with Obama’s political capital or, indeed, Obama at all. The point is not that “political capital” is a meaningless term. Often it is a synonym for “mandate” or “momentum” in the aftermath of a decisive election—and just about every politician ever elected has tried to claim more of a mandate than he actually has. Certainly, Obama can say that because he was elected and Romney wasn’t, he has a better claim on the country’s mood and direction. Many pundits still defend political capital as a useful metaphor at least. “It’s an unquantifiable but meaningful concept,” says Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute. “You can’t really look at a president and say he’s got 37 ounces of political capital. But the fact is, it’s a concept that matters, if you have popularity and some momentum on your side.” The real problem is that the idea of political capital—or mandates, or momentum—is so poorly defined that presidents and pundits often get it wrong. “Presidents usually over-estimate it,” says George Edwards, a presidential scholar at Texas A&M University. “The best kind of political capital— some sense of an electoral mandate to do something—is very rare. It almost never happens. In 1964, maybe. And to some degree in 1980.” For that reason, political capital is a concept that misleads far more than it enlightens. It is distortionary. It conveys the idea that we know more than we really do about the ever-elusive concept of political power, and it discounts the way unforeseen events can suddenly change everything . Instead, it suggests, erroneously, that a political figure has a concrete amount of political capital to invest, just as someone might have real investment capital—that a particular leader can bank his gains, and the size of his account determines what he can do at any given moment in history. Naturally, any president has practical and electoral limits. Does he have a majority in both chambers of Congress and a cohesive coalition behind him? Obama has neither at present. And unless a surge in the economy—at the moment, still stuck—or some other great victory gives him more momentum, it is inevitable that the closer Obama gets to the 2014 election, the less he will be able to get done. Going into the midterms, Republicans will increasingly avoid any concessions that make him (and the Democrats) stronger. But the abrupt emergence of the immigration and gun-control issues illustrates how suddenly shifts in mood can occur and how political interests can align in new ways just as suddenly. Indeed, the pseudoconcept of political capital masks a larger truth about Washington that is kindergarten simple: You just don’t know what you can do until you try. Or as Ornstein himself once wrote years ago, “Winning wins.” In theory, and in practice, depending on Obama’s handling of any particular issue, even in a polarized time, he could still deliver on a lot of his second-term goals, depending on his skill and the breaks. Unforeseen catalysts can appear, like Newtown. Epiphanies can dawn, such as when many Republican Party leaders suddenly woke up in panic to the huge disparity in the Hispanic vote. Some political scientists who study the elusive calculus of how to pass legislation and run successful presidencies say that political capital is, at best, an empty concept, and that almost nothing in the academic literature successfully quantifies or even defines it. “It can refer to a very abstract thing, like a president’s popularity, but there’s no mechanism there. That makes it kind of useless,” says Richard Bensel, a government professor at Cornell University. Even Ornstein concedes that the calculus is far more complex than the term suggests. Winning on one issue often changes the calculation for the next issue; there is never any known amount of capital. “The idea here is, if an issue comes up where the conventional wisdom is that president is not going to get what he wants, and [they]he gets it, then each time that happens, it changes the calculus of the other actors” Ornstein

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 274 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core says. “If they think he’s going to win, they may change positions to get on the winning side. It’s a bandwagon effect.”

Issues are compartmentalized Dickinson, Middlebury College professor of political science, 9 (Matthew, former instructor at Harvard University under the supervision of presidential scholar Richard Neustadt, 5/26/09, Presidential Power: A NonPartisan Analysis of Presidential Politics, “Sotomayor, Obama and Presidential Power,” http://blogs.middlebury.edu/presidentialpower/2009/05/26/sotamayorobama-and-presidential-power/, Accessed 7/9/13) As for Sotomayor, from here the path toward almost certain confirmation goes as follows: the Senate Judiciary Committee is slated to hold hearings sometime this summer (this involves both written depositions and of course open hearings), which should lead to formal Senate approval before Congress adjourns for its summer recess in early August. So Sotomayor will likely take her seat in time for the start of the new Court session on October 5. (I talk briefly about the likely politics of the nomination process below). What is of more interest to me, however, is what her selection reveals about the basis of presidential power. Political scientists, like baseball writers evaluating hitters, have devised numerous means of measuring a president’s influence in Congress. I will devote a separate post to discussing these, but in brief, they often center on the creation of legislative “box scores” designed to measure how many times a president’s preferred piece of legislation, or nominee to the executive branch or the courts, is approved by Congress. That is, how many pieces of legislation that the president supports actually pass Congress? How often do members of Congress vote with the president’s preferences? How often is a president’s policy position supported by roll call outcomes? These measures, however, are a misleading gauge of presidential power – they are a better indicator of congressional power. This is because how members of Congress vote on a nominee or legislative item is rarely influenced by anything a president does. Although journalists (and political scientists) often focus on the legislative “endgame” to gauge presidential influence – will the President swing enough votes to get his preferred legislation enacted? – this mistakes an outcome with actual evidence of presidential influence. Once we control for other factors – a member of Congress’ ideological and partisan leanings, the political leanings of her constituency, whether she’s up for reelection or not – we can usually predict how she will vote without needing to know much of anything about what the president wants. (I am ignoring the importance of a president’s veto power for the moment.) Despite the much publicized and celebrated instances of presidential arm-twisting during the legislative endgame, then, most legislative outcomes don’t depend on presidential lobbying. But this is not to say that presidents lack influence. Instead, the primary means by which presidents influence what Congress does is through their ability to determine the alternatives from which Congress must choose. That is, presidential power is largely an exercise in agenda-setting – not arm-twisting. And we see this in the Sotomayer nomination. Barring a major scandal, she will almost certainly be confirmed to the Supreme Court whether Obama spends the confirmation hearings calling every Senator or instead spends the next few weeks ignoring the Senate debate in order to play Halo III on his Xbox. That is, how senators decide to vote on Sotomayor will have almost nothing to do with Obama’s lobbying from here on in (or lack thereof). His real influence has already occurred, in the decision to present Sotomayor as his nominee. If we want to measure Obama’s “power”, then, we need to know what his real preference was and why he chose Sotomayor. My guess – and it is only a guess – is that after conferring with leading Democrats and Republicans, he recognized the overriding practical political advantages accruing from choosing an Hispanic woman, with left-leaning credentials. We cannot know if this would have been his ideal choice based on judicial philosophy alone, but presidents are never free to act on their ideal preferences. Politics is the art of the possible. Whether Sotomayer is his first choice or not, however, her nomination is a reminder that the power of the presidency often resides in the president’s ability to dictate the alternatives from which Congress (or in this case the Senate) must choose. Although Republicans will undoubtedly

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 275 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core attack Sotomayor for her judicial “activism” (citing in particular her decisions regarding promotion and affirmative action), her comments regarding the importance of gender and ethnicity in influencing her decisions, and her views regarding whether appellate courts “make” policy, they run the risk of alienating Hispanic voters – an increasingly influential voting bloc (to the extent that one can view Hispanics as a voting bloc!) I find it very hard to believe she will not be easily confirmed. In structuring the alternative before the Senate in this manner, then, Obama reveals an important aspect of presidential power that cannot be measured through legislative boxscores.

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Winners Win Victories increase capital Lee, Claremont McKenna College 5 (Andrew, “Invest or Spend? Political Capital and Statements of Administration Policy in the First Term of the George W. Bush Presidency,” Georgia Political Science Association Conference Proceedings, http://a-s.clayton.edu/trachtenberg/2005%20Proceedings%20Lee.pdf, accessed 7-9-12 FFF) To accrue political capital, the president may support a particular lawmaker’s legislation by issuing an SAP urging support, thereby giving that legislator more pull in the Congress and at home. The president may also receive capital from Congress by winning larger legislative majorities. For example, the president’s successful efforts at increasing Republican representation in the Senate and House would constitute an increase in political capital. The president may also receive political capital from increased job favorability numbers, following through with purported policy agendas, and defeating opposing party leaders (Lindberg 2004). Because political capital diminishes, a president can invest in policy and legislative victories to maintain or increase it. For example, President George W. Bush invests his political capital in tax cuts which he hopes will yield returns to the economy and his favorability numbers. By investing political capital, the president assumes a return on investment.

