DDO OT Final: US hegemony is desirable.

I will defend my caseFrameworkIn response the desirability analysis, he claims that what is desirable is what bring us closest to our ideals. That is simply not the case. You can extend the ice cream example, which demonstrates that desirability is only about the ideal. Desirability does not extend to steps that we take to achieve that ideal because those are not the end goal and have no importance to us in themselves; they are merely a means to an end. Nevertheless, I offered the notion of multipolarity. and you can weigh the impacts of US heg on US citizens as to whether or not it is desirable. DesirableApproval of the US leadership is not equivalent to liking US hegemon or preferring it over their own hegemony. He has provided no link or warrant for this. I might approve of my class president’s work, but that does not mean I would prefer that he be the class president over me. Second, you can turn the Gallup poll because it explicitly states in the source that he provided that the leadership approval has soared under Obama, and Obama has generally (not in all cases, but generally), taken a humble, slightly less imperialistic and hegemonic approach, as when he evacuated the troops from Iraq. This means that the rest of the world wants us to be less hegemonic. The point flows Con. Economy1. He never proved that other countries would not promote free trade. He says that they do protectionism to obtain economic dominance over other countries, but that does not make sense because if trade is necessary in order actually get goods out of the country and expand on wealth, it’s not in their interest to do it. Also, if he’s admitting that nobody listens to the US when it supports trade, then he loses this argument entirely. 2. He says that I need to provide an alternative to the wasteful wars. Ok, I’ll give one: don’t spend the money. Slash it from the budget or invest it in the US economy. The Iraq War cost the US 1 trillion dollars and was entirely unproductive. It did nothing to help the economy; it only tanked it. Hegemony relies on wasteful spending. Clearly not spending the money would be superior to wasting it. 3. He says that this is only an argument against the wars, and not heg. That’s actually not true. The cards I referenced discussed the impact on spending necessary to maintain the American Empire-they clearly referenced hegemony and not just the wars. 4. He says this impact is US specific. So what? I already demonstrated that other people don’t find US heg desirable, so now I just have to prove that it is not desirable to US citizens either.Plus, this debate about US heg, not Chinese heg or whatever. It’s ok for me to reference the drain on the US for that reason. 5. He says that I don’t quantify the impact on the economy. I don’t have to do this-I just have to prove that it is detrimental. Surely as a free market advocate, my opponent agrees that wasteful government spending is detrimental. 6. He says that this is a US specific impact again. Again, so what? The alternative is that the US won’t spend the money and the economy improves. I don’t need to quantify this and compare it to Chinese military heg. That’s ridiculously unfair and impossible to expect me to do. 7. He says that total wars are more common in multipolar worlds and then tries to turn the Eland card. He provided no warrant for this assertion (please check his source for proof if you do not believe me-it does not mention this at all). He has no proof, whereas I have proof that the US gov. did commandeer our resources to maintain its hegemony. In fact, there were definitely total wars during periods of British hegemony and French Hegemony (Napoleonic wars come to mind as an example), so his argument is false anyways. That should take out the attempted turn. 8. He says that this is an argument against poorly managed resources, not heg. No, the card very clearly is about how the maintenance of heg leads to a drain on the economy. In fact, it seems to posit that heg itself is a poor waste of resources. He also quotes a card that says that the economy collapsed because of the Fed, but the card just flows to my side because it doesn’t explain why the Fed interfered. My card also agrees that the Fed interfered, but notes that they did it to maintain the empire, so his carded attack doesn’t do much.9. He says that the US makes countries it dominates powerhouses. Um, no, the USSR was a pretty solid economic nation, and China became an economic powerhouse and it has not been dominated by the US since it overthrew US/European imperialism. The US is not necessary to create powerhouses. Also, it is bad to pump our tax money into other countries and make them competitors. Blowback1. He says they prefer the US. I already dealt with this argument in the Desirable section. They don’t prefer the US, they like Obama because he is less hegemonic,so turn this back. He says that no other nations have risen against the US. Um, no, that’s not true. Just a few days ago, North Korea threatened to bomb the US and several nations, like Iran, have been classified by our own State Department as state sponsors of anti-US terrorism. 2. He says prefer US b/c no power struggle. He’s ignoring the fact that states don’t stop struggling for power just because there is a hegemon; in fact, they continue to struggle against the heg. That’s what the terrorism cards prove. During the Napoleonic wars, all of Europe allied against France even though it was the hegemon. Power struggle does not evaporate just because there is a hegemon, it just focuses it on one major target. 3. He then says that it isn’t unique. Again, it doesn’t matter. We’re discussing US heg, not Chinese heg. This is harmful to US citizens, and it isn’t fair to put ridiculous burdens like this on me as he’s been doing throughout the whole debate. He also says that the US is less dominating? Not true at all-we invade many, many nations, covertly overthrow their governments, fund fascist dictators like Pinochet, and put military bases on their lands to cow them into submission (and also let our soldiers get away with rape and murder). The US gov. also openly contracts private companies that are involved in human trafficking-a very despicable and dominating act. 4. He says that there are few major wars since US heg has occured. No, there have been fewer wars since the end of WWII because of the creation of the atom bomb. This is confounding. It’s also undisputed that the US has engaged in the most wars since the end of WWII in order to maintain dominance in many areas. If the US was not hegemon, it would not be doing this.5. He says that this is outweighed by the impacts of multipolarity. I invite you to judge the truth of this. Where are the terrorist acts against non-hegemonic countries that do not dominate others? Is Al Qaeda bombing Mexico? Canada? Switzerland? Nope. 6. He says that I’m not giving ways this could be solved. Actually, I think I did this pretty clearly-end US heg. US dominance is causing the blowback that results in aysmmetric warfare (terrorism). Ending US dominance ends the problem against US citizens and lets us choose not pay for people to kill us.7. He says that Osama didn’t think that the US would interfere less in the middle east. That wasn’t the point. He wasn’t trying to stop the US. He was trying to get revenge-that’s what the card is about. He also says that we’ve killed terrorist leaders. Sure, but we’ve also killed civilians and made more terrorism with our policies. Terrorism has been on the rise since the war on terror began.