Rep. Paul Ryan's "Path to Prosperity" budget proposal should be passed.

I thank Sieben for conceding my first and third contentions. These are obvious facts and I had hoped that I would not have to defend them. And so I will now begin my argument: 1. DEALING WITH HIS PRESTANDARDS. Prestandard 1 is conceded. “Because we have limited space, dropped arguments ought to count as concessions.” My opponent has dropped arguments g and h of Contention 2, and has thus conceded them. This alone is enough for me to win the debate. Prestandard 2 is contested. My opponent is simply using this prestandard to dismiss all of my factually based arguments instead of legitimately answering them. He is saying that my arguments are not substantiated- that they are an appeal to authority. This is partly true. Every good argument must have some sort of appeal to authority. It’s called factual reasoning. Anything else would be simply mindless venting of subjective opinion. My arguments consist of contentions that logically follow from premises, which are based only in fact. To accept this prestandard would be to disqualify informed debate entirely, leaving the only option to be a childish “uh-huh/uh-uh” repetition. 2. DEFENDING MY SECOND CONTENTION. (a/b) i. Again, my opponent is trying to wield his faulty second prestandard by claiming, in effect, that these arguments are unacceptable because they are facts, when in reality, this adds to their credibility. ii. First, his own first source, which is simply an opinion page anyway, contradicts his claim. In the very first paragraph of the article, it clearly states, “The discrepancy here does not prove that the CBO is wrong or bad at making these kinds of predictions.”[1] In addition, it only examined one very specific instance when the CBO was wrong; an instance where two unexpected wars were declared shortly after the projections were issued, thus adding quite a bit of unexpected spending. To conclude from this very specific and abnormal example that the Congressional Budget Office is always wrong is entirely illogical. As to his second claim, it is worth pointing out beforehand that his source is a blog. This means it represents some person's opinion that he or she has decided to broadcast. It is not at all reliable as an empirical source. However, even assuming that this opinion blog is somehow dependable, my opponent is misrepresenting it. The overly dramatic figure of 113 percent was again only in one specific instance, which my opponent is again trying to use to conclude that the Congressional Budget office is always wrong. Again, this is illogical. Also, this statistic actually supports my case. According to my opponent’s source, “savings turned out to be 113 percent greater in 1999 than the budget office forecast” (my emphasis) [2]. And so, if anything, the Path to Prosperity’s positive projections from the CBO are actually overly conservative by as much as 113%.! (c-f) My opponent really does only rely on his “appeal to authority(i.e. fact) line” here. And, since I have proven that his second prestandard is wholly without merit, he has no legitimate answer to these arguments. He says that I am not using logic to defend my case. This is simply not the case. Although it is true that these claims are ones of fact, not logical syllogisms, they are simply the factual premises that are used to logically prove my case. And so in this case, since I am only asserting fact, it is entirely acceptable to rely on one of the most reputable financial publications in the world. To entirely debunk this “lack of logic” myth, here is a valid syllogism that uses my factual premises to logically prove the resolution. Legislation that fixes major problems and has benefits that outweigh its disadvantages should be passed. The Path to Prosperity fixes major problems and has benefits that outweigh its disadvantages. Therefore: The Path to Prosperity should be passed. Given this logical proof, the only way you can disprove the resolution is by arguing either that legislation that fixes major problems and has benefits that outweigh its disadvantages should not be passed or that the Path to Prosperity does not fix major problems and does not have benefits that outweigh its disadvantages, both of which are factually false. 3. REFUTING THE NEGATIVE CASE. First of all, my opponents philosophically ungrounded assertion that second-best plans are immoral is outrageous. This is to say that the only morally acceptable proposal is an entirely perfect one. And no matter who is determining the value of any given plan, no plan is absolutely perfect. To use my opponent’s analogy, if this moral theory were true, since it would be impossible to save all three drowning people, no course of action would be perfect, and thus it would be immoral to save any of the drowning people. Therefore, if the Path to prosperity is significantly better than the status quo, which my opponent has conceded, I should win this debate. Now concerning my opponent’s contentions: Contention 1: First of all, this contention relies almost entirely on Wikipedia, a notoriously undependable source that, according to the United States Judiciary branch, is inherently unreliable because "it can be written and edited anonymously by anyone.” [3] In other words, for all we know, some middle-aged, burger-flipping college dropout from Yugoslavia could have written that article. The only source used other than Wikipedia is a single article from the Cato institute (It should also be noted that the use of any source at all violates his own prestandard). And so the only factually reliable statement made in this entire argument is that there are several ways in which the military could be cut. This statement is tautologically true and irrelevant, and therefore should be disregarded. In short, if the claims made in this contention were even dependable, I could concede them all and it would make no difference. Indeed, we could cut the military more (which would not be a good idea considering we are currently fighting three wars), and we could substantially alter our agriculture policy. We could even assume that these changes would be beneficial. However, this is entirely irrelevant because we are not debating an anonymous, formless plan that makes some vague, undefined changes in agriculture or defense; we are debating whether or not House Concurrent Resolution 34 should be passed. Therefore, this contention is immaterial to the debate and should be completely disregarded. irrelevant Contention 2: a) i. The argument that that the Path to Prosperity will not be followed is simply factually false. It is a piece of legislation. If it is passed, it becomes law. There doesn’t need to be an incentive to follow it, people are obligated by law to do so. ii. This debate is one of values (The Path to Prosperity should be passed), not one of practicality (The Path to Prosperity will be passed), and so political feasibility or infeasibility is wholly extraneous to the matter at hand.b) The notion that GDP is not relevant is utterly untrue. According to the US Department of Commerce, GDP is the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States.[4] Therefore, if the GDP grows, the amount of goods of services is growing, and the economy is growing. This is clearly a good and relevant thing. In conclusion, I have refuted every single one of my opponent’s arguments and validly defended my previous contentions against my opponent’s attacks. Therefore, my case still stands and I should win this debate.I thank my opponent and patiently await his reply[1] http://voices.washingtonpost.com... [2] http://takingnote.tcf.org...[3] http://www.14thcoa.courts.state.tx.us... [footnote 3][4] http://www.bea.gov...