Victory begets more victories – politicians won’t cross a winner Ornstein, American Enterprise Institute fellow and political analyst, 1 (Norman J., Roll Call, 9-10-1, “High Stakes and an Overloaded Agenda”, Lexis) Those victories came at a crucial time, psychologically, for the White House. Imagine if the Democrats' preferred patients' rights legislation had passed by a wide margin in the House (as it has in the past) and if the President had been rebuffed on drilling in ANWR. He would have spent the month of August as the target of news stories declaring him weak and on the defensive, and arrived back in Washington in September with no momentum and limited leverage in the legislative battles of the fall. Instead, by showing that he can win even when he's expected to lose, and even on highstakes issues, Bush left lawmakers with reason to pause before writing him off when key votes loom.

Winners win – plan is a win for Obama because he overcomes opposition Ornstein, American Enterprise Institute fellow and political analyst, 1993 (Norman J., Roll Call, “Clinton Can Still Emerge a Winner; Here's What to Do”, May 27, p. Online) 2. Winning comes to those who look like winners. This only sounds redundant or cliche-ish. If power is the ability to make people do something they otherwise would not do, real power is having people do things they otherwise wouldn't do without anybody making them - when they act in anticipation of what they think somebody would want them to do. If a president develops a reputation as a winner, somebody who will pull out victories in Congress even when he is behind, somebody who can say, "Do this!" and have it done, then Members of Congress will behave accordingly. They will want to cut their deals with the president early, getting on the winning team when it looks the best and means the most. They will avoid cutting deals with the opposition.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 277 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Stories that show weakness, indecisiveness, or incompetence in the White House - and there are always lots of them - will go unreported or will be played down because they will be seen as the exception that proves the rule of strength and competence.

Winners win – empirically proven, and compromises don’t work Gergen, CNN senior political analyst, 1/19/13 (David, CNN, “Obama 2.0: Smarter – but wiser?”http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/18/opinion/gergenobama-two/index.html, Accessed 7/9/13) On the eve of his second inaugural, President Obama appears smarter, tougher and bolder than ever before. But whether he is also wiser remains a key question for his new term.¶ It is clear that he is consciously changing his leadership style heading into the next four years. Weeks before the November elections, his top advisers were signaling that he intended to be a different kind of president in his second term. "Just watch," they said to me, in effect, "he will win re-election decisively and then he will throw down the gauntlet to the Republicans , insisting they raise taxes on the wealthy. Right on the edge of the fiscal cliff, he thinks Republicans will cave." ¶ What's your Plan B, I asked. "We don't need a Plan B," they answered. "After the president hangs tough -- no more Mr. Nice Guy -the other side will buckle ." Sure enough, Republicans caved on taxes. Encouraged, Obama has since made clear he won't compromise with Republicans on the debt ceiling, either. Obama 2.0 stepped up this past week on yet another issue: gun control. No president in two decades has been as forceful or sweeping in challenging the nation's gun culture. Once again, he portrayed the right as the enemy of progress and showed no interest in negotiating a package up front. In his coming State of the Union address, and perhaps in his inaugural, the president will begin a hard push for a comprehensive reform of our tattered immigration system. Leading GOP leaders on the issue -- Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, for example -- would prefer a piecemeal approach that is bipartisan. Obama wants to go for broke in a single package, and on a central issue -- providing a clear path to citizenship for undocumented residents -- he is uncompromising.¶ After losing out on getting Susan Rice as his next secretary of state, Obama has also shown a tougher side on personnel appointments. Rice went down after Democratic as well as Republican senators indicated a preference for Sen. John Kerry. But when Republicans also tried to kill the nomination of Chuck Hagel for secretary of defense, Obama was unyielding -- an "in-your-face appointment," Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-South Carolina, called it, echoing sentiments held by some of his colleagues. Republicans would have preferred someone other than Jack Lew at Treasury, but Obama brushed them off. Hagel and Lew -- both substantial men -- will be confirmed, absent an unexpected bombshell, and Obama will rack up two more victories over Republicans. Strikingly, Obama has also been deft in the ways he has drawn upon Vice President Joe Biden. During much of the campaign, Biden appeared to be kept under wraps. But in the transition, he has been invaluable to Obama in negotiating a deal with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on the fiscal cliff and in pulling together the gun package. Biden was also at his most eloquent at the ceremony announcing the gun measures. ¶ All of this has added up for Obama to one of the most effective transitions in modern times. And it is paying rich dividends: A CNN poll this past week pegged his approval rating at 55%, far above the doldrums he was in for much of the past two years. Many of his long-time supporters are rallying behind him . As the first Democrat since Franklin D. Roosevelt to score back-to-back election victories with more than 50% of the vote, Obama is in the strongest position since early in his first year.¶ Smarter, tougher, bolder -- his new style is paying off politically . But in the long run, will it also pay off in better governance? Perhaps -- and for the country's sake, let's hope so. Yet, there are ample reasons to wonder, and worry. Ultimately, to resolve major issues like deficits, immigration, guns and energy , the president and Congress need to find ways to work together much better than they did in the first term. Over the past two

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 278 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core years, Republicans were clearly more recalcitrant than Democrats, practically declaring war on Obama, and the White House has been right to adopt a tougher approach after the elections. But a growing number of Republicans concluded after they had their heads handed to them in November that they had to move away from extremism toward a more center-right position, more open to working out compromises with Obama. It's not that they suddenly wanted Obama to succeed; they didn't want their party to fail. ¶ House Speaker John Boehner led the way, offering the day after the election to raise taxes on the wealthy and giving up two decades of GOP orthodoxy. In a similar spirit, Rubio has been developing a mainstream plan on immigration, moving away from a ruinous GOP stance.¶ One senses that the hope, small as it was, to take a brief timeout on hyperpartisanship in order to tackle the big issues is now slipping away. While a majority of Americans now approve of Obama's job performance, conservatives increasingly believe that in his new toughness, he is going overboard, trying to run over them . They don't see a president who wants to roll up his sleeves and negotiate; they see a president who wants to barnstorm the country to beat them up. News that Obama is converting his campaign apparatus into a nonprofit to support his second term will only deepen that sense. And it frustrates them that he is winning : At their retreat, House Republicans learned that their disapproval has risen to 64%.¶ Conceivably, Obama's tactics could pressure Republicans into capitulation on several fronts. More likely, they will be spoiling for more fights. Chances for a "grand bargain" appear to be hanging by a thread.

Winners win – plan is a legislative victory Mead, Council on Foreign Relations senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy, 6-20-11 [Walter Russell, Business Insider, “Here's How Obama Can Save His Presidency,” http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-how-obama-can-save-his-presidency-2011-6, accessed 7-3-11] Americans are realistic enough to understand that the breakdown of the blue social model is a messy process and that perhaps no president can deliver a pain free transition to the next stage. But what they aren’t hearing from President Obama is a compelling description of what has gone wrong, how it can be fixed, and how the policies he proposes will take us to the next level. What they hear from this administration are defensive responses: Hooveresque calls for patience mingled with strange-sounding attacks on ATMs and sharp, opportunistic jabs at former President Bush. The White House has responded to strategic challenges at home and abroad with tactical maneuvers. Voters sense that we live in historic times that demand leadership of a different kind. What does President Obama think about the fiscal squeeze forcing trade-offs between state employee benefits and services to the poor? How much trouble is the American middle class in — and what changes are needed to save it? The President of the United States has to own this conversation. His vision, his initiatives must dominate the political scene. His opponents may fight him and defeat his proposals in Congress — that is not the worst thing that can happen. Harry Truman did very well running against a ‘do-nothing’ Congress in 1948. At a time of historic anxiety and tension like the present, the President of the United States cannot be an administrator, a fence-sitter, a finger-pointer. He must first and foremost stand for something — and he must be able to make that something resonate with the voters. The President’s job is to lead. The longer the President fails to dominate the discussion about where this country is going the more his authority will erode. In the end, a failure to define the problem and outline a convincing solution will hurt more than what now appears his likely failure to regenerate healthy economic growth by the next election. He may have only one chance to get this right. A failed attempt to define the problem and control the discussion would further fuzz the President’s image and reinforce the sense among many voters that the man is not up to the hour. The Obama Presidency can still be saved, but only if the President becomes the kind of inspiring and effective leader these tough and uncertain times demand.

