BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
Independent campaign groups.

It is almost impossible to guarantee that groups are truly independent, in the sense in which side opposition uses the word. In America, so called “527” organisations[i], which profess no direct affiliation with a candidate, are permitted to launch campaigns to attack or support particular politicians, without being subjected to the same funding limitations and fair conduct rules as political parties.[ii] Right-to-life groups and religiously motivated organisations may operate as 527s, along with groups controlled by business organisations. Coordination between 527 groups, candidates and political parties is banned in the US. In practice, however, the close alignment of the groups’ ideological objectives and the characteristic policies of Republican and Democrat candidates leads to 527s taking their cues (and their targets) from the pronouncements of politicians and their campaigns. Groups such as Citizen’s Solidarity and the Indian anti-corruption movement mobilised around Anna Hazare[iii] are comparatively rare. Where flaws in a nation’s democratic institutions are pervasive, affecting coalitions, government and opposition parties, the role of the press as a neutral observer is usually more effective than political attacks in bringing problems to light – consider the role of the Daily Telegraph in disclosing British MP’s misuse of their publicly funded expense allowances[iv]. [i] “FEC collects $630000 in civil penalties from three 527 organisations”. Federal Election Commission, 13 December 2006. http://www.fec.gov/press/press2006/20061213murs.html [ii] Section 527, United Stated Internal Revenue Code. [iii] “No modern-day Mahatma”. The Economist, 27 April 2011. http://www.economist.com/node/21526895 [iv] MPs’ Expenses. The Daily Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/
Negative campaigning reduces the diversity and representativeness of government.

Many able, idealistic and talented individuals are discouraged or excluded from participating in the political process by aggressive negative campaigning[i]. Bright potential candidates may be concerned about intrusion by political opponents into their private lives or backgrounds[ii]. They may be opposed in principle to participating in a political culture that obliges aspirant office holders to engage in smear- and fear-lead campaigning. Under the status quo, only those able to stomach the confrontational and bullying tactics that have grown up around contemporary electioneering will dare enter the political arena. Moreover, such trends in political culture favour candidates with close links to the media. Individuals able to command the ear of newspaper owners, or who possess a professional background in journalism or publicity will be better able to manipulate or evade attacks launched via television and mass communications. A democratic system is best served when it encourages the participation of candidates from a range of backgrounds and professional fields. The ability of a government to arrive at novel solutions to problems confronting a state, to understand that state’s economy and to effectively represent different sectors of the population will be compromised without a diverse skillset within the state’s legislative and executive branches. By transforming politics into a game based on the production of political “brands” and unassailable, manufactured “personalities,” the jousting and muckraking of negative campaigning gives a disproportionate advantage to former editors and PR men[iii]. This dilutes the pool of professionals from which future leaders are drawn, leading to poor policy making (due to a lack of professional skills) and a conservative, sclerotic, defensive approach to political problem solving. Western liberal politics is increasingly discussed only in terms of communication, image, rhetoric and appearance[iv], rather than the technical language of law, economics and diplomacy. Negative campaigning artificially limits the types of people and professions who can engage in political discourse, infantilising and disabling politics itself. [i] “Meg’s mistake”, The Economist, 28 September 2009, http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2009/09/post_8 [ii] “Tory woman attacks ‘misogyny’ of grassroots members”, The Guardian, 01 November 2009. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/nov/01/conservative-party-misogyny-liz-truss?INTCMP=SRCH [iii] “Analysis: PR people fall prey to the lure of parliament.”, PR Week, 04 April 1996. http://www.brandrepublic.com/news/92597/ANALYSIS-PR-people-fall-prey-lure-Parliament/?DCMP=ILC-SEARCH [iv] “I’m fake, vote for me”, The Guardian, 22 September 2006. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2006/sep/22/media.media?INTCMP=SRCH
Identifying strong, honest candidates.

As noted above, the rougher, ruder, character-oriented tone of a negative campaigning environment acts as a useful test of a politician’s reputation and integrity. Further, opposition wish to restate their early counter-argument on the evolving and dynamic nature of election campaigns. No campaign is uniformly negative of positive. A candidate who is able to stand firm in the face of attacks against his character and his policies is much more likely to be able to act as a strong advocate in a legislative forum, or when accounting for the actions of the executive. Determination and strong argumentation skills in one area imply a similar degree of dedication in other areas. By contrast, how much confidence should we have in a politician who would be prepared to appeal to the enforcement mechanism created by the proposition to forcibly exclude a particular statement or allegation from a political debate, rather than respond to it? The problems that confront national governments cannot be dismissed simply by invoking a law designed to eliminate fuzzily defined forms of unfair conduct. Attack adverts are used much more frequently in US-style primary selection contests, which poll members of a particular political party in order determine the candidate who will represent it in national or lower-level elections[i]. The use of negative campaigning in the context of party or semi-open primaries may help to distinguish between politicians running on very similar ideological platforms. If an aspiring president’s ideological allies can be dissuaded from voting for him, based on his past actions or associations, it will be extremely easy to convince undecided voters to do the same. By identifying politicians who are difficult to assail on an ad hominem basis, and by identifying politicians who can remain composed and professional when subjected to such attacks, political parties are able to field significantly stronger candidates in open elections. Voters then carry out similar assessments of character and integrity in the polling booth. [i] “Clinton Questions Role of Obama in a Crisis”. The New York Times, 01 March 2008. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/01/us/politics/01campaign.html?_r=1
The difficulty of identifying attack adverts and negative messages.

