Education/Jobs Affirmative: Northwestern Markoff, Mehta, Astead, Kostrinsky Education/Jobs Aff Wave One

Northwestern Markoff, Mehta, Astead, Kostrinsky
Education/Jobs Aff Wave One
Education/Jobs Affirmative
**1AC
1AC – Plan Text..............................................................................3
1AC – Inherency..............................................................................4
1AC – Inherency..............................................................................5
1AC – Economy..............................................................................6
1AC – Economy..............................................................................7
1AC – Economy..............................................................................8
1AC – Economy..............................................................................9
1AC – Economy............................................................................10
1AC – CTE....................................................................................11
1AC – CTE....................................................................................12
1AC – CTE....................................................................................13
1AC – CTE....................................................................................14
1AC – CTE....................................................................................15
1AC – CTE....................................................................................16
1AC – CTE....................................................................................17
1AC – CTE....................................................................................18
1AC – CTE....................................................................................19
1AC – Defense-Industrial Base.....................................................20
1AC – Space..................................................................................25
1AC – Space..................................................................................26
1AC – Space..................................................................................27
1AC – Space..................................................................................28
1AC – Space..................................................................................29
1AC – Space..................................................................................30
1AC – Solvency.............................................................................31
1AC – Solvency.............................................................................32
**Economy
Economy – Ext: No Jobs  Protectionism...................................33
Economy – Protectionism Uniqueness..........................................34
Economy – AT: Buy America  Protectionism...........................35
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Chinese Econ.........................36
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Japanese Econ [1/2]...............37
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Japanese Econ [2/2]...............38
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Environment [1/2]..................39
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Environment [2/2]..................40
Economy – Protectionism Impact: EU Relations [1/2].................41
Economy – Protectionism Impact: EU Relations [2/2].................42
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Laundry List...........................43
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Economy................................44
Economy – Protectionism Impact: Wars.......................................47
Economy – Ext: Education Solves Econ.......................................48
Economy – 2AC War Add-on.......................................................49
Peace through superior firepower. / 1

**CTE
CTE – Ext: NCLB Kills CTE........................................................50
CTE – 2AC Agriculture Add-on...................................................51
CTE – 2AC Internet Add-on [1/2].................................................52
CTE – 2AC Internet Add-on [2/2].................................................53
CTE – Internet Add-on (Freedom of Speech !).............................54
CTE – Internet Add-on (Poverty !)................................................57
CTE – 2AC Manufacturing Add-on [1/2].....................................58
CTE – 2AC Manufacturing Add-on [2/2].....................................59
CTE – 2AC Nanotech Add-on.......................................................60
CTE – 2AC Science Diplomacy Add-on [1/2]..............................61
CTE – 2AC Science Diplomacy Add-on [2/2]..............................62
CTE – Green Jobs: 2AC Venture Capital Add-on........................63
CTE – Green Jobs: 2AC Oil Shocks Add-on................................64
CTE – Green Jobs: Ext- Job Shortages.........................................65
CTE – Green Jobs: Ext- Chemical Industry Impact......................66
**Defense-Industrial Base
Defense-Industrial Base – Ext: Education Key to DIB.................67
Defense-Industrial Base – Ext: Nat. Standards Key to DIB..........68
Defense-Industrial Base – 2AC Sino-Indian War Add-on [1/2]. . .69
Defense-Industrial Base – 2AC Sino-Indian War Add-on [2/2]. . .70
Defense-Industrial Base – 2AC Competitiveness Add-on............71
Defense-Industrial Base – Competitiveness Key to Heg...............72
Defense-Industrial Base – Education Key to Competitiveness.....73
Defense-Industrial Base – Education Key to Competitiveness.....74
**Solvency
Solvency – Ext: Putting CTE in NCLB Solves.............................75
Solvency – Ext: National Standards Good....................................76
Solvency – Ext: National Standards Good....................................77
Solvency – Title I Key...................................................................78
Solvency – Ext: Poverty Key.........................................................79
Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Moral Obligation..........................80
Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Poverty Add-on............................81
Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Segregation Add-on.....................82
Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Dropouts Add-on.........................83
**No Child Left Behind

NCLB Bad – Race to the Bottom..................................................84
NCLB Bad – Low-Income Schools...............................................85
NCLB Bad – High-Stakes.............................................................86
NCLB Bad – AT: Doesn’t Hurt Everyone....................................87
NCLB Bad – AT: Tests Prove it’s Good.......................................88
NCLB Bad – AT: NAEP Worse....................................................89
**2AC -- Case Arguments

AT: Status Quo Solves (NGA)......................................................90
AT: Status Quo Solves (DOE Grants)...........................................91

AT: Teachers Unions Bad.............................................................92

AT: Teachers Unions Bad.............................................................93
**2AC -- Counterplans
AT: States......................................................................................94
AT: States......................................................................................95
AT: States......................................................................................96
AT: States – Standards Key...........................................................97
AT: States – Uniformity Fails.......................................................98
AT: States – Can’t Solves CTE.....................................................99
AT: States – Spending DA..........................................................100
AT: States – Trade-off DA..........................................................101
AT: States – Cali Econ DA..........................................................102
AT: States – AT: Deficit Spending..............................................103
AT: States – Evolution DA [1/2].................................................104
AT: States – Evolution DA [2/2].................................................105
Ext: Texas Spills Over.................................................................106
AT: States – Links to Politics......................................................107
AT: Repeal NCLB CP.................................................................108
AT: Higher Education CP............................................................109
AT: Liberal Arts CP....................................................................110
**2AC -- Disads
AT: Disads...................................................................................111
AT: Recruitment Trade-off DA...................................................112
Plan Popular – Teachers Unions..................................................113
Plan Popular – Ext: Teachers Unions Like Plan..........................114
Plan Popular – Ext: Teachers Unions Key to Agenda.................115
Plan Popular – Moderate Democrats...........................................116
Plan Popular – AT: Link Turns...................................................117
Plan Popular – AT: Historical Examples.....................................118
Plan Unpopular............................................................................119
Plan Unpopular – Political Capital..............................................120
Plan Unpopular – AT: Link Turns...............................................121
**2AC -- Topicality
2AC Layne Thumper [1/5]..........................................................122
2AC Layne Thumper [2/5]..........................................................123
2AC Layne Thumper [3/5]..........................................................124
2AC Layne Thumper [4/5]..........................................................125
2AC Layne Thumper [5/5]..........................................................126
**Random Fun
Neg Bonus – Nuclear War Outweighs Education.......................127

1AC – Plan Text

Plan: The United States federal government should increase need-based allocations under Title I of
the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 to include uniform proficiency standards for science,
technology, engineering, and mathematics through career and technical education programs.

1AC – Inherency
Contention : Inherency
Stimulus increased Title I education funding – but it’s not targeted towards low-income schools
Cohen 1/29 (Jennifer, Writer, New America Foundation, Ed Money Watch, http://www.newamerica.net/blog/ed-
money-watch/2009/closer-look-title-i-stimulus-spending-9747)
Yesterday we took a look at total stimulus funding per student as estimated by the House Education and Labor
Committee's stimulus allocation data. Today, we will take a closer look at the estimated 2009 Title I funding
distributions per poor student in each state and the District of Columbia (Puerto Rico is not included in Census
estimates). Title I stimulus distribution is expected to be the same in 2009 and 2010. To the untrained eye, Title I
stimulus funding appears to be allocated randomly, with little connection to student poverty levels. According to the
House stimulus bill, distribution of stimulus Title I funds will be channeled through two Title I funding formulas: 50
percent through Targeted Grants and 50 percent through Education Finance Incentive Grants (EFIGs). Both of these
formulas target funds based on the number of poor students in a state or district as measured by the census. We used
2007 census data for our analysis.
Our analysis suggests that Wyoming is expected to receive the most stimulus funding per poor student at $1,493.
This is unexpected given that Wyoming ranks fairly low in terms of percent of students living in poverty - 43rd out
of 51 at 10.8 percent. As might be expected, Utah appears slated to receive the least Title I stimulus funding per
poor student at $428. Utah has 10.2 percent of students in poverty and ranks 47 th out of 51 on that indicator. Even
though Utah and Wyoming have similar percentages of students living in poverty, their Title I stimulus allocations
differ dramatically. Mississippi has the most students living in poverty (27.2 percent) of the 50 states and the District
of Columbia. However, it is only expected to receive $503 dollars in Title I funding per poor student via the
stimulus. New Hampshire, the state with the smallest number of students living in poverty , 7.9 percent, is expected
to receive $1,002 in Title I funds per poor student.
These findings show that current allocations do not effectively target states with the largest impoverished
populations. In fact, of the 10 states expected to receive the most Title I stimulus funding per poor student, only
two of them, DC and New York, rank in the top 25 states in terms of student poverty. The District of Columbia
ranks third in terms of student population living in poverty at 24.8 percent and New York ranks 14 th with 18.3
percent. Conversely, of the ten states expected to receive the least Title I stimulus funding per student, six of them
are in the top 25 states in terms of student poverty - Arizona, Mississippi, Arkansas, Alabama, Oklahoma, and
Tennessee.
The lack of continuity between projected Title I stimulus funding per poor student and percent of students living in
poverty can in some part be attributed to the complicated formulas used to calculate the Title I distributions. Grant
allocations are skewed by small state minimums, hold harmless amounts, and state expenditure factors.
Furthermore, the Targeted Grant formula uses poverty weights to provide more money to districts with larger
impoverished populations. The Targeted formula allocates dollars based on either the actual number of poor
students or the proportion of poor students, depending on which results in a higher weighting. As a result, it favors
states with many small districts that educate a large proportion of poor students or states with large districts but
relatively small proportions of poor students. (..) Although Louisiana ranked 29 th in per poor student funding in the
stimulus allocation with $593, it would rank 41 st with $531 per poor student using 100% EFIG. Nevada would
move from 33rd ($564 per poor student) to 46th ($505 per poor student) in per poor student funding.
These outcomes for the Title I stimulus allocations are unexpected. Funds should flow to states and districts with
the neediest populations. Instead, allocations are the result of complicated Title I funding formulas that don't appear
to do a great job of providing the maximum benefit to states with large impoverished populations. Admittedly, $13
billion in Title I funds is a small part of the total pot of stimulus funding (as much as $140 billion) aimed for
education, but its sole purpose is to improve educational opportunities and outcomes for poor students. We hope
that the final stimulus bill enables those funds to do just that.

1AC – Inherency
No Child Left Behind creates a patchwork of state standards for proficiency causing overall
education to stagnate
Quaid, 9 – Staff Writer, Washington Times (Libby, 2/20, “Academic standards vary by state, U.S. study finds,”
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/feb/20/academic-standards-vary-by-state-us-study-finds/)
Some schools deemed to be failing in one state would get passing grades in another under the No Child Left Behind
law, a national study found.
The study underscores wide variation in academic standards from state to state. It was issued Thursday by the
Thomas B. Fordham Institute, which conducted the study with the Kingsbury Center at the Northwest Evaluation
Association.
The study comes as the Obama administration indicates it will encourage states to adopt common standards, an often
controversial issue on which previous presidents have trod lightly.
"I know that talking about standards can make people nervous," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said recently.
"But the notion that we have 50 different goal posts doesn't make sense ," he said. "A high school diploma needs to
mean something, no matter where it's from."
Every state, he said, needs standards that make children college- and career-ready and are benchmarked against
international standards.
The Fordham study measured test scores of 36 elementary and middle schools against accountability rules in 28
states.
It found the schools failed to meet yearly progress goals in states with more rigorous standards , such as
Massachusetts. But they met yearly progress goals in states with lower standards, such as Arizona and Wisconsin.
Under No Child Left Behind, states have a patchwork of rules that vary from state to state, the study found.
No Child Left Behind is misleading, said Chester E. Finn Jr., president of the nonprofit Fordham Foundation.
"It misleads people into thinking that we have a semblance of a national accountability system for public schools,
and we actually don't," he said. "And it's produced results I would call unfair from one state to the next."

1AC – Economy
Contention : The Economy
No Child Left Behind is destroying focus on STEM education – overvalues ELA

McMurrer, 8 - Head Research Associate @ Center on Education Policy
(Jennifer, “Instructional Time in Elementary Schools, A Closer Look at Changes for Specific Subjects,” February,
http://www.cep-dc.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=document.showDocumentByID&nodeID=1&DocumentID=234)
As part of an ongoing study of the impact of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), the Center on Education
Policy (CEP) conducted a deeper analysis of 2006-07 survey data first reported in July 2007 on the amount of
instructional time devoted to specific subjects. Here is what we learned about the magnitude of changes in
instructional time in elementary schools from districts that reported increases or decreases in time for certain
subjects since NCLB took effect in 2002:
􏰀 The shifts in instructional time toward English language arts (ELA) and mathematics and away from other
subjects were relatively large in a majority of school districts that made these types of increases and decreases.
Districts that increased instructional time for ELA and/or math did so by 43%, on average. Districts that also
reduced instructional time in other subjects reported total reductions of 32%, on average. Eight out of ten districts
that reported increasing time for ELA did so by at least 75 minutes per week , and more than half (54%) did so by
150 minutes or more per week. Among districts that reported adding time for math, 63% added at least 75 minutes
per week, and 19% added 150 minutes or more per week.
􏰀 Most districts that increased time for ELA or math also reported substantial cuts in time for other subjects or
periods, including social studies, science, art and music, physical education, recess, or lunch.
􏰀 Among the districts that reported both increasing time for ELA or math and reducing time in other subjects,
72% indicated that they reduced time by a total of at least 75 minutes per week for one or more of these other
subjects. For example, more than half (53%) of these districts cut instructional time by at least 75 minutes per
week in social studies, and the same percentage (53%) cut time by at least 75 minutes per week in science.
These approaches will fail – science, tech, engineering, and math education are key to job growth
and the economy
Paulus, 9 – Professor @ North Hennepin Community College (Dr. Eugenia, “STEM Education,” The Star Tribune,
http://www.startribune.com/yourvoices/42109707.html?
elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O:DW3ckUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUdcOy9cP3DieyckcUsI)
STEM is the acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. Among the disciplines that the
National Science Foundation includes under STEM are engineering, mathematics, agricultural sciences, biological
sciences, physical sciences, psychology, economics and other natural and social/behavioral sciences, computer
science, earth, atmospheric and ocean sciences.
If you are an educator in science like me, brace yourself for what you will find if you look for data on science
education in America collected during the past few years. By the time U.S. students reach their senior year of high
school, they rank below their counterparts in 17 other countries in math and science literacy, according to the Third
International Mathematics and Science Study, the largest international study of scientific achievement ever
conducted. In physics, U.S. high school seniors scored last among 16 countries tested. The depressing reality is that
when it comes to educating the next generation in these subjects, America is no longer a world contender. In fact,
U.S. students have fallen far behind their competitors in much of Western Europe and in advanced Asian nations
like Japan, India, China and South Korea. Most high school graduates are not adequately prepared for college-level
science courses. It is reported that just 26% of the 2003 high school graduates scored high enough on the ACT
science test to have a good chance of completing a first-year college science course. That's one reason why
enrollments of U.S. students in science and engineering majors have been flat or declining-even as the demand for
these skills increases. The U.S. now ranks below 13 other countries in the percentage of 24-year olds with a college
degree in these subjects, down from third place 25 years ago. You don't have to be a scientist to recognize that the
status quo is a recipe for big trouble.
This trend has disturbing implications , not just for the future of American technological leadership, but for the
broader economy. Already, there is a shortage of highly-skilled workers and a surplus of lesser-skilled workers.

This is creating an imbalance between the supply of such workers and the burgeoning demand for them, placing the

1AC – Economy
[Paulus Continues, no text omitted]
future of the U.S. science and engineering workforce in peril. Until recently, America has compensated for its
failure to adequately educate the next generation by importing brainpower. In 2000, a stunning 38% of U.S. jobs
requiring a PhD in science and technology were filled by people who were born abroad, up from 24% in 1990.
Similarly, doctoral positions and graduate programs in science at the nation's leading universities are often filled
with foreign students. However, as the global competition for science and engineering talent is intensifying, the
United States may not be able to rely on the international market to meet its needs. As globalization accelerates,
bright young Indian or Chinese scientists may well have better opportunities at home than in the U.S. The
consequences of this could be enormous. Because the quality of a nation's workforce has such a huge influence on
productivity, effective school reform could easily stimulate the economy more than conventional strategies , such as
Bush tax cuts. Consider what would happen if the U.S. could raise the performance of its high school students in
math and science to the levels of Western Europe within a decade. According to the Eric A. Hanushek, a senior
fellow at the Hoover Institution in Stanford University, U.S. gross domestic product would then be 4% higher than
otherwise by 2025 and 10% higher in 30 years. That may not sound like much. But Hanushek figures that the 4%
annual increase alone would be enough to offset the entire cost of America's public K-12 school system for the same
year. Improving the teaching and learning of mathematics and science in U.S. schools is vital to maintaining
America's global leadership.
Market downturns combined with job losses to foreigners is creating momentum towards
protectionism
McCormick, 8 – former Under Secretary for International Affairs within the United States Department of the
Treasury, Previously served as Deputy National Security Advisor to the President for International Economic
Affairs (David H., "Looking Past Today: Staying Competitive in a Changing Global Economy"
http://www.ustreas.gov/press/releases/hp1004.htm)
Unfortunately, the recent market developments have contributed to a climate of increased distrust and anxiety
among Americans that is fueling support for protectionist policies. This is partially due to concerns created by the
economic downturn, but it is also the result of a broad-based transformation underway across regions and within all
sectors of our economy. International competition from free trade, as an example, appears threatening to
Americans already skeptical about the overall benefits of globalization. A recent Pew Research Center poll found
that 48 percent of Americans see free trade agreements as a bad thing for the country, and only 30 percent seeing
them as a good thing. This message has reached Capitol Hill, where there is reluctance to pass the Colombia Trade
Promotion Agreement, despite its clear benefits to the United States and Colombia. We also see protectionist
rhetoric particularly pronounced in this political year where the benefits of trade are being openly questioned by
individuals from across the political spectrum. Many Americans are also fearful about the implications of foreign
investment. In the wake of September 11th, concerns about national security have led Congress and the public to
take a careful look at investment from outside our borders. The Dubai Ports World case epitomizes this concern, as
do the frequent headlines about investment by sovereign wealth funds. And it is not just in the United States. Many
countries are now considering further restrictions on foreign investment in certain sectors of their economies, and
are also considering limits to sovereign wealth fund investment. In an increasingly globalized world, some countries
seem resolved that the only sure protection is the rejection of foreign capital. While some investments may pose
genuine national security concerns, broader restrictions on foreign direct investment, whether explicit or implicit,
also pose serious economic risks. Finally, we also see Americans increasingly concerned about competing for jobs
against people from around the world. Talent is the most important commodity in the global marketplace and ever
more fungible as advanced technology makes borders less relevant. U.S. companies are global leaders in a variety of
industries, and to maintain or improve their global leadership position they have to hire the best talent , wherever that
talent may be. And their U.S. employees benefit as these companies maintain their competitive edge and grow. But
this is a difficult reality for many Americans to accept.

1AC – Economy
Protectionist momentum in the context of jobs collapses the economy and causes trade wars
Malkiel, 2/5 – professor of economics at Princeton University
(Burton G., "Congress Wants a Trade War" http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123380102867150621.html)
As the world-wide recession deepens, protectionist sentiments are rising. The House of Representatives' version
of the economic stimulus bill contains a provision that only American-made steel and other products be used for the
infrastructure projects. Wrapped in the cloak of "Buy American" patriotism, the Senate version of the bill contains
even stronger anti-free-trade provisions. This Buy American momentum is bad economics, and by threatening to
destabilize trade and capital flows, it risks turning a global recession into a 1930s-style depression. Asked about
Buy American on Tuesday, President Barack Obama told Fox News that "we can't send a protectionist message." He
said on ABC News that he doesn't want anything in the stimulus bill that is "going to trigger a trade war." He's right.
Suppose that we did not allow free trade between the 50 American states. Citizens like me in New Jersey would be
far worse off if we could not buy pineapples from Hawaii, wine and vegetables from California, wheat from Kansas,
and oil from Texas and Louisiana while we sell pharmaceuticals to the rest of the country. The specialization that
trade makes possible allows all of us to live better. The situation is the same with respect to world trade. Both we
and the Chinese are better off if we can import inexpensive clothing from China and sell them large-scale computers
and data storage equipment. To be sure, such trade does not make everyone better off, and that is why free trade is
often a tough sell, especially during times of hardship. If I am a textile worker whose job is lost because Chinese
imports have caused my factory to close, I feel the pain far more acutely than consumers feel the benefits of cheap
clothing. The pain tends to be localized while the benefits are spread broadly. No one person's benefit can compare
with the loss felt by the textile worker. But the total benefits do exceed the costs. And competitive markets have
spurred the innovation revolution that has made the U.S. the economic powerhouse that it is. The solution for the
displaced worker is job retraining and adjustment assistance, and to improve the safety net available to displaced
workers during the transition period. We also need to revamp our educational system so that it prepares workers for
the jobs that are available today -- and imparts the flexible skills that make our citizens ready for the future jobs that
we cannot even imagine. Buy American provisions invite retaliation by other nations, and the spread of "beggar
thy neighbor" policies throughout the world. This House provision caused a palpable anxiety during the recent
World Economic Forum at Davos, and America's closest allies are furious. "Buy American" would effectively ban
Canadian steel products and other raw materials from infrastructure projects receiving stimulus funds. Foreign steel
would only be allowed if domestic products were either unavailable or drove up the cost of the project by 25% or
more. If the provision is not diluted, Mr. Obama will find a very hostile reception during his first international trip to
Canada later this month. Hostility has been no less evident in Europe and China. The European Union has said that
it will not stand by idly if the U.S. violates its trade agreements and its obligations to the World Trade Organization.
The risks of retaliation and a trade war are very real. Since the U.S. is the biggest exporter in the world,
retaliation could cost America more jobs than the provision would create. It could also destabilize the global capital
flows on which the U.S. depends to fund its deficits. Moreover, the provision could delay some shovel-ready
infrastructure projects, since sufficient American-made materials may not be immediately available. The U.S. does
not manufacture enough steel to meet domestic demand. In 1930, just as the world economy was sinking as it is
today, the U.S. Congress passed the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which essentially shut off imports into the U.S. Our
trading partners retaliated, and world trade plummeted. Most economic historians now conclude that the tariff
contributed importantly to the severity of the world-wide Great Depression. Later, as one of his last acts, President
Herbert Hoover made the situation even worse by signing a "Buy America Act" requiring all federal government
projects to use American materials. (That act is still on the books although it was weakened during the 1980s.) We
must avoid repeating the disastrous mistakes of the past. Buy American provisions and other forms of
protectionism will destroy jobs, not create them. They are an irresponsible and self-defeating response to a
downturn in world economic activity. Beggar-thy-neighbor policies create more beggars and hostile neighbors. Let's
hope that President Obama presses his Democratic colleagues in Congress to listen to him, and to British Prime
Minister and Labour Party head Gordon Brown. As Mr. Brown put it at Davos, "Protectionism protects nobody,
least of all the poor."

1AC – Economy
Protectionism escalates and causes nuclear exchange
Garten, 9 – professor at the Yale School of Management and chairman of Garten Rothkopf, a global advisory firm
(Jeffrey E, The Dangers of Turning Inward, Truth About Trade & Technology, 3-3-09,
http://www.truthabouttrade.org/content/view/13454/54/lang,en/)
The point is, economic nationalism, with its implicit autarchic and save-yourself character, embodies exactly the
wrong spirit and runs in precisely the wrong direction from the global system that will be necessary to create the
future we all want.
As happened in the 1930s, economic nationalism is also sure to poison geopolitics. Governments under economic
pressure have far fewer resources to take care of their citizens and to deal with rising anger and social tensions.
Whether or not they are democracies, their tenure can be threatened by popular resentment. The temptation for
governments to whip up enthusiasm for something that distracts citizens from their economic woes -- a war or a
jihad against unpopular minorities, for example -- is great. That's not all. As an economically enfeebled South Korea
withdraws foreign aid from North Korea, could we see an even more irrational activity from Pyongyang? As the
Pakistani economy goes into the tank, will the government be more likely to compromise with terrorists to alleviate
at least one source of pressure? As Ukraine strains under the weight of an IMF bailout, is a civil war with Cold War
overtones between Europe and Russia be in the cards?
And beyond all that, how will economically embattled and inward-looking governments be able to deal with the
critical issues that need global resolution such as control of nuclear weapons, or a treaty to manage climate change,
or help to the hundreds of millions of people who are now falling back into poverty?
Incorporating vocational training into high schools stops the slide toward protectionism
Furchtgott-Roth, 7 – senior fellow and director of Hudson Institute's Center for Employment Policy. She is the
former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor (Diana, "Adjusting to Free Trade"
http://www.hudson.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=publication_details&id=5285&pubType=Trd)
In addition to workforce training, America needs to take a fundamental look at its education system. We need to
reduce our high-school dropout rates—by incorporating vocational training , if necessary—and encourage young
people to get as much education as possible. This prepares them for a succession of careers, rather than just one, and
enables them to change jobs more easily. Such changes, many of which have repeatedly been proposed by President
Bush and rejected by Congress, would mitigate the negative impacts of free trade on the small pool of affected
workers. Addressing these workers’ problems would be far better for the economy, and for most other American
workers, than sliding toward protectionism.

1AC – Economy
Free trade contains all other impacts by increasing democratic independence – protectionism
results in backsliding and war
Glaeser, 9 – professor of economics at Harvard University, director of the Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston
(Edward L, “Building walls with US trading partners,” The Boston Globe, lexis)
FREE TRADE is a child of economic confidence; protectionism is pessimism's progeny. In today's fearful economic
climate, policy-makers have again cried "buy American," and embraced interventions that support domestic
producers at the expense of our trading partners. Protectionism is bad economics and worse foreign policy, for many
of our trading partners have only a tenuous link to peaceful democracy. To avoid the terrible path of the 1930s that
led to prolonged depression and global conflict, the United States must maintain its commitment to globalization.
My father was born in Berlin in 1930, at the start of an earlier global downturn, when democracy still held sway
over most of Central and Western Europe. The United States had adopted the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, setting off a
global tariff war. Between 1929 and 1934, world trade declined by two-thirds. In the dark years that followed,
thuggish dictators snuffed out nascent republics and Europe descended into the madness of war. Today as we
contemplate an international recession, it is worth remembering that worse terrors than double-digit unemployment
have stalked human history.
Few findings in social science are more robust than the fact that democracies almost never fight one another. If the
current downturn causes democracies to become dictatorships, then the probability of conflict between those places
and our own democracy will increase. Since dictators are far more likely to slaughter their own people, America
may be faced with the awful choice of military intervention or standing by and watching the deaths mount.
Democracy is bolstered by prosperity and damaged by downturns. Since the pioneering work of Martin Lipset 50
years ago, social scientists have tried to understand why democracies and wealth go together. My colleague Robert
Barro found that this link exists not because democracies increase prosperity, but because prosperity supports
democracy. The appeal of democracy's enemies increases when democracies, like the Weimar Republic, are unable
to deliver economic success.
Trade is crucial for the prosperity of the world's poorer countries , especially during a downturn. My own research
finds little connection between trade and economic growth among rich or middle-income countries, but in the
poorest places, where democracies are least stable, a 20 percent drop in the ratio of trade to GDP is associated with
per capita incomes growing by 1 percent less per year. Reductions in trade had a devastating impact on Argentina in
the 1930s, ending decades of democracy and ushering in a long period of dictatorship and political turmoil.
Free trade brings prosperity to the world's poorer countries, strengthening their transitions to democracy and making
their citizens, and us, safer. But the United States is now contemplating policies that threaten our ability to argue
that an economically connected world is stronger and safer. The Recovery Act's "Buy American" clause forbids
spending on public works "unless all of the iron, steel, and manufactured goods used in the project are produced in
the United States." That clause sends a terrible message to our trading partners.

