Platt,+Justice

Currently head coach at Nicolet High School (2009-present) Assistant coach NHS 2008, frequent policy judge since 2007, LD judge prior, parli debater in college (very bad).

I consider myself a biased tabs judge. I will vote on any arguments, but I tend to need a far more compelling story than dropped blip args before I'll vote on T and theory. Tell me what the in-round abuse is, paint me a picture of the ragged corpse of debate caused by voting for arguments of the kind your opponent is making, regale me with a description of the bitter tears of your mother when she contemplates the fact that conditional counterplans will continue in debate, whatever-just make it strong, believable, and give it impacts that demand immediate action on my part. In general, I'll default to "reject the arg not the team" without a quite good reason to do otherwise.

I'm happy to hear and vote on critiques, but I would ask you to actually do some critiquing when you run them. A block of cards and blank assertion is not a good way to win these. Point me to specifically how the plan is an instantiation of the thing you're critiquing, show me how the stuff the plan does should be an affront to my value system, tell me how my ballot makes a difference, and the win is far more likely to come your way.

In general, I prize rounds involving debaters actually doing some real evidence and argument analysis, and that's probably an easy way to impress me as well. You're better off going for one very strong argument that you can support with detailed analysis than ten little positions and a lot of screaming about nuclear war. I'm rarely impressed by claims that one drop on a 20 point flow is necessarily round-decisive. Do your impact analysis, as well-within the limitations outlined above, I will weigh the round as the debaters tell me to.

I don't often call for ev unless it's questioned in the round or I think it's highly fishy. I am very willing to yell at you about dubious ev, and to drop you if I catch you with flat out lies or out of context cards. I'll make that judgment whether or not the other team brings it up, but I will only drop you on it absent a team challenge if I know for an absolute fact that your ev was cut out of context or has similar strong issues. Still, I read a lot, and may have seen your literature...

As far as speed goes, I'm fine with it, but probably not as good as some about hearing everything you do in a very fast round. If I'm starting to miss arguments or cards (and I try to flow your warrants as well as your cards), or if you start mumbling, I'll ask you to slow down or clear up, and I need you to respect that. If I ask you to do this a couple times, you're better off pretending I said that I insist on conversational speed.