The content and meaning of a particular broadcast or print advert will not always be clear. A piece of campaign media may not be uniformly and objectively positive or negative in tone. Words are ambiguous, their definition based partly on the experiences and opinions of observers. Context can also play an important role in determining how a political communication may be perceived. When a scandal breaks involving an opponent, is it legitimate for one of the others candidates in an election to run positive adverts about their own background on a particular topic. If an incumbent is found to be a cuckold, for example, could a challenger run an advert asserting that he was a “good family man”? Side proposition may choose to respond by creating some variety of independent campaign commission, or by expanding the role of the judiciary. However, this does nothing to address the basic issue of subjectivity highlighted above.
Independent campaign groups.

The resolution ignores the possibility that negative campaigns may occur outside of a partisan context. In India[i] and Korea[ii], grass roots campaigns without specific party or ideological ties have been used to highlight corruption among electoral candidates and legislative incumbents. These campaigns are arguably an expression of democratic political freedom, with individual citizens banding together to enforce core democratic norms. However, as the example of the Citizen’s Solidarity movement in South Korea shows, because such actions inevitably involve questioning the character and conduct of politicians running for election, they frequently fall foul of laws designed to restrict negative campaigning. Similar problems are encountered by the professional press. Even in countries with liberal electoral and libel law regimes, the press frequently find themselves accused of political bias if they attempt to highlight mendacity or wrongdoing by a particular candidate. Unless the wrongdoing in question is particularly severe, western journalists may find themselves in the position of their Singaporean counterparts – held accountable for “electoral crimes”, libel or contempt of court by a body of law that treat political institutions as sacrosanct and denies that scrutiny of those institutions’ officer holders is necessary. [i] “No modern-day Mahatma”. The Economist, 27 April 2011. http://www.economist.com/node/21526895 [ii] “Korea’s art of negative campaigning.” The Economist, 6 April 2000. http://www.economist.com/node/299823
Drugs are safer when legal

Currently in the UK, purity of illegal Amphetamine is normally under 5%, and some tablets sold as ecstasy contain no MDMA at all. Instead, drugs are adulterated (“cut”) with substances from chalk and talcum powder to completely different drugs.[1] At least when drugs are legalised the state can regulate their sale to make sure that they are clean and not cut with other dangerous substances. This will minimise the risk to users. [1] Drugscope, ‘How Pure Are Street Drugs?’, updated January 2005, http://www.drugscope.org.uk/resources/faqs/faqpages/how-pure-are-street-...
Drugs currently fund terrorism and regional instability

The Taliban gets most of its revenue from poppies, which provide the opium for heroin. They do this by intimidating local farmers who would otherwise sell their harvest at market. They then demand “protection money” as well, or else either another local warlord or the ‘protectors’ themselves would rob the farmer. Something like 22,700 people have died in Mexico since January 2007 from gangsters who want to protect their revenue and almost the entire continent of South America, from Brazil to Colombia, has had their governments destabilised by drug lords.[1]  The hugely-costly but unsuccessful war on drugs could be ended, starving terrorists of the profits of drug production. As a result peace and development could be brought to unstable drug-producing states such as Colombia and Afghanistan. [1] Mexico under siege, The drug war on our doorstep, Los Angeles Times , 27 September 2011, http://projects.latimes.com/mexico-drug-war/#/its-a-war
Legal drugs would increase tax revenue

In 2009-2010, the tax revenue from tobacco in the UK was £10.5 billion.[1] If the state legalizes drugs, it can tax them and use the revenue from this practise to fund treatment. At the moment such treatment is difficult to justify as it appears to be spending ordinary taxpayers’ money on junkies. [1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tax Revenue From Tobacco’, accessed 16th June 2011 - http://www.the-tma.org.uk/tma-publications-research/facts-figures/tax-re...
More people will take drugs if they are legal