1AC – CTE
Contention : Job Training
Green initiatives growing and demand for green jobs is inevitable – but worker shortages kill
effectiveness, technical education is key
Hyslop, 8 – Assoc Director of Public Policy @ Association for Career and Technical Education (Alisha,
http://www.acteonline.org/uploadedFiles/Publications_and_E-Media/files/files-techniques-
2009/Theme_2%281%29.pdf)
High-tech companies like Siemens, Hewlett-Packard, Apple, SunMicrosystems,6 and Subaru Isuzu Automotive7
have launched green initiatives, creating products and processes that conserve energy and resources. Americans
purchased more than 330,000 hybrid automobiles in 2007,8 and rental car companies are increasing their fleets of
hybrids as well. About 250,000 U.S. homes already have some type of solar energy system, and another 2,500
homeowners have installed their own wind turbine.9
Twenty-eight states have mandates generally requiring that up to 25 percent of their energy be obtained through
renewable sources in the next two decades.10 This should serve to further increase the demand for new products and
processes focused on generating and conserving energy.
Growing Workforce Needs
The demand for sustainability has created two parallel workforce phenomena— the development of new careers in
the green industry, such as solar panel installers and wind turbine technicians; and the “greening” of all other jobs.
From construction to business management, sustainability issues are growing very important in a number of career
pathways. A report commissioned by the American Solar Energy Society attributed 8.5 million jobs in 2006 to
renewable energy or energy efficient industries.11 As federal, state and local governments mandate or incentivize
more energy from alternative sources , the Apollo Alliance predicts that the nation could generate three to five
million more green jobs over the next 10 years.12
For example, Randall Swisher, executive director of the American Wind Energy Association, has estimated that by
2030, nearly a half-million new jobs could be created in the wind industry, in manufacturing, construction and
operation.13
These jobs are high skill, high wage and in high demand. They exist in sectors as diverse as landscaping and
automotive manufacturing. Unfortunately, there is a tremendous shortage of individuals with the necessary
skills in sustainability practices, and employers seeking more “green-collar” workers often face bleak prospects.
In many instances, while the technologies to support the sustainability industry have been or are being created, the
industry lacks the skilled workforce necessary to implement and use these technologies. To some capacity, the need
for human capital is proving to be a barrier to the continued growth and expansion in energy efficiency and
sustainability.
As the San Francisco Chronicle reported after a summit on green-collar jobs, “California’s new green tech economy
won’t get very far if the state doesn’t develop the workforce that eco-friendly businesses need.” California already
lacks enough solar panel installers, and needs more workers with experience in green building
Many jobs in green industries use the same technical skills as existing industries, but with skilled-worker shortages
in areas like engineering, manufacturing and construction technology, the new jobs often lack qualified applicants.
For example, the demand to make buildings more energy efficient increases the need for insulation workers,
carpenters, roofers, building inspectors, construction managers and electricians. 15
The sustainability industry has the power to dramatically revive employment in many areas around the country as
green-collar careers can replace the jobs of workers in areas with stagnant job growth or layoffs. However, there
must be a greater focus by policymakers and business and industry leaders on providing the training and retraining
necessary to help shape this new workforce and ensure the continued pipeline of skilled workers.
CTE Provides Solutions
Career and technical education (CTE) programs are poised and ready to ease the workforce bottleneck that
could limit job growth in sustainability and meet the need for green-collar job training across career areas. Despite
the fact that the term “sustainability” has only been around for two decades, and mainstream public interest has only
recently peaked, high-quality CTE programs already exist around the country to help prepare students for
sustainable careers.
Community and political leaders, along with local business and industries, should look to CTE programs as the
answer to this workforce challenge, and aim to invest in and expand these programs and opportunities so that even

1AC – CTE
[Hyslop Continues, no text omitted]
more students can participate. CTE programs are flexible and responsive to economic and workforce needs, placing
CTE offers early exposure to students regarding sustainable energy career options through curriculum integration,
provides the “cutting edge” training necessary to ensure future employees meet workforce pipeline needs , and sets
an example through state-of-the-art green buildings that become part of the curriculum.
Exposing Students to Green Curriculum
Today’s CTE is becoming more rigorous in response to the growing skill needs in the current economy, and at the
same time remains extremely relevant to students and their lives. Often organized around 16 career clusters, such as
“Agriculture, Food, and Natural Resources” and “Manufacturing,” with more specific programs of study that link
secondary and postsecondary coursework, CTE offers unique opportunities for students to explore career options at
the same time they are receiving the strong academic foundation necessary to succeed in the 21st century economy.
CTE has often been turned to as the answer as policymakers around the country examine ways to reform high
schools and help more students earn high school diplomas and transition to postsecondary education. It is also the
answer to ensuring that students gain the sustainability knowledge they need to be successful in whatever career they
may choose, and that students are exposed to careers in sustainability early enough to consider them as future
options.
For example, leaders of California’s State Building and Construction Trades Council think the state needs more CTE
in high schools. Jay Hansen, legislative and political director, said, “We’re not going to be able to build anything
and do any green retrofits until we have a workforce to do that.
If we wait until they’re out of high school to start training them, we’re going to lose a lot of people .”21 Hansen’s
comments point to the need to expose students to careers in green areas early in their educational experience. A
number of high schools have started to offer this type of exploration and integration of sustainability concepts.
California’s Lake Tahoe Unified School District has plans for a green academy at South Tahoe High School that
would expose students to careers in green construction, auto mechanics and technology. 22 Aiken University High
School in Cincinnati has instituted a special environmental sciences program where coursework in all subjects is
linked to environmental issues. For example, an “ECOnomics” course will combine 11th-grade economics standards
with a look at how the forces of the marketplace affect the environment. A CTE Tech Prep articulation agreement
that provides college credit will allow students to follow a clear career path to Cincinnati State University in a
variety of environmental fields.23

1AC – CTE
NCLB kills focus on science and engineering career education
Fletcher, 6 – Workforce Development and Education @ The Ohio State University
(Edward C Fletcher Jr, “No Curriculum Left Behind: The Effects of the No Child Left Behind Legislation on Career
and Technical Education,” http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/CTER/v31n3/pdf/fletcher.pdf)
It is possible that many assume the NCLB policy does not affect CTE programs because the objectives of NCLB
appear to be directed towards the core academic courses such as English, math, and science. However, anecdotal
evidence suggests otherwise. Tom Applegate, president of the ACTE, in an article by Lewis (2004), suggested that
“NCLB was ‘ squeezing career and technical education’ out of the curriculum ”; he further stated that if that is the
result “then we really shot ourselves in the foot in terms of some of our other missions in education” (¶ 7). ). In
fact, the National Assessment of Vocational Education ([NAVE], 2004) found a national .2 decline in the amount of
vocational credits earned and a 2.8 decline in the percentage of students who are occupational concentrators. Despite
the limited research on how NCLB affects CTE programs, Phelps (2002) points out that, “Career and technical
education (CTE) is not immune from the provisions of NCLB” (p. 1). Austin and Mahlman (2002) add, “In many
states CTE students are now in the same ‘high-stakes kettle’ as students in other tracks…One hypothesis is that CTE
is an area to which students with low scores or special needs are steered” (p. 5). The remainder of this manuscript
will explain the various aspects in which the NCLB policy may affect CTE programs; these aspects include CTE
teacher qualifications, the adequate yearly progress (AYP) provision, CTE school reform initiatives, and CTE
legislation objectives. Finally, this manuscript will point out various implications for CTE programs.
Absent effective CTE, green sustainability movements will collapse

Hyslop, 9 – Assoc Director of Public Policy @ Association for Career and Technical Education (Alisha, “CTE's
Role in Energy and Environmental Sustainability,” 4/1/09, http://www.allbusiness.com/labor-employment/labor-
sector-performance-labor-force/12275431-1.html)
At all levels of education, from career exploration to specific job training, CTE has an essential role to play in
energy and environmental sustainability. Without critical CTE activities providing a skilled and ready workforce,
all of the investments in new energy- efficient and sustainable technology will be for naught. Around the country,
CTE programs focused on a wide variety of green ideas and practices are now in place to ensure the continued
pipeline of skilled workers with a strong knowledge foundation. These programs should be recognized for their
leadership and expanded so that even more students can participate. Community and political leaders, along with
local businesses and industries, should look to CTE programs as the answer to the sustainability workforce
challenge.

1AC – CTE
Efficiency and renewable projects solve climate change and oil dependence
Barrett, 2 - Economic Policy Institute; J. Andrew Hoerner, Center for a Sustainable Economy; Steve Bernow and
Bill Dougherty, Tellus Institute
(James P, http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/studies_cleanenergyandjobs/)
The consumption of coal, petroleum, and natural gas has introduced a number of unintended side effects throughout
the world. Proposals to expand oil drilling may endanger sensitive natural habitats such as the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge. Coal is the nation's primary source of electricity, but is also the principal source of sulfur dioxide
that causes acid rain, atmospheric mercury, and other pollutants. Combustion of fossil fuels is the principal source of
air pollution and a number of other environmental problems. Many of these problems have been reduced through
end-of-pipe controls and other measures over recent decades. Overall air and water quality have improved by some
measures, and a number of serious environmental problems - e.g., atmospheric lead - have been virtually eliminated.
However, other problems have proven more intractable, and continued economic growth, while good in itself, can
lead to increased environmental impacts even when emissions (or other damages) per unit of output are declining.
One central example of such a problem is global warming. 5 The vast majority of the world's leading scientists now
agree that human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases - most notably carbon dioxide, a necessary by-product of
fossil fuel combustion - are trapping extra solar heat, with potentially catastrophic worldwide consequences.
Ongoing events such as the recent string of years with record-breaking average temperatures and the thinning of
glacial and polar ice make clear that this is a problem that will become increasingly urgent over time. A substantial
reduction in fossil fuel consumption will be necessary if the U.S. is to significantly curtail greenhouse gas emissions
and other environmental problems.
This report did not set any particular target or goal for emissions reduction. Instead, the goal is to assemble a
feasible, cost-effective package that achieves substantial energy savings and related environmental benefits , and
puts aggregate emissions of major pollutants, including carbon dioxide, on a downward path for every major sector
of the economy. To achieve this, the policy set examined here focuses on improvements in energy efficiency and
increased use of renewable energy resources. In addition, it encourages the substitution of fuels with lower
emissions of greenhouse gasses and other pollutants, such as natural gas, for those with higher emissions, such as
coal.
1.1.2 Improving enbergy security
It is impossible to run a modern society without substantial amounts of energy. However, in recent decades energy
prices have been extremely volatile, threatening the economic health of U.S. industries and households alike.
Reducing consumption of oil, for example, would help to avoid the periodic economic instability that arises from
fluctuations in world oil prices, which have contributed to two major U.S. recessions. In a similar vein, more
efficient use of electricity could help protect industry from the economic impacts of electricity price spikes such as
those recently seen in California.
One goal of this project was to improve national energy security, and the policy package addresses this issue in two
ways. First, we improve energy efficiency in all sectors in order to reduce the vulnerability of the economy by
cutting the share of energy purchases in total industry costs and household budgets. Second, we expand the diversity
of energy sources so that choice is increased and markets become more difficult to manipulate.

1AC – CTE
Warming causes extinction
Tickell, 8 – Environmental Researcher
(Oliver, 8/11, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/11/climatechange) [Quals Added]
We need to get prepared for four degrees of global warming, Bob Watson [PhD in Chemistry, Award for Scientific
Freedom and Responsibility from the American Association for the Advacement of Science] told the Guardian last
week. At first sight this looks like wise counsel from the climate science adviser to Defra. But the idea that we
could adapt to a 4C rise is absurd and dangerous. Global warming on this scale would be a catastrophe that
would mean, in the immortal words that Chief Seattle probably never spoke, "the end of living and the beginning
of survival" for humankind. Or perhaps the beginning of our extinction. The collapse of the polar ice caps would
become inevitable, bringing long-term sea level rises of 70-80 metres. All the world's coastal plains would be lost,
complete with ports, cities, transport and industrial infrastructure, and much of the world's most productive
farmland. The world's geography would be transformed much as it was at the end of the last ice age, when sea levels
rose by about 120 metres to create the Channel, the North Sea and Cardigan Bay out of dry land. Weather would
become extreme and unpredictable, with more frequent and severe droughts, floods and hurricanes. The Earth's
carrying capacity would be hugely reduced. Billions would undoubtedly die. Watson's call was supported by the
government's former chief scientific adviser, Sir David King [Director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the
Environment at the University of Oxford], who warned that "if we get to a four-degree rise it is quite possible that
we would begin to see a runaway increase". This is a remarkable understatement. The climate system is already
experiencing significant feedbacks, notably the summer melting of the Arctic sea ice. The more the ice melts, the
more sunshine is absorbed by the sea, and the more the Arctic warms. And as the Arctic warms, the release of
billions of tonnes of methane – a greenhouse gas 70 times stronger than carbon dioxide over 20 years – captured
under melting permafrost is already under way . To see how far this process could go, look 55.5m years to the
Palaeocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, when a global temperature increase of 6C coincided with the release of
about 5,000 gigatonnes of carbon into the atmosphere, both as CO2 and as methane from bogs and seabed
sediments. Lush subtropical forests grew in polar regions, and sea levels rose to 100m higher than today. It appears
that an initial warming pulse triggered other warming processes. Many scientists warn that this historical event
may be analogous to the present : the warming caused by human emissions could propel us towards a similar
hothouse Earth.

1AC – CTE
The warming debate is over – it’s real and caused by humans
McKibben, 9 – Environmental Studies @ Middlebury (Bill, Foreign Policy, Iss. 170, p. 32, Jan/Feb)
"Scientists Are Divided" No, they re not. In the early years of the global warming debate, there was great
controversy over whether the planet was warming, whether humans were the cause, and whether it would be a
significant problem. That debate is long since over. Although the details of future forecasts remain unclear, there's
no serious question about the general shape of what's to come . Every national academy of science , long lists of
Nobel laureates , and in recent years even the science advisors of President George W. Bush have agreed that we
are heating the planet. Indeed, there is a more thorough scientific process here than on almost any other issue:
Two decades ago, the United Nations formed the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (lPCC) and charged
its scientists with synthesizing the peer-reviewed science and developing broad-based conclusions. The reports have
found since 1995 that warming is dangerous and caused by humans. The panel's most recent report, in November
2007, found it is "very likely" (defined as more than 90 percent certain, or about as certain as science gets) that
heattrapping emissions from human activities have caused "most of the observed increase in global average
temperatures since the mid-20th century." If anything, many scientists now think that the IPCC has been too
conservative - both because member countries must sign off on the conclusions and because there's a time lag. Its
last report synthesized data from the early part of the decade, not the latest scary results, such as what we're now
seeing in the Arctic. In the summer of 2007, ice in the Arctic Ocean melted. It melts a little every summer, of course,
but this time was different - by late September, there was 25 percent less ice than ever measured before. And it
wasn't a one-time accident. By the end of the summer season in 2008, so much ice had melted that both the
Northwest and Northeast passages were open. In other words, you could circumnavigate the Arctic on open water.
The computer models, which are just a few years old, said this shouldn't have happened until sometime late in the
21st century. Even skeptics can't dispute such alarming events .
Timeframe is irrelevant – must stop irreversible chain reactions

Podesta and Ogden, 7 – *President of the Center for American Progress and ** Senior National Security Analyst
at the Center for American Progress (John and Peter, The Security Implications of Climate Change, The Washington
Quarterly 31.1, Winter 2007)
Consequently, even though the IPCC projects that temperature increases at higher latitudes will be approximately
twice the global average, it will be the developing nations in the earth's low latitudinal bands, as well as sub-Saharan
African countries, that will be most adversely affected by climate change. In the developing world, even a relatively
small climatic shift can trigger or exacerbate food shortages, water scarcity, destructive weather events, the spread
of disease, human migration, and natural resource competition. These crises are all the more dangerous because they
are interwoven and self-perpetuating: water shortages can lead to food shortages, which can lead to conflict over
remaining resources, which can drive human migration, which can create new food shortages in new regions. Once
underway, this chain reaction becomes increasingly difficult to stop. It is therefore critical that policymakers do
all they can to prevent the domino of the first major climate change consequence, whether it be food scarcity or the
outbreak of disease, from toppling. The most threatening first dominos, where they are situated, and their cascading
geopolitical implications are identified in this essay.

1AC – CTE
Oil economy causes extinction
Campbell, 99 – partner with Petroplan, a consultancy that specialises in petroleum forecasts and depletion analysis
(C.J, “The extinction of Hydrocarbon Man?” Times Higher Education Magazine
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?storyCode=160650&sectioncode=34)
The oil age is 150 years old and now just about half over. We have consumed about 820 billion barrels of the 1,800
billion readily available to us. The great social struggles of capitalism, socialism and communism that sought an
equitable reward from this abundant energy have run their course, leaving a global economy seemingly bent on
concentrating wealth. It may turn out to be virtual wealth as the fuel that drives it becomes first expensive and then
in short supply.
We are now on the cusp, as oil production peaks. Population, too, may peak not long after oil for not wholly
unrelated reasons, agriculture being heavily dependent on petroleum for synthetic nutrients and water supply.
What goes up must come down, and in the 21st century we will have to deal with the downside. It is logical for
environmentalists to predict apocalypse. Yet there is much that we could do to ameliorate the transition to a
leaner economy based on renewable energy. These two books in their different ways will help us understand our
predicament.
And, sustainability is key to maintaining a competitive chemical industry

Trainham et al, 5 (James A. Trainham III, Chairperson, COMMITTEE ON GRAND CHALLENGES FOR
SUSTAINABILITY IN THE CHEMICAL INDUSTRY under the Board on Chemical Sciences and Technology,
Sustainability in the Chemical Industry: Grand Challenges and Research Needs - A Workshop Report, pg. 54-55)
The high standard of living accorded by the availability of food, water, clothing, shelter, transportation, and
recreation, are the result of great advances in chemical and biological sciences and technology. However, the
chemical products resulting from these advances require considerable energy input or intensity.1 The U.S. energy
use constitutes about 24 percent of the global consumption of energy, 88 percent of which is derived from fossil
fuels (petroleum, coal, and natural gas combined).2 Industrial activity accounts for 33 percent of all the energy
(fossil fuels, electricity, etc.) used in the U.S. The U.S. chemical process industry (CPI) consumes nearly 25 percent
of this,3,4 or about 7.7 percent of all the energy resources used in the United States. In short, energy use in the CPI
is significant. The readily available and relatively inexpensive sources of fossil fuels that the chemical industry has
enjoyed for the last century are in part responsible for the present situation.
The implications for sustainability of the high energy use in the CPI are well documented. Similar to the discussion
in Chapter 3, these include business risks associated with the:
Increasingly higher cost of energy which is reflected in the increasing production cost of chemical products;
Uncertainties in the reliability of supply;
Impacts on global climate change from emissions of greenhouse gases (CO 2, etc.) as well as ones causing acid rain
and ground-level ozone pollution (NOx, etc.)
Competition with other industries (transportation, domestic, etc) for fossil fuel resources.
Global events in the last three decades, however, have brought the realization that fundamental changes in energy
use are necessary for continued sustainability of the chemical and allied industries. Recently, the price of a
barrel of oil reached more than $60, and is likely to continue to fluctuate, with the mean value staying substantially
above the price over the last 20 years. The price of natural gas is at an all time high in the United States, which is the
highest price in the world. This places the U.S. chemical industry at an economic competitive disadvantage. The
fourfold increase in oil prices since the mid-1990s has driven the CPI to discover energy efficient technologies that
have contributed to more useful products, reduced emissions, and improved productivity. Indeed, there are
numerous examples of real gains made by the chemical industry in addressing the high energy intensity. One
company has publicly reported5 achievements of more than 20 percent improvement in energy efficiency in a ten
year period from 1994 to 2004. However the exploration, discovery and implementation of innovative and more
energy efficient technology are, and must remain, ongoing pursuits.6

1AC – CTE
Competitive chemical industry solves extinction
ICCA, 2 (International Council of Chemical Associations), June 20, “SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND
THE CHEMICAL INDUSTRY,” online: http://www.cefic.be/position/icca/pp_ic010.htm)
The key finding of "Our Common Future", (the 1987 report of the United Nations' World Commission on
Environment and Development), is that environmental, economic and social concerns must be integrated if the
world's peoples are to advance and develop without jeopardizing the natural environment on which all life depends.
Although today we cannot define the needs of future generations, the challenge for today's leaders is to pursue
policies that will leave available an array of choices for future generations to meet their own needs.
Sustainable Development will only come about if three goals - economic, environmental and society-related - can be
reconciled. To determine the limits of acceptability and scope for action requires a set of conventions which society
at large accepts as valid.
Sustainability in economic terms means the efficient management of scarce resources as well as a prospering
industry and economy. Sustainability in the environmental sense means not placing an intolerable load on the
ecosphere and maintaining the natural basis for life. Seen from society's viewpoint, sustainability means that
human beings are the centre of concern. In view, particularly, of the population increase worldwide, there needs to
be provided as large a measure of equal opportunities, freedom, social justice and security as possible.
The chemical industry views Sustainable Development as a challenge put before all parts of society. In the advances
made in its own operations, its improved performance and in the improvements to the human condition made
through its products, the chemical industry sees cause for optimism and believes that Sustainable Development can
be the intellectual framework around which the chemical industry, other industries and other sectors of society can
reach consensus on how to improve living standards and the environment.
The main challenges facing the world include:-
* Optimizing the benefits obtained from depleting resources
* Assuring against excessive strains placed on the eco-system
* The dynamic growth of the world population
* Remedying social and economic inequalities
These are challenges on a global scale. It follows, therefore, that the attainment of Sustainable Development will call for action on the part of the
people, governments, businesses and organisations around the world. The global chemical industry has realized this challenge.
CONTRIBUTION OF THE CHEMICAL INDUSTRY TO SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
The chemical industry is a key industry. Its products and services are instrumental in meeting the needs of
mankind. It is present in all areas of life, from food and clothing, housing, communications, transport - right through
to leisure activities. In addition, it helps to solve the problems of other sectors of industry, such as the energy sector,
information technologies, environmental industries and the waste disposal sector, as examples.
Due to its size, the chemical industry is an important supplier to a broad range of downstream industries and is, as
well, a customer of a broad range of products and services from other industries. It follows, therefore, that the
chemical industry plays a major role in providing/ supporting performance improvements, research and development
progress and, last but not least, employment in other industries.
In itself, it is a large-scale provider of jobs and makes a significant contribution to wealth creation and, hence, to the
financing of both public works and the exercise of public responsibilities. Since living standards are determined to a
large degree by material considerations, it is clear that the chemical industry with its unique capabilities is in a
position to make a decisive contribution to Sustainable Development.
Commitment by the world chemical industry to the concept of Sustainable Development requires words to be transposed into company-specific
action programmes in order to provide a framework for all those working in the sector. Its "Responsible Care" initiative, self-monitoring systems
and other voluntary programmes such as Sustainable Technology (SUSTECH), Education-Industry Partnerships, Energy Efficiency Programmes
are also part of this framework. Thereby, companies are also confronted with new challenges and must act responsibly. They must take account
of the consequences of their actions upon society and future generations.
The global chemical industry believes that the key to improving the performance of the industry is both its commitment to achieving
environmentally sound Sustainable Development and improved performance and transparency. Under the concept of "Responsible Care",
chemical companies are committed, in aljl aspects of safety, health and protection of the environment, to seek continuous improvement in
performance, to educate all staff and work with customers and communities regarding product use and overall operation. Through these
efforts the industry is improving its efficiency, reducing risks to health and the environment and making better
products which, in turn, help individual and industry customers.
THE CHEMICAL INDUSTRY's LEADERSHIP IN INNOVATION
The very notion of Sustainable Development will require new approaches in a number of areas. Innovation at all
levels and in all fields of activity is the most effective instrument for ensuring that the economic, and environmental

1AC – CTE
[ICCA Continues, no text omitted]
goals, as well as those of society, are being advanced.

The chemical industry's contribution is to continue innovation of new products that meet customer needs and
manufacturing processes that reduce risks to health and the environment. This contribution is based upon the knowledge and
experience the industry has acquired from applying innovation not only to making, handling and use of chemical compounds, but also to
reprocessing, recycling and solving environmental problems. The challenge facing the chemical industry is to maximize innovation, which can
contribute to society meeting its goals for Sustainable Development.
The chemical industry is firmly convinced that leadership in innovation represents the best way of attaining Sustainable Development. For the
individual company, this means:-
* a consistent orientation towards products, technologies and solutions which offer the greatest promise for the future
* development of new integrated environmental technologies
* a close cooperation with the customers of the chemical industry
* adaptation to the conditions of global competition
* bringing the most promising products quickly on the market
* strengthening the R&D effort which requires resources which can only be financed from profitable earnings
* actively contributing ideas and suggestions to the policy debates taking place in society
* improving process yield (efficiency).
APPROACH TO THE ECONOMIC GOAL OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
The internationalization of the economy at large, in conjunction with a growing trend towards global competition, is becoming more and more
apparent. This is being manifested by:-
* an increase of imports and exports of goods as well as services
* growing outward and inward flows of direct investment
* an ever increasing exchange of technology transfers
* globalization of monetary and financial schemes.
The inter-relation of economic systems is complex, with a variety of relationships among countries. Multi-national chemical companies apply
common standards in spreading investment capital and stimulating markets around the globe, thus setting the scene for the world market. What
they need, in order to play a constructive role in Sustainable Development, is, first and foremost, freedom and fairness in international trade.
Trade as an engine of economic growth is essential for Sustainable Development. A climate needs to be fostered within which such growth may
take place on the basis of a clear set of rules with predictable consequences, by which investors may be guided in their long-term decision-making
process. This includes bringing to a halt the growing intervention by governments in industry and their ever increasing demands to raise income
by taxation, thus imposing a disproportionate load on the business community.
Wealth creation and profits are fundamental to Sustainable Development. They sustain economies (not just the
chemical industry), and contribute, via re-investment and R&D, to new technologies and environmental
improvements. Profits are needed to create flexible company structures oriented towards economic, environmental
and society-related requirements.
The chemical industry is a major industrial sector and an essential contributor to welfare and employment on a
global scale. In order to maintain this position under the imperative of Sustainable Development, the long-term
future of the industry must be rooted in a dynamic policy, whereby continual innovation and re-engineering of
companies result in an increase of productivity and, thus, keeping up international competitiveness as a pre-requisite
of sustainable job creation.

1AC – Defense-Industrial Base

Contention : Total Primacy
STEM education in K-12 is key to competitiveness and a strong defense-industrial base

Carafano et al, 6/16 – Ph.D, Assistant Director of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for
International Studies and Senior Research Fellow for National Security and Homeland Security in the Douglas and
Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies; and Ethel Machi, independent researcher; and Jena Baker McNeill,
Policy Analyst for Homeland Security in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies, a
division of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies; and Jennifer A. Marshall ,
Director of Domestic Policy Studies; and Dan Lips, Senior Policy Analyst in Education in the Domestic Policy
Studies Department
(James Jay, “Improving U.S. Competitiveness with K-12 STEM Education and Training,
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Education/upload/SR_57.pdf) //HM
Every day, a new technology is brought to market by the STEM workforce, enabling people around the world to live
longer, better lives. From computer chips to microwaves, from cell phones to antibiotics, access to technology and
technological innovation is what separates the developed world from developing nations. The U.S. depends on
science, technology, engineering, and math to maintain its position as the world superpower. In today’s world,
technology begets technology. Multidisciplinary research is a prerequisite for any nation to maintain, let alone gain,
a competitive edge. The physicist must work with the structural engineer to create alternative energy sources; neither
can do it alone. The ocean engineer must work with the nuclear engineer to create world-class submarines. Such
technologies keep the economy thriving and protect the country in times of war. Advances in robotics can improve
manufacturing. When a company fails to make progress in materials science, it means a competitor’s microchips
will be smaller. Falling behind in any technological field has a detrimental domino effect because every field is
dependent on the others. For years, the U.S.-dominated science and technology fields filed record numbers of
patents, which in turn empowered its military and fueled its economy. But times are changing. China has gained
ground in electrical engineering and computing, and India has made enormous strides toward becoming the leader in
accounting and financial services. Ninety-five percent of Fortune 500 CEOs believe that there is a severe shortage
of U.S. citizens working in STEM fields. Sixty-eight percent believe that the U.S. is less focused on STEM than
other countries. In America, K–12 education is compulsory. Even so, 30 percent of 18- to 22-year-olds do not have a
high school diploma. Every year, there are 200,000 U.S. engineering jobs that need to be filled and every year only
60,000 U.S. engineers graduate—leaving more than two-thirds of these STEM positions vacant. While STEM
engineering work can arguably be outsourced to other nations, such as China and India (each of which graduates
600,000 engineers per year), continually sending U.S. work to be performed in other countries is not a sustainable
solution: Over time globalization will directly and negatively impact America’s industrial economy, national
defense, and homeland security. In some parts of the world, the positive correlation between STEM expertise and
economic prosperity has been recognized with increased investment. India, for example, has recently experienced a
600 percent increase in research and development (R&D) centers. These centers are not only funded by Indian
companies but by U.S. companies as well—evidence that U.S. graduates are not meeting domestic business
demands in quantity or in quality. If the U.S. stays on its current trajectory, more and more high-tech, high-paying
jobs will be sent overseas. But the STEM crisis extends far beyond economic prosperity. In an alarming
development, America is rapidly moving toward a future where its top defense technologies are invented, designed,
and manufactured in foreign countries, leaving the U.S. vulnerable in times of war. Schools across the U.S. place
more emphasis on extracurricular activities than on STEM education. In many schools, there are multiple
fundraising activities for sport teams but few for science fairs or math competitions. Likewise, students who excel in
sports are considered heroes while students who excel in science are considered geeks. Detrimental to national
competitiveness, low achievement in STEM fields at all levels of education and beyond is becoming not only
culturally acceptable—it is becoming the norm.


China and Russia are gearing up to topple the U.S. – no chance of a peaceful rise
Nyquist, 7 – Analyst @ Financial Sense, frmr analyst @ Defense Intelligence Agency, Poli Sci Ph.D. program @
UC Irvine (J.R, “One Clenched Fist,” http://www.financialsense.com/stormwatch/geo/pastanalysis/2007/0427.html)
Two recent items reveal Moscow’s intentions. First, President Vladimir Putin has announced that he is suspending
Russia’s commitment to follow the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty (CFE). This means that Russia can move
tank and motorized infantry divisions to NATO’s doorstep. Second, Russian radio news broadcasters have been
ordered to make 50 percent of their reporting on Russia “positive,” and that the United States is – from now on – to
be described as Russia’s enemy.
President Putin’s intentions are clear. The Cold War is to be renewed. America is the “main enemy” once again. It
has been my contention, for many years, that this was the KGB’s intention from the outset. The collapse of
Communism was a staged event. It was a repeat of Lenin’s New Economic Policy of the 1920s, in which Russia
pretended to liberalize and move toward capitalism, drawing investment and technology from the West. I believe
that the political process in Russia, from 1989 to the present, was guided to this end. In 1989 America’s leaders
could not see the Kremlin’s intentions because intentions are invisible to the naked eye. And so America’s leaders
were fooled. Now Russia and China will emerge together as “one clenched fist,” and their intention is to smash
America.
The Chinese, like the Russians, have carefully crafted their excuse for enmity. And like the Russians, they will
blame the American side. The Chinese government, through its official organ (The People's Daily), says that U.S.
Right-wing forces are determined to destroy a "fragile" Sino-U.S. relationship. The American side has supposedly
manufactured an imaginary "China threat." A typical column published by The People's Daily rhetorically asks:
"Why Does U.S. Preach 'China Military Threat'?" According to Beijing's official organ, the Americans are
determined to misread China's intentions. "In the opinion of the United States," says the Daily, "... it is still the
traditional countries [like Russia and China] that constitute strategic threats." The People's Daily has also stated:
"U.S. Right-wing forces ... have all along clung to the Cold War mentality and held fast to the principle of
containment in their policy toward China." The People's Daily bitterly complains that the Americans oppose
Chinese military expansion in Asia. Psychologically, the outrage expressed by Beijing inadvertently reveals the
malevolence of China's leaders. After all, why would The People's Daily express outrage at U.S. opposition to
Chinese military expansion? Only a would-be aggressor feels thwarted by the collective security arrangements of
neighboring countries. In fact, if we look at recent history we find that China has sent its armies against at least five
neighboring countries since World War II: against Korea and the U.N. forces in 1950; against Tibet in 1950; against
India in 1962; against Russia in 1969; and against Vietnam in 1979. Each instance involved a sudden, unprovoked
strike against foreign forces outside China.
If we examine Chinese propaganda with a psychological eye, we catch a glimpse of Beijing's evil intentions. They
are not as easy to see as Moscow’s; but they are nonetheless real, and observable. Contrary to Chinese propaganda,
American officials and analysts hardly agree there is a China threat. The American side prefers to believe that
Marxism-Leninism is dead, that China is evolving into a "normal" country. The received wisdom of our time holds
that peace can be established through technology transfers and trade. Wrap China in a blanket of dollars and
Communist ideology will find itself smothered. On June 13, 2005, former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell gave
the keynote address at the Asia Leadership Forum in Bangkok, Thailand. He said that China's increased military
spending doesn't threaten the United States. "My analysis in the last four years," he explained, "is that China has no
such [hostile] intention. China wishes to live in peace with its neighbors and the U.S."


Defense-industrial deters war with China and Russia and solves terrorism and prolif
Watts, 8 – Senior Fellow @ The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments
(Barry D, “The US Defense Industrial Base, Past, Present and Future,” CBA,
http://www.csbaonline.org/4Publications/PubLibrary/R.20081015._The_US_Defense_In/R.20081015._The_US_De
fense_In.pdf)
Since the 1950s, the US defense industrial base has been a source of long-term strategic advantage for the United
States, just as it was during World War II. American defense companies provided the bombers and missiles on
which nuclear deterrence rested and armed the US military with world-class weapons, including low-observable
aircraft, wide-area surveillance and targeting sensors, and reliable guided munitions cheap enough to be employed in
large numbers. They also contributed to the development of modern digital computers, successfully orbited the first
reconnaissance satellites, put a man on the moon in less than a decade, and played a pivotal role in developing the
worldwide web.
Critics have long emphasized President Eisenhower’s warning in his farewell television address that the nation
needed to “guard against the acquisition of undue influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial
complex.” Usually forgotten or ignored has been an earlier, equally important, passage in Eisenhower’s
January 1961 speech:
A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant
action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction.
Eisenhower’s warning about undue influence, rather than the need to maintain American military strength, tends to
dominate contemporary discussions of the US defense industrial base. While the percentage of US gross domestic
product going to national defense remains low compared to the 1950s and 1960s, there is a growing list of defense
programs that have experienced problems with cost, schedule, and, in a few cases, weapon performance. In fairness,
the federal government, including the Department of Defense and Congress, is at least as much to blame for many of
these programmatic difficulties as US defense firms. Nevertheless, those critical of the defense industry tend to
concentrate on these acquisition shortcomings.
The main focus of this report is on a larger question. How prepared is the US defense industrial base to meet the
needs of the US military Services in coming decades? The Cold War challenge of Soviet power has largely ebbed,
but new challenges have emerged. There is the immediate threat of the violence stemming from Salafi- Takfiri and
Khomeinist terrorist groups and their state sponsors, that have consumed so much American blood and treasure in
Iraq; the longer-term challenge of authoritarian capitalist regimes epitomized by the rise of China and a resurgent
Russia; and, not least, the worsening problem of proliferation, particularly of nuclear weapons. In the face of
these more complex and varied challenges, it would surely be premature to begin dismantling the US defense
industry. From a competitive perspective, therefore, the vital question about the defense industrial base is whether it
will be as much a source of long-term advantage in the decades ahead as it has been since the 1950s.
The bulk of this report is contained in three chapters. Chapter 1 traces the evolution of the US defense industrial
base since World War II. Chapter 2 offers an assessment of the industry’s performance to date. Chapter 3 addresses
two questions: first, what kind of defense industry is in the best interests of the United States, especially in the
foreseeable future? Second, if the defense industry best suited to cope with the challenges of the early twenty-first
century is substantially different from the one which exists today, what steps might be undertaken to begin bringing
about the required changes?
There do not appear to be easy answers to either question. It is probably not possible, nor would it be wise, for the
federal government to set about imposing a purportedly more efficient or effective structure on the US defense
industrial base. During the 1990s, US political leaders and defense industry analysts called for replacing a defense
industry largely isolated from the commercial sectors of the US economy with a single, integrated industrial base
that would serve multiple customers. While some defense companies tried to follow this advice, most had little
success. In hindsight, such advice seems to have overlooked the unique requirements and government-imposed
constraints that pervade major weapons programs, and defense-industry leaders were probably right not to go very
far down the road in trying to heed it.