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Winners win – the bully pulpit outweighs Kuttner, American Prospect co-founder, 11 (Robert, co-founder and current co-editor of The American Prospect, co-founder and director of the Economic Policy Institute, and Demos research and policy center Distinguished Senior Fellow; 5/10/11, The American Prospect, “Barack Obama’s Theory of Power,” http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=barack_obamas_theory_of_power, Accessed 7/9/13) Obama’s critics contend that his prolonged fantasy of bipartisanship, his failure to lay the blame for the depressed economy squarely on the Republicans, and his reluctance to use his bully pulpit to tell a coherent story, particularly about jobs, needlessly weakened the Democrats and led to avoidable losses in the 2010 midterm. More fundamentally, under Obama government has lost credibility as a necessary force for economic recovery and fairness, undermining the Democrats’ core appeal to voters. At the very least, Obama failed to drive the agenda or exploit the full possibilities of presidential leadership in a crisis. In the formulation of the political historian James MacGregor Burns, Obama ran and inspired voters as a “transformational” figure but governed as a “transactional” one. Notwithstanding a vow to profoundly change Washington, Obama took the Washington power constellation as a given. Despite an economic emergency, he moved neither Congress nor public opinion very much and only seldom used his oratorical gifts. “He is so damned smart and confident that he thinks he just has to explain things to the American people once,” says former House Appropriations Chair David Obey. “He doesn’t appreciate that you have to reinforce a message 50 times.” Obama’s reticence, his reluctance to lay blame, make sharp partisan distinctions, or practice a politics of class, reflects the interplay of his personality and his tacit theory of power—one that emphasizes building bridges to opponents, defying ideological categories, shying away from the kind of mass mobilization that swept him into office, and practicing a kind of Zen detachment. At moments in American history, that conception of the presidency has suited the times. This doesn’t seem to be one of those moments. Yet in the third year of his presidency, there are signs of a learning curve. It may be that Obama is playing his own elegant brand of rope-a-dope, biding his time, letting the Republicans lead with their chins, waiting for just the right moment to dramatize their extremism and exploit their schisms—then demonstrating a toughness that has largely eluded him until now and reshaping the political center as a more progressive one. The hope of a new, more combative Obama was kindled by portions of his April 13 speech at George Washington University, which showed an Obama that we’ve seldom seen during his presidency. “The man America elected president has re-emerged,” exulted The New York Times’ lead editorial. Obama departed from his usual reluctance to be partisan, explicitly criticizing the self-annihilating Republican designs so usefully spelled out in Rep. Paul Ryan’s proposed 10-year budget. The president resorted to a formulation he seldom uses—the injustices of class: “The top 1 percent saw their income rise by an average of more than a quarter of a million dollars each. That’s who needs to pay less taxes?” Obama said. “They want to give people like me a $200,000 tax cut that’s paid for by asking 33 seniors each to pay $6,000 more in health costs. That’s not right. And it’s not going to happen as long as I’m president.” At last, Obama shifted the mind-numbing debate from the scale of the budget and its deficits to its content and political meaning. He did what his progressive critics have long advocated, drawing a clear, bright, partisan line and pledging to defend Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. But the budgetary details of the speech showed an Obama who was still the transactional leader of the Burns paradigm. Obama devoted most of the speech to his own plans for cutting the deficit. Jobs and recovery were hardly mentioned. Most of the proposed deficit reductions came from cuts to programs rather than from tax increases. And Obama was far too generous with the word, we. As in: But after Democrats and Republicans committed to fiscal discipline during the 1990s, we lost our way in the decade that followed. We increased spending dramatically for two wars and an expensive prescription-drug program—but we didn’t pay for any of this new spending. Instead, we made the problem worse with trillions of dollars in unpaid-for tax cuts. [Emphasis added.] As

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 280 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Tonto said to the Lone Ranger, What do you mean, we? This fiscal deterioration, of course, was the Republicans’ handiwork. Why not point that out? Obama seemed to come to his partisanship reluctantly, almost apologetically. At one point in the speech, having just flayed the Republicans for their sheer extremism, he added, “I’m eager to hear other ideas from all ends of the political spectrum.” He further mixed his own message by declaring, “We will all need to make sacrifices.” Indeed, the main ideological themes of the speech had been undermined by Obama’s earlier compromises. The left pole that Obama defined in the budget debate had already been moved to the right by his yearlong emphasis on deficit reduction; his prior concessions in the December 2010 tax deal, which failed to restore higher tax rates on the rich; and the 2011 budget deal, which cut $38 billion in programs. If the bipartisan Gang of Six, spawn of Obama’s own Bowles-Simpson commission, does reach agreement, it will only add pressure to alter Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid for the worse—thus fatally blurring Obama’s bright line. Was Obama’s speech—the most resolutely political, partisan, progressive, and effective in recent memory—a turning point or a one-off? Is Obama now revising his theory and practice of presidential power? As the political scientist Richard Neustadt observed in his classic work, Presidential Power, a book that had great influence on President John F. Kennedy, the essence of a president’s power is “the power to persuade.” Because our divided constitutional system does not allow the president to lead by commanding, presidents amass power by making strategic choices about when to use the latent authority of the presidency to move public and elite opinion and then use that added prestige as clout to move Congress. In one of Neustadt’s classic case studies, Harry Truman, a president widely considered a lame duck, nonetheless persuaded the broad public and a Republican Congress in 19471948 that the Marshall Plan was a worthy idea. As Neustadt and Burns both observed, though an American chief executive is weak by constitutional design, a president possesses several points of leverage. He can play an effective outside game, motivating and shaping public sentiment, making clear the differences between his values and those of his opposition, and using popular support to box in his opponents and move them in his direction. He can complement the outside bully pulpit with a nimble inside game, uniting his legislative party, bestowing or withholding benefits on opposition legislators, forcing them to take awkward votes, and using the veto. He can also enlist the support of interest groups to pressure Congress, and use media to validate his framing of choices. Done well, all of this signals leadership that often moves the public agenda. The most effective presidents have worked all these levers. Think of Franklin Roosevelt, or Ronald Reagan, or Lyndon B. Johnson during the era of the War on Poverty and the civil-rights crusade. But except in the endgame of the battle for health care and his recent turnabout in defending Medicare, Obama has been relatively disengaged on all of these fronts. He left the details of his signature legislation and attendant bargaining to his staff. Says a senior Democrat who speaks frequently to Obama, “He is just not someone who enjoys what most of presidential politics entails.” Reviewing Obama’s relatively short career, a few core principles emerge in which he deeply believes. These have remained constants. Building Bridges. Obama, famously, is convinced both by his life journey and his prior experience in politics that he can persuade almost any adversary to find areas of common ground. “Much of Obama’s self-confidence,” wrote David Remnick in his biography of Obama, The Bridge, “resided in his belief that he could walk into a room, with any sort of people, and forge a relationship and even persuade those people of the rightness of his position.” From the Harvard Law Review, to the Illinois Senate, to the Iowa precinct caucuses, Obama’s political life before his presidency only strengthened that conviction. Obama has a deep certitude that the voters, especially political independents, are sick of partisan division and want a leader who will rise above it to solve practical problems. In service of that goal, he has bent over backward to praise his opposition rather than attack it, frequently offering concessions in advance. Mostly, he has pursued common ground by giving ground. The experience of his first two years, when Republicans wanted nothing so much as to destroy him, did not shake Obama from these strategic beliefs. “He doesn’t have a fighter’s instinct, but he is in the middle of a hugely consequential fight,” says a veteran Senate Democrat. “They will keep pushing him as long as he keeps backing up.” His drawing of bright lines in the April 13 speech was very much the exception. Defying Categories. This core political instinct interacts with, and is reinforced by, Obama’s personal reticence and determination not to be the angry black man. From his first entry into