Considering that drug use has so many negative consequences, it would be disastrous to have it increase. However, the free availability of drugs once they are legal will make it far easier for individuals to buy and use them. In most cases, under 1% of the population of OECD countries regularly use illegal drugs; many more drink alcohol or smoke tobacco.[1] This must at least partly to do with the illegality. Indeed, in an Australian survey, 29% of those who had never used cannabis cited the illegality of the substance as their reason for never using the drug, while 19% of those who had ceased use of cannabis cited its illegality as their reason.[2] [1] UN Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2009, http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/WDR-2009.html?ref=menutop [2] NSW Bureau of Crime and Statistics, ‘Does Prohibition Deter Cannabis use?’, 23 August 2001, http://www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/lawlink/bocsar/ll_bocsar.nsf/vwFiles/mr_cj...$file/mr_cjb58.pdf
Prohibition does not work; instead, it glamorizes drugs

Prohibition may not be working in the UK but that does not mean that prohibition is not working everywhere. In the US, the Drug Enforcement Agency states that “Overall drug use in the United States is down by more than a third since the late 1970s. That’s 9.5 million people fewer using illegal drugs. We’ve reduced cocaine use by an astounding 70% during the last 15 years.”[1] [1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Fact 1: We have made significant progress in fighting drug use and drug trafficking in America. Now is not the time to abandon our efforts’, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/01so.htm
Legalisation reduces crime

Drugs affect how people think, and they take away their ability to control their actions rationally, and so people on drugs are more likely to commit crimes. The US Drug Enforcement Administration states, “Crime, violence and drug use go hand in hand. Six times as many homicides are committed by people under the influence of drugs, as by those who are looking for money to buy drugs. Most drug crimes aren’t committed by people trying to pay for drugs; they’re committed by people on drugs.”[1] [1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Summary of the Top Ten Facts on Legalization’, 2010, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/index.html
Drugs are dangerous, and the governement should discourage its use

Many things that can be dangerous are legal, from drugs such as alcohol, to activities such as skydiving, or even rugby. However, millions of people are able to drink or play sports without harming themselves or society. It would seem draconian and extremely paternalistic for the government to ban everything that has the potential to be dangerous; instead, they should educate people about the dangers, but trust them to make decisions about their own lives. The State has no authority to force its own morality on the general populace unless these drugs can be proven to harm others. The State is the facilitator of the voters’ desires in a democracy. So, a State enforced, morality goes against the obligations of the State to its people.
Prohibition does not work; instead, it glamorizes drugs

Those who want to use drugs will take them whether they are legal or not – and more are doing so than ever before. In 1970 there was something like 1,000 problematic drug users in the UK, now there are over 250,000.[1] Legalization will also remove the glamour which surrounds an underground activity and so make drug use less attractive to impressionable teenagers. For example, statistics suggest that cannabis use in the UK declined after its classification was lowered from ‘B’ to ‘C’.[2] [1] Home Affairs Select Committee, ‘The Government’s Drug Policy: Is It Working?’, parliament.uk, 22 May 2002, http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm200102/cmselect/c... [2] Travis, Alan, ‘Cannabis use down since legal change’, The Guardian,   26th October 2007, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/oct/26/drugsandalcohol.homeaffairs
Legalisation reduces crime

The illegality of drugs fuels a huge amount of crime that could be eliminated if drugs were legalised. Price controls would mean that addicts would no longer have to steal to fund their habits, and a state-provided drug services would put dealers out of business, starving criminal gangs of their main source of funding. For example, an Italian Mafia family were making around $44bn a year from cocaine smuggling. [1] This represents something like 3% of Italy’s entire GDP – and that from only one crime syndicate. [1] Kington, Tom, ‘Italian police raids reveal how an 80-year-old gangster held sway over the feared Calabrian mafia’, The Observer, 18 July 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/18/ndrangheta-mafia-italy-police
The law is hypocritical

In most countries where drugs are illegal, tobacco and alcohol, which arguably have equally devastating consequences in society, are legal. In a UK study, alcohol was shown to have the worst effects of any drug, yet the current law recognises that people should be able to choose whether they drink or not.[1] The same should be true of drugs. [1] Professor David Nutt, ‘Drug Harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis’, The Lancet, Vol 376, Issue 9752, pp. 1558-1565, 6th November 2010, http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2810%2961...
Drugs are dangerous, and the governement should discourage its use

The government has a responsibility to protect its citizens; if a substance will do people and society significant harm, then that substance should be banned.  There is no such thing as a safe form of a drug. Legalization can only make drugs purer, and therefore perhaps more deadly and addictive. Many illegal drugs are closely related to potentially dangerous medicines, whose prescription is tightly restricted to trained professionals, but the proposition would effectively be allowing anyone to take anything they wished regardless of the known medical dangers. However entrenched in modern culture drugs may be, legalising them will only make them appear more acceptable. The state has a duty to send out the right message, and its health campaigns will be fundamentally undermined by the suggestion that drugs are harmless, which is what will be understood from their legalisation – just like when cannabis was downgraded in the UK.
People should be free to take drugs