Failure to check China’s rise causes nuclear war
Farah, 7 – founder, editor and CEO of WorldNetDaily (Joseph, “A U.S.-China war?” LA Times Opinion,
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-op-dustup10oct10,0,1215555,full.story)
China is the Evil Empire of the future. You don't have to be a prophet to see it. You only need to be a student of
history. It was just two years ago that a top Chinese military official said Beijing would use nuclear weapons against
the U.S. if Americans defended Taiwan against an invasion from the mainland.
"If the Americans draw their missiles and position-guided ammunition on to the target zone on China's territory, I
think we will have to respond with nuclear weapons," Zhu Chenghu, a major general in the People's Liberation
Army, said at an official briefing.
Chas Freeman, a former U.S. assistant secretary of Defense, said in 1999 that a PLA official had told him China
would respond with a nuclear strike on the U.S. in the event of a conflict with Taiwan.
"In the end, you care more about Los Angeles than you do about Taipei," Freeman quoted this official as saying.
More recently, we learned of China's plans for a cyberwar attack on the U.S. to be launched in conjunction with a
conventional assault on U.S. carriers in the Pacific.
Code-named "Pearl Harbor II" by the Pentagon, the plan was designed to leave America's key allies in the Pacific -
Japan and Taiwan - virtually defenseless.
Does this sound like the work of friends?
We have a clear choice before us in dealing with the next great threat to America's future - follow the policies of
Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, or those of Ronald Reagan.
In ignoring China's military expansion, its threats against Taiwan, its threats even against the United States, we serve
only to ensure a costly battle against the expansionist power in the future. We are making our worst fear a virtual
inevitability.
War with Russia is the highest magnitude impact

Bostrom, 2 - Ph.D. Philosophy @ Oxford and really smart dude
(Nick, Journal of Evolution and Technology, Vol. 9, http://www.nickbostrom.com/existential/risks.html)
A much greater existential risk emerged with the build-up of nuclear arsenals in the US and the USSR. An all-out
nuclear war was a possibility with both a substantial probability and with consequences that might have been
persistent enough to qualify as global and terminal. There was a real worry among those best acquainted with the
information available at the time that a nuclear Armageddon would occur and that it might annihilate our species or
permanently destroy human civilization.[4] Russia and the US retain large nuclear arsenals that could be used in a
future confrontation, either accidentally or deliberately. There is also a risk that other states may one day build up
large nuclear arsenals. Note however that a smaller nuclear exchange, between India and Pakistan for instance, is not
an existential risk, since it would not destroy or thwart humankind’s potential permanently. Such a war might
however be a local terminal risk for the cities most likely to be targeted. Unfortunately, we shall see that nuclear
Armageddon and comet or asteroid strikes are mere preludes to the existential risks that we will encounter in the 21 st
century.


We promise we’re not crazy – history proves the probability of a peaceful rise is zero and attempts
at integration will fail
Kagan, 5 - senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
(Robert, “The Illusion of 'Managing' China,” Published in the Washington Post, May 15th, 2005,
http://www.carnegieendowment.org/publications/index.cfm?fa=view&id=16939)
The history of rising powers, however, and their attempted "management" by established powers provides little
reason for confidence or comfort. Rarely have rising powers risen without sparking a major war that reshaped the
international system to reflect new realities of power. The most successful "management" of a rising power in the
modern era was Britain's appeasement of the United States in the late 19th century, when the British effectively
ceded the entire Western Hemisphere (except Canada) to the expansive Americans. The fact that both powers shared
a common liberal, democratic ideology, and thus roughly consonant ideas of international order, greatly lessened the
risk of accommodation from the British point of view.
Other examples are less encouraging. Germany's rise after 1870, and Europe's reaction to it, eventually produced
World War I. Even the masterly Bismarck, after a decade of successful German self-management, had a difficult
time steering Europe away from collision. The British tried containment, appeasement and even offers of alliance,
but never fully comprehended Kaiser Wilhelm's need to challenge the British supremacy he both admired and
envied. Right up until the eve of war, highly regarded observers of the European scene believed commercial ties
among the leading powers made war between them unlikely, if not impossible.
Japan's rise after 1868 produced two rounds of warfare -- first with China and Russia at the turn of the century, and
later with the United States and Britain in World War II. The initial Anglo-American response to Japan's growing
power was actually quite accommodating. Meiji Japan had chosen the path of modernization and even
Westernization, or so it seemed, and Americans welcomed its ascendancy over backward China and despotic Russia.
Then, too, there was the paternalistic hope of assisting Japan's entry into the international system, which was to say
the Western system. "The Japs have played our game," Theodore Roosevelt believed, and only occasionally did he
wonder whether "the Japanese down at bottom did not lump Russians, English, Americans, Germans, all of us,
simply as white devils inferior to themselves . . . and to be treated politely only so long as would enable the Japanese
to take advantage of our national jealousies, and beat us in turn."
Today we look back at those failures and ruminate on the mistakes made with the usual condescension that the
present has for the past. But there is no reason to believe we are any smarter today than the policymakers who
"mismanaged" the rise of Germany and Japan. The majority of today's policymakers and thinkers hold much the
same general view of global affairs as their forebears: namely, that commercial ties between China and the other
powers, especially with Japan and the United States, and also with Taiwan, will act as a buffer against aggressive
impulses and ultimately ease China's "integration" into the international system without war. Once again we see an
Asian power modernizing and believe this should be a force for peace. And we add to this the conviction, also
common throughout history, that if we do nothing to provoke China, then it will be peaceful, without realizing that it
may be the existing international system that the Chinese find provocative.

1AC – Space
Contention : Space
STEM education key to maintaining the space industry – the alternative is loss of space dominance
Pollack, 5 (Susan W., Ms. Pollack graduated as a member of the Industrial College of the Armed Forces class of
2005. Some of her assignments prior to attending ICAF include contracts specialist at the Space and Naval Warfare
Systems Command and deputy director of the acquisition support cadre at the Missile Defense Agency. She has a
Bachelor of Arts degree in international relations from Saint Joseph’s University and has completed the Advanced
Program Management Course at the Defense Systems Management College. , THE FUTURE OF OUR NATION’S
SPACE INDUSTRY WORKFORCE, http://www.dtic.mil/cgi bin/GetTRDoc?
AD=ADA449454&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf)
“The harsh fact is that the US need for the highest quality human capital in science, mathematics, and
engineering is not being met . . . .In a knowledge-based future, only an America that remains at the cutting edge of
science and technology will sustain its current world leadership.”82 Introduction: There is a crisis looming in
America’s science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce base that has serious implications
for the future of America’s space industry, and our nation’s economic and national security. Today, trends indicate
other nations are on the verge of passing the US in scientific excellence and technological innovation .83 This
comes at a time when the US is more dependent on its military, civil, and commercial-supporting space assets than
any other nation. To maintain American preeminence in space, our nation must reinvigorate and inspire a new
generation of STEM talent, as well as increase investments in research and development (R&D) and infrastructures. Troubling Trends of
STEM Education and the R&D Connection: The Council on Competitiveness found that innovation is the single most important factor in
determining America’s success through the 21st century.84 While the report recommends increased funding in R&D, the US government has
reduced funding in national R&D over the past ten years, including cuts in the President’s FY 2006 R &D budget. Studies link a strong
correlation between reduced R&D funding to the decline in the number of graduates in the STEM subjects.85 Over
the past decade, our nation has lost more than 600,000 scientific and technical aerospace jobs which have also
adversely impacted the number of students earning degrees in STEM. Meanwhile, nearly 30 percent of the
aerospace workforce will be eligible to retire in 2008. 86 The current US educational system will not provide
enough students with the needed STEM skills to fill the critical positions being vacated by the retiring baby-
boomers.87 Concurrently, other nations are building up their science and technology (S&T) infrastructures and
capabilities. A disturbing trend is the low performance of American students in the math and science subjects. Math and science achievement
scores of US students fall below international averages.88 The results of a recent international survey, conducted by the Program for International
Student Assessment in the spring of 2003, indicate the learning gap between the US and its competitors in Europe and Asia is widening in basic
math and science skills at the eighth through twelfth grade levels. This is alarming since technology and innovation in the space industry depends
on high tech skills in the STEM subjects, yet this is precisely where the best US students are not excelling. Space science education gets taught
within the Earth science curriculum in the grades K-9. This narrow focus on space science is dangerously small relative to our nation’s reliance
on space. A Department of Defense (DoD) senior official recently stated that the need for US citizens in defense work is critical and that the
downturn in America’s science and engineering workforce has become “an issue of national security .”89 Solutions
to Improve the National STEM Workforce: It is imperative our nation take action to ensure the scientific proficiency
needed in our future workforce. There are numerous policy improvements and on-going initiatives the government should pursue to
increase student interest in math and science in the formative years, and to widen the pipeline of scientists and engineers who drive innovation .
The US government and industry are taking some steps in the right direction to address the issues discussed in the first two points below.
However, our nation should act now to implement the recommendations stated in recommendations three through six . First, the Federal
government should develop a clear policy of sustaining long term research to encourage young people to enter
careers in science, mathematics or engineering. Developing a top-notch space industry workforce requires a
top-down vision by the President that reaches out to the nation and across the government as the
inspirational basis necessary to develop and sustain a knowledgeable and skilled workforce. The Administration is
addressing this need and has recently announced a five-year Mathematics and Science Initiative that will engage in a public campaign to highlight
the importance of mathematics and science education, and to recruit, train and retain teachers with strong backgrounds in mathematics and
science. Second, early outreach programs are vital to developing and sustaining a knowledgeable workforce.
The Council on Competitiveness notes that we lose our future scientists and engineers around the junior high
school years.90 Successful outreach initiatives which expose children to the STEM subjects can help to
reverse this trend. DoD implements a Starbase program which provides students in K-12 with a week of math and science based
simulations and experiments in space-related fields.91 The National Aeronautics and Space Administration educational outreach program,
“Inspiring the Next Generation of Explorers”, influences youths 13 to pursue science and engineering educational opportunities. The Boeing
Company’s Summer Science Camp has successfully led students to pursue careers in science and engineering .92 Third, the Federal government
should lift the visa restrictions for foreign students applying to enter the US. Post 9/11 immigration controls have resulted in a 32 percent drop in

1AC – Space
[Pollack Continues, no text omitted]
the number of international student applications in 2004.93 Foreign students graduating from US universities with degrees in science and
engineering have been an important asset in our industry workforce and have contributed to basic science and new innovations. One-third of
today’s US workforce of scientists and engineers were born outside the US94 The challenge regarding foreign students is to find a balance
between scientific exploration and security.95 Fourth, Congress should resist R&D cuts proposed in the President’s FY 2006 budget. Federally-
funded research has long been a significant factor in US patent productivity and economic strength.96 As the government tries to reduce its
budget deficits, R&D programs in mathematics and engineering are being reduced.97 There is a real disconnect between the Administration’s
plans for the new space exploration initiative, and the failure to fund basic R&D programs. These programs motivate STEM talent and lead to the
innovation our space industry needs for competitive advantage. Congress should also assist entrepreneurs who have plans to build space
components, but do not have the capital to go from concept to delivery. Fifth, the nation desperately needs to create an educational system of
S&T schools. At a minimum, we should be offering and requiring advanced Earth and space science courses at the middle and high school levels
while helping students integrate learning into future careers. Sixth, sufficient training for teachers is critical since they are the ones who inspire
and motivate our nation’s children to dream and learn. President Bush’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology recently released a
report which recommends improving our country’s K-12 education to ensure future innovation and improve the nation’s STEM capabilities.98 In
summary, there is an urgent need for all the stakeholders involved, including the government, academia, industry, and professional societies, to
develop an integrated plan for education, training, and workforce development . At present, there is no central database for collaboration and
sharing information at the national level. Although there is a lot of good coming from existing initiatives, more should be accomplished, and in an
integrated approach. Conclusion: STEM talent is the center of gravity in a knowledge-based economy that has raised the
bar on innovation. America’s economic progress depends on a continuing supply of STEM talent engaged in and
funded across the R&D spectrum.99 The nation’s space industry, knowledge base, and economic prosperity requires
an urgent response from the government to accelerate and resource current initiatives while developing a national
human capital strategy and vision to inspire the next generation workforce. It is clear that a long term solution to developing a
skilled space industry workforce begins with improved math and science education, from kindergarten through graduate school. Children,
teachers, and educational and science and technology infrastructures are key to our nation’s vitality and future security. We must take
deliberate steps to nurture our nation’s children in math and science in the formative years and attract and retain
enthusiastic educators who will hand off the pride and the passion to the next generation . Just as President Kennedy inspired our
nation in the race to the Moon, we must now inspire the nation’s young people to create a new generation of
innovators to protect our national interests in space across the military, civil and commercial sectors. The
children we are educating today are the STEM workforce that will successfully lead the US in the 21st
century..

1AC – Space
Specifically, Chinese space expansion will be hostile
Pollack, 5 (Susan W., Ms. Pollack graduated as a member of the Industrial College of the Armed Forces class of
2005. Some of her assignments prior to attending ICAF include contracts specialist at the Space and Naval Warfare
Systems Command and deputy director of the acquisition support cadre at the Missile Defense Agency. She has a
Bachelor of Arts degree in international relations from Saint Joseph’s University and has completed the Advanced
Program Management Course at the Defense Systems Management College., THE FUTURE OF OUR NATION’S
SPACE INDUSTRY WORKFORCE, http://www.dtic.mil/cgi bin/GetTRDoc?
AD=ADA449454&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf)
With a great deal of awe (and some apprehension), we have all watched China’s rise over the last decade as a major
world power. China’s increasing interest in space (backed up by capital investments in its space program) mirrors its
growing economy and emergence as a major power – both regionally and globally. Overview of China’s Program. On
October 15, 2003, the Chinese taikonaut Lieutenant Colonel Yang Liwei launched aboard the Shenzhou V, thus making China the newest
member in a select group of countries with manned space programs (the US and Russia being the other two). This event fulfilled one of the key
milestones set forth in China’s 2000 White Paper for Space Activities – a document which stressed the importance of and the future ambitions
and milestone for the Chinese space program. The White Paper is essentially the roadmap for China’s space activities. Lieutenant Colonel
Liwei’s successful spaceflight embodies the vision set forth in the Paper – a vision that reflects the importance China places on the exploitation of
space and the space program’s role in protecting national interests.100 China’s slow but steady progress in achieving success in space reflects
drive and determination. The Chinese know where they want to go with their space program, and by all indications have
the national will and state sponsorship to achieve their vision. The foundation of China’s stable communist
government lies in nationalism and steady economic growth -- a successful space program helps contribute to both
as it lends credibility and legitimacy to the government and provides yet another possible area to commercially
challenge the United States.101 In updating the 2000 White Paper, Chinese officials added a space lab and an orbiting space station as
part of their 3-step plan for manned spaceflight (having achieved step one with the launch of Shenzhou V). 102 It is important to note that much
of China’s space program remains shrouded in secrecy – especially the degree to which the military is involved.
While it is known that the military is heavily involved in the commercial launch industry (all of China’s launch and tracking centers
are run exclusively by the military), the extent to which the military is involved in other aspects of China’s space program is largely unknown at
the unclassified level. In trying to assess the status and makeup of China’s space industry, a senior analyst within the
Department of Defense admitted that much of what we know and try to draw conclusions from comes from open
written media as well as on-line sources .103 Our understanding (at the unclassified level) of future Chinese ambitions in space,
weapons, launch capability, etc. is based on observations of actual events and interpretation of statements made by Chinese officials. Regardless,
China’s rise as a space power has raised many of the same questions, concerns, and issues faced during the Cold
War space race with the Soviet Union. Will China Weaponize Space?: One of the most hotly debated topics with regard to US national
security is the issue of placing offensive weapons in space. As noted in the FY03 Annual Report to Congress on the Military Power of the
People’s Republic of China, China’s official public stance on space weaponization is that they oppose the militarization of space. In private,
however, Chinese officials probably consider the development of anti-satellite technology inevitable.104 Is China’s stated opposition to space
weaponization rhetoric or genuine policy they intend to pursue? The former is probably closer to the truth since it is likely that the Chinese will
react in kind to whatever path the US pursues. As noted by Hui Zhang, a research associate in the Belfer Center for Science and International
Affairs at Harvard 15 University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, many in China believe the goal of space control (vis-à-
vis the US) is to achieve space domination. In light of China’s skepticism and mistrust for US policies, it should be expected that
regardless of China’s officially stated policy, any move by the US to place offensive weapons in space will be met by similar attempts by the
Chinese. 105 At the unclassified level, one word best describes the assessment of the military threat that China poses to the United States space
program – speculative. Much of the unclassified literature deals with expected responses by the Chinese to US policy and developments in space.
The suspected capabilities the Chinese possess (in the unclassified arena) are probably based on assessments and
estimates of how China’s known and potential technologies might be used to field offensive space capabilities to
counter US systems. Estimates in classified literature are almost certain to be more specific, less speculative,
and more accurate. Anti-satellite technology is the one area that seems to garner the most attention and debate. In light of the
preponderance of open-source information about US space systems, the Chinese probably have enough knowledge to field systems that could jam
US communications and navigation (GPS) satellite systems.106 In follow-up to the FY03 Annual Report to Congress on the Military Power of
the People’s Republic of China, the FY04 report noted a January 2001 Hong Kong newspaper article that said China had developed, ground-
tested, and would soon space-test parasitic micro-satellite and nano-satellite technology that could be launched and detonated close to US
satellites. In addition, the FY04 report noted China making progress in anti-satellite ground-based laser technology. The interest the
Chinese have shown in such technology makes it feasible they could develop (if they do not already possess) the
capacity to disrupt or destroy US space-based system.107 There is sufficient reason to believe, therefore, that
adversaries such as China can and will pursue technology capable of denying us the use of our own space system s –
especially if we pursue a similar strategy of weaponizing space.

1AC – Space
Absent U.S. dominance, China’s space expansion will cause escalatory wars over Taiwan
Tellis, 7 – Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
(Ashley, Survival, Autumn, “China’s Military Space Strategy”, ingenta)
Finally, the growing Chinese capability for space warfare implies that a future conflict in the Taiwan Strait would
entail serious deterrence and crisis instabilities. If such a clash were to compel Beijing to attack US space systems
at the beginning of a war, the very prospect of such a ‘space Pearl Harbor’94 could, in turn, provoke the United
States to contemplate pre-emptive attacks or horizontal escalation on the Chinese mainland. Such outcomes would
be particularly likely in a conflict in the next decade, before Washington has the opportunity to invest fully in
redundant space capabilities. Already, US Strategic Command officials have publicly signalled that conventionally armed Trident
submarine-launched ballistic missiles would be appropriate weapons for executing the prompt strikes that might become necessary in such a
contingency.95 Such attacks, even if employing only conventional warheads, on space launch sites, sensor nodes and command and control
installations on the Chinese mainland could well be perceived as a precursor to an all-out war. It would be difficult for all sides to limit
the intensification of such a conflict, even without the added complications of accidents and further misperception.96
The emergence of potent Chinese counterspace capabilities makes US military operations in Asia more risky than
ever. The threat has not arisen due to a lack of a space arms-control regime, or because of the Bush administration’s
disinclination to negotiate an accord that bans the weaponisation of space. Rather, it is rooted entirely in China’s
requirement that it be able to defeat the United States in a regional conflict despite its conventional inferiority. This
strategic challenge has compelled Beijing to exploit every anti-access and battlespace-denial technology potentially
available. The threat posed by this Chinese effort cannot be neutralised by arms-control agreements, even though all countries stand to profit
from the absence of threats to their assets in space. There is a temptation, especially in the United States, to view China’s counterspace
programmes in moralistic terms. This approach is undesirable and best avoided: Beijing’s desire to defeat the stronger by asymmetric means is
not a reflection of its deviousness, nor provoked by mendacity on the part of the United States or the Bush administration. It is grounded in the
objective conditions that define the relationship between the two countries: competing political goals, likely to persist whether or not the Taiwan
conflict is resolved. In such circumstances, the United States should seek, as the Bush administration’s own National Space
Policy declares, to protect the ’use of outer space by all nations for peaceful purposes and for the benefit of all
humanity’. But if this fundamental goal is threatened by Chinese counterspace activities aimed at American space
assets, the United States has no choice but to run an offence–defence arms race, and win.
Extinction
Strait Times, June 25, 2K, Pg. l/n
THE high-intensity scenario postulates a cross-strait war escalating into a full-scale war between the US and China.
If Washington were to conclude that splitting China would better serve its national interests, then a full-scale war
becomes unavoidable. Conflict on such a scale would embroil other countries far and near and -horror of horrors
-raise the possibility of a nuclear war. Beijing has already told the US and Japan privately that it considers any country providing bases
and logistics support to any US forces attacking China as belligerent parties open to its retaliation. In the region, this means South Korea, Japan,
the Philippines and, to a lesser extent, Singapore. If China were to retaliate, East Asia will be set on fire. And the
conflagration may not end there as opportunistic powers elsewhere may try to overturn the existing world order.
With the US distracted, Russia may seek to redefine Europe's political landscape. The balance of power in the Middle East
may be similarly upset by the likes of Iraq. In south Asia, hostilities between India and Pakistan, each armed with its own nuclear arsenal, could
enter a new and dangerous phase. Will a full-scale Sino-US war lead to a nuclear war? According to General Matthew Ridgeway, commander of
the US Eighth Army which fought against the Chinese in the Korean War, the US had at the time thought of using nuclear weapons against China
to save the US from military defeat. In his book The Korean War, a personal account of the military and political aspects of the conflict and its
implications on future US foreign policy, Gen Ridgeway said that US was confronted with two choices in Korea -truce or a broadened war, which
could have led to the use of nuclear weapons. If the US had to resort to nuclear weaponry to defeat China long before the latter acquired a similar
capability, there is little hope of winning a war against China, 50 years later, short of using nuclear weapons. The US estimates that China
possesses about 20 nuclear warheads that can destroy major American cities. Beijing also seems prepared to go for
the nuclear option. A Chinese military officer disclosed recently that Beijing was considering a review of its "non
first use" principle regarding nuclear weapons. Major-General Pan Zhangqiang, president of the military-funded Institute for Strategic
Studies, told a gathering at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars in Washington that although the government still abided by
that principle, there were strong pressures from the military to drop it. He said military leaders considered the use of nuclear
weapons mandatory if the country risked dismemberment as a result of foreign intervention. Gen Ridgeway said that
should that come to pass, we would see the destruction of civilization.

1AC – Space
American space dominance makes war structurally impossible
Dolman, 5 – Professor of Comparative Military Studies at the US Air Force’s School of Advanced Air and Space
Studies (Everett C, “US Military Transformation and Weapons in Space,” September 14, 2005, http://www.e-
parl.net/pages/space_hearing_images/ConfPaper%20Dolman%20US%20Military%20Transform%20&
%20Space.pdf)
Indeed, it is concern for the unanticipated arrival of technology X that initially motivates my own preference for a
policy advocating immediate deployment of space weapons. So long as America is the state most likely to acquire a
breakthrough technology in this area, my concern is limited to the problem of letting technology take us where it
will. But what if an enemy of democratic liberalism should suddenly acquire the means to place quickly and cheaply
multiple weapons into orbit? The advantages gained from controlling the high ground of space would accrue to it as
surely as to any liberal state, and the concomitant loss of military power from the denial of space to our already-
dependent military force could cause the immediate demise of the extant international system. The longer the US
dithers on its responsibilities, the more likely a potential opponent could seize low-earth orbit before America could
respond. And America would respond … finally. But would another state? If America were to weaponize space
today, it is unlikely that any other state or group of states would find it rational to counter in kind. The entry cost to
provide the infrastructure necessary is too high; hundreds of billions of dollars, at minimum. The years of
investment it would take to achieve a minimal counter-force capability—essentially from scratch—would provide
more than ample time for the US to entrench itself in space, and readily counter preliminary efforts to displace it.
The tremendous effort in time and resources would be worse than wasted. Most states, if not all, would opt not to
counter US deployments in kind. They might oppose US interests with asymmetric balancing, depending on how
aggressively America uses its new power, but the likelihood of a hemorrhaging arms race in space should the US
deploy weapons there—at least for the next few years—is extremely remote. This rationality does not dispute the
fact that US deployment of weapons in outer space would represent the addition of a potent new military capacity,
one that would assist in extending the current period of American hegemony well into the future. This would clearly
be threatening, and America must expect severe condemnation and increased competition in peripheral areas. But
such an outcome is less threatening than any other state doing so. Placement of weapons in space by the United
States would be perceived correctly as an attempt at continuing American hegemony. Although there is obvious
opposition to the current international balance of power, the status quo , there is also a sense that it is at least
tolerable to the majority of states. A continuation of it is thus minimally acceptable, even to states working towards
its demise. So long as the US does not employ its power arbitrarily, the situation would be bearable initially and
grudgingly accepted over time. On the other hand, an attempt by any other state to dominate space would be part of
an effort to break the land-sea-air dominance of the United States in preparation for a new international order, with
the weaponizing state at the top. The action would be a challenge to the status quo , not a perpetuation of it. Such
an event would be disconcerting to nations that accept the current international order (including the venerable
institutions of trade, finance, and law that operate within it) and intolerable to the US. As leader of the current
system, the US could do no less than engage in a perhaps ruinous space arms race, save graciously decide to step
aside. There is another, perhaps far more compelling reason that space weaponization will in time be less threatening
to the international system than without it. One of the more cacophonous refrains against weapons procurement of
any kind is that the money needed to purchase them is better spent elsewhere. It is a simple cliché but a powerful
one. Space weapons in particular will be very, very expensive. Are there not a thousand uses that are more beneficial
for the money? But funding for weapons does not come directly from education, or housing, or transportation
budgets. It comes from military budgets. And so the question should not be directed at particular weapons, but at all
weapons. Immediately we see that the impact on the budget of significant increases in space weapons will be
decreases in funding for combat aircraft, the surface battle fleet, and ground forces. This creates a dilemma for both
pro and anti-space weaponization camps. Space advocates must sell their ideas to fellow pro-weapons groups by
making the case that the advantages they provide outweigh the capabilities foregone. This is a mighty task. The tens
(likely hundreds) of billions of dollars needed to develop, test, and deploy a minimal space weapons system with the
capacity to engage a few targets around the world could displace a half a dozen or more aircraft carrier battle groups,
entire aircraft procurement programs (such as the F-22), and several heavy armored divisions. This is a tough sell for
supporters of a strong military. It is an even more difficult dilemma for those who oppose weapons in general, and
space weapons in particular. Ramifications for the most critical current function of the army, navy, and marines are
profound—pacification, occupation, and control of foreign territory. With the downsizing of traditional weapons to

1AC – Space
[Dolman Continues, no text omitted]
accommodate heightened space expenditures, the ability of the US to do all three will wane significantly. At a time
when many are calling for increased capability to pacify and police foreign lands, in light of the no-end-in-sight
occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, space weapons proponents must advocate reduction of these capabilities in
favor of a system that will have no direct potential to do so. Hence, the argument that the unilateral deployment of
space weapons will precipitate a disastrous arms race is misplaced. To be sure, space weapons are offensive by their
very nature. They deter violence by the omnipresent threat of precise, measured, and unstoppable retaliation. They
offer no advantage if the target set considered is not global. But they also offer no advantage in the mission of
territorial occupation. As such, they are far less threatening to the international environment than any combination of
weapons employed in their stead. A state employing offensive deterrence through space-weapons can punish a
transgressor state, but is in a poor position to challenge its sovereignty . The transgressor state is less likely to
succumb to the security dilemma if it perceives its national survival is not at risk. Moreover, the tremendous expense
of space weapons inhibits their indiscriminate use. Over time, the world of sovereign states will recognize that the
US does not threaten self-determination internally, though it challenges any attempts to intervene militarily in the
politics of others, and has severely restricted its own capacity to do so. America will maintain the capacity to
influence decisions and events beyond its borders, with military force if necessary. The operational deployment of
space weapons would increase that capacity by providing for nearly instantaneous force projection worldwide. This
force would be precise, unstoppable, and deadly. At the same time, the US must forego some of its ability to
intervene directly in other states because its capacity to do so will have been diminished in the budgetary trade-offs
required. Transformation of the American military assures that the intentions of current and future leaders will have
but a minor role to play in international affairs. The limited requirement for collateral damage, need for precision to
allay the low volume of fire, and tremendous cost of space weapons will guarantee they are used only for high value,
time sensitive targets. Whether or not the United States desires to be a good neighbor is not necessary to an opposing
state’s calculation of survival. Without sovereignty at risk, fear of a space dominant American military will
subside. The US will maintain its position of hegemony as well as its security, and the world will not be threatened
by the specter of a future American empire. Seizing the initiative and securing low-Earth orbit now, while the US is
unchallenged in space, would do much to stabilize the international system and prevent an arms race in space. From
low-Earth orbit (LEO), the enhanced ability to deny any attempt by another nation to place military assets in space ,
or to readily engage and destroy terrestrial ASAT capacity, makes the possibility of large scale space war and or
military space races less likely, not more. Why would a state expend the effort to compete in space with a
superpower that has the extraordinary advantage of holding securely the highest ground at the top of the gravity
well? So long as the controlling state demonstrates a capacity and a will to use force to defend its position, in effect
expending a small amount of violence as needed to prevent a greater conflagration in the future, the likelihood of a
future war in space is remote. Moreover, if the US were willing to deploy and use a military space force that
maintained effective control of space, and did so in a way that was perceived as tough, non-arbitrary, and efficient,
such an action would serve to discourage competing states from fielding opposing systems. Should the US use its
advantage to police the heavens (assuming the entire cost on its own), and allow unhindered peaceful use of space
by any and all nations for economic and scientific development, over time its control of LEO could be viewed as a
global asset and a public good. Much in the manner that the British maintained control of the high seas, enforcing
international norms of innocent passage and property rights , the US could prepare outer space for a long-overdue
burst of economic expansion. As leader of the international community, the United States finds itself in the
unenviable position that it must make decisions for the good of all. On the issue of space weaponization, there
appears no one best option. No matter the choice selected, there are those who will benefit and those who will suffer.
The tragedy of American power is that it must make a choice, and the worst choice is to do nothing. And yet, in the
process of choosing, it has a great advantage—the moral ambiguity of its people regarding the use of power. There
is no question that corrupted power is a dangerous thing, but perhaps only Americans are so concerned with the
possibility that they themselves will be corrupted. They fear what they could become. No other state has such
potential for selfrestraint. It is this introspection, this self-angst that makes America the best choice to lead the world
today and tomorrow. It is not perfect, but perhaps it is perfectible.