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 281 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core electoral politics, he defined himself as a different sort of African American and a different sort of liberal. Even though his voting record as a U.S. senator was one of the most progressive, as president he has almost gone out of his way to distance himself from the liberal base. In an interview with The New York Times’ Peter Baker on the eve of the 2010 elections, Obama expressed regrets for looking too much like “the same old tax-and-spend liberal Democrat.” Courting Elites, Wary of Mass Mobilization. Obama and his campaign staff brilliantly enlisted an army of volunteers who thought of themselves as a movement built on the values of sweeping change and the tactics of community organizing. Obama repeatedly vowed that he would use these engaged citizens to press Congress to enact health reform and other urgent priorities. But once elected, Obama’s political staff quickly downgraded Obama for America into Organizing for America, a denatured arm of the Democratic National Committee—out of concern that an independent movement might be more of a pressure group than an amen chorus. While he has maintained a close—and politically damaging—alliance with Wall Street (and lately, under Chief of Staff Bill Daley’s tutelage, has reached out to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce), Obama has been detached from the one recent popular rising that could help him win lost ground in the crucial states of the Midwest—the backlash against union busting and draconian budget cuts by Midwestern Republican governors and legislators. Though the line attributed to FDR speaking to supporters—“Now, make me do it”—is probably apocryphal, Roosevelt did make good use of popular groups to his left, as did Lyndon Johnson in his complex alliance with Martin Luther King. Obama and his political staff are distinctly uncomfortable with independent mobilizations making him do anything. At a time when progressive movements lack the energy of the 1930s or 1960s, the president has not chosen to help animate them. Zen Leadership. The adjectives widely used to describe Obama are words like diffident, detached, aloof, professorial. Obama practices restraint to a fault. As a policy expert and intellectual, he is hands-on when it comes to White House deliberation but mostly hands-off with Congress. As Burns demonstrated, power is enhanced in the course of its exercise. But Obama, despite his eloquence and capacity to motivate, seems to believe that power should be conserved and presidential leadership reserved for emergencies. He waited long and disabling months before becoming personally engaged in the health-reform battle. This left the details obscure, voters anxious, and Democrats at the August 2009 town meetings playing the role of pinata. By the time the bill finally passed, the victory was politically Pyrrhic. An exasperated David Obey told me, “Obama sat and let Jubilation T. Cornpone tie up Max Baucus for all those months. Hell, Chuck Grassley made it clear to me that he’d never vote for the thing.” Obama and his team never embraced such strategies as forcing Republicans (and conservative Democrats) to take awkward votes or using the veto to define clear and principled differences. David Axelrod told me that the White House considered it futile and self-defeating to bring up measures in the Senate that couldn’t win. This stance, the opposite of Harry Truman’s, has infuriated Obama’s allies in the House. During the last session, important progressive legislation on jobs and energy independence passed the House but was never even brought to a vote in the Senate. In one emblematic episode in December 2009, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pulled out all the stops to get the House to narrowly pass a $154 billion public-investment, jobs, and unemployment-extension bill. The White House, however, rebuffed Pelosi’s entreaties to urge Majority Leader Harry Reid to bring the measure to a vote in the Senate. At the time, Obama’s aides were convinced that job growth was around the corner, had already moved on to deficit reduction as the theme of the 2010 State of the Union address, and were laying plans for “Recovery Summer,” a conceit that entirely backfired. Except on such rare occasions at late stages of the health debate, it was not Obama’s style to call in wavering Democrats to give them an LBJ-style treatment—or to call them in at all, even to discuss major pending policy decisions. A number of senior Democrats were livid that they were kept in the dark about the April 13 budget speech, which had evidently been months in preparation. They first heard about it when David Plouffe, the White House political director, made the rounds of the Sunday talk shows, three days before the speech. “You’ve heard of the ‘great man’ theory,” says Robert Borosage, who co-directs the progressive Campaign for America’s Future. “They believe in the ‘great speech’ theory.” Obama’s stirring speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention established the

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 282 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core novice as presidential timber. During the campaign, his superb address on race, a subject he dearly wanted to avoid, saved his candidacy from being destroyed by the controversy over the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. But as president, much of the time Obama has been AWOL rather than a defining presence driving the debate. His great speeches, like April’s budget address, often come late in the game, after concessions have been made and damage done. Obama seems to relish demonstrating that he can score the occasional touchdown run starting from his own end zone. But politics, like football, is a game of cumulative scoring. If you keep giving ground, the clock eventually runs out . Hands off, above the fray, turning the other cheek, representing decency and common purpose,conserving rather than wielding power, uncomfortable with popular movements he doesn’t control—by some alchemy, this style of leadership is expected to produce the voter approval that puts polite pressure on the other party to join the quest for consensus. Reciprocity and compromise then result in effective government and popular adulation. This has been Obama’s operating theory of power. For the most part, it hasn’t worked.

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Winners Win – Control Agenda Perception of successful policy boosts president’s power to control agenda Rosati, University of South Carolina Government and International Studies professor, 04 (Jerel A., THE POLITICS OF UNITED STATES FOREIGN POLICY, 2004, p. 98) It was the sense of national emergency associated with the cold war during the fifties and sixties, after all, that was the ultimate source of presidential power and American global leadership following World War II. This means that the fragmented and pluralist political environment that has prevailed since Vietnam will likely continue in the post-cold war future, posing greater foreign policy opportunities and political risks for presidents and American leadership abroad. And as the American public focuses its concern increasingly on “intermestic” (and especially economic) issues, presidents who are perceived as dealing successfully with those issues are likely to enjoy an increase in their popularity and ability to govern in foreign policy and in general. But much will depend on the image that Americans have of a president’s policies and of their relative success, at home and abroad – a function of the turn of events and the strength of presidential leadership.

Coalition building using leadership bolsters agenda Ornstein, American Enterprise Institute fellow and political analyst, 93 (Norman J., Roll Call, “Clinton Can Still Emerge a Winner; Here's What to Do”, May 27, p. Online) 1. A president's power is defined by his relations with Congress. A president must exercise power in many arenas, persuading many audiences at home and abroad. But the key test for a president's clout or success is how he is judged in dealing with Congress: Does he master them, or do they master him? The successful president, I suggested in these pages in March, comes across like animal tamer Gunther Gebel-Williams: He gets into the ring with the Congressional lions and tigers, cracks the whip, and, although they growl and roar, they still get up on their tiny little stools and perform. But if a president looks like Gulliver, a pitiful, helpless giant dominated by Congressional Lilliputians, then watch out. Winning in this regard does not mean forcing sweeping proposals, in toto, down the throats of lawmakers. It means compromising, cutting back, and ceding ground to build majorities, but doing so in ways that make it clear that you are in control.

Winners win – empirically proven Green, Hofstra University political science professor, 10 [David Michael, 6/11/10, "The Do-Nothing 44th President", http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-DoNothing-44th-Presid-by-David-Michael-Gree-100611-648.html, Accessed 7/9/13] Moreover, there is a continuously evolving and reciprocal relationship between presidential boldness and achievement. In the same way that nothing breeds success like success, nothing sets the president up for achieving his or her next goal better than succeeding dramatically on the last go around. This is absolutely a matter of perception, and you can see it best in the way that Congress and especially the Washington press corps fawn over bold and intimidating presidents like Reagan and George W. Bush. The political teams surrounding these presidents understood the psychology of power all too well. They knew that by simultaneously creating a steamroller effect and feigning a clubby

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 284 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core atmosphere for Congress and the press, they could leave such hapless hangers-on with only one remaining way to pretend to preserve their dignities. By jumping on board the freight train, they could be given the illusion of being next to power, of being part of the winning team. And so, with virtually the sole exception of the now retired Helen Thomas, this is precisely what they did.

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AT – Political Capital

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Persuasion Fails Presidential rhetoric has no effect on the public or on Congress- empirical data proves Klein, Washington Post columnist, 12 [Ezra, 3-19-12, New Yorker, “The Unpersuaded? Who listens to a President?”, http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/03/19/120319fa_fact_klein?currentPage=all, accessed 7-8-13, MSG] In 1993, George Edwards, the director of the Center for Presidential Studies, at Texas A. & M. University, sponsored a program in Presidential rhetoric. The program led to a conference, and the organizers asked their patron to present a paper. Edwards didn’t know anything about Presidential rhetoric himself, however, so he asked the organizers for a list of the best works in the field to help him prepare. Like many political scientists, Edwards is an empiricist. He deals in numbers and tables and charts, and even curates something called the Presidential Data Archive. The studies he read did not impress him. One, for example, concluded that “public speech no longer attends the processes of governance—it is governance,” but offered no rigorous evidence. Instead, the author justified his findings with vague statements like “One anecdote should suffice to make this latter point.” Nearly twenty years later, Edwards still sounds offended. “They were talking about Presidential speeches as if they were doing literary criticism,” he says. “I just started underlining the claims that were faulty.” As a result, his conference presentation, “Presidential Rhetoric: What Difference Does It Make?,” was less a contribution to the research than a frontal assault on it. The paper consists largely of quotations from the other political scientists’ work, followed by comments such as “He is able to offer no systematic evidence,” and “We have no reason to accept such a conclusion,” and “Sometimes the authors’ assertions, implicit or explicit, are clearly wrong.” Edwards ended his presentation with a study of his own, on Ronald Reagan, who is generally regarded as one of the Presidency’s great communicators. Edwards wrote, “If we cannot find evidence of the impact of the rhetoric of Ronald Reagan, then we have reason to reconsider the broad assumptions regarding the consequences of rhetoric.” As it turns out, there was reason to reconsider. Reagan succeeded in passing major provisions of his agenda, such as the 1981 tax cuts, but, Edwards wrote, “surveys of public opinion have found that support for regulatory programs and spending on health care, welfare, urban problems, education, environmental protection and aid to minorities”—all programs that the President opposed—“increased rather than decreased during Reagan’s tenure.” Meanwhile, “support for increased defense expenditures was decidedly lower at the end of his administration than at the beginning.” In other words, people were less persuaded by Reagan when he left office than they were when he took office. Nor was Reagan’s Presidency distinguished by an unusually strong personal connection with the electorate. A study by the Gallup organization, from 2004, found that, compared with all the Presidential job-approval ratings it had on record, Reagan’s was slightly below average, at fiftythree per cent. It was only after he left office that Americans came to see him as an unusually likable and effective leader. According to Edwards, Reagan’s real achievement was to take advantage of a transformation that predated him. Edwards quotes various political scientists who found that conservative attitudes peaked, and liberal attitudes plateaued, in the late nineteen-seventies, and that Reagan was the beneficiary of these trends, rather than their instigator. Some of Reagan’s closest allies support this view. Martin Anderson, who served as Reagan’s chief domestic-policy adviser, wrote, “What has been called the Reagan revolution is not completely, or even mostly, due to Ronald Reagan. . . . It was the

