College Republicans the losers in Rhea Miller debate

February 25, 2008 —

The College Republicans and the Organization for Progressive Politics (OPP) had a policy debate last Tuesday in the Rhea Miller Recital Hall. The debate focused on three major political issues: immigration, health care, and the environment; and each organization fielded a student to debate each issue. I thought the OPP won.

I felt that the College Republicans held a tremendous advantage. True conservatism should always beat liberalism when the two collide, but the Republicans failed to hit some of the floaters that were pitched by OPP out of the park, and as a result, they seemed unprepared and unintelligent in their responses. That was the tale for both sides as each organization opened themselves up for stinging rebuttals. But no one capitalized on those opportunities.

I thought Holly Champagne, a political science senior, was the best debater of the night, not so much for her stances as for her poise and demeanor. Her thoughts were clearly conveyed and her answers rang more like a conversation with the audience than the seemingly scripted and robotic responses from most of the other performers.

The first issue of the debate was immigration. Political science and French sophomore Bridget Sobek of the College Republicans faced off against English junior James Gault of OPP. Both sides of the stage started with the typical conservative-liberal rhetoric and talking points along with Gault's numerous pleas to "put it all in perspective." He spoke eloquently and fluently, but he frequently ran off-topic. Sobek was very robotic. It seemed to me that she was answering from a script, especially when her answer had nothing to do with the question.

The big issue that was never raised: a path to citizenship for illegal aliens. This could have swayed the debate over to the Republican side. However, among all the talk about border fences and "perspectives," Sobek failed to address the concern of a path to citizenship for illegals, which is crucial to the conservative position on immigration. Score: Tie.

The next issue of the night was health care. This debate pitted Champagne against political science junior Matt Chisholm. Chisholm was doomed from the start, with a particularly unconvincing speech against the constitutionality of a federal health care system.

The big issue that was never raised: how socialized medicine takes away from the responsible and rewards the unprepared. Falling right into the theme of the evening, Chisholm failed to address universal health care as a whole.

Health care, like everything else, costs money. If you have no money, you have no health care (children, I believe, do not have the capability of providing for themselves, and should be universally covered). It should not be my responsibility to pay for my neighbor's health care. What's next? Paying for his new shiny red sports car? Score: Win for Champagne.

I found the last debate of the night hard to watch. Focusing on the environment, the debaters were political science sophomore Aaron Bayliss, former president of the College Republicans, and political science freshman Kirsten Whitlock. This debate was the case of one side being as ridiculous with their policy stances as the other side was with answering questions. Bayliss vacillated his way to one of the most notable statements of the night when he expalined the warming of the Great Lakes by saying that warm water takes longer to freeze. I know, I know, I didn't understand it either.

The only thing that made up for Bayliss' answers was Whitlock's position on the issue, calling climate change a "crisis" and presenting Al Gore as a pseudo-god. But again, the big issue that was never raised: Whether or not global warming is man-made.

No one denies global warming exists. That's not the debate anymore, the big question is if it's natural or not. The term "climate change" is redundant. Climate changes, that's the very definition of climate. No amount of carbon restrictions will change that. Score: Tie.

I felt that overall, OPP won the debate.