1AC – Solvency
Contention : Solvency
Putting CTE under No Child Left Behind for targeted assistance solves job training
Phelps, 2 – National Association of State Directors of Career Technical Education Consortium
(D. Jason, “THE NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND ACT OF 2001: Opportunities for Career Technical Education,” July
2002)
During the reauthorization of ESEA, NASDCTEc and the CTE community worked to increase the ties, coordination
and involvement of Perkins in ESEA to enhance the federal focus on secondary education (Perkins is currently the
largest federal investment in secondary schools). While NCLB’s impact and connection to secondary education is
still limited, the new law does offer numerous opportunities for coordination with Perkins.
In general, the areas that NCLB seeks to coordinate with Perkins are related to state plans (Title I, Section 1111) and
local plans (Title I, Section 1112). There also are opportunities to enhance secondary schools, including the
“integration of vocational technical programs” into school-wide improvement programs (Title I, Section 1114) and
coordinating these plans with provisions under the Perkins Act where applicable. School-wide improvement
programs, according to NCLB, are described as strategies to assess student needs, align curriculum with academic
standards, integrating vocational and technical education programs, providing professional development for school
personnel, college and career awareness and preparation programs and other similar programs. Another area of
coordination is for targeted assistance to schools (Section 1115, Targeted Assistance Programs), where Perkins
could be coordinated with state and local plans.
Federal standards are key to stop the race to the bottom created by states – the alternative is a
failing education system
Brown, 5 – Fellow @ the Center for American Progress, and Elena Rocha, Fellow @ the Center for American
Progress (Cindy, “The Case for National Standards, Accountability, and Fiscal Equity,” November 2005,
http://www.americanprogress.org/kf/standards-based_framework.pdf)
In 2001, the standards movement advanced with passage of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. NCLB built
upon and made significant changes to the 1994 laws, placing greater emphasis on accountability for student learning
and specifying the authorization of federal dollars through fiscal year 2007. Today, all states have developed both
curriculum and student performance standards and hold their districts and schools accountable for meeting yearly
student achievement goals that grow tougher each year.
But what can be considered a step forward in many respects, is also an impediment—a false sense of student
performance. With more than 50 different sets of standards, there is no national
measure/yardstick/standard/benchmark for academic achievement at each of the grade levels. NCLB requires that
states hold districts and schools accountable for getting all their students to “proficient” achievement levels, but
allows them to adopt their own definitions of “proficiency.” With the pressure to increase student performance, as
illustrated below, there has been counter pressure for states to game the system by lowering both standards and
proficiency definitions. Such action can lead, perversely, to weakening curriculum and lowering, not raising
expectations. Only national curriculum standards and national definitions and measures of student
performance at proficiency levels can prevent this behavior.
National cries for increased expectations and evidence of higher student achievement are more than 30 years old.
But the decentralized system of schooling continues mostly unchanged. Students continue to move through the
nation’s schools gaining widely varying levels—mostly low—of knowledge, skills and preparedness. Evidence of
this abounds. 3

1AC – Solvency
Specifically, STEM standards are key at the national level – best for job training and global
leadership
Education Weekly, 5 (“Nationwide Standards Eyed Anew,” 12/7, lexis)
"I've been watching very, very closely the educational progress in Asia--China, India, Vietnam, Singapore, and
several others," said Robert L. Wehling, a retired global-marketing officer for the Cincinnati-based Procter &
Gamble Co., "and I'm telling you, they're making rapid progress, whereas we're making minuscule progress. And I
don't think the average American understands the impact of this for our future, because they're going to have the
bulk of the intellectual and creative talent in the world, and that has devastating consequences for us."
Given that global situation, the United States needs to define a common set of standards, "especially in subjects like
math and science and related courses," said former Gov. James B. Hunt Jr. of North Carolina, a Democrat, who also
has been speaking out this year on the need for national standards.
"I don't think this discussion has gotten to the place where people are ready to do it yet," he added, "but I think the
discussion among governors is at the point where they recognize they are facing very tough competition."
Antonia Cortese, the executive vice president of the American Federation of Teachers, personally thinks it makes "a
lot of sense" to have national standards. While the 1.3 million-member union has not taken an official position on
the issue, she argues that national standards and curriculum frameworks "could also influence teacher preparation,
and that would be a good thing."
Low-income education is critical to the success of overall education policies – globalization means
the workforce must be fully optimized
McGuire, 4 (Mark, Colonel in the US Army, http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA435137
&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf)
The US education industry produces the Nation’s most vital national security resource—sons and daughters
educated in a variety of subjects. Civics, history, social studies, and political science cultivate democratic values and
instill an understanding of America’s role in the world. Math, science, and technology build the foundation
needed to compete in the Information Age. Collectively, educated citizens are the economic backbone of the
country. They provide the human and materiel resources needed to build a strong military force and enable
government leaders and institutions to work effectively within the domestic and international environments.
In the words of President John F. Kennedy, “A free Nation can rise no higher than the standard of excellence set in its schools
and colleges.” The US education industry took its present form following World War II. While the industry was expanding to
serve the needs of veterans and the ensuing “baby boomer” generation, the Supreme Court’s Brown vs. Board of Education
ruling in 1954 required the industry to focus on providing equity in education. From then until the turn of the century, the
education system satisfied America’s national security requirements—it fueled the world’s most powerful economic engine,
produced a superior military capability, and enabled one of the most diverse populations of any country to thrive. Despite these
successes, however, two negative trends emerged during this period. First, overall student performance began to
decline, prompting the government in 1983 to publish A Nation at Risk that warned of a “rising tide of mediocrity”
in education that threatened future national security.iii Second, minority and low-income students were achieving at
levels far below that of other socioeconomic groups, a condition that perpetuated poverty and other social ills .iv
Although both trends have seen some improvement, the significance of these and other shortfalls within the US
education industry is magnified by three factors. Globalization, rapidly advancing technologies, and shifting US
demographics represent a new strategic environment that increases the importance of education to national security.
Globalization’s radically expanding economic competition leaves no room for US industries to be less than
fully optimized. Rapidly advancing technologies yield untold capabilities and reward the extremely talented who
develop and exploit them. Shifting US demographics will soon create a majority of minorities, and America’s
well being will be defined largely by the success of those minorities. With an eye toward this new environment,
the Education Industry Study Seminar conducted an executive-level analysis of the US education industry to assess
national security implications and offer policy recommendations.

Economy – Ext: No Jobs  Protectionism

Protectionist policies are increasing due to outsourcing of American jobs
UPI 3/10 ("Protectionism threatens India's IT sector," United Press International,
http://www.upiasia.com/Economics/2009/03/10/protectionism_threatens_indias_it_sector/5138/)
Nevertheless, until now protectionist rhetoric remained just that – rhetoric. But what’s drawing worry lines across
the Indian IT sector is the fact that protectionism is suddenly dominating the policies of almost every government.
“The threat of protectionism for the Indian IT sector comes almost from everywhere,” said Rodney A. Nelsestuen,
research director at the U.S.-based IT consulting firm Tower Group. “Nations across the world are looking at
supporting their industries and as a part of that, you will suddenly see taxpayers and stakeholders and all those who
contribute to support the government, regardless what the government structure is, will also want to see that the
industries are held to account,” he said. “So what we see happening is potential for protectionism, because as a
condition for support the governments are saying that we need not only to restore financial wellbeing but also to
contribute to domestic job growth.” Protectionism is indeed widespread and real. In early February, the U.S.
Senate voted to impose strict conditions on companies that receive federal bailout money, limiting the hiring of
foreigners with H-1B temporary-work visas. Although the final version was watered down from the original, which
had called for a blanket ban on H-1B visas, it was still a big blow to the Indian IT sector, which termed the
restriction as “irrational.” An even bigger blow came two weeks later when U.S. President Barack Obama, in his
first address to the Congress, said that there would be no tax breaks in outsourcing. “We will restore a sense of
fairness and balance to our tax code by finally ending the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas,"
Obama said.

Economy – Protectionism Uniqueness

Protectionism is a minor concern now, but the economic crisis has accelerated trade disputes – now
is key to stop protectionist measures
Bergsten and Brown. 2.19.09. “In Bad Economy, Countries Contemplate Protectionist Measures” PBS. Fred
Bergsten is Director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. Jeffrey Brown is an American journalist
and a senior correspondent and news anchor for the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on PBS since May 2005. Interview
Transcript. http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/business/jan-june09/trade_02-19.html
JEFFREY BROWN: It's not only between the U.S. and Canada that trade is becoming a critical issue. In hard times
-- and in some cases, in response to worker protests -- governments around the world are acting or threatening to act
to prop up their own companies and workers. Are such moves appropriate? Or do they signal a shift toward
protectionism?
We talk about all this now with Fred Bergsten, director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics, and
Thea Lee, policy director and chief international economist at the AFL-CIO.
Welcome to you both.
FRED BERGSTEN, Peterson Institute for International Economics: Good to be here.
JEFFREY BROWN: Fred Bergsten, let me start first. To what extent do you see the trade issue becoming a source
of friction as the global economy weakens?
FRED BERGSTEN: I think the trade issue will become a major source of friction, both among economic relations,
but between countries more broadly.
Over 30 countries have put in new trade barriers just since the Group of 20 had its summit meeting here in
Washington back in mid-November. Most of those are minor to date, but it's clear that, as the recession deepens and
broadens, this is going to be a very, very profound issue.
Countries around the world are going to be tempted to try to export their problems to their neighbors, try to close
their markets and create jobs at home at the expense of others.
The problem, of course, is that it won't work. As the president says today in Ottawa, this is a global crisis. All
countries are suffering downturns.
So any country that tries to export its problems, export its unemployment, create jobs at the expense of others is
going to face instant retaliation by others, and the whole trade system will spiral downward. It just won't work, but it
could become a major friction point between a lot of countries.

Economy – AT: Buy America  Protectionism

Buy America was watered down, but it put us on the brink of more protectionism
Hargreaves 3/6 – CNN money staffwriter (Steve, "'Buy American' cuts bothways"
http://money.cnn.com/2009/03/06/news/economy/stimulus_protection/index.htm) **Adam Tonelson is a research
fellow with the US Business and Industry Council
Although some U.S. trading partners reacted strongly against the original buy American rule - especially Canada
and Brazil, the latter of which threatened a lawsuit - Tonelson sees little downside to more government support.
Many of our trading partners, he said, already have their own protectionist measures in place, whether they are
explicit or hidden in the form of government bureaucracies that favor their own firms. "[U.S. manufacturers] are
already shut out of many procurement contracts," Tonelson said. "How much more harm could these provisions
do?" Although the buy American clause was watered down, Tonelson sees it as a springboard for further
protections. He named renewable energy as one sector deserving more government support. That support would go
above and beyond the 30% tax break the stimulus plan offered to manufacturers of things like wind turbines and
solar cells, and might require direct cash payments from the government. "We've got this important precedent that's
been set," he said. "We're going to try to beat this as far as we can." Supporters of the free market It's precisely that
line of thinking that's got the free traders so worried. Buy American, in its watered down form, isn't seen as
particularly restrictive. But there's a fear it could grow. To free traders - including former Presidents George Bush
and Bill Clinton - that means perpetuating inefficient industries at home, driving the cost of goods up and the quality
down, and hampering a global economic recovery.
Buy American was watered down in the stimulus

AFP 6/6 ("'Buy American' plan leads to ire, confusion," Agence France-Presse
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.dd912210b093ea987c89da799e3901ac.401&show_article=1)
"Some of these measures of course cause a lot of discomfort to many of us including Singapore," said Lim Hng
Kiang, the island nation's trade minister, in Washington for meetings with trade officials and US lawmakers. While
Singapore was not directly affected by the restriction, the tiny trade-dependent state understood the concerns of
countries hit by the action, he said, pointing out that some nations were exploiting "gray areas" in global trade rules.
"We are monitoring the situation very closely," Lim told reporters. Without pointing at the United States, Lim said it
might be difficult to pin down countries that took steps that bordered on protectionism at the World Trade
Organization, the global trade watchdog. The Buy American clause originally said that infrastructure projects
designed to kick-start the US economy out of a languishing recession could only use US-made manufactured
materials. But it was later watered down to show that such procurement could only take place in a manner consistent
with Washington's international treaty obligations. Some businesses and officials complained the amendment is
proving virtually meaningless in practice.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Chinese Econ

Protectionist policies cause a significant contraction in the Chinese economy
Deming, 2/20 (Chen, Minister of Commerce for PRC, given to the WSJ, "Protectionism doesn’t pay) AHerndon
Global trade is now in dire straits . Thanks to shrinking external demand caused by the economic crisis, major
trading countries have seen their export growth tumble or have suffered huge contractions. Germany's exports
dropped 10.6% in November 2008, compared to the same period the prior year -- the highest one-month drop since
1990. China also experienced negative export growth in November, and a 17.5% decline last month, when
compared to the prior year. Protectionist policies would make things even worse, and the consequences would be
hard to even predict.
In the heat of the crisis, it's critical that all countries refrain from pointing fingers at each other or pursuing their own
interests at the expense of others. The financial crisis reflects a chronic illness resulting from global economic
structural imbalance and financial risk accumulation, and there is no quick fix to this malady. The fundamental
interest of every country is to step up consultation and cooperation and keep international trade smoothly flowing.
Healthy international trade can help revive the world economy. During the Great Depression, the U.S. recovered
from its economic woes because the Roosevelt administration implemented the New Deal and shunned
protectionism.
In 2008, amid a contraction in global trade, unprecedented financial crisis and protectionist policies have inflicted a
severe impact on China and other countries. China's economic growth has slowed, exports have plunged, and
unemployment pressure has mounted. Yet even so, China still firmly believes that trade protectionism isn't a
solution to the world's problems. China imported $1.133 trillion worth of goods from countries around the world --
an 18.5% increase over the prior year. These imports are boosting the economic development of China's trading
partners. Since the crisis broke out, the Chinese government has put forward a series of measures aiming at
stimulating domestic demand. Given the size and openness of our country, the growth in China's domestic markets
can be translated into greater market potential and investment opportunities for other countries. This year China will
continue to increase imports and send buying missions abroad for large-scale purchase of equipment, products and
technology.
World War Three

Tom Plate, East Asia Expert, Adjunct. Prof. Communications @ UCLA, 6/28/’3
(Neo-cons a bigger risk to Bush than China, Strait Times, l/n)
But imagine a China disintegrating- on its own, without neo-conservative or Central Intelligence Agency prompting,
much less outright military invasion because the economy (against all predictions) suddenly collapses. That would
knock Asia into chaos. A massive flood of refugees would head for Indonesia and other places with poor border
controls, which don’t’ want them and cant handle them; some in Japan might lick their lips at the prospect of World
War II revisited and look to annex a slice of China. That would send Singapore and Malaysia- once occupied by
Japan- into nervous breakdowns. Meanwhile, India might make a grab for Tibet, and Pakistan for Kashmir . Then
you can say hello to World War III, Asia style. That’s why wise policy encourages Chinese stability, security and
economic growth – the very direction the White House now seems to prefer.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Japanese Econ [1/2]

Global protectionism will collapse the Japanese economy
Ellington, 4 (Lucien, Stanford Program for International Research, http://spice.stanford.edu/docs/122) AHerndon
During the miracle years, Japan had few economic competitors in Europe and none in Asia. Because Japan was a
Cold War ally, the United States ignored Japanese policies that discouraged imports. The situation is now
dramatically different. Japan faces strong international competition. Although the U.S. government is not as
concerned about trade issues as prior to the War on Terror, it periodically is critical of Japan's barriers to imports.
Protectionism makes life worse for most Japanese. Also, as a result of the communication and computer revolutions,
the very nature of global economic competition has changed. Companies now must make swift business decisions in
order to remain competitive. While there has been moderate deregulation, Japan's relatively inflexible economic
system still makes it difficult for Japanese companies to respond as quickly to competitive challenges as their
foreign counterparts. In the face of dramatic new economic challenges the Japanese system continues to change
much too slowly.
For example, the typical Tokyo family spends about one third more of its household income each year on food than
that of a New York family in part because of informal and formal trade barriers that still keep much foreign produce
out of Japan. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party and bureaucrats friendly to the farm lobby are responsible for this
situation. Even though Japan's full-time farmers constitute a miniscule percentage of the nation's workforce, they are
solid LDP supporters and have been protected from foreign competition as consumers suffer. Government protection
of highly inefficient industries such as construction and food processing wastes resources and causes Japanese
individuals and firms to pay much more for products than would otherwise be the case. In an effort to secure
political support from the construction industry, the LDP often supports useless public works projects thus
increasing Japan's already high-government deficit. Because until very recently large Japanese companies would not
lay off permanent employees, many Japanese industries still have high costs compared to companies in other
developed nations. However, Japanese companies are now significantly changing employment practices in order to
again become healthy.
During the 1980's Bubble, Japan's state-directed banking system made an enormous number of loans to non-
productive companies, who are still unable to pay them back, which has created a credit crunch for potentially
strong firms who need capital. As of 2004 the large majority of economists and policy makers concur regarding
what reforms Japan needs and there are definite signs of progress. Japan has entered into agricultural free trade
agreements recently with other nations thereby weakening the excessive power of farmers. Although the
nonperforming loan problem remains substantial, the total amount of bad debt has been reduced. Also, even though
the amount is very low by the standards of developed countries, Japan is increasingly open to foreign investment.
Still, much further reform must occur before the Japanese economy returns to full health.
An increasing number of Japanese and foreign observers believe that the only long-term solution to Japan's
structural economic problems will be the rise of a political party strong enough to wrest power from the LDP thus
ending the excessive coddling of special interests groups at the expense of the nation's economic health. Recently
the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) won impressive gains in national elections. Although they do not need to
"become like us," the Japanese should move more in the direction of freer and more unregulated capitalism and
away from the still somewhat inflexible state-directed system that was created to solve a different set of economic
problems than the ones that exist today. These reforms must continue to progress because demographic changes in
Japan's population also threaten the nation's economic viability. Very soon Japan will have the highest percentage of
citizens over 65 of any developed country. Already, because of an almost-twenty-year baby "bust," Japan's
population is growing at a mere 0.08 percent (estimate for 2004) and may soon start declining. The most effective
way to combat the enormous cost of these demographic changes is through impressive economic growth. Because of
Japan's massive global impact, the world will be better off if Japan again becomes an economic engine of growth.
Meanwhile, American students can learn much about an important country and about economics from Japan's
successes and failures.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Japanese Econ [2/2]

Japanese Economy key to Global economy
Pal, 8 (Mukal, Business Standard.com, "Japan and the World Economy," http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/japanthe-world-
economy/329181/) AHerndon
We at Orpheus are unequivocal about our view that Japanese economy leads not only America, but the overall world
economy. This is no simple hypothesis and can really change how Ben Bernanke handles the ongoing global credit
crisis, which coincidecidentally happened exactly on the centenarian year of the Federal Reserve in 2007.
The regulatory body was formed a century ago in 1907, after a banking crisis caused a run on the banks and
bankruptcies. Economists like Bernanke and many others swear by the Great Depression as the most important
lesson of macroeconomics.
But in size and proportions, the Japanese depression of 13 years pales the three-year falls of the Great Depression. It
took 15 years for Dow to cross its 1929 high, while even after 25 years the Nikkei is still far away from historical
highs seen in 1980's. The Japanese slowdown of contemporary times is the largest slowdown we have ever seen.
And there can be many reasons it did not get the much deserved attention by macroeconomists around the world.
First, maybe because markets are not sure whether it's over, or it's still ongoing. Second, because Japanese are not
too happy talking about it. Third, maybe because the slowdown happened in the most prosperous 20 years of the
world economy. The reticent two halves of have and have-not's were polarised. Fourth, because we have few
econohistorians today and fewer readers of econohistory. Fifth, humans understand things in retrospect and not in
the present. There is too much emotion involved to result in any profound learning. Sixth, conventional economics
failed in Japan. And talking about failure is admitting to a mistake, which is hard. Nobody likes asking or answering
uncomfortable questions.
All economic axioms were junked in this time by Japan. Depression happened in an era of falling interest rates,
which are supposed to do more good than bad. Nikkei fell more than 80 per cent from 1990 till 2003. The excesses
of the 1980s collapsed as prices in real estate fell 1/100 to 1/10. And there are people still paying mortgage for
houses bought at the peak of 1980's.
The depression in mood has not eased and a suicide happens every 15 minutes, with average 30,000 people taking
their lives every year. The bestselling book was The Complete Manual of Suicide written in 1993. And more
Japanese want to emigrate, as salaries are still poor and corporates highly conservative.
Despite all this negativity in the mood which is linked with economic depression, yen not only strengthened over
this period, but has historically outperformed gold by nearly 100 per cent. This means that if gold quintupled since
2000, holding the yen could have bettered that performance.
Japan is the most energy efficient country in the world, and has technological capabilities which it's selling to
neighboring China and world over. If the country shares its stockpile of rice, international food crisis can really ease
and prices can fall by half. This is the power Japan can exercise on a global forum today.
Above all this, the Japanese market has the largest proportion of listed debt-free companies in the world, about 40
per cent. More than half of the listed companies are below price to book of 1, meaning that the companies are worth
less than their strip value.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Environment [1/2]

Protectionism kills the environment- more pollution and less investment in green conservation
Boin, 8 (Caroline, Director, environment programme at the International Policy Network, a London-based think tank, "Protectionism hurts
consumers and enviorment," http://www.newvision.co.ug/D/8/20/610203) AHerndon
In January, European leaders suggested that, to sell their goods in Europe, companies from the US, China, India and
other countries should be forced to purchase emissions permits in the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme. Although
the US trade representative criticised this proposal, legislation being considered in the US Senate – the Lieberman-
Warner bill – would have a similar effect, applying a carbon tax to imports from countries that do not cap their
emissions. The idea behind such protectionism is to create a “level playing field” – where European and American
producers are not disadvantaged by their self-imposed restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions. But instead of
levelling the playing field, this game would artificially make all players one-legged and one-armed.
The benefits of trade would be replaced by losses in consumer welfare and environmental degradation. Whereas the
beneficiaries of liberalisation are widely dispersed, the beneficiaries of trade restrictions are concentrated and tend to
be very effective in lobbying national governments to protect their business from competition, especially when
supported by moralists, such as environmentalists, who claim that such protections benefit the earth.
Thus, Greens, big business and organised labour unite.
The Lieberman-Warner bill is endorsed not only by major Green groups but also by electricity providers and their
associated trade unions. Similarly, various European trade unions have applauded calls for punitive trade measures
against non-EU competitors.
But in reality, it is far more moral to support liberalisation.
Trade barriers of any kind, including “green” subsidies, tariffs and quotas , harm both consumers and producers.
They artificially increase costs, leading to unnecessary waste of scarce natural and human resources. Consumers and
producers spend more to purchase the same goods and services, so have less to invest in new technologies or to save
for the future.
Although some claim that trade barriers would help the environment, they are actually counterproductive. They
favour the status quo by rewarding inefficient producers and thus delaying the adoption of cleaner , resource-saving
technologies. Consider bananas.
These could be grown in the cold climates of Finland, Canada, and Russia. But to do so would be far more costly
than growing them in warm places, and then exporting them to consumers around the world. Which is why they are
grown in places such as Costa Rica and the Ivory Coast. As a result bananas are less expensive and resources are
used more sustainably.
Instead, they will continue to use older, dirtier production methods and thus will use scarce resources less
sustainably.
This effect would be exacerbated by reduced investment from multinational companies. Moreover, less trade means
less wealth, which translates into fewer resources available to invest in environmental conservation. India
demonstrates the follies of protectionism.
Until 1984, India had one car manufacturer, which produced just one car – the Ambassador – which was
technologically inferior, belched pollutants, and was unaffordable to all but the elite. In 1984, India began to open its
market to foreign car producers.
This process exploded after the reforms of 1991 and millions of Indians have benefited from competition,
purchasing cars that are less expensive, cleaner, more technologically advanced and efficient . Environmental
ideologues continue to make dour prognostications about our planet’s future, claiming that we all must consume
less, have fewer children and trade less with each other to address climate change. Based on their scaremongering
and frankly embarrassing record of false predictions in recent decades, these claims should not be heeded seriously.
Such demands may suit the protectionist agenda but they have little merit in terms of their practical ability to enable
humanity to use scarce natural and human resources in an ever-more sustainable manner.
The competitive market process, underpinned by free trade between and within nations, is inherently more
sustainable than the regulated economy advocated by eco-doom mongers.
Protectionism, naked or cloaked in green, harms the vast majority of people as well as the environment – and is best
avoided.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Environment [2/2]

Environmental collapse causes extinction
Farabee, 7 (M.J, Ph.D., Professor Estrella Mountain Community College, Enviormental Author, "The Biosphere and Mass exticiton, Lexis)
AHerndon
Extinctions occur when environments change too fast. Local extinctions can occur, as can mass extinctions: they differ in scale,
scope and the numbers of species involved. There have been five environmental changes (mostly cooling) of global proportions that resulted in
the five mass extinctions in Earth history. Recovery from these extinctions took millions of years. A spectacular exception was the large
meteorite strike sixty-six million years ago near the Yucatán peninsula in Mexico that either caused the extinction of dinosaurs and 75% of all
marine species, or was the nail in the coffin of the dinosaurs.
There have been several natural mass extinctions in the history of earth followed by recovery. Human activities that
reduce biodiversity began about 30,000 years ago with development of social and language skills to apply
increasingly better stone tool technology to trap and kill the larger animals. Hunting contributes to the estimated extinction of
15,000 to 30,000 species a year. Fish stocks are being depleted by overfishing. Commercial trade causes exploitation of tigers, cheetahs, leopards,
jaguars, etc. for furs; sharks for fins; rhinoceros for rhino horn powder; elephants for tusks for ivory; and cacti for gardeners. A major cause of
extinction is the loss of habitat to support a species. The habitat for a species may be totally destroyed through natural events or human activities.
Habitats may be fragmented into small pieces that cannot support the population. By 2010, very little undisturbed rain forest will exist outside of
national parks.Accidental or purposeful introduction of new species can cause extinction of endemic species. Introduction of brown tree snake to
Guam has resulted in extinction of nine of eleven native bird species. The carp, an Asian fish that can tolerate polluted waters, is now more
prevalent than our native fish. Kudzu, a plant native to Asia, has beome a major pest throughout the south. Water hyacinth escaped from captivity
and has become a hazard to navigation, as well as disrupting the local environment.
Global climate change may be so rapid that many species cannot adjust . Biological magnification of pesticides has
reduced predatory bird populations. Acid deposition is implicated in the worldwide decline in amphibian
populations.
Conservation biology is a discipline that brings together many fields to attempt to solve biodiversity problems. It attempts to develop practical
approaches to preventing extinction of species and destruction of ecosystems. Most conservation biologists believe biological diversity is good
and each species has a value all its own. Sustainability is concept that it is possible to meet economic needs while protecting environment. Some
economists argue that as per capita income increases, environmental degradation first increases, then decreases as people become affluent enough
to begin to protect the environment.
Development in Tropical Regions
Human-caused environmental changes and extinctions are accelerating in the tropics. If this pace continues nearly
half all species could be extinct by 2050. Development in tropical areas causes more extinctions due to the great
diversity found in tropical rain forests (half all species on Earth). Tropical reefs are also under siege by water
pollution, leading to even more extinctions. Nearly half the rain forests are gone already. By as early as 2010 ( less
than 15 years!) all rain forests will be gone if present trends of exploitation and human population growth continue.
Species are not equally likely to suffer extinction. Cockroaches hav e been around for 300 million years essentially unchanged and probably will
be around for millions more. Island species, species with limited habitats, low reproductive rates, high territory requirements, susceptibility to
pollution, predators, and having economic value: all make the human species susceptible to extinction .

Economy – Protectionism Impact: EU Relations [1/2]

Protectionism crushes US-EU relations
AP, 7.8.09. “US trading partners complain about protectionism” Associated Press / Accessed through MSN
Money.com. The Associated Press is the backbone of the world's information system serving thousands of daily
newspaper, radio, television and online customers with coverage in all media and news in all formats. It is the
largest and oldest news organization in the world. http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/provider/providerarticle.aspx?
feed=AP&date=20090608&id=9987235)
WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States' largest trading partners are warning that protectionist moves by Congress
could poison global trade relations, despite President Barack Obama's assurances that he wants to keep U.S. markets
open.
Businesses in the European Union and Canada complain they have been shut out of U.S. markets because of the
"Buy American" provision in the massive stimulus bill, passed in February, which requires the use of U.S.-
manufactured products.
EU and Canadian officials worry the practice is widening, as Congress is considering adding similar measures to
other spending bills.
Buy American supporters want to make sure that the billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars being spent to revive the
economy create jobs at home. The U.S. unemployment rate is at its highest level in 25 years.
Many U.S. exporters fear the provisions will backfire, costing American jobs as other countries retaliate. Some
municipalities in Canada have begun organizing boycotts of U.S. products, and EU and Canadian officials say they
are reviewing their options.
The Obama administration is looking for ways to reassure trading partners as it prepares to detail its trade policy in
coming weeks.
Though much of the trading partners' ire is aimed at Congress, there also is uncertainty about Obama's commitment
to free trade. As a candidate seeking support from working-class voters, Obama had criticized some U.S. trade
agreements.
The EU Commission's ambassador to Washington, John Bruton, said he would like to see the White House take a
harder line with Congress on the issue.
"My concern is increasing because we are seeing protectionist measures being introduced under the guise of other
measures," Bruton told The Associated Press. "I think it is something that arose from the presidential and
congressional election. We saw heated election rhetoric, and I suppose that that is now reflected in Congress."
US-EU relations are key to preventing Russian aggression in Central Asia

Brzezinski, 03 (Zbigniew, Former National Security Advisor, The National Interest, “Hegemonic Quicksand”,
Issue 74, Winter 03/04, Proquest)
While Russia has not stood in the way of any decisive U.S. military efforts to alter the strategic realities of the
region, the current geopolitical earthquake in the Persian Gulf could jeopardize America's efforts to consolidate the
independence of the Caspian Basin states. American preoccupation with the mess in Iraq, not to mention the
cleavage between America and Europe as well as the increased American-Iranian tensions, has already tempted
Moscow to resume its earlier pressure on Georgia and Azerbaijan to abandon their aspirations for inclusion in the
Euro-Atlantic community and to step up its efforts to undermine any enduring U.S. political and military presence in
Central Asia. That would make it more difficult for the United States to engage the Central Asian states in a larger
regional effort to combat Islamic fundamentalism in Afghanistan and Pakistan. A resurgence of Muslim extremism
of the Taliban variety could then even acquire a regional scope.
These risks could be lessened by closer U.S.-EU strategic collaboration with regard to Iraq and Iran. That may not
be easy to achieve, given divergent American and European perspectives, but the benefits of cooperation outweigh
the costs of any compromise. For the United States, a joint approach would mean less freedom of unilateral action; for the
European Union, it would mean less opportunity for self-serving inaction. But acting together-with the threat of U.S. military
power reinforced by the EU's political, financial and (to some degree) military support-the Euro-Atlantic community could foster
a genuinely stable and possibly even democratic post-Saddam regime.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: EU Relations [2/2]

The impact is Russia-US thermonuclear war
F. William Engdahl. 8.8.08. “Russia Georgia War - Washington risks nuclear war by miscalculation” Current. F.
William Engdahl is a leading analyst of the New World Order, and a prolific author
http://current.com/items/89192617_russia-georgia-war-washington-risks-nuclear-war-by-miscalculation.htm
The dramatic military attack by the military of the Republic of Georgia on South Ossetia in the last days has brought
the world one major step closer to the ultimate horror of the Cold War era—a thermonuclear war between Russia
and the United States—by miscalculation. What is playing out in the Caucasus is being reported in US media in an
alarmingly misleading light, making Moscow appear the lone aggressor. The question is whether George W. Bush
and Dick Cheney are encouraging the unstable Georgian President, Mikhail Saakashvili in order to force the next
US President to back the NATO military agenda of the Bush Doctrine. This time Washington may have badly
misjudged the possibilities, as it did in Iraq , but this time with possible nuclear consequences.
The underlying issue, as I stressed in my July 11 piece in this space, Georgien, Washington, Moskau: Atomarer
geopolitischer Machtpoker , is the fact that since the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact in 1991 one after another
former member as well as former states of the USSR have been coaxed and in many cases bribed with false
promises by Washington into joining the counter organization, NATO.
Rather than initiate discussions after the 1991 dissolution of the Warsaw Pact about a systematic dissolution of
NATO, Washington has systematically converted NATO into what can only be called the military vehicle of an
American global imperial rule, linked by a network of military bases from Kosovo to Poland to Turkey to Iraq and
Afghanistan . In 1999, former Warsaw Pact members Hungary , Poland and the Czech Republic joined NATO.
Bulgaria , Estonia , Latvia , Lithuania , Romania , and Slovakia followed suit in March 2004. Now Washington is
putting immense pressure on the EU members of NATO, especially Germany and France , that they vote in
December to admit Georgia and Ukraine .