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 287 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core other way around.” Edwards later wrote, “As one can imagine, I was a big hit with the auditorium full of dedicated scholars of rhetoric.” Edwards’s views are no longer considered radical in political-science circles, in part because he has marshalled so much evidence in support of them. In his book “On Deaf Ears: The Limits of the Bully Pulpit” (2003), he expanded the poll-based rigor that he applied to Reagan’s rhetorical influence to that of nearly every other President since the nineteen-thirties. Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s fireside chats are perhaps the most frequently cited example of Presidential persuasion. Cue Edwards: “He gave only two or three fireside chats a year, and rarely did he focus them on legislation under consideration in Congress. It appears that FDR only used a fireside chat to discuss such matters on four occasions, the clearest example being the broadcast on March 9, 1937, on the ill-fated ‘Courtpacking’ bill.” Edwards also quotes the political scientists Matthew Baum and Samuel Kernell, who, in a more systematic examination of Roosevelt’s radio addresses, found that they fostered “less than a 1 percentage point increase” in his approval rating. His more traditional speeches didn’t do any better. He was unable to persuade Americans to enter the Second World War, for example, until Pearl Harbor. No President worked harder to persuade the public, Edwards says, than Bill Clinton. Between his first inauguration, in January, 1993, and his first midterm election, in November, 1994, he travelled to nearly two hundred cities and towns, and made more than two hundred appearances, to sell his Presidency, his legislative initiatives (notably his health-care bill), and his party. But his poll numbers fell, the health-care bill failed, and, in the next election, the Republicans took control of the House of Representatives for the first time in more than forty years. Yet Clinton never gave up on the idea that all he needed was a few more speeches, or a slightly better message. “I’ve got to . . . spend more time communicating with the American people,” the President said in a 1994 interview. Edwards notes, “It seems never to have occurred to him or his staff that his basic strategy may have been inherently flawed.” George W. Bush was similarly invested in his persuasive ability. After the 2004 election, the Bush Administration turned to the longtime conservative dream of privatizing Social Security. Bush led the effort, with an unprecedented nationwide push that took him to sixty cities in sixty days. “Let me put it to you this way,” he said at a press conference, two days after the election. “I earned capital in the campaign, political capital, and now I intend to spend it.” But the poll numbers for privatization—and for the President—kept dropping, and the Administration turned to other issues. Obama, too, believes in the power of Presidential rhetoric. After watching the poll numbers for his health-care plan, his stimulus bill, his Presidency, and his party decline throughout 2010, he told Peter Baker, of the Times, that he hadn’t done a good enough job communicating with the American people: “I think anybody who’s occupied this office has to remember that success is determined by an intersection in policy and politics and that you can’t be neglecting of marketing and P.R. and public opinion.” The annual State of the Union address offers the clearest example of the misconception. The best speechwriters are put on the task. The biggest policy announcements are saved for it. The speech is carried on all the major networks, and Americans have traditionally considered watching it to be something of a civic duty. And yet Gallup, after reviewing polls dating back to 1978, concluded that “these speeches rarely affect a president’s public standing in a meaningful way, despite the amount of attention they receive.” Obama’s 2012 address fit the pattern. His approval rating was forty-six per cent on the day of the speech, and forty-seven per cent a week later. Presidents have plenty of pollsters on staff, and they give many speeches in the course of a year. So how do they so systematically overestimate the importance of those speeches? Edwards believes that by the time Presidents reach the White House their careers have taught them that they can persuade anyone of anything. “Think about how these guys become President,” he says. “The normal way is talking for two years. That’s all you do, and somehow you win. You must be a really persuasive fellow.”

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Compartmentalization by Congress means opposition is never persuaded Klein, Washington Post columnist, 12 [Ezra, 3-19-12, The New Yorker, “The Unpersuaded: Who Listens to a President?”, http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/03/19/120319fa_fact_klein?currentPage=all, accessed 7-8-13, HG] Back-room bargains and quiet negotiations do not, however, present an inspiring vision of the Presidency. And they fail, too. Boehner and Obama spent much of last summer sitting in a room together, but, ultimately, the Speaker didn’t make a private deal with the President for the same reason that Republican legislators don’t swoon over a public speech by him: he is the leader of the Democratic Party, and if he wins they lose. This suggests that, as the two parties become more sharply divided, it may become increasingly difficult for a President to govern—and there’s little that he can do about it. Theorists have long worried over this possibility. They note that our form of government is not common. As Juan Linz, a professor of political science at Yale, pointed out in a 1989 paper, “The only presidential democracy with a long history of constitutional continuity is the United States.” A broad tendency toward instability and partisan conflict, he writes, is woven into the fabric of a political system in which a democratically elected executive can come from one party and a democratically elected legislature from another. Both sides end up having control over some levers of power, a claim to be carrying out the will of the public, and incentives that point in opposite directions. The American system has traditionally had certain features that reduced the stakes—notably, political parties that encompassed a diverse range of opinions and often acted at cross purposes with themselves. But today the parties operate as disciplined, consistent units. According to Congressional Quarterly, in 2009 and 2010 Democrats and Republicans voted with their parties ninety per cent of the time. That rigidity has made American democracy much more difficult to manage—and it has made the President, as party leader, a much more divisive figure. Edwards, ever the data cruncher, has the numbers to back up this perception. “When President Obama took office, he enjoyed a 68 percent approval level, the highest of any newly elected president since John F. Kennedy,” he wrote in a recent paper. “For all of his hopes about bipartisanship, however, his early approval ratings were the most polarized of any president in the past four decades. By February 15, less than a month after taking office, only 30 percent of Republicans approved of his performance in office while 89 percent of Democrats and 63 percent of Independents approved. The gap between Democratic and Republican approval had already reached 59 percentage points—and Obama never again reached even 30 percent approval among Republicans.” This, Edwards says, is the reality facing modern Presidents, and one they would do well to accommodate. “In a rational world, strategies for governing should match the opportunities to be exploited,” he writes. “Barack Obama is only the latest in a long line of presidents who have not been able to transform the political landscape through their efforts at persuasion. When he succeeded in achieving major change, it was by mobilizing those predisposed to support him and driving legislation through Congress on a partyline vote.” That’s easier said than done. We don’t have a system of government set up for Presidents to drive legislation through Congress. Rather, we have a system that was designed to encourage division between the branches but to resist the formation of political parties. The parties formed anyway, and they now use the branches to compete with one another. Add in minority protections like the filibuster, and you have a system in which the job of the President is to persuade an opposition party that has both the incentive and the power to resist him. Jim Cooper says, “We’ve effectively lost our Congress and gained a parliament.” He adds, “At least a Prime Minister is empowered to get things done,” but “we have the extreme polarization of a parliament, with party-line voting, without the empowered Prime Minister.” And you can’t solve that with a speech.

