Tournament: GBX | Round: 1 | Opponent: Niles West HG | Judge: Donna Carrasco
Crocker 9 – Chester Crocker, Professor of Strategic Studies at the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, Former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, "Terms of Engagement", New York Times, 9-13, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/opinion/14crocker.html?_r=0
PRESIDENT OBAMA will have a hard time achieving his foreign policy goals until he masters some key terms and better manages the expectations they convey. Given the furor that will surround the news of America’s readiness to hold talks with Iran, he could start with "engagement" — one of the trickiest terms in the policy lexicon.
The Obama administration has used this term to contrast its approach with its predecessor’s resistance to talking with adversaries and troublemakers. His critics show that they misunderstand the concept of engagement when they ridicule it as making nice with nasty or hostile regimes.
Let’s get a few things straight. Engagement in statecraft is not about sweet talk. Nor is it based on the illusion that our problems with rogue regimes can be solved if only we would talk to them. Engagement is not normalization, and its goal is not improved relations. It is not akin to détente, working for rapprochement, or appeasement.
So how do you define an engagement strategy? It does require direct talks. There is simply no better way to convey authoritative statements of position or to hear responses. But establishing talks is just a first step. The goal of engagement is to change the other country’s perception of its own interests and realistic options and, hence, to modify its policies and its behavior.
Limits —- requiring direct talks places a functional limit on the topic because few Affs can defend the process. Specific import cases can’t beat the PIC out of talks, controlling the Neg’s research burden
Ground —- talks are a stable mechanism for DA links and competition for counterplans like two-track or quiet diplomacy —- core ground is key to fairness
Counterplan solves and doesn’t need Congress –
Shapiro 2k11
(Ilya, A.B. from Princeton University, an M.Sc. from the London School of Economics, and a J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School senior fellow in constitutional studies as a special assistant/advisor to the Multi-National Force in Iraq on rule of law issues and practiced international, political, commercial, and antitrust litigation at Patton Boggs and Cleary Gottlieb, "Interstate Compacts and Do-It-Yourself Federalism," pg online @ http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/interstate-compacts-and-do-it-yourself-federalism/ ghs-ef)
With the federal government’s growing assertion of power over the states — Obamacare is just
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and part III of Justice Kennedy’s opinion in Bond v. United States.)
It’s predictable to have all 50 states involved – carries the rule of law and solves
Mountjoy 2k3
(John, is the director of CSG’s National Center for Interstate Compacts. He managed CSG’s national effort on the Interstate Compact for Adult Offender Supervision and currently oversees the revision of the Interstate Compact for Juveniles and the Interstate Compact for the Placement of Children. He holds a Masters in Public Administration and a B.A. in Communications from Western Kentucky University.pg online @ http://www.csg.org/knowledgecenter/docs/ncic/SolutionsForStates.pdf ghs-ef)
Interstate compacts serve a multitude of functions within state governments. They regulate state boundaries
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, educational leadership on a nationwide basis at the State and local levels.
Rodriguez 11 (Matthew, Secretary for Environmental Protection, State of California and Chairman, California-Mexico Border Relations Council, "The California-Mexico Border Relations Council", 2011, http://www.calepa.ca.gov/border/cmbrc/2012/AnnualReport.pdf** )
The California-Mexico Border Relations Council (CMBRC), created through the passage of
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the Council. • Provide an annual report of activities to the Legislature.
National level foreign policy is controlled by elites and excludes citizen participation—-state involvement in the international sphere is critical to break the trend of corporate domination
Dolan, Fellow-Institute of Policy Studies, 1/31/8
http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/4932
The potential of making and influencing national and international policy at the local level excites
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militia, civic associations and, most importantly, state and local governments.
National Democratic Institute, 6
http://www.ndi.org/globalp/citpart/citpart.asp
NDI works to increase and strengthen the political participation of citizens. Citizens are essential
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skills to voice their concerns, act collectively and hold public officials accountable.
Geoff Dyer, 11/20/13, Obama in plea to postpone new Iran sanctions, www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/585195a2-516f-11e3-9651-00144feabdc0.html?ftcamp=published_links2Frss2Fhome_uk2Ffeed2F2Fproduct~23axzz2lJpZPDlW
Barack Obama made a personal appeal to leading senators on Tuesday to postpone new sanctions
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mooted by some senators as another route for new punitive measures against Iran.
NADBank was historically unpopular, and was cut down from a broader mandate because it would have cost Clinton too much political capital.
Leising, reporter from the Graduate School of Journalism at UC-Berkeley, 2K
(Matt At the breaking point : US - MEXICO BORDER. "EL PASO: NADBANK." http://journalism.berkeley.edu/projects/border/elpasonadbank.html, ~accessed 7/10/13~, JB).
In a political portent of things to come, the commitment of 24225 million
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as a way to bring potable water and infrastructure to places in need .
The original idea for NADBank was to have it cover the entire North American continent
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billion available if and when the 24450 million was committed to projects .
In a two-tiered structure, BECC serves to certify projects seeking NADBank assistance - it is the screening room and the front door through which any project wanting to deal with NADBank must come. BECC provides technical assistance and design implementation to poor communities to ensure that projects are environmentally sustainable and financially viable. As well, any community seeking BECC approval must be able to absorb the cost of maintenance and operation of its project .
Yet the vagaries of the institutional process were well beyond the thinking of the Clinton Administration in 1993, which was interested in using BECC and NADBank to get the crucial support of Latino politicians and environmentalists in order to pass NAFTA. This political move, many critics say, shows that the administration was never serious about helping the border and also doomed the bank’s effectiveness from the start.
"~President Clinton~ really didn’t care about Mexico," said Raul Hinojosa, a
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a very stripped down version of the environmental parts of the trade bill.
"The institutions as we were proposing them were much more ambitious, much larger" than what got through the NAFTA negotiations, Hinojosa said. "The minimal political capital was expended."
The Leveretts, Flynt and Hillary Mann, Going to Tehran, New America Foundation, Former National Security Council, 11/4/13, America’s Moment of Truth on Iran, thediplomat.com/2013/11/04/americas-moment-of-truth-on-iran/
America’s Iran policy is at a crossroads. Washington can abandon its counterproductive insistence on
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standing as a great power depends significantly on his readiness to do so.
New sanctions cause Iran strikes—locks-in prolif and regional instability—a deal resolves conflict incentives
Rosa Brooks, Gtown University Law PRofessor, New America Foundation Senior Fellow, 11/20/13, Smother ’Em With Love, www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/11/20/smother_em_with_love_iran_nukes
At this point, tightening sanctions still further would be either ineffective or dangerous,
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It’s a path dictated by pure, hard-headed self-interest.
Chossudovsky 6
(Michel Chossudovsky, The Next Phase of the Middle East War, Global Research, http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va26aid=3147)
The Bush Administration has embarked upon a military adventure which threatens the future of humanity
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basin, eventually leading to the destabilization and conquest of the Russian Federation.