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Laundry List

Protectionism (causes terrorism) / (decks national security) / (kills global liberty)
Markheim and Kim, 3.4.06. “Free Trade with the UAE Supports America's National Security Interests” The Heritage Foundation.
Daniella Markheim is Jay Van Andel Senior Analyst in Trade Policy, and Anthony B. Kim is Research Data Specialist, in the Center for
International Trade and Economics at The Heritage Foundation. http://www.heritage.org/research/tradeandeconomicfreedom/wm1006.cfm
Protectionism of this sort is no way to boost national security. In fact, it would do the opposite. Protectionism would
endanger U.S. prosperity—the cornerstone of security—strain relationships with important allies in the war on
terrorism, and make it more difficult to use trade as a tool to spread American values and bolster U.S. interests. A
successful strategy for improving national security must include free trade and investment. Free Trade and Free Markets. A
strong economy, bolstered by free trade, is a pillar of national defense . The Bush Administration’s 2002 National Security
Strategy correctly identifies “free trade and free markets” as the keys to a secure America and necessary components of our national security
strategy. As pointed out in the U.S. National Security Strategy: “Economic growth supported by free trade and free markets
creates new jobs and higher incomes. It allows people to lift their lives out of poverty, spurs economic and legal
reforms, and the fight against corruption, and it reinforces the habits of liberty.”
Last week, U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Rob Portman re-emphasized this point by warning that “canceling this port deal would be
contrary” to U.S. beliefs that fighting terrorism means promoting policies that create “opportunities for people to improve their lives and the lives
of their families.” The opportunity to promote economic freedom in the UAE through free markets and free trade should not be sacrificed in the
current debate on the port deal.
Economic freedom, of which free trade is a major component, leads to faster economic growth and improved
standards of living. According to The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom, countries with freer trade policies
experience higher per-capita GDP growth than countries that maintain trade barriers. Countries that opened their trade
policies between 1995 and 2004 saw their per-capita GDP grow at an average compound rate of 2.5 percent. Countries whose trade policies were
unchanged experienced an average compound growth rate of 2.1 percent in per capita GDP. Finally, countries that increased their barriers to trade
managed only a 1.8 percent average compound growth rate.
These results support the 9/11 Commission’s recommendation that “a comprehensive U.S. strategy to counter terrorism
should include economic policies that encourage development, more open societies, and opportunities for people to
improve the lives of their families and to enhance prospects for their children’s future.”
Consistent with the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations, the Administration authorized the negotiation of a free trade agreement with the UAE
in 2004 as part of President Bush’s plan to create a Middle East Free Trade Area (MEFTA) by 2013. This move enjoyed broad bipartisan support
at the time of the Administration’s initial consultations with Congress. Last month, the USTR announced that it intends to resume free trade talks
with the UAE in March.
This move is about far more than just trade. America’s free trade agreements (FTAs) go beyond winning lower tariffs on U.S. agriculture,
manufacturing, and services exports. FTAs contain provisions that safeguard investors from discrimination and
uncompensated expropriation of property, increase regulatory transparency and eliminate excessive red tape, protect
and enforce intellectual property rights, combat corruptive practices, insure nondiscriminatory government
procurement, protect labor rights, and strengthen environmental protection . The USTR negotiates agreements that include
transparent dispute resolution and arbitration mechanisms to guarantee that the agreements are upheld, along with the rights of U.S. firms and
consumers.
Each element of an FTA strengthens the transparent and efficient flow of goods, services, and investments between
member countries. FTAs open markets, protect investors, and increase economic opportunity and prosperity. In
short, FTAs serve to promote U.S. interests, not weaken them.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Economy

Protectionism devastates the global economy –making material recovery impossible
Joseph Rosta, June 09. “Protectionism Is not Self-Defense” US Banker. Rosta is the Editor-in-Chief of Industrial
Equipment News. http://www.americanbanker.com/usb_article.html?id=200905221SXXYW2W
Former President George W. Bush increased 300 tariffs in the final days of his administration; Congress successfully inserted "buy-America"
provisions into the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act; French President Nicolas Sarkozy threatened to repatriate auto manufacturing
from Eastern Europe; and UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown promised "British jobs for British workers." Desperate times often bring damaging
measures. But protectionist acts will only further stifle world trade, thus lengthening and deepening the recession.
In Book IV, Chapter 2 of "The Wealth of Nations", Adam Smith makes clear his distaste for what the modern world
calls protectionism: "To give the monopoly of the home-market to the produce of domestic industry...must, in
almost all cases, be either a useless or a hurtful regulation." While G-20 nations and most other free-trading
countries strive to meet the letter of international trade law, some appear to be skirting its spirit.
Indeed, the World Trade Organization regularly tracks "trade and trade-related measures," country by country. Its latest survey covered the
September 2008 to March 2009 period, and pointed to more than 200 measures, often with multiple effects. Some of the actions are no doubt
acceptable under WTO rules — and the organization says its listing "implies no judgment by the WTO Secretariat on whether or not such
measure, or its intent, is protectionist in nature." But it is clear that, in many cases, the measures could limit imports.
Argentina, for example, introduced reference prices for "around 1,000 imported products considered sensitive," the WTO report states. State-
sponsored reference pricing allows domestic companies to sell their goods at just below market prices, and is considered
one of the basic non-tariff trade barriers.
The allure of protectionism is growing, the WTO says. "At the start of this year, most WTO members appeared to
have successfully kept these pressures under control," according to most recent report from the director-general to
the organization's Trade Policy Review Body. Now the barricades are going up, with higher tariffs, other
restrictions, and anti-dumping actions on the rise. Although most stimulus bills "clearly favor the restoration of trade
growth globally," several include trade-limiting government aid and subsidies, and various buying and hiring
restrictions.
And as anti-trade measures pile up, "this will worsen the contraction of world trade and undermine confidence in an
early and sustained recovery in global economic activity," the WTO says.
The world has experienced the misfortune of protectionism before. High tariffs didn't create the Great Depression,
but they made it greater, making the downward spiral uncontrollable and unstoppable . Smoot-Hawley was a craven
concession to the perceived public will, a pure play for votes. The law passed despite the failure of the Fordney-McCumber Tariff, enacted in
1922 to protect the American farmer. Fordney-McCumber greatly limited European agricultural imports. But overproduction eroded prices, and
American farmers continued to suffer. So newly elected President Herbert Hoover raised tariffs even more. In no time other industries sought and
were granted similar "protection," which was solidified by Smoot-Hawley in 1930.
An escalating imposition of retaliatory measures ensued amid already weakened economies, a self-destructive virus
that strangled trade and was only wiped out by a world war.
"Clearly there's enough understanding that extreme trade wars can be destructive, and that's better than starting
without that underlying belief," says David Levy, chairman and director of the Levy Forecasting Center. But the public grows impatient as
the pain of recession intensifies. "It's difficult for politicians who want to stay in office — or alive, depending on their situation — too ignore the
temptation," Levy observes. The G-20's defense of free trade is laudable. But when survival of key domestic industries is in doubt "it's natural to
say we can't have all those cars coming into the U.S. The nature of the debate changes."
Levy calls the U.S. the "800-pound gorilla because the importer has more clout in this situation." Protectionism could "push a particular player to
default," leading to a panicked, downward spiral . The global economy is in a delicate state: "Rattle it and it can break ," he
warns.
The 300 tariff hikes signed by President Bush complied with WTO rules, and the "buy-America" provisions in the
stimulus bill were altered to the same effect. But Brown still stands behind his "British jobs for British workers" cry,
and Sarkozy has not withdrawn his repatriation remarks. This protectionist stance may win them votes, but it will
harm their economies.


Protectionism collapses the economy – history flows aff
Ahsan, 2/12 (Mainul, Economic Proffessor Texas Tech U, Financial Times Express, "Protectionism does not
create jobs, it destroys it," http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2009/02/12/58600.html) AHerndon
Not only the Bangladeshis, but also the Americans do not learn from the history ! If we go back to 1930s, we will see that three of the
Uncle Sam's attempt led the World to the Great Depression: (1) Tighter monetary policy during the depression which allowed to fall money
supply at least one third; (2) In 1930 when the world economy was sinking as it is today, the US Congress passed the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act,
which essentially shut off imports into the US Consequently, United State's trading partners also retaliated, and world trade plummeted; and (3)
President Herbert Hoover made the situation even worse by signing a "Buy America Act" requiring all federal government projects to use only
American manufactured materials. Thus, the truth is US government's intervention in 1930s in fact prolonged depression . Now,
it's time to say that history really repeats itself. The Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke is also a student and researcher of the great
depression. So, he already flooded the market with liquidity, and kept interest rate near zero. But what are the US politicians doing? The House of
Representatives' version of the economic stimulus bill, contains a provision, "Buy American", requires that all "manufactured goods" bought by
taxpayers for the stimulus be produced domestically. "Buy American" bill contains stronger anti-free-trade provisions, for instance, foreign steel
in federal projects would only be allowed if domestic products were either unavailable or drove up the cost of the projects by 25 per cent or more.
We know that world trade allows both parties to be better-off by importing inexpensive commodities from country A, and selling them our
commodities on which we have comparative advantage over country A. However, as the world-wide recession leading to depression deepens,
protectionist sentiments get a boost to "save" jobs. But, Princeton Universities Economics Professor, Burton Malkiel, in one his
article on the Wall Street Journal says , "No one person's benefit can compare with the loss felt by the displaced worker. But the total benefits do
exceed the costs. And competitive markets have spurred the innovation revolution that has made the US the economic powerhouse that it is."
He also added that the solution for the displaced worker is job retraining and adjustment assistance, and to improve the safety net available to
displaced workers during the transition period.
Policymakers neglected the fact that "Buy American" provision invites retaliation by other nations too. Though more than 50 nations
are covered by treaties with the United States, and thus may be entitled to exceptions to the restrictions, many of those countries, and the
European Union (EU), have issued protests about the proposed legislation. The EU has already declared that it will not stand by idly if the US
violates its trade agreements and its obligations to the World Trade Organization (WTO). Since the US is the biggest exporter in the
world, retaliation could cost America more jobs than the proposed provision would create.
In October 2008, when the US met at an emergency meeting in Washington with the world's 20 largest economies, all countries agreed on " the
critical importance of rejecting protectionism and not turning inward in times of financial uncertainty." Surely most
of the parties forgot their promise just like before . The EU nations have reversed direction and tightened their own trade rules, for
instance by resuming subsidies to dairy farmers' exports and effectively barring Chinese screws and bolts from their market, while accusing
China of dumping them below cost. As a step towards retaliation, the US is planning retaliatory tariffs on Italian water and French cheese to
punish the EU for restricting imports of U.S. chicken and beef. India is proposing to increase tariffs on foreign steel at the request of its steel
industry. Thus, global trade is expected to shrink by more than 2.1 per cent this year after growing by 6.2 per cent in 2008, according to the
WTO. International trade analysts say the current rash of trade constraints could make it harder for global economic growth to recover from the
current downturn.
Unfortunately, the WTO is as powerless as the United Nations (UN). But, yes, if all the countries worked together and coordinated with each
other, all the nations would have been better off.
Protectionism in the name of "Buy American" will surely destabilize trade
and capital flows, and it also risks turning a global recession into a 1930s-style great depression.
On January 30th, 2009, at the World Economic Summit in Davos, Switzerland, British Prime Minister and Labour Party head Gordon Brown said
that protectionism will lead to "longer and deeper" recession . He also said, "Protectionism protects nobody, least of
all the poor." He is right. Protectionism will simply destroy jobs, not create them, and poor people in this world will
experience most of the pain.


Protectionism restrict economic growth and causes economic decline
Brouwer, 8 (Kurt, Co-founder large financial advisory firm that was founded in 1987. Author of three books on
mutual fund investing, http://www.fundmasteryblog.com/author/admin/) AHerndon
Free trade has been one of the chief engines of global prosperity . It would be a huge mistake to adopt protectionism
as the Smoot-Hawley legislation did prior to the Great Depression. There is plenty of disguised protectionism
going around today in the form of misleading claims about America’s manufacturing output. In fact, though
employment in manufacturing is dropping due to improvements in productivity, manufacturing output has never
been higher.
There is also plenty of obstructionism about trade agreements as well. The Colombia free trade pact is a perfect
example. Colombia’s goods can now come here largely without restriction. But, there is a bill that would give U.S.
exporters improved access to Colombian markets. That seems unambiguously good for us, yet Congress is holding
it up due to opposition primarily from U.S. labor unions. Big mistake.
The Washington Post continues with a second point on how we could squelch the recovery:
Increasing taxes in a downturn. Hoover more than doubled income tax rates, taking the top marginal rate to 63 percent from 25 percent.
FDR hiked the top rate to 90 percent. Perhaps worse, Roosevelt’s Treasury crafted taxes to punish business, including an undistributed
profits tax and an excess profits tax, that ultimately sucked cash from a capital-starved economy.
Today, Democrats are planning tax increases that make Bill Clinton’s hike look mild. The proposals start with lifting
the cap on Social Security payroll taxes — an effective increase in the top marginal tax rate of 6.2 percent, or for
some 12.4 percent, all by itself. Add in the promised repeal of the Bush tax cuts and you have an additional 4.6
percent increase. Effective top rates approach 50 percent. There are also proposed increases for dividends and
capital gains. Taken together, these will make the U.S. economy sluggish and more like that of Europe…
(…)
If you improve and enhance economic freedom, more prosperity ensues. If you restrict economic freedom by
increasing taxes or laying on more bureaucratic red tape, you inevitably reduce prosperity. Our economy is resilient,
yet it should also be clear that people gain prosperity faster in areas with more economic freedom.
No matter what happens with this presidential election, it should be clear that we want to encourage — rather than
squelch — economic growth. There is certainly room for disagreement on how to achieve growth, but let’s not lose sight of the goal — a
strong, prosperous economy.

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Wars

Protectionism sparks global trade wars- furthers economic disaster
TWP, 3/18 (The Washington Post, "Trade Barriers threaten Global Economy, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2009/03/17/AR2009031703218.html) AHerndon
At least 17 of the 20 major nations that vowed at a November summit to avoid protectionist steps that could spark a
global trade war have violated that promise, with countries from Russia to the United States to China enacting
measures aimed at limiting the flow of imported goods, according to a World Bank report unveiled yesterday.
The report underscores a "worrying" trend toward protectionism as countries rush to shield their ailing domestic
industries during the global economic crisis. It comes one day after Mexico vowed to slap new restrictions on 90
U.S. products. That action is being taken in retaliation against Washington for canceling a program that allowed
Mexican truck drivers the right to transport goods across the United States, illustrating the tit-for-tat responses that
experts fear could grow in coming months. The report comes ahead of an April 2 summit in London in which the
heads of state from those 20 industrialized and developing economies will seek to shape a coordinated response to
the economic crisis. Their inability to keep their November promises is another indication of how difficult it will be
to implement any agreement reached next month on a global scale.
Protectionist measures may also sharply worsen the collapse of global trade , which the World Bank said is facing its
steepest decline in 80 years as global demand dries up.
"Leaders must not heed the siren-song of protectionist fixes, whether for trade, stimulus packages or bailouts," said
World Bank Group President Robert B. Zoellick. Noting that protectionism is widely viewed as having deepened
and prolonged the Great Depression, he added "economic isolationism can lead to a negative spiral of events such as
those we saw in the 1930s, which made a bad situation much, much worse."
The Bank said that, since last November, a host of nations has imposed a total of 47 measures that restrict trade at
the expense of other countries. The most obvious trade restrictions -- raising tariffs, or taxes on imports -- represent
only about a third of all measures taken. Some countries are taking a direct approach. Ecuador, for instance, has
raised tariffs on more than 600 items. But most are taking more creative steps that fall into the gray area of what is
considered legal under international trade law.
Some measures, the report concludes, may distort global production for products like cars and trucks . National
bailouts and subsidies proposed worldwide for the auto industry, the World Bank said, now total some $48 billion
globally, with aid pouring out from governments including the United States, France, Canada, Germany, Britain,
China, Argentina and Brazil. That could prevent the natural readjustment of the industry , which many experts say is
greatly overcapacity, allowing automakers to continue to produce more cars than consumers need.
The report noted that current trade laws, however, make it tougher for nations to take the more sweeping measures
that triggered the trade wars of the 1930s. The era of globalization has made countries more interdependent than
ever before, with supply chains for a single car made in China or a plane made in the United States now often
relying on components manufactured in many other nations. That has led to a new measure of caution when putting
up trade barriers. Additionally, global treaties have made it more difficult to enact draconian barriers.
The fear, critics contend, is that actions like these could touch off countermeasures that could lead to broader trade
wars. "I think the one thing that people forget is that at the end of the day, our failure to comply with NAFTA is
going to result in the loss of more jobs here in America," said Sean Spicer, a official at the Office of the U.S. Trade
Representative during the Bush administration. "There are consequences for this kind of action, and they tend to
build upon each other and provoke more responses. Is that really the kind of path we want to go down?"

Economy – Ext: Education Solves Econ

Finland proves- Education is the new age way of sustainable economic growth
Egloo, 8 (Michael, BBC News Reporter, Re-posted on his blog, http://ziny96.egloos.com/4766681)
How can a small, affluent country such as Finland maintain a high-wage, high-skill economy? It can't compete with
the low-cost economies of Asia, so it must, as a matter of economic survival, invest heavily in education and
training.
"In Finland, we believe we have to invest in education, in research and in higher education.
"Education can pioneer new areas for jobs. We always need new skills for the labour force - so it means that we
have to keep investing." This policy received an endorsement last month from an annual report from the World
Economic Forum, which identified Finland as the world's most competitive economy, citing its "culture of
innovation".
Ms Haatainen, a minister in a centre-left coalition government, says that this economic imperative is best served by
having a broad-based, open-access education system. And in particular, she says the country's educational success
can be attributed to the "unified" school system, which sees children staying at the same school between the ages of
seven and 16, rather than having primary and secondary schools. "We don't divide at an early stage between
students who do well and those that don't manage so well in schools," she says, speaking at Finland's education
ministry in Helskini. (…)
The emphasis on investing in education has created a system where as much as possible is delivered to students
without charge.
School meals are free to all pupils, there are no university fees and students can stay in the upper secondary stage
(loosely equivalent to sixth forms) for up to four years. Re-skilling workers Compared to the UK, Finland has a
higher unemployment rate - currently about 8% - and an aim of the education policy is to improve adult education.
"We have lots of people who do not have any education beyond basic education and they have been in the labour
force for a long time. "And we have a special programme for these people to give them chances to come back to
vocational training, such as ICT [information and communication technology], so that they can manage in the
changing labour market."
Language learning is also a key to this effort to compete - and the success is apparent in the hugely impressive
standards of English to be heard throughout Helsinki, whether it's from shop staff or people talking to overseas
visitors.
In a relatively short of space of time, Finland has transformed itself from an agricultural country to a high-tech
economy, associated more with mobile phone company Nokia than with timber-felling.
And the fast-forward button has been education.

Economy – 2AC War Add-on

STEM education key to the economy – builds a robust workforce that increases GDP and offsets
recessions, that’s Paulus.
Economic decline causes nuclear war

The Baltimore Examiner, 9 (“Will this recession lead to World War II,” 2/26, http://www.examiner.com/x-
3108-Baltimore-Republican-Examiner~y2009m2d26-Will-this-recession-lead-to-World-War-III)
Could the current economic crisis affecting this country and the world lead to another world war? The answer may
be found by looking back in history. One of the causes of World War I was the economic rivalry that existed
between the nations of Europe. In the 19th century France and Great Britain became wealthy through colonialism
and the control of foreign resources. This forced other up-and-coming nations (such as Germany) to be more
competitive in world trade which led to rivalries and ultimately, to war. After the Great Depression ruined the
economies of Europe in the 1930s, fascist movements arose to seek economic and social control. From there fanatics
like Hitler and Mussolini took over Germany and Italy and led them both into World War II. With most of North
America and Western Europe currently experiencing a recession, will competition for resources and economic
rivalries with the Middle East, Asia, or South American cause another world war? Add in nuclear weapons and
Islamic fundamentalism and things look even worse. Hopefully the economy gets better before it gets worse and the
terrifying possibility of World War III is averted. However sometimes history repeats itself.

CTE – Ext: NCLB Kills CTE

NCLB trades off with CTE – curriculum trade-off
Another issue expressed by Diane Rentner, project coordinator at the Center on Education Policy, is that school
districts with fewer funds are more likely to spend more time preparing students in math and reading, which in turn
may cause those students to have a less rich curriculum (Mantel, 2005). According to the Center on Education
Policy (2006), “Urban districts are increasingly experiencing the greatest effects…about 90% of the schools in
restructuring, the last stage of NCLB’s sanctions, are in urban districts” (p. ix). In a review of the literature, findings
indicate that the increased pressure on assessment mandated by NCLB seems to have a negative impact on the
quality of instruction and results in narrowing of the curricula (Abrams et al., 2003; Austin & Mahlman, 2002;
Circle, 2005; Herman & Dietel, 2005; Neill, 2006; Weland, 2006). Due to the increased emphasis on core academic
programs, anecdotal evidence indicates that curricula may be getting “left behind” in relation to other areas. This
likely influences CTE curricula, among others.
NCLB decreases enrollment in CTE courses

Daggett, 2 – President of the International Center for Leadership in Education
(Willard R, “The Future of Career and Technical Education,” International Center for Leadership in Education,
http://www.leadered.com/pdf/CTE%20white%20paper.pdf)
Career and technical education (CTE) has weathered many storms in the recent past, but it will face substantial new
challenges as a result of the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation. If CTE leaders are to meet these
challenges, they must build upon the lessons learned and successes they have experienced with such initiatives as
Tech Prep, career academies, High Schools That Work, applied academics, school-to-work, and school-to-career
programs.
As states, school districts, and schools come to grips with the new NCLB requirement of 100 percent of students –
in each of nine subgroups – achieving proficiency in their academic requirements, CTE programs will, once again,
be at risk. CTE will be increasingly squeezed off the plate in terms of student enrollment in courses unless CTE
champions and leaders can clearly show that these programs
• are contributing to the academic success of students as measured by the state academic tests
• serve as a motivation for students to stay in school and help students perform better in their academic courses.
AYP causes a trade-off

2002)
All students, including CTE students, will be impacted by AYP. The goal that all students will be able to perform at
proficient levels by 2014 means that states and locals will be intensely focusing on academic achievement. Some
have forecasted that this focus on academics will result in a reduction of secondary CTE programs. In addition,
some states already have increased the academic requirements for graduation, thereby reducing the time available
for students to take career technical education courses. While NASDCTEc supports all students receiving sufficient
academic coursework to make successful post-high school transitions, many students need more than additional
academic coursework to improve their academic achievement. It also reinforces the unfortunate belief that students
must choose to take either career technical or academic education—students can take both and succeed in both
during their high school careers.
**note: AYP = Adequate Yearly Progress, the testing requirements on schools created by No Child Left Behind

CTE – 2AC Agriculture Add-on

Technical education key to ag industry – continuous innovation is key
Alston, 3 - assistant professor of agriscience education @ North Carolina A&T University
(Antoine, “USE OF INSTRUCTIONAL TECHNOLOGY IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION IN NORTH
CAROLINA AND VIRGINIA,” Journal of Career and Technical Education Volume 20, Number 1, Fall 2003,
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JCTE/v20n1/alston.html#FFA)
United States agriculture is one of the most productive systems in the world. The leading position of the United
States in agriculture can be attributed in part to its infrastructure for developing and delivering new technologies.
Agricultural education in secondary schools is part of the infrastructure of this remarkable system. With this
technological change, researchers have suggested that perhaps curriculum development initiatives and educational
delivery approaches in local schools have not kept pace with the rate of technological change that the agricultural
industry has experienced over the past decade (National FFA Organization, 1999). For agricultural education to
remain viable, new ways need to be generated to deliver instruction in the total secondary agricultural education
program (National Research Council, 1988). Instructional technology can help keep educational programs aligned
with new developments in agriculture. Instructional technology is a division of the body of knowledge known as
"educational technology." Educational technology is the "overall methodology and set of techniques employed in
the application of instructional principles" (Cleary, 1976, p. 1). Instructional technology is the media born of the
communication revolution which can be used for instructional purposes. It includes television, videotapes,
computers, data lines, and other media (Commission on Instructional Technology, 1970). The day is near when
every child will be able to stretch a hand over a keyboard and reach every book ever written, every painting ever
painted, and every symphony ever composed (Clinton, 1998).
Collapse of ag causes extinction

Lugar, 4 – U.S. Senator (Richard, http://www.unep.org/OurPlanet/imgversn/143/lugar.html)
In a world confronted by global terrorism, turmoil in the Middle East, burgeoning nuclear threats and other crises, it
is easy to lose sight of the long-range challenges. But we do so at our peril. One of the most daunting of them is
meeting the world’s need for food and energy in this century. At stake is not only preventing starvation and saving
the environment, but also world peace and security. History tells us that states may go to war over access to
resources, and that poverty and famine have often bred fanaticism and terrorism. Working to feed the world will
minimize factors that contribute to global instability and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
With the world population expected to grow from 6 billion people today to 9 billion by mid-century, the demand for
affordable food will increase well beyond current international production levels. People in rapidly developing
nations will have the means greatly to improve their standard of living and caloric intake. Inevitably, that means
eating more meat. This will raise demand for feed grain at the same time that the growing world population will
need vastly more basic food to eat. Complicating a solution to this problem is a dynamic that must be better
understood in the West: developing countries often use limited arable land to expand cities to house their growing
populations. As good land disappears, people destroy timber resources and even rainforests as they try to create
more arable land to feed themselves. The long-term environmental consequences could be disastrous for the entire
globe. Productivity revolution To meet the expected demand for food over the next 50 years, we in the United
States will have to grow roughly three times more food on the land we have. That’s a tall order. My farm in Marion
County, Indiana, for example, yields on average 8.3 to 8.6 tonnes of corn per hectare – typical for a farm in central Indiana. To triple our
production by 2050, we will have to produce an annual average of 25 tonnes per hectare. Can we possibly boost output that much? Well, it’s been
done before. Advances in the use of fertilizer and water, improved machinery and better tilling techniques combined to generate a threefold
increase in yields since 1935 – on our farm back then, my dad produced 2.8 to 3 tonnes per hectare. Much US agriculture has seen similar
increases. But of course there is no guarantee that we can achieve those results again. Given the urgency of expanding
food production to meet world demand, we must invest much more in scientific research and target that money toward projects
that promise to have significant national and global impact. For the United States, that will mean a major shift in the way we conduct and fund
agricultural science. Fundamental research will generate the innovations that will be necessary to feed the world. The United States can
take a leading position in a productivity revolution. And our success at increasing food production may play a
decisive humanitarian role in the survival of billions of people and the health of our planet.

CTE – 2AC Internet Add-on [1/2]

Internet expansion falling off due to job vacancies
Joyce, 8 – Ph.D. Education and Social Policy from Harvard, Workforce Development Manager @ Cisco Systems
Inc, has authored numerous publications on workforce issues, business-education partnerships, and school-to-career
transition (Peter J, “Facing the IT Talent Squeeze in a networked global economy,” Techniques, publication of the
Association for Career and Technical Education,
http://acte.hodgsonconsult.com/uploadedFiles/Publications_and_Online_Media/files/files-techniques-2008/Facing-
the-IT-Talent-Squeeze-in-a-Networked-Economy.pdf)
During the genesis of the Internet, computers were considered the sources of value and the network was viewed as a
simple pipe between them. Today we are seeing an Internet-driven revolution, an entirely different level of instant
and complex collaboration across the increasingly critical global human network.
This is particularly evident with the growing Web traffic from young people, who interact via instant messaging, cell phones
and MySpace as they watch TV and YouTube on the Web. The world is becoming a much more networked place, and the next phase of business
differentiation relies on the network for the real-time information and services that will foster rewarding customer interactions. Those who
question the future growth of this communication technology and its effectiveness need only to look at the amount of digital information being
created today. It took more than 200 years for the U.S. Library of Congress to build its collection of millions of books, recordings, photographs,
maps and manuscripts. The digital equivalent of that same information is now created every 15 minutes—and this is just the beginning.
Although Yahoo! has already indexed many billions of Web pages, more pages are hidden behind corporate firewalls or in private databases. By
some estimates, this “dark Web” is 500 times the size of the Internet as we know it. IBM estimates that by 2010, the amount of digital
information is expected to double every 11 hours. In a little more than two years, worldwide Internet traffic will hit 9 exabytes per month. That is
the equivalent of 9 quintillion typed characters, enough for 4 trillion novels. This is nearly two times the number of letters you’d need to write
down all the words ever spoken. And that’s only the virtual Web.
We are seeing now that everything physical will eventually be connected to everything else. A decade after the
introduction of the World Wide Web, the number of computing devices connected to the Internet had grown to 100
million. By 2010, that number will probably reach 14 billion. Just about all the early inhabitants of the Internet were
computers, but the mix is now shifting to other devices such as cell phones, PDAs and set-top boxes. Wireless
access will be everywhere—integrating personal communication and computing devices, connecting home and
business networks and providing ubiquitous access.
The Squeeze
Meeting the opportunities ahead will require a technically skilled workforce, both for development and
deployment. This is true on a global scale for not only technology companies, but also true for the schools, hospitals,
businesses and other institutions that will use technology around the world.
The technology industry is experiencing a squeeze for talent. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has identified
computer-based jobs as one of the hottest areas of growth, and those involving specific skill sets—such as systems
analysis, database administration and computer science—will be some of the fastest-growing occupations through
2012, with growth rates anywhere from 40 to 70 percent in the United States alone. At least 1.5 million additional IT
field professionals will be needed by the end of this year. Adding to the talent squeeze is the retirement of
approximately 70 million baby boomers that will leave the workforce over the next 15 years. With only 40 million
new workers coming in, this will make the shortage of computer-skilled employees even more dramatic. Canada,
Europe, the Middle East and Asia foresee similar retirement rates. Ever since the dotcom bust in the United States
there’s been a steep drop-off in the number of students pursuing science and engineering degrees. The number of
newly declared computer science majors has actually declined by 32 percent over the last four years. Even more
concerning, is that many women and underrepresented minorities are not even considering science and engineering
programs as a field of interest.
There are a couple of reasons for this problem. One is a myth, believed by parents, students and high school
guidance counselors, that computer science and engineering jobs are all being outsourced to China and India. This is
absolutely not the case. Ac- cording to a government study, the voluntary attrition in the Unit- ed States has outpaced the number of
outsourced jobs to emerging nations. Furthermore, for every job outsourced from the United States, nine U.S. jobs are created. The global
competition for skills and jobs is escalating, especially in computer science, math and engineering. According to the Council on Competitiveness,
about 70,000 of the 1 million U.S. college graduates each year earn engineering degrees. China and India produce 6.4 million graduates a year,
nearly 1 million of whom are in engineering.
U.S. educators and industry leaders must advance the nation’s competitiveness by keeping the innovation pipeline
fortified with fresh ideas and talent. Technological advancements depend on encouraging top students to be the
next researchers, developers and problem solvers. A critical part of this mission is a stronger commitment from
corporate leadership to work closely with schools at multiple levels, helping to prepare students for the workforce.