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Theories of presidential persuasion are false – American Jobs Act proves Klein, Washington Post columnist, 12 [Ezra, 3-19-12, The New Yorker, “The Unpersuaded: Who Listens to a President?”, http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/03/19/120319fa_fact_klein?currentPage=all, accessed 7-8-13, HG] Richard Neustadt, who died in 2003, was the most influential scholar of the American Presidency. He was a founder of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and an adviser to Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Bill Clinton, and, in his book “Presidential Power” (1960), he wrote the most frequently quoted line in Presidential studies: “The power of the presidency is the power to persuade.” On August 31st of last year, President Barack Obama prepared to exercise that power. Frustrated with the slow recovery of the economy, he wanted to throw the weight of his office behind a major new stimulus package, the American Jobs Act. To this end, the White House announced that the President would deliver a televised speech to a joint session of Congress, and, as is customary, the President sent a letter to the Speaker of the House, John Boehner, asking him to schedule the address for September 7th. Boehner, the man Obama needed to persuade above all others, said no. In a written reply to the President, the Speaker said that the House had votes scheduled for six-thirty that evening. He added, “It is my recommendation that your address be held on the following evening, when we can ensure there will be no parliamentary or logistical impediments that might detract from your remarks.” Few believed that this was all there was to it. Boehner’s real objection, most thought, was that the Republican Presidential candidates were scheduled to hold a televised debate at the Reagan Library on the seventh, and Obama’s speech would upstage it. The White House, meanwhile, had its own concerns: Boehner’s suggested date would pit the President against the opening game of the N.F.L. season. No Speaker of the House had ever refused a President’s request to address a joint session of Congress, but the House Republicans refused to budge, and the back-and-forth, which was dominating and delighting the political news media, threatened to overwhelm the President’s message on jobs. In the end, Obama agreed to speak on the eighth. He was in a combative mood, and, after a summer in which the Republicans had driven the economic debate, with their brinkmanship over the debt ceiling, the Democrats were thrilled to see him take back the legislative initiative. When the TV ratings came in, the White House was relieved: with thirty-one million viewers, the President had beaten the N.F.L. But, in the days following the speech, Obama’s approval rating was essentially unchanged—according to a Gallup poll, it actually dropped a percentage point. The audience, apparently, had not been won over. Neither had Congress: the American Jobs Act was filibustered in the Senate and ignored in the House. The White House attempted to break the act into component parts, but none of the major provisions—expanded payroll-tax cuts, infrastructure investment, and a tax credit for businesses that hired unemployed workers—have passed. The President’s effort at persuasion failed . The question is, could it have succeeded?

Negotiations fail – Boehner proves Klein, Washington Post columnist, 12 [Ezra, 3-19-12, The New Yorker, “The Unpersuaded: Who Listens to a President?”, http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/03/19/120319fa_fact_klein?currentPage=all, accessed 7-8-13, HG] One option is to exert private leadership. The Obama Administration has had some success with this approach. Late in 2010, some observers wondered why the White House, which clearly believed that there was a need for further stimulus, wasn’t pushing Republicans on a payroll-tax cut, one of the few stimulus measures they had seemed somewhat open to. Then, suddenly, after the midterm election, it appeared in the tax deal. Axelrod says, “We didn’t put the payroll-tax cut into our speeches in the fall

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 290 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core because we didn’t think we could pass it, and we worried that if we included it in our rhetoric it might pollute the issue and impair our chances of getting it done after the election.” Back-room bargains and quiet negotiations do not, however, present an inspiring vision of the Presidency. And they fail, too. Boehner and Obama spent much of last summer sitting in a room together, but, ultimately, the Speaker didn’t make a private deal with the President for the same reason that Republican legislators don’t swoon over a public speech by him: he is the leader of the Democratic Party, and if he wins they lose. This suggests that, as the two parties become more sharply divided, it may become increasingly difficult for a President to govern—and there’s little that he can do about it.

No internal link – Presidents do not have persuasive power, they can only use their agenda setting usefully if the public is behind them Klein, Washington Post columnist, 12 [Ezra, 3-13-12, Washington Post, “Presidential persuasion: The case of Iraq,” http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/presidential-persuasion-the-case-ofiraq/2011/08/25/gIQAzemh9R_blog.html, accessed 7-8-13, MSG] Kevin Drum responds to my piece on the ineffectiveness of presidential persuasion by asking, in effect: What about Iraq? The question gets to a weakness in my article. For space reasons, I didn’t spend much time making the distinction between “persuasion” and “agenda setting.” But it’s a crucial one. There’s no doubt that the president can focus both the public and the political system on a particular issue. Iraq is the ultimate example. Neither Congress nor the American people were thinking very much about Saddam Hussein and Iraq in July 2001, or even in October 2001. By the middle of 2003, it was all they were thinking about. That’s the power of presidential agenda setting. It is, perhaps, the most significant power the president possesses. But it, too, is a limited power. In particular, it’s limited, at least in my view, by the fact that presidents are typically unable to persuade the public or the Congress of things they don’t already believe. This is what keeps the president from being, in political scientist George Edwards’s terminology, a “director of change” and makes him instead a “facilitator of change.” So the question with Iraq is whether it’s an example of agenda setting, persuasion or both? The polling suggests that although Iraq was a remarkable example of ambitious and sustained agenda setting, was not necessarily an example of persuasion. John Sides posts this graph from Gary Jacobson: The American people, in other words, were persuaded of the virtue of removing Saddam Hussein long before 9/11. They may not have seen it as something we needed to do right this second, or even as the best use of federal resources, but when asked whether they were for or against it, they were for it. Bush used 9/11 to make Iraq a high-priority issue, and his administration did expend considerable persuasive energy justifying this decision. But they were working from a base line in which most Americans, when asked, agreed that we should overthrow Hussein. That doesn’t take away from Bush’s achievement, such as it was. He saw that 9/11 presented an opportunity to invade Iraq, and he was very effective in using his agenda-setting power to make that happen. If not for him, the fact that Americans were passively in favor of regime change in Iraq wouldn’t have mattered. But if Americans hadn’t been against regime change in Iraq — if he hadn’t been working off of a favorable base line — it’s not clear he could have succeeded. To put it another way, it sounds obvious to the point of being silly to say that if Bush had asked Congress to authorize war with Peru, they wouldn’t have done it. But that’s actually precisely the point: There was a preexisting willingness to “finish the job” in Iraq, and that was crucial to Bush’s success. If the “persuasion” lift had been larger, the war likely wouldn’t have happened.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 291 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core That said, you can see something else I argue in that graph: Bush’s efforts on Iraq eventually polarized public opinion. In 2001, large majorities of Democrats and Republicans supported further action against Hussein. By 2004, only 20 percent of Democrats supported the war. Kevin also argues that Ronald Reagan’s presidency changed the public’s attitude towards taxation in an enduring way. This is conventional wisdom, but it’s not evident in the polling. If anything, the belief that the income tax people paid was “too high” fell after Reagan: It’s clear that Reagan’s presidency — and, perhaps as importantly, George H.W. Bush’s presidency — changed the politics of taxes inside the Republican Party. But I’m not certain that the country’s attitude toward taxes changed dramatically. Bill Clinton raised taxes when he was president, and he seemed to do okay. More recently, Barack Obama has had considerable success arguing for tax increases on wealthier Americans. But I’m sure there’s more thorough scholarship on this subject, and I’m open to being proved wrong.

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Persuasion Backfires Presidential persuasion backfires – compartmentalizes policymakers and increases opposition to proposals Klein, Washington Post columnist, 12 [Ezra, 3-19-12, The New Yorker, “The Unpersuaded: Who Listens to a President?”, http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/03/19/120319fa_fact_klein?currentPage=all, accessed 7-8-13, HG] But being President isn’t the same as running for President. When you’re running for President, giving a good speech helps you achieve your goals. When you are President, giving a good speech can prevent you from achieving them. In January, 2004, George W. Bush announced his intention to “take the next steps of space exploration: human missions to Mars and to worlds beyond.” It was an occasion that might have presented a moment of bipartisan unity: a Republican President was proposing to spend billions of dollars on a public project to further John F. Kennedy’s dream of venturing deep into the cosmos. As Frances Lee, now a professor at the University of Maryland, recalls, “That wasn’t a partisan issue at all. Democrats had no position on sending a mission to Mars.” But, she says, “they suddenly began to develop one. They began to believe it was a waste of money.” Congressional Democrats pushed the argument in press releases, public statements, and television appearances. In response, the White House, which had hinted that the Mars mission would feature prominently in the State of the Union address, dropped it from the speech. The experience helped to crystallize something that Lee had been thinking about. “Most of the work on the relationship between the President and Congress was about the President as the agenda setter,” she says. “I was coming at it from the perspective of the increase in partisanship, and so I looked at Presidents not as legislative leaders but as party leaders.” That changes things dramatically. As Lee writes in her book “Beyond Ideology” (2009), there are “inherent zero-sum conflicts between the two parties’ political interests as they seek to win elections.” Put more simply, the President’s party can’t win unless the other party loses. And both parties know it. This, Lee decided, is the true nature of our political system. To test her theory, she created a database of eighty-six hundred Senate votes between 1981 and 2004. She found that a President’s powers of persuasion were strong, but only within his own party. Nearly four thousand of the votes were of the mission-to-Mars variety—they should have found support among both Democrats and Republicans. Absent a President’s involvement, these votes fell along party lines just a third of the time, but when a President took a stand that number rose to more than half. The same thing happened with votes on more partisan issues, such as bills that raised taxes; they typically split along party lines, but when a President intervened the divide was even sharper. One way of interpreting this is that party members let their opinion of the President influence their evaluation of the issues. That’s not entirely unreasonable. A Democrat might have supported an intervention in Iraq but questioned George W. Bush’s ability to manage it effectively. Another interpretation is that party members let their political incentives influence how they evaluate policy. “Whatever people think about raw policy issues, they’re aware that Presidential successes will help the President’s party and hurt the opposing party,” Lee says. “It’s not to say they’re entirely cynical, but the fact that success is useful to the President’s party is going to have an effect on how members respond.” Or, to paraphrase Upton Sinclair, it’s difficult to get a man to support something if his reëlection depends on his not supporting it. Both parties are guilty of this practice. Karl Rove, President Bush’s deputy chief of staff, recalls discussing the Social Security privatization plan with a sympathetic Democrat on the House Ways and