This point makes the assumption that drug use only affects the individual concerned; in reality, drug usage can have a significant effect on people close to the user, as well as wider society. People who can be affected include family who have to care for a user and victims of drug-related crimes. In addition, in countries with welfare states, there is an additional significant societal cost as many drug users cannot hold down jobs.[1] Studies in the USA have shown that parents often put their need for drugs above the wellbeing of their children.[2] This being the case, it is clear that the harms of drugs far outweigh governmental duty to protect individual freedoms. Furthermore, doing drugs may be a free choice at first, but after a certain period the drug user is no longer to choose for himself/herself because addiction overruns their judgement. [1] BBC News, ‘Drugs cost society £18.8bn’, 12 February 2002,   http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1816215.stm [2] National Drug Intelligence Center, ‘The Impact of Drugs on Society’, National Drug Threat Assessment 2006, January 2006, http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs11/18862/impact.htm
Drugs are safer when legal

Part of the reason that drugs are illegal is because of the health ramifications, which exist even if a drug is pure. To give a brief summary of some health harms that come from unadulterated drugs:  “Cocaine can cause such long-term problems as tremors, seizures, psychosis, and heart or respiratory failure. Marijuana and hashish can cause rapid heart rate and memory impairment soon after use. Long-term effects include cognitive problems, infertility, weakened immune system, and possible lung damage. Narcotics such as heroin can bring on respiratory and circulatory depression, dizziness, impotence, constipation, and withdrawal sickness. Overdoses can lead to seizures and death.” [1] [1] Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies, ‘Effects of Alcohol and Drugs on your Health’, University of North Carolina, http://www.med.unc.edu/alcohol/prevention/health.html
Legal drugs would increase tax revenue

If the state is to make money from taxing drugs, this undercuts the (supposed) advantages of lower-priced drugs and will just encourage a black market to continue. In the UK, there is large black market for tobacco; it is suspected that tax has not been paid on 21% of cigarettes and 58% of hand rolling tobacco consumed.[1]  Furthermore, for the state to take revenue from this practise is morally wrong, whatever use the money is put to. The point of drug treatment is to help abusers off drugs, but under the proposition’s system the state would have a financial interest in prolonging addiction. [1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tobacco Smuggling and Crossborder Shopping’, http://www.the-tma.org.uk/policy-legislation/tobacco-smuggling-crossbord...
More people will take drugs if they are legal

When drugs are illegal, this does not stop people from using them.  A Canadian report on the matter concluded, "The licit or illicit status of substances has little impact on their use."[1] In addition, even though drugs are illegal, it is not hard to access them. In a Spanish survey, 92.9% of Spanish students said that it was very easy to access illegal drugs – even though only 11.6% used cannabis, which was the most used.[2] Even using the survey quoted by opposition, it is clear that the majority of people surveyed did not view the illegality of cannabis as a reason not to use it. [1] Parliament of Canada House of Commons, Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs, report issued November, 2002, http://www.parl.gc.ca/committeebusiness/StudyActivityHome.aspx?Cmte=SNUD&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=37&Ses=2&Stac=626199 [2] Eurocare, ‘92.9 % of Spanish students say that access to drugs is very easy’, 26 March 2010, http://www.eurocare.org/library/latest_news/92_9_of_spanish_students_say...
People should be free to take drugs

Individuals are sovereign over their own bodies, and should be free to make choices which affect them and not other individuals. Since the pleasure gained from drugs and the extent to which this weighs against potential risks is fundamentally subjective, it is not up to the state to legislate in this area. Rather than pouring wasted resources into attempting to suppress drug use, the state would be better off running information campaigns to educate people about the risks and consequences of taking different types of drugs.
Austerity is creating a cycle of decline

Arguing that austerity will lead to a cycle of decline due to less demand ignores the role of the markets and their concerns with the state’s debt burden. The UK has only managed to hold on to its triple A credit rating (the best possible rating that can be given to a borrower’s debts, meaning lower interest rates)[1] due to austerity.[2] European countries that have not convinced the markets that they take the debt threat seriously such as France have had their ratings hit and have had to pay more to finance their government debt. Spending more on something as economically inefficient as social support would be a bad way to stimulate the economy as it will not be helping future growth. Moreover it is far from certain people really would spend more if they know there is a welfare net as most people will realise that if the government is to spend more they will also need more taxes at some point to pay for that spending. Why would consumers spend more now even if there is a bigger social security net if they think they will also have more money taken from them to pay for this net?[3] [1] ‘Financial glossary’, BBC News, 13 October 2011. [2] Stewart, Heather, ‘UK credit rating reaffirmed by S&P’, guardian.co.uk, 13 April 2012. [3] Barro, Robgert J., ‘The Ricardian Approach to Budget Deficits’, The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol.3 No.2, Spring 1989, pp.37-54, p.38.