CTE – 2AC Internet Add-on [2/2]

Low-income education key to job growth that solves internet expansion
Joyce, 8 – Ph.D. Education and Social Policy from Harvard, Workforce Development Manager @ Cisco Systems
Inc, has authored numerous publications on workforce issues, business-education partnerships, and school-to-career
transition (Peter J, “Facing the IT Talent Squeeze in a networked global economy,” Techniques, publication of the
Association for Career and Technical Education,
http://acte.hodgsonconsult.com/uploadedFiles/Publications_and_Online_Media/files/files-techniques-2008/Facing-
the-IT-Talent-Squeeze-in-a-Networked-Economy.pdf)
The Internet is on the verge of yet another expansion. We must take advantage of the opportunity to build on our
partnership successes to ensure that we are well positioned for the future. Here are the challenges that the United
States must undertake to meet our collective education and workforce goals.
Create More Interest—We must continue to foster interest in technology careers among young people. It is
important to get the word out by working with local employers and demonstrating to students and workers the
connections between local educational pathways.
Attract Untapped Groups—Women and minorities continue to be underrepresented in computer science and
engineering fields. It is critical to attract and encourage a diverse pool of workers. Academic and business leaders
must reach out to our successors and serve as role models, whether it’s through classroom interaction, mentoring
networks or other initiatives.

CTE – Internet Add-on (Freedom of Speech !)

Internet technology is key to freedom of speech
Shirazi, 8 [Prof @ Institute for Research on Innovation and Technology Management @ Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson
University, “THE CONTRIBUTION OF ICT TO FREEDOM AND DEMOCRACY: AN EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS OF A RCHIVAL DATA
ON THE MIDDLE EAST,” http://www.ejisdc.org/ojs2/index.php/ejisdc/article/download/499/255]
ICTs provide new tools for efficient public participation in the democratic process in the form of e-democracy, e-
government, e-voting and the dissemination of opinions, thoughts, ideas, and/or rallying social action about things
that concern citizens. Clift (2003) argues that e- democracy is the use of information and communications
technologies and strategies by “democratic sectors” within the political processes of local communities, states,
regions, and nations, as well as those on the global stage such as the United Nations. Morrisett (2003) points out that
ICTs can be used to enhance the democratic process in form of e-government in which citizens are able to
effectively impact the decision-making process in a timely manner within and between institutionally, politically or
geographically distinct networked communities. Clift (2003) uses the phrase “representative e-government” to
describe the e- democracy activities of government institutions whether local or international. Government
institutions are making significant investments in the use of ICTs in their work, expressing “democratic intent”.
Their efforts make this one of the most dynamic and important areas of e-democracy development. Brinkerhoff
(2005) states that the Internet facilitates the expression of liberal values, such as individualism and freedom of
speech, either through anonymity or access. Ferdinand (2000) argues that as a means of communication, the Internet
has the potential to revolutionize political activity far more profoundly than the telephone or television ever did.
This has led to the prediction that it will completely revolutionize government and democracy, to the extent that the
outcome will be a new wave of democratization world-wide, as authoritarian regimes will find it increasingly
difficult to survive and as established democracies transform. Kalathil et al. (2003) found that some studies have
addressed the question of media and democracy, engaging in comparative case studies of the Internet across a
variety of developing counties, including many authoritarian regimes. This section addresses the impact of ICT
development and, more specifically, the Internet and mobile cell phones on the promotion of freedom of expression
in a region that is governed mostly by such regimes.
That must be protected at all costs—the alternative is war and genocide

D’Souza, 96 [Frances D’Souza, Prof of anthropology @ Oxford, European Parliament Hearing on Free Speech,
http://www.europarl.eu.int/hearings/speech/freedom_en.htm]
In the absence of freedom of expression which includes a free and independent media, it is impossible to protect
other rights, including the right to life. Once governments are able to draw a cloak of secrecy over their actions and
to remain unaccountable for their actions then massive human rights violations can, and do, take place. For this
reason alone the right to freedom of expression, specifically protected in the major international human rights
treaties, must be considered to be a primary right. It is significant that one of the first indications of a government’s
intention to depart from democratic principles is the ever increasing control of information by means of gagging the
media, and preventing the freeflow of information from abroad. At one end of the spectrum there are supposedly
minor infringements of this fundamental right which occur daily in Western democracies and would include abuse
of national security laws to prevent the publication of information which might be embarrassing to a given
government: at the other end of the scale are the regimes of terror which employ the most brutal moves to
suppress opposition, information and even the freedom to exercise religious beliefs. It has been argued, and will
undoubtedly be discussed at this Hearing, that in the absence of free speech and an independent media, it is
relatively easy for governments to capture, as it were, the media and to fashion them into instruments of propaganda,
for the promotion of ethnic conflict, war and genocide. 2. Enshrining the right to freedom of expression The right
to freedom of expression is formally protected in the major international treaties including the United Nations
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
In addition, it is enshrined in many national constitutions throughout the world, although this does not always
guarantee its protection. Furthermore, freedom of expression is, amongst other human rights, upheld, even for those
countries which are not signatories to the above international treaties through the concept of customary law which
essentially requires that all states respect the human rights set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by
virtue of the widespread or customary respect which has been built up in the post World War II years. 3. Is free


speech absolute? While it is generally accepted that freedom of expression is, and remains the cornerstone of
democracy, there are permitted restrictions encoded within the international treaties which in turn allow for a degree
of interpretation of how free free speech should be. Thus, unlike the American First Amendment Rights which allow
few, if any, checks on free speech or on the independence of the media, the international treaties are concerned that
there should be a balance between competing rights: for example, limiting free speech or media freedom where it
impinges on the individual’s right to privacy; where free speech causes insult or injury to the rights and reputation of
another; where speech is construed as incitement to violence or hatred, or where free speech would create a public
disturbance. Given that these permitted restrictions are necessarily broad, the limits of free speech are consistently
tested in national law courts and, perhaps even more importantly, in the regional courts such as the European
Commission and Court of Human Rights. In recent years several landmark cases have helped to define more closely
what restrictions may be imposed by government and under what circumstances. In particular, it has been
57ondition57 by the European Court that any restriction must comply with a three-part test which requires that any
such restriction should first of all be prescribed by law, and thus not arbitrarily imposed: proportionate to the
legitimate aims pursued, and demonstrably necessary in a democratic society in order to protect the individual
and/or the state. 4. Who censors what? Despite the rather strict rules which apply to restrictions on free speech that
governments may wish to impose, many justifications are nevertheless sought by governments to suppress
information which is inimical to their policies or their interests. These justifications include arguments in defence of
national and/or state security, the public interst, including the need to protect public morals and public order and
perfectly understandable attempts to prevent racism, violence, sexism, religious intolerance and damage to the indi-
vidual’s reputation or privacy. The mechanisms employed by governments to restrict the freeflow of information are
almost endless and range from subtle economic pressures and devious methods of undermining political opponents
and the independent media to the enactment of restrictive press laws and an insist-ence on licensing journalists and
eventually to the illegal detention, torture and disappearances of journalists and others associated with the
expression of independent views. 5. Examples of censorship To some the right to free speech may appear to be one
of the fringe human rights, especially when compared to such violations as torture and extra-judicial killings. It is
also sometimes difficult to dissuade the general public that censorship, generally assumed to be something to do
with banning obscene books or magazines, is no bad thing! It requires a recognition of some of the fundamental
principles of democracy to understand why censorship is so immensely dangerous. The 57ondition of democracy is
that people are able to make choices about a wide variety of issues which affect their lives, including what they wish
to see, read, hear or discuss. While this may seem a somewhat luxurious distinction preoccupying, perhaps, wealthy
Western democracies, it is a comparatively short distance between government censorship of an offensive book to
the silencing of political dissidents. And the distance between such silencing and the use of violence to suppress a
growing political philosophy which a government finds inconvenient is even shorter. Censorship tends to have small
beginnings and to grow rapidly. Allowing a government to have the power to deny people information, however
trivial, not only sets in place laws and procedures which can and will be used by those in authority against those
with less authority, but it also denies people the information which they must have in order to monitor their
governments actions and to ensure accountability. There have been dramatic and terrible examples of the role that
censorship has played in international politics in the last few years: to name but a few, the extent to which the media
in the republics of former Yugoslavia were manipulated by government for purposes of propaganda; the violent role
played by the government associated radio in Rwanda which incited citizens to kill each other in the name of ethnic
purity and the continuing threat of murder issued by the Islamic Republic of Iran against a citizen of another country
for having written a book which displeased them. 6. The link between poverty, war and denial of free speech There
are undoubted connections between access to information, or rather the lack of it, and war, as indeed there are
between poverty, the right to freedom of expression and development. One can argue that democracy aims to
increase participation in political and other decision-making at all levels. In this sense democracy empowers people.
The poor are denied access to information on decisions which deeply affect their lives, are thus powerless and have
no voice; the poor are not able to have influence over their own lives, let alone other aspect of society. Because of
this essential powerlessness, the poor are unable to influence the ruling elite in whose interests it may be to initiate
conflict and wars in order to consolidate their own power and position. Of the 126 developing countries listed in the
1993 Human Development Report, war was ongoing in 30 countries and severe civil conflict in a further 33
countries. Of the total 63 countries in conflict, 55 are towards the bottom scale of the human development index
which is an indicator of poverty. There seems to be no doubt that there is a clear association between poverty and
war. It is reasonably safe to assume that the vast majority of people do not ever welcome war. They are normally


coerced, more often than not by propaganda, into fear, extreme nationalist sentiments and war by their governments.
If the majority of people had a democratic voice they would undoubtedly object to war. But voices are silenced.
Thus, the freedom to express one’s views and to challenge government decisions and to insist upon political rather
than violent solutions, are necessary aspects of democracy which can, and do, avert war. Government sponsored
propaganda in Rwanda, as in former Yugoslavia, succeeded because there weren’t the means to challenge it. One
has therefore to conclude that it is impossible for a particular government to wage war in the absence of a
compliant media willing to indulge in government propaganda. This is because the government needs civilians to
fight wars for them and also because the media is needed to re-inforce government policies and intentions at every
turn.

CTE – Internet Add-on (Poverty !)

Internet expansion solves poverty
Kamarck, 8 [Elaine Kamarck, lecturer in public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, “Look to the Internet to fight
poverty,” Dec 1 http://www.benton.org/node/19414]
In the past decade, information technology has begun to transform anti-poverty efforts and bring to the poverty
world some of the increases in productivity that have been common in the private sector. If President-elect
Obama can expand on this, the chances for him to make good on a broad social justice agenda will increase in
spite of the other challenges he faces. In the past two decades, electronic database and Internet technologies have driven down the
cost of government overhead while significantly elevating the productivity of the nation's anti-poverty
programs. Fraud has been reduced while the needs of the economically distressed are addressed in a more
timely manner. This has freed up money for other pressing anti-poverty needs. Internet innovation has transformed
business, entertainment, and even government. In an Obama administration, it can transform approaches to poverty at home and abroad. The
government's efforts should be focused on expanding access to Internet and other technologies for as many Americans as possible while
continuing to develop our national broadband capacity.
Outweighs nuclear war

Gilligan, 96 [James, professor of Psychiatry at the Harvard Medical School, Director of the Center for the Study of Violence, and a member
of the Academic Advisory Council of the National Campaign Against Youth Violence, Violence: Our Deadly Epidemic and its Causes, p 191-
196]
The deadliest form of violence is poverty. You cannot work for one day with the violent people who fill our prisons and mental hospitals for the criminally insane
without being forcible and constantly reminded of the extreme poverty and discrimination that characterizes their lives. Hearing about their lives, and about their families and friends, you are
forced to recognize the truth in Gandhi’s observation that the deadliest form of violence is poverty. Not a day goes by without realizing that trying to understand them and their violent behavior
in purely individual terms is impossible and wrong-headed. Any theory of violence, especially a psychological theory, that evolves from the experience of men in maximum security prisons and
hospitals for the criminally insane must begin with the recognition that these institutions are only microcosms. They are not where the major violence in our society takes place, and the
perpetrators who fill them are far from being the main causes of most violent deaths. Any approach to a theory of violence needs to begin with a look at the structural violence in this country.
Focusing merely on those relatively few men who commit what we define as murder could distract us from examining and learning from those structural causes of violent death that are far more
significant from a numerical or public health, or human, standpoint. By “structural violence” I mean the increased rates of death, and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of
society, as contrasted with the relatively lower death rates experienced by those who are above them. Those excess deaths (or at least a demonstrably large proportion of them) are a function of
class structure; and that structure is itself a product of society’s collective human choices, concerning how to distribute the collective wealth of the society. These are not acts of God. I am
contrasting “structural” with “behavioral violence,” by which I mean the non-natural deaths and injuries that are caused by specific behavioral actions of individuals against individuals, such as
. *The
the deaths we attribute to homicide, suicide, soldiers in warfare, capital punishment, and so on. Structural violence differs from behavioral violence in at least three major respects
lethal effects of structural violence operate continuously, rather than sporadically, whereas murders, suicides,
executions, wars, and other forms of behavioral violence occur one at a time. *Structural violence operates more or less independently of
individual acts; independent of individuals and groups (politicians, political parties, voters) whose decisions may nevertheless have lethal consequences for others. * Structural
violence is normally invisible, because it may appear to have had other (natural or violent) causes. The finding that
structural violence causes far more deaths than behavioral violence does is not limited to this country. Kohler and Alcock
attempted to arrive at the number of excess deaths caused by socioeconomic inequities on a worldwide basis. Sweden was their model of the nation that had come closes to eliminating structural
violence. It had the least inequity in income and living standards, and the lowest discrepancies in death rates and life expectancy; and the highest overall life expectancy in the world. When they
18 million deaths a year could be attributed to
compared the life expectancies of those living in the other socioeconomic systems against Sweden, they found that
the “structural violence” to which the citizens of all the other nations were being subjected. During the past decade, the discrepancies between the rich and poor nations have
increased dramatically and alarmingly. The 14 to 18 million deaths a year caused by structural violence compare with about
100,000 deaths per year from armed conflict. Comparing this frequency of deaths from structural violence to the
frequency of those caused by major military and political violence, such as World War II (an estimated 49 million military and civilian deaths,
including those by genocide—or about eight million per year, 1939-1945), the Indonesian massacre of 1965-66 (perhaps 575,000) deaths), the Vietnam war (possibly two million, 1954-1973),
and even a hypothetical nuclear exchange between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. (232 million), it was clear that even
war cannot begin to compare with structural violence, which continues year after year. In other words, every
fifteen years, on the average, as many people die because of relative poverty as would be killed by the Nazi
genocide of the Jews over a six-year period. This is, in effect, the equivalent of an ongoing, unending, in fact
accelerating, thermonuclear war, or genocide, perpetrated on the weak and poor every year of every decade,
throughout the world. Structural violence is also the main cause of behavioral violence on a socially and
epidemiologically significant scale (from homicide and suicide to war and genocide). The question as to which of
the two forms of violence—structural or behavioral—is more important, dangerous, or lethal is moot, for they are
inextricably related to each other, as cause to effect.

CTE – 2AC Manufacturing Add-on [1/2]

Plan key to manufacturing
Reese, 7 – Contributing Editor of Techniques, publication of the Association for Career and Technical Education
(Susan, “Manufacturing Success,” Techniques, http://acte.hodgsonconsult.com/uploadedFiles/Publications_and_E-
Media/files/files-techniques-2007/March07_Thm1.pdf)
When NAM and its research and education arm, The Manufacturing Institute, released the handbook, The Facts
About Modern Manufacturing, in October 2006, NAM President John Engler noted, “Manufacturing output in
America is at the highest level in U.S. history and continues to support our economy.” Engler also noted , however,
that the industry faces unprecedented challenges, including “a serious shortage of skilled production workers,
scientists and engineers that will intensify as the baby boom generation retires.”
If there is any doubt about the need the manufacturing industry has for skilled workers, an ad that appeared in the
January 16 issue of Pennsylvania’s Butler Eagle newspaper provides compelling evidence of the situation. A
network of more than 100 manufacturers in southwestern Pennsylvania ran the ad offering job placement with their
partner companies to individuals who complete the six-month, tuition-free manufacturing training program at Penn
United Technology’s L.I.G.H.T. Training Center, which still had 10 spots available in the winter classes.
Dreams of Success
NAM is taking actions to address the need for skilled workers in the industry and has even launched the “Dream it.
Do it.” campaign and Web site, hoping to interest young people in careers in manufacturing. Stacey Wagner,
managing director of NAM’s Center for Workforce Success, says, “Nothing could be more important than helping
our young people understand the opportunities for careers as they think about who they are and what they want to
be.”
“Dream It. Do It.” she says is, “an aspirational campaign to help young people think about their hopes, and their
dreams and their passions, and then to understand that can come not just from being a rock star or a movie star or a
basketball star. In fact, there are many opportunities to get into jobs in manufacturing where they will have the
chance to be innovative and creative and entrepreneurial and do the kind of things they really like to do.”
According to Jerry Jasinowski, president of The Manufacturing Institute, manufacturing offers “a broad range of
high-paying, interesting jobs with average annual compensation of nearly $65,000 for young people with the right
skills and education.” Wagner notes that part of finding those interesting, creative and high-paying jobs means
students have to go on after high school and get some postsecondary education. “Certainly two-year colleges and
technical colleges are a great stepping stone into a technical career,” she says. “We are very supportive of two-year
colleges to help them understand what the workplace competencies are for the 21st century workforce, and we are
supporting the development of industry-led certificates and two-year degrees, so that people can graduate from high
school and get a two-year degree or a certificate and then get into a good job in manufacturing. Then, at some point,
we hope they will want to move up the career ladder, at which point they will have the opportunity to build upon
those two-year degrees by going on to other institutions of higher learning.”
Wagner believes that providing students with better information about career opportunities, such as those in
manufacturing, will help them make better decisions, and might help change the fact that more than half of those
who go straight into a four-year college after high school end up dropping out.
Noting that the latest report from the National Center for Education and the Economy discusses providing all
students with opportunities for technical education as well as academic education, Wagner says, “We certainly
think this is a very good idea. It helps people get both the technical education that they need to go on to technical
jobs as well as an academic background. One of the things that I think is a long-held myth is that if you go into a
technical career, you don’t necessarily need to be as academically savvy as young people going on to a four-year
college. Of course, this is simply not the case. So we are very supportive of helping young people think about their
future and then providing them with a lot of options about how they would get there.”

CTE – 2AC Manufacturing Add-on [2/2]

Key to the economy – outweighs all other internals
Fontelera, 9 (Jorina June 30 “U.S. Manufacturers Face Critical Threats to Competitiveness,” Thomas Net News
http://news.thomasnet.com/IMT/archives/2009/06/new-studies-identify-critical-threats-to-competitiveness-for-us-
manufacturers.html?t=recent)

Two new reports identify significant threats that could impede the ability of U.S. manufacturers to successfully
compete in the global economy, including the public perception of pursuing a career in manufacturing.
Americans believe manufacturing as the most important industry for economic prosperity . It is perceived as the
backbone of the economy and the one that contributes the most to the United States' economic success.
In Deloitte LLP and The Manufacturing Institute's new Public Viewpoint on Manufacturing survey, released this
month, 82 percent of respondents agree that America's manufacturing base is key to the country's economic
prosperity. The majority of respondents (71 percent) also view manufacturing as a national priority and 59 percent
believe that U.S. manufacturing competes effectively on a global scale.
This should come as little surprise to most, considering the manufacturing sector employs 13 million Americans and
drives job growth in industries such as logistics, marketing, transportation and business services, the American
Small Manufacturers Coalition (ASMC) said in an announcement of its own new findings. Moreover, manufactured
goods represent two-thirds of U.S. exports and drive more net-wealth creation than any other industry.
However, the ASMC has found that more than a quarter of American manufacturers — about 90,000 firms — are at
risk of not being able to compete on the global stage.
The ASMC asked manufacturers where they stood within the "next-generation manufacturing" framework of
competitiveness strategies, which include: 1) customer-focused innovation, 2) systemic continuous improvement, 3)
advanced talent management, 4) global engagement, 5) extended enterprise management and 6) having sustainable
products and processes.
Based on the study's findings, a serious gap exists between the strategies U.S. manufacturers believe to be critical to
success and their progress in implementing those strategies. Small and mid-sized manufacturers are especially at
risk. One-third of respondents who had annual revenues less than $10 million are neither at nor near "world-class" in
any strategy, according to the research. Of those with more than $100 million in revenue, merely 14 percent are
under-performing.
"In a country where 282,000 small and mid-sized firms comprise the backbone of the industry, this is a significant
threat to U.S. competitiveness and the viability of these companies," according to the study.
The results are "a wake-up call," ASMC Board Chair Michael Klonsinski said. "The consequences of inaction could
trigger more job losses in manufacturing and ultimately a lower standard of living for all Americans ."
Likewise, the public viewpoint survey found that 81 percent of respondents believe the manufacturing industry
significantly impacts their standard of living and 74 percent say that the U.S. should further invest in manufacturing
industries.

CTE – 2AC Nanotech Add-on

Plan’s workforce expansion key to nanotech development
NTW, 6 (Nanotech Wire, “Programs Focus on Work Force for Nanotechnology,” 2/28,
http://www.nanotechwire.com/news.asp?nid=2973)
The U.S. government is investing a billion dollars a year in the technology of the very small. The National Science
Foundation (NSF) estimates that by the year 2015, nanotechnology will directly employ more than two million
workers worldwide. Yet 80 percent of the people recently surveyed by the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies
admitted to knowing little or nothing about it.
“We still have a long road ahead in educating people,” said Healy, whose efforts are headquartered at the
Georgia Institute of Technology. “But we don’t have much time because the tech nology is moving forward quickly.
Nanotechnology is already here, though some of the most important aspects of it are still 10 or 15 years away.”
Today, nanotechnology is mostly seen as the province of Ph.D. scientists and engineers. But as the industry grows, it
will need people at all education and skill levels to meet needs that range from cutting-edge research to maintenance
of manufacturing equipment.
“The field is wide open,” Healy added. “There are many opportunities, not just for technical people, but also for
specialists such as patent attorneys, pharmacists, entrepreneurs and marketers. The most important skill will be the
ability to work with people in other disciplines – to be an interdisciplinary person.”
A consortium of 13 U.S. universities supported by the NSF, the NNIN supports a broad base of educational
programs focused on K-12 students, teachers, undergraduate students – and the general public.
Goals of the effort include:
Exposing young people to nanotechnology research to help encourage them toward careers in science and
engineering;
Training teachers and guidance counselors about experimental sciences, providing teaching tools and enhancing
their enthusiasm for helping students pursue science and engineering careers;
Creating and distributing educational materials for children, college students, technical professionals, teachers and
the general public, and
Focusing efforts on populations having disproportionately low employment and education in the sciences.
Nano leads to utopia – solves all impacts

Joy, 2K – Cofounder, chief scientist of Sun Microsystems
(Bill, “Why the future doesn’t need us” Wired Magazine. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.04/joy.html)
The many wonders of nanotechnology were first imagined by the Nobel-laureate physicist Richard Feynman in a
speech he gave in 1959, subsequently published under the title "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom." The book
that made a big impression on me, in the mid-'80s, was Eric Drexler's Engines of Creation, in which he described
beautifully how manipulation of matter at the atomic level could create a utopian future of abundance, where just
about everything could be made cheaply, and almost any imaginable disease or physical problem could be solved
using nanotechnology and artificial intelligences.
A subsequent book, Unbounding the Future: The Nanotechnology Revolution, which Drexler cowrote, imagines
some of the changes that might take place in a world where we had molecular-level "assemblers." Assemblers could
make possible incredibly low-cost solar power, cures for cancer and the common cold by augmentation of the
human immune system, essentially complete cleanup of the environment, incredibly inexpensive pocket
supercomputers - in fact, any product would be manufacturable by assemblers at a cost no greater than that of wood
- spaceflight more accessible than transoceanic travel today, and restoration of extinct species.

CTE – 2AC Science Diplomacy Add-on [1/2]

Science education key to science diplomacy
Lord and Turekian, 7 (Kristin and Vaughan, respectively. Elliott School of International Affairs, The George
Washington University, Washington, DC 20052, USA.; Chief international officer, AAAS, Washington, DC 20005,
USA. “Time for a New Era of Science Diplomacy.”
http://www.scienceonline.org/cgi/content/full/315/5813/769#AFF1)///HM
It is time to adopt science diplomacy for a new era. Old-fashioned diplomacy between governments, while
necessary, is no longer sufficient. In this age of the Internet, rapid and relatively low-cost travel, and 24-hour global
news, the power of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), private companies, and social networks is rising. To
protect and advance U.S. interests, the U.S. government needs to accelerate its engagement with these new actors
and to build positive relationships with foreign publics, as well as their diplomats. Science and technology (S&T)
offer a promising entry point for engaging citizens and civil society organizations worldwide. An opinion piece on
the op-ed page of the Washington Times called on the U.S. government to recognize the opportunities afforded by
widespread respect for American S&T (4). We concur. But without the engagement and commitment of the U.S.
scientific community, the government cannot succeed. Why Diplomacy Through Science? Nearly 4 years ago, the
United States entered a complex and difficult war with Iraq. Since then, global public opinion regarding the United
States has reached all-time lows. Polls in 33 countries indicate that only 40% of those surveyed view America's
influence in the world as mainly positive. In contrast, 45% view China positively and 58% hold favorable views of
Europe. Dislike of America extends to long-time friends and allies. Only 30% of Canadians, 21% of Germans, and
15% of Turks hold favorable opinions of the United States (5). Readers may ask why this matters if the U.S.
government is charged with protecting U.S. interests, not winning popularity contests overseas. The answer is that,
increasingly, our interests depend on the support (or at least acquiescence) of foreign populations. Negative images
of the United States translate directly into constraints on American influence and ability to implement policy.
Engaging foreign citizens is the goal of public diplomacy. As the 9/11 Commission report (6) underscored, engaging
foreign public opinion is vital to winning the global struggle of ideas. President Bush clearly agrees, having
appointed one of his closest advisers, Karen Hughes, to the position of Under Secretary of State for Public
Diplomacy and Public Affairs in 2005. Despite this high-level attention, however, promoting America's image
overseas continues to be a daunting task, particularly in predominantly Muslim countries. In our view, public
diplomacy is most effective when exercised through deeds rather than words. The U.S. government should focus on
doing things that positively affect foreign societies and speak to what we stand for as a nation. We should foster
tangible initiatives that promote education, economic growth, human well-being, and hope. If we understand
public diplomacy in these terms, the role of S&T is pivotal. Scientific education creates citizens with the critical
thinking skills necessary for successful participatory governance and competition in the global economy. S&T
are linked strongly with economic development (7). Zogby public opinion polls in several Middle Eastern
nations, where the United States is particularly unpopular, indicate that S&T are the single most respected elements
of American society (8). Social science research indicates that collaboration to solve common problems is one of the
best ways to foster positive relations between groups (9). Under Secretary Hughes increasingly appreciates the
unifying power of science (10). She held major events on breast cancer awareness in the Middle East and has
launched a project on fighting malaria (11). She has created new International Science Fulbright awards and
supported activities, led by Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs, Paula Dobriansky, to
cultivate networks of women scientists and engineers (12). Yet, in an era where international skepticism about U.S.
foreign policy abounds, government can only do so much. Ultimately civil society--including scientists and
engineers--will need to join in this diplomacy of deeds in order for the new science diplomacy to succeed. The fact
that science is, and should remain, outside the realm of politics only makes scientists better suited for this task. How
can the U.S. science community contribute to science diplomacy and remind the world that Americans are defined
by more than specific U.S. government policies? Individual scientists can contribute by realizing that they are
valuable ambassadors of goodwill. They can intensify their global activities and promote greater engagement with
counterparts worldwide. They can increase their efforts to invite foreign peers to review scientific articles and
papers. Senior U.S. researchers can use their own international networks, including former students and postdocs
working outside of the United States, to reach out to junior scientists in other countries, to collaborate with peers,
and to promote broader international cooperation. U.S. scientists should make a special effort to engage with
scientists from countries where the United States is misunderstood or disliked--not to justify or promote any
government policy, but to build bridges and trust. They can engage more with university students and the general

CTE – 2AC Science Diplomacy Add-on [2/2]

[Lord and Turekian Continue, no text omitted]
public overseas, not just other scientists, and let them know how scientists from all nations make a collective
difference in their lives. In so doing, U.S. scientists will make the world a better place, and perhaps improve
foreigners' views of America along the way. Scientists can also encourage their universities, research institutions,
professional societies, and laboratories to adopt global engagement as a priority. Although a large sum of individual
efforts is important, effective global engagement will be most influential if it engages whole organizations as well.
Many of the major U.S. scientific and engineering societies already have specific offices or initiatives dedicated to
international collaborations. To give just one example, in January AAAS joined the U.S. Department of State, the
Kuwaiti government, and a Kuwaiti science NGO to convene a conference in Kuwait City to promote networks of
women scientists and engineers in the broader Middle East (see figure above). AAAS has also recently started a
pilot program that remotely links U.S. researchers with university-level science students in developing and emerging
countries in order to share and discuss seminal papers across a range of scientific disciplines (13). Yet, despite
current efforts, scientific organizations can do more. Of course, all this assumes that scientists and engineers are
willing to be ambassadors and to participate in the new science diplomacy. Why would they? The answer is
threefold. First, while science holds great benefits for diplomacy, diplomacy also benefits science. For instance,
in large-scale programs such as International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) (14), scientists from
major powers such as China, India, Russia, Korea, Japan, the European Union, and the United States will work
together in an unprecedented international agreement to develop fusion energy. Moreover, diplomacy can create
opportunities to conduct research in parts of the world critical to scientific advancement. Scientific research
ranging from astronomical observation in Australia to archaeological research in Libya depends on broader access,
as well as diplomatic support. Second, the health of the U.S. scientific community depends on the continued
willingness of foreign scientists and students to come to the United States for study, research, and work. Visa
difficulties, combined with a perception that the United States does not welcome foreigners, reduced the number of
foreign students coming to the United States after 9/11. This trend is beginning to reverse, but negative perceptions
persist and it is important to remain vigilant. The U.S. economy benefits greatly from foreign scientists and science
(15).We must ensure that the United States remains attractive and welcoming. Third, scientists are citizens. Like
their counterparts outside of the scientific community, many scientists and engineers share concerns about negative
perceptions of the United States.
Science Diplomacy key to innovation and the economy

Dobriansky, 6 - Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs
[Dr. Paula J., "The Art of Science Diplomacy" http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/67518.pdf]
As President George W. Bush stated, “Science and technology have never been more essential to the defense of
the nation and the health of our economy.” To remain at the forefront of scientific and technological achievement,
America must cooperate globally. Historically, global leadership in science and technology is transitory, and leaders
must expend considerable effort to maintain their position. As Secretary Rice stated, “Today, dynamic
advancements in science and technology are transforming the world— making it possible for more and more people
to compete equally across all fields of human endeavor. America must remain at the forefront of this new world.”
Our economy benefits from collaborative efforts. Science and technology are major drivers of innovation in the
United States and an important source of exports. Economists estimate that the increase in American productivity
growth that began in the mid-1990s is entirely due to technology investments.