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 293 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core Means Committee. He says that the representative told him, “You wouldn’t get everything you want and I wouldn’t get everything I want, but we could solve the problem. But I can’t do it because my leadership won’t let me.” Rove says, “It was less about Social Security than it was about George W. Bush.” At various times during the nineteen-nineties, Clinton and other Democrats had been open to adding some form of private accounts to Social Security, and in 1997 there were, reportedly, quiet discussions between Democrats and Republicans about doing exactly that. In theory, this background might have led to a compromise in 2005, but Bush’s aggressive sales pitch had polarized the issue. The Obama Administration was taken by surprise when congressional Republicans turned against the individual mandate in health-care reform; it was the Republicans, after all, who had championed the idea, in 1993, as an alternative to the Clinton initiative. During the next decade, dozens of Senate Republicans co-sponsored health-care plans that included a mandate. Mitt Romney, of course, passed one when he was governor of Massachusetts. In 2007, when Senator Jim DeMint, of South Carolina—now a favorite of the Tea Party—endorsed Romney for President, he cited his health-care plan as a reason for doing so. Senator Orrin Hatch, of Utah, who supported the mandate before he opposed it, shrugs off his party’s change of heart. “We were fighting Hillarycare,” he has said, of the Republicans’ original position. In other words, Clinton polarized Republicans against one health-care proposal, and then Obama turned them against another.

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Political Capital Theory Flawed Political capital theory is vague and impossible to quantify Soha, University of North Texas Associate Professor, and Rottinghaus, University of Houston Associate professor, 13 [Matthew Eshbaugh-Soha and Brandon Rottinghaus, March 2013, Presidential Studies Quarterly 43, no. 1, “Presidential Position Taking and the Puzzle of Representation,” Page 5, CB] These studies limit what we can conclude about presidential representation for two¶ primary reasons. First, many of studies of presidential representation do not take specific¶ presidential positions into account. Instead, they amalgamate all liberal or conservative¶ positions by the president as a way to test for responsiveness. Although this provides an¶ excellent broad measure of ideology, it may miss presidential responsiveness to important¶ subgroups that are important to presidential success in Congress and reelection. This¶ may also miss important issues not included in the measure or which do not load on a¶ traditional left-right scale (Page 2002). A second issue is that, without specific policies to¶ explore representation, we may overstate the president’s representational qualities. For¶ example, if a president unveils a predominately liberal policy but only talks about the¶ conservative elements, one might misrepresent to whom the president responds with his¶ legislative agenda. Presidents could also be forced to take public positions in response to¶ circumstances outside of their control, which might overrepresent these issues as part of¶ the president’s larger policy agenda. Related to this, minor deviations in responsive¶ tendencies are coded the same as large deviations. For instance, Canes-Wrone and Shotts’s¶ (2004) dichotomous measure of congruence may overstate or understate presidential¶ representation in that even a small increase or decrease in the president’s budgetary¶ request would be coded as being fully congruent with the public.

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AT – Political Capital Key [Beckmann and Kumar] Beckmann and Kumar admit it’s situational – their political theories offer varied results and propositions depending on who is in congress and how much political capital the president has right now Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] However, if spending political capital in the service of vote-centered and agenda-¶ centered strategies is a necessary condition for presidents to have positive influence in¶ Congress, it certainly is not a sufficient condition. Instead, we find the exact policy return ¶ on a particular presidential lobbying campaign is conditioned by the location of the status quo, and the nature of leading opponents’ and pivotal voters’ preferences . Beyond¶ enjoying ample political capital, then, those presidents who seek to change far-off status¶ quos and confront pliable leading opponents and/or pivotal voters are expected to wield¶ the greatest policymaking impact. By comparison, presidents with little to no political¶ capital, seeking to change centrist status quos, or confronting opposing leaders and piv-¶ otal voters who staunchly oppose their proposals can find themselves with ‘nothing to do¶ but stand there and take it’, as Lyndon Johnson once put it.

Their model assumes the President spending political capital and adapting perfectly Beckmann, UC-Irvine political science professor, & Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology economics professor, 11 [Matthew N. Beckmann PhD and Associate Professor, Political Science School of Social Sciences at UC Irvine; and Vimal Kumar, Journal of Theoretical Politics “How presidents push, when presidents win: A model of positive presidential power in US lawmaking,”, 23: 3, Ebsco, accessed: 7/8/13, ML] One important point: in anticipating how the game will be played and exactly how¶ much he can influence pivotal voters, in our model the president never proposes some-¶ thing which the opposition leader can defeat. This point is important because our presidents strategically adapt their proposals to meet practical realities, and, as such, the¶ appropriate measure of a president’s success is not passage per se, but rather the substance of what passes (or does not). In practice, presidents do not seem to adapt their ¶ proposals so strategically (Light, 1982; Peterson, 1990), so¶ α¶ ’s real-world empirical referent is better thought of as what the president signs into law (if anything) rather than what he proposes. In terms of content, how close is the outcome to what the president¶ actually preferred?

