Leader of The Affirmative
The leader of the Affirmative is responsible for several key points in the debate. As the first speaker they must define the resolution that they selected earlier. For instance, if the resolution is Resolved: this house would abandon the use of torture on enemy combatants. the Leader of the Affirmative would be responsible for defining the meaning of this house, enemy combatants and any other key pieces of the resolution. Whatever they fail to define the Leader of the Opposition is then free to define, which can spell disaster for the Affirmative. The Leader of the Affirmative is also responsible for presenting the plan. the plan is the way that the Affirmative will carry out the resolution. Working off the example resolution above, the plan would be something like, " Congress will pass a law expressly stating that any and all forms of inhumane treatment towards peoples in times of war or peace would be expressly forbidden at any level of command". If the Affirmative fails to present a plan the negation can claim that they win automatically because the Affirmative did not give them a concrete procedure to argue against and effectively Ruined the educational value of the debate . After this the Affirmative uses the remainder of the time to outline his case.
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