CTE – Green Jobs: 2AC Venture Capital Add-on

Sustainability efforts skyrocket venture capital investment
BCNS, 9 (Bay City News Service, “'Green industry' offers hope for Silicon Valley,” February 18th, 2009,
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/show_story.php?id=11268)
An emerging "green industry" could offer huge economic gains for Silicon Valley, according to an economic-
outlook analysis released Tuesday. The outlook showed the region suffering recessionary economic woes in 2008,
but analysts cautiously report the emerging green industry could offer huge economic gains for the area. In a special
analysis companion to the "Silicon Valley Index 2009," published each year by community groups Joint Venture
Silicon Valley Network and Silicon Valley Community Foundation, financial analysts detailed trends in the valley's
portfolio that are both worrisome and favorable. "The national trends have finally overtaken the Silicon Valley and
brought us down," said Russell Hancock, president and CEO of Joint Venture. This year's report, he said, indicates
the area has the economic equivalent of a head cold that could threaten to escalate into pneumonia if left untreated.
Employment numbers began to fall into negative percentages in November 2008, lagging behind nationwide negative
employment trends until year's end, analysts reported. The metropolitan statistical area encompassing San Jose, Sunnyvale and Santa Clara posted
a 1.3 percent drop from December 2007 to December 2008.Home foreclosure sales are higher than the statewide average and the demand for
commercial real estate has dropped, the report said. However, the region is better poised than most to reinvent itself, Hancock
said. "We don't have a single industry that has been our mainstay for generations," he said. "It's an idea-driven,
knowledge-intensive economy." Hancock said clean technology, especially solar technology, is thriving, and could
be the key to invigorating the Silicon Valley economy. While venture capital investment fell 7.7 percent from 2007
to 2008, capital investments in clean tech are up 94 percent, according to the report. Data shows this sum accounts for 31 percent
of all national clean industry investment over the same time period. This sector has reportedly supported job growth at 23 percent since 2005, the
report said. "This is the world's epicenter for solar technology right now," Hancock said. "Maybe we won't be the Silicon Valley anymore; maybe
we're the green valley." In California, 15 percent of new hybrid vehicles, 10 percent of electric cars and 5 percent of new natural gas vehicles are
registered in the Silicon Valley, according to the report. As the region's focus shifts toward cleaner forms of technology, the report highlights
the need for additional education and training to help employees make this transition. "People are self-starters, but
wouldn't it be nice if there were industry partnerships with our educational institutions," he said. Hancock was quick
to add that local colleges are "oversubscribed and underfunded," and lack the resources to make such partnerships a
reality.
Strong VC solves the economy

Portland Business Journal, 2 (“Venture industry gears up for major transition” lexis)
So where is the venture capital industry heading? More importantly, what effect will this have on the U.S. economy
as a whole? To date, much of the carnage in the venture industry has been masked by an illusion of investment
activity. Many venture funds have spent the last two years performing triage on their existing portfolios. The bulk of new venture dollars
invested by these firms has been used to prolong the survival of struggling portfolio companies. Many of these companies will fail, resulting in
poor returns for the limited partners who supply the venture firms with the capital they need to survive. As a result, the number of active venture
firms will decrease dramatically over the next five years. Particularly vulnerable are first-time venture funds that were caught up in the internet
bubble and now have little value or track record to show for their invested dollars. While I've heard some colleagues predict a decline in the
number of firms of 15 percent to 20 percent, I expect we'll see a much sharper decline on the order of 40 percent to 50 percent. Why such a sharp
decline? The institutions that back venture firms continually expanded the number of funds they invested in throughout the 1990s. By
attempting to spread the risk of their venture fund portfolios through diversification, institutions failed to realize the venture industry has a scarce
pool of experienced and talented venture capitalists. The result was a dilution of the overall quality of the venture capitalists they backed, which
subsequently led to significant losses. A majority of institutions realize their mistake and will likely revert to their old strategy of concentrating
their investment dollars in the hands of a more limited set of venture capitalists. In particular, venture funds that have provided institutions with
consistent returns over a long period of time will receive the highest allocations. We will see a continually maturing venture industry during the
next decade, resulting in fewer but larger venture firms. While some niche venture funds focused on a particular industry sector will continue to
exist and thrive, the majority of investment dollars raised by venture funds in the future will be concentrated among the top 20 to 30 firms. Like
many industries, the 80/20 rule applies to the venture industry as well. In aggregate, the venture capital industry will grow and become a more
established asset class in the coming years. The influence and importance of venture capital as a vital engine for growth
has no equal in our economy or our country. According to an economic impact study released last year by the
National Venture Capital Association, the $273.3 billion of venture capital invested during the 30 year period from
1970 to 2000 created 7.6 million U.S. jobs and more than $1.3 trillion in revenue as of the end of 2000. The study
also shows that although venture capital represented less than 1 percent of U.S. investment activity during the 1970
to 2000 period, companies created with venture capital were responsible for 5.9 percent of the nation's jobs and 13.1
percent of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product in 2000.

CTE – Green Jobs: 2AC Oil Shocks Add-on

Plan solves oil shocks by offsetting oil with renewables – that’s Barrett.
Shocks collapse the global economy and magnify their impact

Setser, 4 – Research Associate @ the Global Economic Programme University College, Oxford
(Brad, http://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~nroubini/papers/OilShockRoubiniSetser.pdf)
These effects are not trivial: oil shocks have caused and/or contributed to each one of the US and global recessions
of the last thirty years. Yet while recent recessions have all been linked to an increase in the price of oil, not all oil
price spikes lead to a recession. The 2003 spike associated with the invasion of Iraq is a good example.
Private sector estimates generally suggest that a persistent 10% increase in the price of oil – say an increase from
$30 to an average of $35 over the course of 2004 -- would reduce the US and the G7 growth rate by about 0.3%-
0.4% within a year. Some (Goldman Sachs) are more pessimistic, and calculate that if oil prices were to increase
further to levels closer to $45, the reduction in the G7 growth rate may be closer to 1% of GDP. Thus, private
estimates of the negative effects of an oil shock currently range between 0.3% to 1% of US and G7 GDP growth.
This means that the US economy, which was growing in Q4:2003 and Q1:2004 at about a 4.3% average rate could
be expected to see a slowdown of its growth to a level between 4.0% and 3.3%. Global growth would also de-
accelerate from its current very strong pace. And, indeed, the first estimate for Q2:2004 U.S. GDP growth was
3.0%, confirming that high oil prices in the first half of 2004 put a dent on real consumer demand. Looking ahead,
persistence of oil prices at recent high levels of $43-44 per barrel (or even higher prices) could further slow down
the U.S. economy below a 3% growth rate.

CTE – Green Jobs: Ext- Job Shortages

Labor shortages kill green job growth
Center for American Progress, 8 (“Green-Collar Jobs in America's Cities,” March 13th, 2008,
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2008/03/green_collar_jobs.html)
Unfortunately, America’s growing green economy faces a looming labor shortage in sectors like manufacturing,
construction and installation. In a 2005 survey by the National Association of Manufacturers, 90 percent of
respondents indicated a moderate to severe shortage of qualified, skilled production employees like machinists and
technicians. Similarly, the National Renewable Energy Lab has identified a shortage of skills and training as a
leading barrier to renewable energy and energy efficiency growth. This labor shortage is only likely to get more
severe as baby-boomers skilled in current energy technologies retire; in the power sector, for example, nearly one-
quarter of the current workforce will be eligible for retirement in the next five to seven years.
Clearly if America is to rise to the global energy challenge, and capture the economic opportunity it represents, we
need to prepare the next generation of Americans for the important work that lies ahead. Green jobs exist, and are
growing, in a range of industries and at every skill and wage level. Many are in the skilled trades: manufacturing,
construction, operation and maintenance, and installation. Most are “middle-skill” jobs, requiring more education
than a high school diploma, but less than a four-year degree. Some are a bridge to high-skill professional jobs or
entrepreneurial opportunities; others are perfect entry level or transitional jobs for urban residents looking for
a pathway out of poverty. In short, green jobs are the kind of family-supporting jobs that once anchored the
American middle class, but in the industries of the future: industries like wind turbine manufacturing, solar panel
installation, energy efficiency retrofits, and green building.

CTE – Green Jobs: Ext- Chemical Industry Impact

Chemical industry solves extinction – job training key
Trainham et al, 5 (James A. Trainham III, Chairperson, COMMITTEE ON GRAND CHALLENGES FOR
SUSTAINABILITY IN THE CHEMICAL INDUSTRY under the Board on Chemical Sciences and Technology,
Sustainability in the Chemical Industry: Grand Challenges and Research Needs - A Workshop Report, pg. 69)
This reality needs to be communicated through education and training. Today, it is still relatively segregated
and marginalized in the study of ecology and other environmental sciences. In management education, the actions
are segregated (and therefore marginalized) in Environment Health and Safety (EH&S) offices or in debates about
ethics and social responsibility. As central topics in the science communities and related to the health and stability of
societies today, these issues are migrating to the core of corporate strategy, but education has not kept up. While
having always influenced the physical environment, the reach of humans has been extended dramatically in the last
100 years through technology and globalization, yet we still design feedstocks and final products, and maintain
industries that produce them as though we were ignorant of these changes. Anthropogenic impact fundamentally
alters the chemistry, ecology, and biology of living and nonliving systems. Historically unprecedented population
growth, with accompanying exponentially expanded throughput of industrial materials, has led to unavoidable
pollution and health challenges. Moreover, growth demands and technological advances place ever growing
requirements for natural and synthetic materials. The scale and accelerating rate of change results in activity and
waste streams that disrupt and degrade natural systems worldwide (e.g. air, hydrologic, and biogeochemical cycles).
Yet these same systems provide critical services on which society and the economy depend—clean water, healthy
air, clean energy, productive soil, and safe food. This knowledge cannot remain marginal to the education of
citizens. Not only does the knowledge base of scientists need augmenting but those working in industry, including
throughout supply chains to final product users, need the systems orientation of green chemistry and sustainability
science.

Defense-Industrial Base – Ext: Education Key to DIB

Education key to defense industrial base and national security
The United States Commission on National Security, 1 (A bipartisan commission set up to evaluate the
current national security climate and propose changes needed to meet new threats has issued a report that calls for
major changes in governmental structures and processes. “Road Map for National Security: Imperative for Change,”
http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/nssg/PhaseIIIFR.pdf)
The scale and nature of the ongoing revolution in science and technology, and what this implies for the quality of
human capital in the 21st century, pose critical national security challenges for the United States. Second only to
a weapon of mass destruction detonating in an American city, we can think of nothing more dangerous than a failure
to manage properly science, technology, and education for the common good over the next quarter century. Current
institutional arrangements among government, higher education, and business have served the nation well over the
past five decades, but the world is changing. Today, private proprietary expenditure on technology development far
outdistances public spending. The internationalization of both scientific research and its commercial development is
having a significant effect on the capacity of the U.S. government to harness science in the service of national
security and to attract qualified scientific and technical personnel. These changes are transforming most facets of the
American economy, from health care to banking to retail business, as well as the defense industrial base. The
harsh fact is that the U.S. need for the highest quality human capital in science, mathematics, and engineering is not
being met. One reason for this is clear: American students know that professional careers in basic science and
mathematics require considerable preparation and effort, while salaries are often more lucrative in areas requiring
less demanding training. Non-U.S. nationals, however, do find these professions attractive and, thanks to science,
math, and technical preparation superior to that of many Americans, they increasingly fill American university
graduate studies seats and job slots in these areas. Another reason for the growing deficit in high-quality human
capital is that the American kindergarten through 12th grade (K-12) education system is not performing as well as
it should. As a result too few American students are qualified to take these slots, even were they so inclined. This is
an ironic predicament, since America’s strength has always been tied to the spirit and entrepreneurial energies of its
people. America remains today the model of creativity and experimentation, and its success has inspired other
nations to recognize the true sources of power and wealth in science, technology, and higher education. America’s
international reputation, and therefore a significant aspect of its global influence, depends on its reputation for
excellence in these areas. U.S. performance is not keeping up with its reputation. Other countries are striving hard,
and with discipline they will outstrip us. This is not a matter merely of national pride or international image. It is an
issue of fundamental importance to national security. In a knowledge-based future, only an America that remains
at the cutting edge of science and technology will sustain its current world leadership . In such a future, only a
well-trained and educated population can thrive economically, and from national prosperity provide the
foundation for national cohesion. Complacency with our current achievement of national wealth and
international power will put all of this at risk.

Defense-Industrial Base – Ext: Nat. Standards Key to DIB

Need National Standards – key to national security
Leshner, 7 (Alan I., CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and executive publisher of
the Journal Science, Washington Times, 8/15/07, http://www.isbe.net/news/2007/newsclips/070817.htm)///HM
President Bush just signed the America Competes Act, overwhelmingly approved by a bipartisan Congress pursuing
a first-rate science and mathematics education for all children at a time when American youngsters lag behind many
of their peers abroad. With the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act up for renewal, an essential next step is clear:
Scrap the crazy-quilt pattern of wildly differing tests and proficiency thresholds that currently vary from state to
state. Revise NCLB to set voluntary nationwide education standards. Science literacy is, after all, no longer merely a
luxury for the gifted and wealthy, but in fact a baseline requirement for any student hoping to compete for jobs in
the 21st century. Though sometimes criticized for its emphasis on students' math and reading scores, the NCLB
approach is working. A recent study confirmed better student test scores in most though not all regions since
enactment in 2002. At least two NCLB revision bids are in play. Rep. George Miller, California Democrat, proposes
changes to increase funding, fairness and flexibility in measuring progress. Earlier, Sens. Joe Lieberman,
Connecticut independent, Mary Landrieu, Louisiana Democrat, and Norm Coleman, Minnesota Republican —
pitched their All Students Can Achieve Act to help close the performance gap between white and minority students.
The core concepts of both bills are on the mark. Whether they're rich, poor, white, black, Hispanic, male, female or
in any other category, all children deserve our very best efforts to teach them science and mathematics. Moreover,
keeping America competitive will require tapping every potential talent pool and bringing them to the highest
possible levels of achievement, which again points to the need for a coherent, uniform set of national science
standards. Nationwide, the performance gap between math and reading test scores for white versus minority
youngsters has narrowed since 2002, but the problem persists in some regions, the Center on Education Policy
reported. In Washington state, the achievement gap actually has widened. Even where the gap is shrinking, it often
remains unacceptably wide — up to 40 percentage points in some states. The trend is even worse when researchers
look at average test scores, rather than the percentage of students meeting different state proficiency levels. These
disparities are dramatic and discouraging, particularly as American students overall continue to score worse than
students in other industrialized nations. It's no wonder. U.S. standards and learning goals vary from place to
place, whereas most other industrialized countries do have nationwide educational standards. So, American
children deemed proficient in science and math in one state might miss the mark if their families move. The
importance of nationwide standards may become painfully clear during the upcoming school year, when
NCLB will require science testing at least once in each of three grade spans (third-fifth, sixth-ninth and 10th-
12th). Earlier this year, Sen. Chris Dodd, Connecticut Democrat, and Rep. Vernon Ehlers, Michigan Republican,
floated the Standards to Provide Educational Achievement for Kids Act, or SPEAK, calling for voluntary,
nationwide standards in science and math, to be developed by the National Assessment Governing Board with
public input. The American Association for the Advancement of Science applauded the bill, which sadly remains
pending. Now we're holding out hope for elements of subsequent proposals, especially for consistent science
standards. There's no need to cook such standards up from scratch, either. They could be based on well-tested,
widely accepted guidelines set forth by Project 2061 at AAAS, the National Research Council, the National Council
of Teachers of Mathematics, and the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Policy-makers clearly see
scientific discovery and science education as keys to the nation's health, economic and security challenges:
When the president signed the America COMPETES Act, whose formal title is the Creating Opportunities to
Meaningfully Promote Excellence in Technology, Education, and Science Act, he authorized an additional $33.6
billion over the next three fiscal years for science, technology, engineering, and math education programs. But one
critical piece is missing. Let's seize the positive momentum and move now toward voluntary nationwide science
standards as well.

Defense-Industrial Base – 2AC Sino-Indian War Add-on [1/2]

Defense-industrial base averts Sino-Indian war
Hawkins, 8 – consultant on international economics and national security issues
(William R, http://www.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=33188)
From Beijing’s perspective, aiding Pakistan keeps India focused to the west, allowing the Chinese more freedom of
action in Southeast Asia, where it is the main source of support for the military dictatorship in Myanmar (Burma).
Beijing has built naval bases along Burma's coastline in the Bay of Bengal, better designed to service Chinese
warships than the non-existent Myanmarese fleet.
In Tibet, Beijing has built all-weather military roads linking army bases, major airfields and ballistic missile sites.
China is increasing its ability to launch strikes deep into India, by both aircraft and missiles, in the wake of
growing unrest by the Tibetan people against Chinese oppression.
While the United States and India have a common enemy in radical Islam, whose terrorists were waging a campaign
in the Indian province of Kashmir long before 9/11, the larger common threat is from China. Beijing’s rapid
economic rise is giving the Communist regime the means to project its power across a wide arc. The 2008 annual
report to Congress from the Office of the Secretary of Defense on the Military Power of the People’s Republic of
China had as its key finding, “China’s expanding and improving military capabilities are changing East Asian
military balances; improvements in China’s strategic capabilities have implications beyond the Asia-Pacific region.”
From the U.S. perspective, India is the only country on the Asian mainland that has the heft to counter China.
From the Indian perspective, the U.S. is a vital source for technology to speed its economic development, and to
improve its military capabilities. For example, India needs to match the ability of Chinese nuclear submarines to
remain submerged while launching nuclear missiles, a senior Indian Navy planner recently told Defense News. New
Delhi also needs to improve its general naval capabilities. Zachariah Mathews, a retired Indian Navy commodore,
has identified three littoral regions — the Arabian Sea, the Indian Ocean and the Bay of Bengal — that India needs
to dominate. India will have to obtain the technology and weapons systems from foreign sources to do so. For example,
the Indian frigate Tabar, which sank a pirate ship off the African coast Nov. 19, is a Russian design built in St. Petersburg. It also incorporates
components from several other countries including Britain, Denmark, Germany, Ukraine, and India itself.
Russia, particularly during the Soviet period, has been India’s primary source for military equipment. But since the collapse of the USSR, India
has found this relationship less appealing. Russia is not the super power it once was, its equipment is second rate, and it is no longer an ally
against China. Rather, Russia under Vladimir Putin has aligned Russia with China to counter American “hegemony.” India
has turned to France, Germany, Israel, and Britain for arms, and is now looking for increased access to the American
defense industry. Indian naval officers now speak in the Pentagon’s language of “net centric warfare.”
In the air, Lockheed Martin's F-16 Fighting Falcon and Boeing's F-18 Super Hornet have already emerged as the front-runners in the competition
to sell 126 fighter jets to India worth $12 billion. Russia, Sweden and France are also in the hunt for one of the world’s richest export
opportunities. Money, however, is not the only reason Washington wants an American firm to win the Indian bid. An arms deal will pull the
military of the two countries together and foster interoperability.
The way for closer ties was opened with the ratification of the U.S.-India Agreement for Cooperation on Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy. The
implementing legislation was signed by President Bush on Oct. 8, a week after it was passed by both houses of Congress. The Senate vote was
86-13, with both Barack Obama and Joe Biden voting with the majority (along with John McCain and Hillary Clinton). The immediate benefit is
that it boosts America’s chances in competition with Russia and France when bidding on the eight nuclear reactors India plans to import by 2012.
The larger gains go beyond the nuclear pact itself. The diplomacy behind the agreement will expand a relationship that was started by President
Ronald Reagan in 1984 when he signed a memorandum of understanding on high-tech sales to India. Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns
said when the nuclear deal was signed that it was, “positive for United States national security interest because it will help us cement our strategic
partnership with India, which is very important for our global interests.”
President-elect Obama needs to understand the value of what President Bush has left him. During his presidential campaign, Obama raised fears
in India regarding a potential U.S. tilt towards Pakistan in the Kashmir dispute. Obama’s thinking seems to be that to win greater Pakistani
cooperation against militants in its border provinces with Afghanistan; the U.S. should help Islamabad advance its militant demands on India.
Such a policy would only embolden jihadists and reward radical elements in Pakistan’s army and intelligence services who are the political
enemies of the country’s new democratic government. Afghanistan and Kashmir are not separate issues, but a common cause for the Islamic
terrorist movement. Alienating India in order to give the militants a partial victory would be a strategic disaster for the United States. Instead,
Washington, in concert with NATO and India, need to make clear to Islamabad that the legitimacy of its claim to sovereignty over its border
areas depends on preventing its territory from being used for attacks against its neighbors.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari understands that the threat to the survival of his democratic government is internal, not external. Pakistan
now wants to normalize relations with India, a country that poses no danger to Islamabad unless provoked. There is already an ongoing and
productive peace process, which has included important back-channel negotiations over Kashmir. Rather than interfere with these discussions,
Obama needs to keep focused on the larger strategic importance of closer ties with New Delhi. India is an emerging
great power in Asia whose alignment with the United States is vital to the maintenance of a balance of power
favorable to American security interests.

Defense-Industrial Base – 2AC Sino-Indian War Add-on [2/2]

Escalates throughout Asia
Poole-Robb, 2 – analyst at Merchant International Group and Alan Bailey
(Stuart, Risky Business: Corruption, Fraud, Terrorism and Other Threats to Global Business p. 181-182)
Most likely scenario for global war

Dibb, 1 – Professor of Security Studies at the Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies
(Paul, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0JIW/is_1_54/ai_75762211)
The areas of maximum danger and instability in the world today are in Asia , followed by the Middle East and parts of the former
Soviet Union. The strategic situation in Asia is more uncertain and potentially threatening than anywhere in Europe. Unlike in
Europe, it is possible to envisage war in Asia involving the major powers: remnants of Cold War ideological
confrontation still exist across the Taiwan Straits and on the Korean Peninsula; India and Pakistan have nuclear
weapons and ballistic missiles, and these two countries are more confrontational than at any time since the early
1970s; in Southeast Asia, Indonesia--which is the world's fourth-largest country--faces a highly uncertain future that could lead to its breakup. The Asia-Pacific
region spends more on defense (about $150 billion a year) than any other part of the world except the United States and Nato Europe. China and Japan are amongst
the top four or five global military spenders. Asia also has more nuclear powers than any other region of the world. Asia's security is at a crossroads: the region could
go in the direction of peace and cooperation, or it could slide into confrontation and military conflict. There are positive tendencies, including the resurgence of
economic growth and the spread of democracy, which would encourage an optimistic view. But there are a number of negative tendencies that must be of serious
concern. There are deep-seated historical, territorial, ideological, and religious differences in Asia. Also, the region has
no history of successful multilateral security cooperation or arms control. Such multilateral institutions as the Association
of Southeast Asian Nations and the ASEAN Regional Forum have shown themselves to be ineffective when confronted with major crises.

Defense-Industrial Base – 2AC Competitiveness Add-on

STEM education key to hegemony and competitiveness, it’s key to long-term innovation and
technological dominance which is the base project power, that’s Carafano.
Multiple scenarios for nuclear war

Zalmay Khalilzad, (Former Assist Prof of Poli Sci @ Columbia), ‘95 Spring, The Washington Quarterly, Vol.
18, No. 2; Pg. 84
Realistically and over the longer term, however, a neo-isolationist approach might well increase the danger of major conflict, require a greater
U.S. defense effort, threaten world peace, and eventually undermine U.S. prosperity. By withdrawing from Europe and Asia, the United States
would deliberately risk weakening the institutions and solidarity of the world's community of democratic powers and so establishing favorable
conditions for the spread of disorder and a possible return to conditions similar to those of the first half of the twentieth century. In the 1920s and
1930s, U.S. isolationism had disastrous consequences for world peace. At that time, the United States was but one of several major powers. Now
that the United States is the world's preponderant power, the shock of a U.S. withdrawal could be even greater. What might happen to the world
if the United States turned inward? Without the United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO),
rather than cooperating with each other, the West European nations might compete with each other for domination
of East-Central Europe and the Middle East. In Western and Central Europe, Germany -- especially since unification
-- would be the natural leading power. Either in cooperation or competition with Russia, Germany might seek
influence over the territories located between them. German efforts are likely to be aimed at filling the vacuum,
stabilizing the region, and precluding its domination by rival powers. Britain and France fear such a development.
Given the strength of democracy in Germany and its preoccupation with absorbing the former East Germany,
European concerns about Germany appear exaggerated. But it would be a mistake to assume that U.S. withdrawal
could not, in the long run, result in the renationalization of Germany's security policy. The same is also true of
Japan. Given a U.S. withdrawal from the world, Japan would have to look after its own security and build up its
military capabilities. China, Korea, and the nations of Southeast Asia already fear Japanese hegemony. Without U.S.
protection, Japan is likely to increase its military capability dramatically -- to balance the growing Chinese forces
and still-significant Russian forces. This could result in arms races, including the possible acquisition by Japan of
nuclear weapons. Given Japanese technological prowess, to say nothing of the plutonium stockpile Japan has acquired in the development of
its nuclear power industry, it could obviously become a nuclear weapon state relatively quickly, if it should so decide. It could also
build long-range missiles and carrier task forces. With the shifting balance of power among Japan, China, Russia,
and potential new regional powers such as India, Indonesia, and a united Korea could come significant risks of
preventive or proeruptive war. Similarly, European competition for regional dominance could lead to major wars in
Europe or East Asia. If the United States stayed out of such a war -- an unlikely prospect -- Europe or East Asia
could become dominated by a hostile power. Such a development would threaten U.S. interests. A power that
achieved such dominance would seek to exclude the United States from the area and threaten its interests-economic
and political -- in the region. Besides, with the domination of Europe or East Asia, such a power might seek global
hegemony and the United States would face another global Cold War and the risk of a world war even more
catastrophic than the last. In the Persian Gulf, U.S. withdrawal is likely to lead to an intensified struggle for regional
domination. Iran and Iraq have, in the past, both sought regional hegemony. Without U.S. protection, the weak oil-
rich states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) would be unlikely to retain their independence. To preclude this
development, the Saudis might seek to acquire, perhaps by purchase, their own nuclear weapons. If either Iraq or
Iran controlled the region that dominates the world supply of oil, it could gain a significant capability to damage the
U.S. and world economies. Any country that gained hegemony would have vast economic resources at its disposal that could be used to
build military capability as well as gain leverage over the United States and other oilimporting nations. Hegemony over the Persian Gulf by either
Iran or Iraq would bring the rest of the Arab Middle East under its influence and domination because of the shift in the balance of power. Israeli
security problems would multiply and the peace process would be fundamentally undermined, increasing the risk of war between the
Arabs and the Israelis. The extension of instability, conflict, and hostile hegemony in East Asia, Europe, and the
Persian Gulf would harm the economy of the United States even in the unlikely event that it was able to avoid
involvement in major wars and conflicts. Higher oil prices would reduce the U.S. standard of living. Turmoil in Asia and Europe would force
major economic readjustment in the United States, perhaps reducing U.S. exports and imports and jeopardizing U.S. investments in these regions.
Given that total imports and exports are equal to a quarter of U.S. gross domestic product, the cost of necessary adjustments might be high. The
higher level of turmoil in the world would also increase the likelihood of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction
(WMD) and means for their delivery. Already several rogue states such as North Korea and Iran are seeking nuclear weapons and long-range
missiles. That danger would only increase if the United States withdrew from the world. The result would be a much more dangerous world in
which many states possessed WMD capabilities; the likelihood of their actual use would increase accordingly. If this
happened, the security of every nation in the world, including the United States, would be harmed .


Defense-Industrial Base – Competitiveness Key to Heg

Competitiveness outweighs all other internal links
Martino, 7 – Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute
(Rocco, “A Strategy for Success: Innovation Will Renew American Leadership,” Orbis, Volume 51, Issue 2)
Much of the foreign policy discussion in the United States today is focused upon the dilemma posed by the Iraq War
and the threat posed by Islamist terrorism. These problems are, of course, both immediate and important. However,
America also faces other challenges to its physical security and economic prosperity, and these are more long-term
and probably more profound. There is, first, the threat posed by our declining competitiveness in the global
economy, a threat most obviously represented by such rising economic powers as China and India.1 There is,
second, the threat posed by our increasing dependence on oil imports from the Middle East. Moreover, these two
threats are increasingly connected, as China and India themselves are greatly increasing their demand for Middle
East oil.2 The United States of course faced great challenges to its security and economy in the past, most
obviously from Germany and Japan in the first half of the twentieth century and from the Soviet Union in the second
half. Crucial to America's ability to prevail over these past challenges was our technological and industrial
leadership, and especially our ability to continuously recreate it . Indeed, the United States has been unique among
great powers in its ability to keep on creating and recreating new technologies and new industries, generation after
generation. Perpetual innovation and technological leadership might even be said to be the American way of
maintaining primacy in world affairs. They are almost certainly what America will have to pursue in order to
prevail over the contemporary challenges involving economic competitiveness and energy dependence. There is
therefore an urgent need for America to resume its historic emphasis on innovation . The United States needs a
national strategy focused upon developing new technologies and creating new industries. Every successful strategy
must define an objective or mission, determine a solution, and assemble the means of execution. In this case, the
objective is economic superiority; the solution is new industries which build upon the contemporary revolution in
information technology; and the means of execution will have to include a partnership of industry, government, and
people.3

Defense-Industrial Base – Education Key to Competitiveness

STEM education key to the economy and competitiveness
Archey et al, 5 – Former President and CEO, AeA, a business and technology advocacy group
(William T, “Tapping America’s Potential,” http://www.tap2015.org/about/TAP_report2.pdf)
Almost 50 years ago, the Soviet Union shocked Americans by launching Sputnik, the first Earth orbit satellite. The
U.S. response was immediate and dramatic. Less than a year later, President Eisenhower signed into law the
National Defense Education Act, a major part of the effort to restore America's scientific pre-eminence. 7
Today, our nation faces a more serious, if less visible, challenge. One of the pillars of American economic
prosperity — our scientific and technological superiority — is beginning to atrophy even as other nations are
developing their own human capital. If we wait for a dramatic event — a 21st-century version of Sputnik — it will
be too late. There may be no attack, no moment of epiphany, no catastrophe that will suddenly demonstrate the
threat. Rather, there will be a slow withering, a gradual decline, a widening gap between a complacent America and
countries with the drive, commitment and vision to take our place.
History is replete with examples of world economies that once were dominant but declined because of myopic, self-
determined choices. The United States is at such a critical point in our own history. Virtually every major
respected organization representing business, research and education, as well as government science and statistics
agencies and commissions,8 has extensively documented the critical situation in U.S. science, technology,
engineering and mathematics. The indicators range from measurable declines in U.S. innovation, such as patents and
scientific articles, to soaring numbers of students in Asia majoring in these fields, to U.S. students' lagging interest
and measured performance in math and science.
Foreign competition: China not only graduates four times as many engineers as the United States,9 but it also offers
lucrative tax breaks to attract companies to conduct research and development (R&D) in the country.10
Interest in engineering: Out of the 1.1 million high school seniors in the United States who took a college entrance
exam in 2002, just under 6 percent indicated plans to pursue a degree in engineering — nearly a 33 percent decrease
in interest from the previous decade.11
Student achievement: In a recent international assessment of 15-year-olds' math problem-solving skills, the United
States had the smallest percentage of top performers and the largest percentage of low performers compared to the
other participating developed countries. 12 This is not surprising when nearly 70 percent of middle school students
are assigned to teachers who lack a major and certification in mathematics.13
Investment in basic research: In the United States, since 1970, funding for basic research in the physical sciences
has declined by half (from 0.093 percent to 0.046 percent) as a percentage of the gross domestic product (GDP). 14
For most of the 20th century, the American education system provided a substantial part of the talent and
proficiency needed to sustain and improve our way of life. In addition, many foreign scientists were attracted to
pursue research in the United States by the American scientific enterprise's top-notch facilities and financial support,
and by their own desire to escape totalitarian regimes and live in a free society.
Today, however, as the U.S. economy becomes even more reliant on workers with greater knowledge and
technological expertise, the domestic supply of qualified workers is not keeping up with the skill demands.
Employers are increasingly interested in hiring people who not only can execute well but also can create the next
wave of innovation. One economist estimates that “trailing other developed countries on education measures may
reduce U.S. economic growth by as much as a half percentage point a year.” 15 All projections suggest that the
discrepancy between supply and demand of domestic talent will grow more pronounced. In the face of the declining
interest and proficiency of Americans in science, math and engineering, American industry has become increasingly
dependent — some would say overly dependent — on foreign nationals to fill the demand for talent in a variety of
fields that require strong backgrounds in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
A number of developments — including heightened security after September 11, growing competition from other
countries for the same foreign talent and the technological capacity for foreign talent to work in their home countries
— have underscored the need for greater scientific and technological self-sufficiency in our country. The United
States has always welcomed the best and brightest from other countries to study and work here, and we should
continue to do so. We cannot and should not, however, rely so heavily on foreign talent to fill critical positions in
teaching, research and industry.