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AT – GOP Compromise Republican obstructionism impedes Obama from passing legislation Sargent, Washington Post, 13 [Greg, 7/9/13, The Washington Post, “Sabotage governing,” http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plumline/wp/2013/07/09/sabotage-governing/, accessed 7/10/13, AS] It’s not unusual to hear dirty hippie liberal blogger types (and the occasional lefty Nobel Prize winner) point out that today’s GOP has effectively abdicated the role of functional opposition party, instead opting for a kind of post-policy nihilism in which sabotaging the Obama agenda has become its only guiding governing light. But when you hear this sort of argument coming from Chuck Todd, the mild-mannered, well respected Beltway insider, it should prompt folks to take notice. That’s essentially what Todd, along with Mark Murray and the rest of MSNBC’s First Read crew, argued this morning. It’s worth quoting at length: More on The Plum Line Happy Hour Roundup Jonathan Bernstein 8 hours ago Our nightly wrap-up of news and opinion. GOP response to farm bill debacle: Move it further to the right Greg Sargent 9 hours ago But that isn't good enough for conservatives, either. So now what? Pelosi to Boehner: Immigration reform must be comprehensive Greg Sargent 12 hours ago The Democratic leader issues a subtle threat to the House GOP leader. GOP opposition to gay workplace equality will do wonders for that `makeover’ Greg Sargent 14 hours ago The coming debate over the Employment Non-Discrimination Act gives the GOP another shot to revive that "makeover" that has fallen by the wayside. Here’s a thought exercise on this summer morning: Imagine that after the controversial Medicare prescription-drug legislation was passed into law in 2003, Democrats did everything they could to thwart one of George W. Bush’s top domestic achievements. They launched Senate filibusters to block essential HHS appointees from administering the law; they warned the sports and entertainment industries from participating in any public service announcements to help seniors understand how the law works; and, after taking control of the House of Representatives in 2007, they used the power of the purse to prohibit any more federal funds from being used to implement the law. As it turns out, none of that happened. And despite Democratic warnings that the law would be a bust — we remember the 2004 Dem presidential candidates campaigning against it — the Medicare prescription-drug law has been, for the most part, a pretty big success. But that thought exercise has become a reality 10 years later as Republicans have worked to thwart/stymie/sabotage — pick your word — the implementation of President Obama’s health-care and financial-reform laws. Recently, the top-two Senate Republicans — Mitch McConnell and John Cornyn — wrote a letter to the NFL and other major sports leagues warning them not to participate in any campaign to promote implementation of Obamacare. The Koch Brothers-backed Americans for Prosperity is in unchartered waters running TV ads to help prevent the law from being implemented, while the Obama political arm is also on the air promoting implementation. And Senate Republicans have vowed to filibuster any nominee (no matter how qualified) to run the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau under the financial-reform law. [...] And this all raises the question: What’s the line between fighting for your ideology and ensuring that the government that pays your salaries actually works — or even attempts to work? At some point, governing has to take place, but when does that begin? We know what opponents will say in response to this: These are bad laws, and we have to do whatever it takes to stop them. But at what point does an election have a governing consequence? For more on that effort by top Republicans to warn the NFL off of participating in any campaign to promote Obamacare, see Jonathan Bernstein’s piece.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 297 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core This from MSNBC’s First Read crew is very well said. But I’d take it further; it goes well beyond Obama care implementation and the relentless blockading of Obama nominees for the explicit purpose of preventing democratically-created agencies from functioning. We’ve slowly crossed over into something a bit different. It’s now become accepted as normal that Republicans will threaten explicitly to allow harm to the country to get what they want, and will allow untold numbers of Americans to be hurt rather than even enter into negotiations over the sort of compromises that lie at the heart of basic governing. Sam Stein’s big piece today details the very real toll the sequester cuts are taking on real people across the country, and crucially, it explains that the sequester was deliberately designed to threaten harm in order to compel lawmakers to act to reduce the deficit. But Republicans will not consider replacing those cuts with anything other than 100 percent in cuts elsewhere, which is to say, they will only consider replacing them with 100 percent of what they want. Meanwhile, Republicans are drawing up a list of spending cuts they will demand in exchange for raising the debt limit, even though John Boehner has openly admitted that default would do untold damage to the U.S. economy. Indeed, even if default doesn’t end up happening, the threat of it risks damaging the economy, yet Republicans still insist they will use it as leverage to get what they want, anyway. As Todd and the First Read crew hint at, the GOP campaign against Obamacare is straying into this mode of governing. Indeed, on Meet the Press this weekend, Todd made this even more explicit, accusing Republicans of “trying to sabotage the law.” The current GOP campaign isn’t just about opposing the Affordable Care Act or arguing for its repeal. It’s about making it harder for uninsured Americans to gain access to coverage under a law passed and signed by a democratically elected Congress and President, and upheld by the Supreme Court, in service of the political goal of making it a greater liability for Democrats in the 2014 elections (the law, after all, isn’t going to get repealed). This is not typical opposition, and its good to hear this stated outright by someone as respected inside the Beltway as Chuck Todd. The only mystery is why more journalists aren’t willing to point it out. After all, Republicans are making this basic reality harder and harder to ignore.

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AT – Bully Pulpit

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No Audience Bully pulpit is irrelevant in the technological era—their evidence doesn’t account for Obama’s inability to secure an audience Zelizer, Princeton University professor of history and public affairs, 11 (Julian E., 7/11/11, CNN Opinion, “President's bully pulpit is not what it used to be,” http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/07/11/zelizer.obama.twitter/index.html, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) During the 1960s, when Presidents Kennedy, Johnson or Nixon spoke, the choice was to hear them or turn off the television and radio. Today, if President Obama wanted to conduct a fireside chat, it is doubtful that many people would be listening. With the end of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987, the media were also able to shed the appearance of neutrality and objectivity. Every perspective did not have to receive equal time. On many television and radio stations, objective reporters have been replaced with openly partisan commentators. Any presidential message is quickly surrounded by polemical instant commentary that diminishes the power of what he says. Making matters worse, on the Internet, presidents can't even fully control the time they have as they must compete with live blogs and video commentary as they try to share their message. Even within most households, the era of the single family television is gone. Now in many middle-class families everyone has their own media and is watching their own thing. President Obama has gone to great lengths to find new ways to reach the American people. But he is trying to achieve a 20th-century goal in a century when it is no longer possible. The reality is that presidents, Democrat or Republican, will have to find new ways to exercise what power they have and should no longer expect the opportunity to simply take their case to the public.

Obama can’t use the bully pulpit—his agenda gets drowned out by other issues Goldman, Bloomberg News chief White House correspondent, 5/23/13 (Julianna, May 23 2013, Bloomberg News, “Obama Bully Pulpit Bullied With Congress Probes Obscuring Agenda,” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-05-24/obama-bully-pulpit-bullied-withcongress-probes-obscuring-agenda.html, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) President Barack Obama renewed his oath of office in January vowing to use the bully pulpit to rally the American people around his second-term agenda. Now, with a trio of controversies fueled by relentless attacks from congressional Republicans, the limits of the presidential megaphone are on display. Since it was revealed on May 10 that the Internal Revenue Service improperly screened Tea Party and other smaller-government groups seeking tax-exempt status, the president has struggled to shift the focus. Press conferences with foreign leaders, a new campaign to sell his economic plans and yesterday’s announcement of his new counter-terrorism policy have been overshadowed in news reports. “The bully pulpit has got a little bit of a drape over it when you’ve got everyone throwing rotten tomatoes over it,” said Mike McCurry, who served as press secretary to former President Bill Clinton. Obama has a limited window to galvanize Americans, put his stamp on revamping the nation’s immigration laws, pursue climate-change legislation and ensure that the plan to expand health coverage to tens of millions of the uninsured is carried out in the face of Republican resistance. Every day that his message is overtaken by the static noise of congressional probes -- into theJustice Department’s seizure of phone records from the Associated Press, the administration’s handling of the

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 300 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core September attack on a U.S. outpost in Benghazi, Libya, and questions about what White House aides knew about the IRS scandal and when they knew it -- is a missed opportunity.

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No Opinion Shift Bully pulpit is only effective on issues popular with the public—pushing controversial policies backfires National Journal 5/30/13 (Sophie Quinton, “The Bully Pulpit Won’t Help Obama Get a Grand Bargain,” http://www.nationaljournal.com/whitehouse/the-bully-pulpit-won-t-help-obama-get-a-grand-bargain20121029, Accessed 7/8/13, JC) The Obama campaign believes in taking its message to the American people. But history shows that, when it comes to the tough issues, use of the bully pulpit can backfire. As Congress faces its toughest negotiating challenge yet, the next president may want to consider keeping a low profile. The bully pulpit can work when a president takes advantage of a groundswell of public support that already exists. But when a president takes a high-profile stance on a controversial issue, it makes it harder for the opposing party to support his plan. “When you raise the profile of the issues, you also raise the political stakes for members of Congress on both sides of the aisle. It makes it harder for the members of your own party to oppose you, but it makes it harder for members of the opposite party to support you,” said Frances Lee, professor of American politics at the University of Maryland. President George W. Bush launched his second term with a very public push for Social Security privatization. He got nowhere. In fact, public support declined, Lee said. “We determined that if we were going to have a chance to get Social Security reformed it was not going to be the kind of thing that we could just get done, quietly, in Congress,” said Tony Fratto, a partner at Hamilton Place Strategies and former communications adviser in the Bush White House. The Bush team believed that the public first needed to learn why privatization made sense, Fratto said. “My instinct would always be to go out and try to educate more” when it comes to complicated issues, Fratto said. But he admitted that an aggressive communications strategy on such issues hasn’t had the best track record. President Clinton campaigned all around the country to try to raise support for his health care plan and failed. The Obama White House tried everything from speeches and town hall meetings to blog posts and tweets to try to rally the public around health care reform. The law—which was based on what were initially Republican ideas—was rammed through Congress on a party line vote. Democrats love it. Republicans despise it. President Reagan, remembered as “the great communicator,” had the benefit of a cross-party coalition in Congress that no longer exists, Lee said.

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Theory Aff

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Bottom of the Docket Plan is at the bottom of the docket – normal means indicates it doesn’t receive priority over the agenda item.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 304 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Winding Way Plan passage starts now, but it still has to go through the committees and votes of the legislative process.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 305 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

No Backlash No backlash to the plan – multiple committees and members of Congress who supported it are also associated with the plan. Obama doesn’t get the blame.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 306 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Fiat Solves the Link Fiat solves the link. This debate is a question of should, not would, the plan happen. The plan bypasses the political process. You still get the politics DA, your links just have to test the desirability of the plan not the process.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 307 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Vote No Vote no – this round functions as a congressional debate. Political capital is spent in the process of the debate, so a negative vote doesn’t avoid the link to the DA.

Gonzaga Debate Institute 13 308 Brovero-Lundeen – Politics Core

Non-Intrinsic The DA isn’t intrinsic. A logical policymaker can do the plan and solve the DA. The DA isn’t an opportunity cost to doing the plan.