Defense-Industrial Base – Education Key to Competitiveness

Education key to competitiveness – outweighs other internals
Gates, 7 (Bill, The writer is chairman of Microsoft Corp. and co-chairman of the Bill and Melinda Gates
Foundation. His wife is a director of The Washington Post Co, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2007/02/23/AR2007022301697.html)
For centuries people assumed that economic growth resulted from the interplay between capital and labor. Today we
know that these elements are outweighed by a single critical factor: innovation.
Innovation is the source of U.S. economic leadership and the foundation for our competitiveness in the global
economy. Government investment in research, strong intellectual property laws and efficient capital markets are
among the reasons that America has for decades been best at transforming new ideas into successful businesses.
The most important factor is our workforce. Scientists and engineers trained in U.S. universities -- the world's best --
have pioneered key technologies such as the microprocessor, creating industries and generating millions of high-
paying jobs.
But our status as the world's center for new ideas cannot be taken for granted. Other governments are waking up to
the vital role innovation plays in competitiveness.
This is not to say that the growing economic importance of countries such as China and India is bad. On the
contrary, the world benefits as more people acquire the skills needed to foster innovation. But if we are to remain
competitive, we need a workforce that consists of the world's brightest minds.
Two steps are critical. First, we must demand strong schools so that young Americans enter the workforce with the
math, science and problem-solving skills they need to succeed in the knowledge economy. We must also make it
easier for foreign-born scientists and engineers to work for U.S. companies.
Education has always been the gateway to a better life in this country, and our primary and secondary schools were
long considered the world's best. But on an international math test in 2003, U.S. high school students ranked 24th
out of 29 industrialized nations surveyed. Our schools can do better. Last year, I visited High Tech High in San
Diego; it's an amazing school where educators have augmented traditional teaching methods with a rigorous,
project-centered curriculum. Students there know they're expected to go on to college. This combination is working:
100 percent of High Tech High graduates are accepted into college, and 29 percent major in math or science.
Contrast that with the national average of 17 percent.
To remain competitive in the global economy, we must build on the success of such schools and commit to an
ambitious national agenda for education . Government and businesses can both play a role. Companies must
advocate for strong education policies and work with schools to foster interest in science and mathematics and to
provide an education that is relevant to the needs of business. Government must work with educators to reform
schools and improve educational excellence.
(…) During the past 30 years, U.S. innovation has been the catalyst for the digital information revolution. If the
United States is to remain a global economic leader, we must foster an environment that enables a new generation to
dream up innovations, regardless of where they were born. Talent in this country is not the problem -- the issue is
political will.

Solvency – Ext: Putting CTE in NCLB Solves

Integrating CTE into No Child Left Behind expands job training
Daggett, 2 – President of the International Center for Leadership in Education
(Willard R, “The Future of Career and Technical Education,” International Center for Leadership in Education,
http://www.leadered.com/pdf/CTE%20white%20paper.pdf)
While the workplace has brought increasingly rigorous academic and technology-related skill requirements as
criteria for career success, No Child Left Behind will bring enormous pressures from within the test-driven
education system to raise the proficiency standards for all students. The NCLB legislation totals more than 1,400
pages. The salient points, however, are fairly straightforward. They are:
• by 2004-05, all students must reach a specified proficiency level in reading, writing, and mathematics and soon
thereafter in science
• beginning in 2002-03, schools must identify for nine subgroups (students with disabilities, LEP, by gender, ethnic
minorities, low socioeconomic status, etc.) where all students are today and then demonstrate adequate yearly
progress (AYP) for each subgroup for each of the next 12 years until they all achieve 100 percent proficiency. This
proficiency will be measured in large part by satisfactory performance – including demonstrable improvement – on
state tests in reading, writing, mathematics, and science
• any school that does not achieve AYP for all students two years in a row will face serious consequences from both
state and federal authorities; this will raise the anxiety level of all administrators dramatically.
Therefore, it is more essential than ever for career and technical education to be able to prove that it contributes not
just to the applied workplace competency demands of business, but also to the academic proficiencies of served
student populations on state academic tests — if CTE is to remain a viable program in our secondary schools.
Solution: No CTE Program Left Behind
Fortunately, some wonderful success stories have emerged out of CTE’s extensive reform efforts over the last
several years. Unfortunately, these success stories are more random local acts of excellence than systemic initiatives
across the national CTE landscape.
Integration of the two works – dropouts clause proves

2002)
Career technical education has long claimed that its programs can be used as a strategy in preventing school
dropouts, and NCLB recognizes this concept. The Dropout Prevention Act can be found in Title I, Part H of NCLB
and is designed to support activities that prevent school dropouts and support former students’ reentry into schools,
all with the goal of raising students’ academic achievement. Resources can be used to collect data on the
effectiveness of programs in preventing dropouts; for professional development, remedial education, counseling at-
risk students, or student-to-teacher ratio reduction; and for implementation of strategies for school dropout
prevention and reentry. Among other things, such strategies may include “approaches such as breaking larger
schools down into smaller learning communities and other comprehensive reform approaches, creating alternative
school programs, and developing clear linkages to career skills and employment.” As with other parts of NCLB,
these strategies must be scientifically based, sustainable, and widely replicable.

Solvency – Ext: National Standards Good

National standard resolves education shortfalls
Brown, 5 – Fellow @ the Center for American Progress, and Elena Rocha, Fellow @ the Center for American
Progress (Cindy, “The Case for National Standards, Accountability, and Fiscal Equity,” November 2005,
http://www.americanprogress.org/kf/standards-based_framework.pdf)
As disappointing as the minimal, overall progress on NAEP is, the more troubling story is the contrasting progress
reported by most states. This progress is just not verified by NAEP. As the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation has
pointed out, “Almost twenty states have reported gains from 2003 to 2005 in the percentage of eighth-graders rated
“proficient” (or the equivalent) in reading on their own state tests. Among those states, however, only three show
any progress at even the “basic” level on the latest National Assessment of Educational Progress…. None of these
states made any progress in eighth grade reading at NAEP's “proficient” level.” (See Chart 5 which highlights the
largest differences in proficiency results, for states with data available, when comparing 2005 state and NAEP data).
Some states reporting gains from 2003 to 2005 on their own tests had declining rates of proficiency on NAEP. (See
Chart 6.)
As noted above, the differences in scores, which can be drastic, relate to how high states set their standards. While
some states have high expectations of their students and therefore high standards for their performance, others
choose not to aim as high. A state with high content standards may have student performance scores that appear low
(or even high if student proficiency cut scores are set low), whereas a state with lower standards can report higher
levels of academic achievement among their students. Consequently, reporting of state assessment results are
misleading. More importantly, they provide the public with a false sense of the condition of education at the local,
state and national levels. Today, state testing results really tell the public little about how schools are performing
and progressing. But the establishment and implementation of national standards and the testing and reporting of
student achievement in two or three core subjects like reading, math, and science would provide the public with a
much more accurate picture of how United States’ students are progressing nationally and state-by- state.
Creating a single set of standards is the only way to improve academic achievement
PE Magazine, July 09 - National Society of Professional Engineers
("NSPE TODAY: POLICY PERSPECTIVES As Stars Align, STEM Support Grows"
http://www.nspe.org/PEmagazine/pe_0709_NSPE_Today_Policy.html)
# The Standards to Provide Educational Achievement for Kids (SPEAK) Act would create, adopt, and implement a
set of core education content standards in math and science in grades K–12 and give states incentives to voluntarily
adopt them. The No Child Left Behind Act allows for great variability in the measures, standards, and benchmarks
for academic achievement in math and science across states—more than 50 different sets of academic standards,
50 state assessments, and 50 definitions of proficiency, in fact. Creating a single set of standards would ensure
that all students were given the same opportunity to learn to a high standard no matter where they reside and allow
for meaningful comparisons of student academic achievement across states.

Solvency – Ext: National Standards Good

National standards key to check achievement gaps
Education Week, 7 (“Gaps in Proficiency Levels on State Tests And NAEP Found to Grow,” 4/18, lexis)
Far greater shares of students are proficient on state reading and mathematics tests than on the National Assessment
of Educational Progress, and those gaps have grown to unprecedented levels since the federal No Child Left
Behind Act became law in 2002, a study released last week concludes.
The study by Policy Analysis for California Education, a nonprofit research group based at the University of
California, Berkeley, was released here April 10 during the annual meeting of the American Educational Research
Association.
The researchers compiled state and federal testing results for the period 1992 to 2006 from 12 states: Arkansas,
California, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, and
Washington.
In all but two states--Arkansas and Massachusetts--the disparity between the share of students proficient on state
reading tests and on NAEP, a congressionally mandated program that tests a representative sample of students in
every state, grew or remained the same from 2002 to 2006. A similar widening occurred between state and federal
gauges of math performance in eight of 12 states.
Those findings call into question whether the state-reported gains are real or illusory, according to the researchers.
"State leaders are under enormous pressure to show that students are making progress," said Bruce Fuller, a
professor of education and public policy at Berkeley who led the study. "So, they are finding inventive ways of
showing higher test scores."
Under the federal law, states must give reading and math tests annually in grades 3-8 and at least once in high
school. Schools and districts that do not meet annual targets for the percentage of students who score proficient on
those exams face an escalating series of federal sanctions, with the target rising to 100 percent proficiency in 2013-
14.
Critics have suggested that, rather than raising academic standards, the law is encouraging states to lower the bar for
passing state tests or otherwise adjust their definition of "proficiency" downward in order to avoid identifying too
many schools as missing their targets.

Solvency – Title I Key

Title I funding is key – low levels are killing school effectiveness and leading to teacher lay-offs
Goodrin, 6/16 (Shelly, News Chief.com, Florida Newspaper,
http://www.newschief.com/article/20090616/news/906165037?Title=Charter-schools-see-decrease-in-funding)
LAKE WALES - With a decrease in student funding, there will not be any salary increases for Lake Wales Charter
Schools employees next year.
State reductions from the Florida Education Finance Program (FEFP) will decrease from $3,810 to $3,560 per
student The student count for all six schools increased .5 percent from last year's count, though all but one school is
seeing a decrease in students.
Bok Academy will see about 145 more students next year as the school expands. Hillcrest Elementary is expected to
see a decrease of only three students while Janie Howard Wilson Elementary is expected to see a decrease of 48
students. Polk Avenue Elementary is expected to see a decrease of 35 students, Lake Wales High School is expected
to see a decrease of 27 students and Babson Park Elementary is expected to see a decrease of 14 students.
"It's consistent with what the county is seeing across the board," said Lake Wales Charter Schools Board
Chairman David Ullman.
Health insurance is budgeted for a 7 percent increase, but employees will be able to choose from dual plan options
for medical and dental insurance. Employer retirement rates for the Florida retirement system will not change from
last year for eligible employees. The expenditure base at each school incorporates a minimum 2 percent hold-back
as a contingency if state funds are adjusted. The schools held back 2 percent from the current budget year as well.
"That's what helped us this year," Ullman said. "We had that 2 percent hold-back and we come to the end of the year
and didn't need it."
The expenditure base and special revenue funds program revenue, which includes funds from the Individuals with
Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), ROTC and Title 1 funds (given to schools with high numbers of low-income
students), are estimated to decrease 14 percent.

Solvency – Ext: Poverty Key

Need to address low-income education – key to overall workforce
&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf)
The education industry faces several challenges. Some have existed for many years, while others are relatively new.
The need to overcome them, however, is greater than ever because of globalization’s explosive economic
competition, the rapid race to stay at the forefront of advancing technologies, and the emerging demographic
shifts in the US. Moreover, whereas these challenges have merely represented obstacles or socioeconomic
nuances in the past, they now have clear national security implications. The most important challenges are
poor achievement among minority students, low teacher retention, powerful teacher unions, shortages of
graduates with advanced science and math skills, and school-choice issues. Poor achievement among minority
students is the most publicized and among the most important challenges. Educators and government officials who
champion the need to improve minority student achievement often do so by pointing to the need for equity among
the entire population and by recognizing that poor education is largely responsible for social ills such as poverty and
crime. There is another reason, however, that makes this challenge even more worth confronting: the percentage of
Hispanics and African Americans making up the US population is increasing.xxxii As a result, these groups are
playing a growing role within America’s economy and national security, whether it is through their economic
participation in the US workforce or through their direct service in the US Armed Services. The need for these
groups to improve cannot be overstated. The US government is currently addressing this challenge through the
No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. This law pushes states to monitor, assess, and report the performance of virtually
every student; to hold the schools and their leaders accountable; and to take action to raise the achievement of those
students who fall short of the learning standards. With an undertaking of this size, it is not surprising that parts of the
education industry have not fully embraced this initiative.xxxiii The challenge is to stay focused on the end goal,
make reasonable adjustments to the law when necessary, and identify further actions that will raise the level of
traditionally low-performing students. An essay on page 18 further describes the importance of learning standards.

Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Moral Obligation

Moral obligation for low-income education
Whitman, 8 – covered social policy for U.S. News & World Report for nearly two decades, former
researcher/teacher @ the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, B.A. in Poli Sci @ Amherst
(David, Sweating the Small Stuff: Inner-City Schools and the New Paternalism, pg. 11)
Yet for all the progress of the last century, the central problem facing American high schools in 2008 is still the
problem of the color line — and the premier civil rights issue of the day is arguably the achievement gap. In the
modern era, when college is often a prerequisite for obtaining a decent job in the global economy, education is more
critical than ever to ensuring equal opportunity for disadvantaged black and Hispanic students. A school record that
was good enough to land a well-paid factory job a quarter century ago is no longer good enough. Today, nearly three
out of four young black men who have dropped out of high school are jobless. And even as urban crime rates have
plunged during the last 15 years, incarceration rates among young black males have soared — so much so that a
staggering 60 percent of black male dropouts now have served time in prison by the time they are in their mid-
thirties.
This ongoing failure to deliver equal educational opportunities to poor black and Hispanic youth is not just an
economic and personal tragedy but a moral problem as well. In few areas of American life are the country’s
professed ideals so at odds with reality. As Gunnar Myrdal observed as far back as 1944 in An American Dilemma,
his landmark study of race relations, “Education has always been the great hope for both individual and society. In
the American Creed it has been the main ground upon which ‘equality of opportunity’ and ‘free outlet for ability’
could be based.” 1

Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Poverty Add-on

Education is the instrumental tool in alleviating poverty
Khan and Williams, 6 (Habibullah and Jeremy, U21 Global Poverty Center, Study,
http://www.u21global.edu.sg/PartnerAdmin/ViewContent?module=DOCUMENTLIBRARY&oid=157294)
Despite the inherent difficulties in quantifying the real contribution of education to Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
or other national income aggregates, it has always been considered a powerful instrument for reducing poverty and
inequality through productivity enhancement which is, of course, a key ingredient for the maintenance of economic
growth. The relationship between education and poverty is quite clear; educated people have higher earning
potential and are better able to improve the quality of their lives, which means they are less likely to be
marginalized within society at large. Education empowers a person and it helps them to become more
proactive, gain control over their lives, and to broaden the range of available options (UNESCO 1997).
Education is recognized as a basic human right and it is closely linked to virtually all dimensions of development -
economic, social, and human. It is also a key factor in improving the quality of governance that has a significant
impact on national income.
Poverty outweighs nuclear war

Gilligan, 96 [James, professor of Psychiatry at the Harvard Medical School, Director of the Center for the Study of Violence, and a member
of the Academic Advisory Council of the National Campaign Against Youth Violence, Violence: Our Deadly Epidemic and its Causes, p 191-
196]
The deadliest form of violence is poverty. You cannot work for one day with the violent people who fill our prisons and mental hospitals for the criminally insane
without being forcible and constantly reminded of the extreme poverty and discrimination that characterizes their lives. Hearing about their lives, and about their families and friends, you are
forced to recognize the truth in Gandhi’s observation that the deadliest form of violence is poverty. Not a day goes by without realizing that trying to understand them and their violent behavior
in purely individual terms is impossible and wrong-headed. Any theory of violence, especially a psychological theory, that evolves from the experience of men in maximum security prisons and
hospitals for the criminally insane must begin with the recognition that these institutions are only microcosms. They are not where the major violence in our society takes place, and the
perpetrators who fill them are far from being the main causes of most violent deaths. Any approach to a theory of violence needs to begin with a look at the structural violence in this country.
Focusing merely on those relatively few men who commit what we define as murder could distract us from examining and learning from those structural causes of violent death that are far more
significant from a numerical or public health, or human, standpoint. By “structural violence” I mean the increased rates of death, and disability suffered by those who occupy the bottom rungs of
society, as contrasted with the relatively lower death rates experienced by those who are above them. Those excess deaths (or at least a demonstrably large proportion of them) are a function of
class structure; and that structure is itself a product of society’s collective human choices, concerning how to distribute the collective wealth of the society. These are not acts of God. I am
contrasting “structural” with “behavioral violence,” by which I mean the non-natural deaths and injuries that are caused by specific behavioral actions of individuals against individuals, such as
. *The
the deaths we attribute to homicide, suicide, soldiers in warfare, capital punishment, and so on. Structural violence differs from behavioral violence in at least three major respects
lethal effects of structural violence operate continuously, rather than sporadically, whereas murders, suicides,
executions, wars, and other forms of behavioral violence occur one at a time. *Structural violence operates more or less independently of
individual acts; independent of individuals and groups (politicians, political parties, voters) whose decisions may nevertheless have lethal consequences for others. * Structural
violence is normally invisible, because it may appear to have had other (natural or violent) causes. The finding that
structural violence causes far more deaths than behavioral violence does is not limited to this country. Kohler and Alcock
attempted to arrive at the number of excess deaths caused by socioeconomic inequities on a worldwide basis. Sweden was their model of the nation that had come closes to eliminating structural
violence. It had the least inequity in income and living standards, and the lowest discrepancies in death rates and life expectancy; and the highest overall life expectancy in the world. When they
18 million deaths a year could be attributed to
compared the life expectancies of those living in the other socioeconomic systems against Sweden, they found that
the “structural violence” to which the citizens of all the other nations were being subjected. During the past decade, the discrepancies between the rich and poor nations have
increased dramatically and alarmingly. The 14 to 18 million deaths a year caused by structural violence compare with about
100,000 deaths per year from armed conflict. Comparing this frequency of deaths from structural violence to the
frequency of those caused by major military and political violence, such as World War II (an estimated 49 million military and civilian deaths,
including those by genocide—or about eight million per year, 1939-1945), the Indonesian massacre of 1965-66 (perhaps 575,000) deaths), the Vietnam war (possibly two million, 1954-1973),
and even a hypothetical nuclear exchange between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. (232 million), it was clear that even
war cannot begin to compare with structural violence, which continues year after year. In other words, every
fifteen years, on the average, as many people die because of relative poverty as would be killed by the Nazi
genocide of the Jews over a six-year period. This is, in effect, the equivalent of an ongoing, unending, in fact
accelerating, thermonuclear war, or genocide, perpetrated on the weak and poor every year of every decade,
throughout the world. Structural violence is also the main cause of behavioral violence on a socially and
epidemiologically significant scale (from homicide and suicide to war and genocide). The question as to which of
the two forms of violence—structural or behavioral—is more important, dangerous, or lethal is moot, for they are
inextricably related to each other, as cause to effect.

Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Segregation Add-on

Status quo education policies are equivalent to segregation
Adleman, 5/28 – Policy Analyst @ Education Sector, bachelor's degree from the University of Iowa and a master's
of public policy degree from the College of William and Mary (Chad, “The Condition of Education: Economic and
Racial Segregation,” http://www.quickanded.com/2009/05/condition-of-education-economic-and.html - blog)
Over the next few days I'll highlight some of the charts and tables I found most interesting. The one at left looks at
the percentage of students, by race, who attend a high-poverty school, defined as a school where 75 percent of the
students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. Nationwide, about a third of black and Hispanic children attend
a high-poverty school, while only four percent of white children and 13 percent of Asian/ Pacific Islanders do. By
contrast, only four percent of black and six percent of Hispanic children attend low-poverty schools, defined as
schools with ten percent or less of students eligible for free and reduced-price lunch.
These numbers are in part a reflection of growing segregation in our nation's schools. Since 1990, the percentage of
students attending a school with a minority population comprising at least 75 percent of the student body has risen
from 16 to 24. A third of all black and Hispanic students attend such schools. 62 percent of whites attend a school
where the student body is more than 75 percent white.
These conditions will not likely be addressed through school assignment policies. The Supreme Court has ruled that
even non-binding race windows are unconstitutional in school assignment plans. Efforts to integrate by economic
factors face their own complications, not least of which is the flight of effective teachers out of low-income, high-
minority schools.
Solutions must do one of two things. Either they must attempt to address large-scale housing and location decisions
that are the basis for school segregation in the first place, or they must ignore the problem entirely and address the
symptoms, rather than the problem itself, head on. The former would require localities to emphasize mixed-use
neighborhoods and other zoning tools to address de facto segregation. The latter would suggest focusing more
resources and attention on these schools, such as providing incentives for effective teachers to work in them.
Without such efforts, schools will be powerless to counter prevailing societal living patterns.
Segregation is racist and an independent D-rule

TLW, 8 (The Louisiana Weekly, http://www.louisianaweekly.com/news.php?viewStory=215)
"This is a critical time for America. It is a critical time for Black America," said Steele. "When America faced a
crisis in race relations and civil rights in 1957, some of the nation's most distinguished Black religious leaders came
together to lead our country through difficult times and to encourage our people to fight for equality and justice.
SCLC today fulfills that same role. And over the past 50th years, we've gained strength to have an even greater
impact." Those leaders issued a document declaring that civil rights are essential to democracy, that segregation
must end, and that all Black people should reject segregation absolutely and nonviolently.

Solvency – Poverty Key: 2AC Dropouts Add-on

Low-income schools have high drop-out rates
Whitman, 8 – covered social policy for U.S. News & World Report for nearly two decades, former
researcher/teacher @ the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, B.A. in Poli Sci @ Amherst
(David, Sweating the Small Stuff: Inner-City Schools and the New Paternalism, pgs. 14-15)
The second factor feeding current disparities in achievement — this time at the end of the educational pipeline — is
the high dropout rates of black and Latino students. During much of the last century, black educational attainment
rose dramatically. But in the last 15 years, the black high school dropout rate stopped plummeting. In fact, by some
measures black and Latino students are less likely to graduate from high school in a timely fashion today than in
1990. Education Week’s June 2007 “Diplomas Count” report shows that, while nearly eight out of ten white
students graduate with a high school diploma in four years, only 58 percent of Hispanics and 53 percent of blacks
graduate on time. These dropout rates are even worse in urban schools in high-poverty neighborhoods, where
60 to 80 percent of students typically fail to get a diploma in four years.
These inner-city schools have been likened to “dropout factories,” and they remain the locus of the nation’s
dropout problem. About 2,000 of the more than 20,000 high schools in the United States produce almost half of the
nation’s dropouts. Nearly half of black students nationwide and about 40 percent of Hispanic students attend those
2,000 failing high schools. High school dropouts have a particularly devastating impact in poor black communities,
where many black male dropouts eventually turn to crime. A disheartening 30 percent of African-American males in
their mid-thirties who did not attend college now have prison records. But a stunning 60 percent of all black male
high school dropouts in their mid-thirties have prison records — a grim measure, if ever there was one, of the costly
toll of the achievement gap.

NCLB Bad – Race to the Bottom

State policies under NCLB cause achievement gaps
Education Week, 7 (“Gaps in Proficiency Levels on State Tests And NAEP Found to Grow,” 4/18, lexis)
Far greater shares of students are proficient on state reading and mathematics tests than on the National Assessment
of Educational Progress, and those gaps have grown to unprecedented levels since the federal No Child Left
Behind Act became law in 2002, a study released last week concludes.
The study by Policy Analysis for California Education, a nonprofit research group based at the University of
California, Berkeley, was released here April 10 during the annual meeting of the American Educational Research
Association.
The researchers compiled state and federal testing results for the period 1992 to 2006 from 12 states: Arkansas,
California, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, and
Washington.
In all but two states--Arkansas and Massachusetts--the disparity between the share of students proficient on state
reading tests and on NAEP, a congressionally mandated program that tests a representative sample of students in
every state, grew or remained the same from 2002 to 2006. A similar widening occurred between state and federal
gauges of math performance in eight of 12 states.
Those findings call into question whether the state-reported gains are real or illusory, according to the researchers.
"State leaders are under enormous pressure to show that students are making progress," said Bruce Fuller, a
professor of education and public policy at Berkeley who led the study. "So, they are finding inventive ways of
showing higher test scores."
Under the federal law, states must give reading and math tests annually in grades 3-8 and at least once in high
school. Schools and districts that do not meet annual targets for the percentage of students who score proficient on
those exams face an escalating series of federal sanctions, with the target rising to 100 percent proficiency in 2013-
14.
Critics have suggested that, rather than raising academic standards, the law is encouraging states to lower the bar for
passing state tests or otherwise adjust their definition of "proficiency" downward in order to avoid identifying too
many schools as missing their targets.
Vagueness of “proficiency” causes a race to the bottom

Yinger, 6 – Professor of Public Administration and Economics @ Syracuse, and William Duncombe, Professor of
Public Administration @ Syracuse, and Anna Lukemeyer, Associate Professor of Public Administration @ UNLV
(John, “The No Child Left Behind Act: Have Federal Funds Been Left Behind?” http://www
cpr.maxwell.syr.edu/efap/Publications/costing_out.pdf)
NCLB sets as its target that all students reach proficiency on these measures by 2013-14. States are provided a fair
amount of discretion in defining the level of performance that is “proficient,” and in setting intervening performance
targets for the years leading up to 2013-14. Thus, states have an incentive to set low proficiency levels and to
backload the required proficiency improvements over the 12-year period (Kim and Sunderman 2004; Ryan 2003).
To highlight differences in the stringency of accountability standards, Figure 1 compares the intermediate targets
and actual performance levels for Kansas and Missouri. In 2002, Kansas set the proficiency level for its students at
about 50 percent compared to 13 percent in Missouri. 3 While for both states the average student was well above
these targets through 2004, the average proficiency rate in Missouri was less than 40 percent of the rate in Kansas.

NCLB Bad – Low-Income Schools

Low-income schools get harsher sanctions under NCLB – hurts education
Yinger, 6 – Professor of Public Administration and Economics @ Syracuse, and William Duncombe, Professor of
Public Administration @ Syracuse, and Anna Lukemeyer, Associate Professor of Public Administration @ UNLV
(John, “The No Child Left Behind Act: Have Federal Funds Been Left Behind?” http://www
cpr.maxwell.syr.edu/efap/Publications/costing_out.pdf)
Another important issue for evaluating either a state accountability system or NCLB is that districts with a high
concentration of disadvantaged students cannot be expected to achieve the same level of student performance as
other districts unless they receive additional resources. Under NCLB, schools with many disadvantaged students
generally face harsher sanctions than other schools (Kim and Sunderman 2004), which can potentially lead to a
number of perverse incentives (Ryan 2003). Depending on assumptions about inefficiency, the potential cost
increases to state governments to provide adequate resources to high-need districts could be large enough to
dominate other types of costs. In a recent analysis for Ohio, Driscoll and Fleeter (2003) estimate that “intervention
costs” represent over 95 percent of additional costs from NCLB and average $760 per student. In a study on costs of
implementing NCLB in Texas, Imazeki and Reschovsky (2006) estimate that meeting AYP associated with a
passing rate of 70 percent would require $4.4 billion of additional spending, or $1,064 per pupil.

NCLB Bad – High-Stakes

State policies under NCLB are high-stakes – decreases teaching quality and causes drop-outs
Another issue regarding raising standards by testing is that some high schools set a cutoff score for their students
and require that they meet or exceed it to warrant a diploma, therefore making the assessment high-stakes. These
high-stakes assessments are used for making important decisions about students, including decisions about
promotion to the next grade level, in-grade retention, and graduating from high school (Harvey & Koch, 2004;
Plake, 2002). According to Goertz and Duffy (2003), assessments are considered high-stakes depending on the level
of consequences; assessments may have high-stakes for schools because of their inability to demonstrate progress
and may result in state intervention or full state control over school administrators. In 2008, 28 states will enact a
requirement for their students to pass a state-mandated assessment to meet their graduation requirements (Vogler,
2004); in addition, seven states will place student scores on transcripts or diplomas (Goertz & Duffy, 2003).
In a review of the literature, assessment experts tend to disagree with using one assessment to make multiple
decisions such as indicating the performance of students, making decisions regarding the future of schools and
students, and assisting in revamping instructional methods (Goertz & Duffy, 2003; Neill, 2006; Vogler, 2004).
Austin and Mahlman (2002) point out two dilemmas that involve high-stakes assessment: (a) the current educational
policies (such as NCLB) and public expectations of the assessments often outweigh the capabilities of the
assessments, resulting in utilizing the assessments for invalid uses; and (b) the fairness of the assessment and the
long-lasting affects of categorizing students based on their performance is debatable and problematic.
In a review of the literature on teacher perceptions of the increase in testing, the overwhelming perceptions among
teachers are negative (Abrams, Pedulla, & Madaus, 2003; Sunderman, Tracey, Kim, & Orfield, 2004). A nationwide
survey disseminated by the National Board on Educational Testing and Public Policy found that the increase in
testing students contradicts teachers’ perspectives of administering proper educational practices (Abrams et al.,
2003). The study also indicates that teachers sacrifice good teaching practices by focusing on test-taking strategies
and studying the content mirrored on state tests. This appears to be the consensus among current research (Herman
& Dietel, 2005; Neill, 2006). In addition, an increase in stress and decrease in morale were also factors noted by
teachers and students. For students, frequent low performance on high-stakes testing may result in dropping out of
high school (Harvey & Koch, 2004). The intended purpose of using high-stakes testing is to ensure accountability
among all students and schools; yet, the end results often create a difficult circumstance.

NCLB Bad – AT: Doesn’t Hurt Everyone

NCLB spills over – decreases overall education quality
Thomas, 7/5 – Columnist, Orlando Sentinel (Mike, http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/orl-locorl-mike
thomas-smart-kids-0070509jul05,0,6352426.column)
No Child Left Behind is leaving a most unlikely group of kids behind — the smart ones.
And that should worry you if you have a smart kid in school because Florida is adopting the federal law. No Child
Left Behind closely tracks progress made by low-performing students. Schools that fail to educate them face
sanctions, including the loss of their students to other schools.
This is separate from Florida's accountability system, which grades schools based on FCAT scores.
Now the state and federal measuring sticks are being combined.
This means more pressure on schools to elevate struggling students, who tend to be low-income minority kids.
Those schools that continually fail to do so could be taken over by the state, with their administrative staffs and
teachers thrown out.
There also is a growing emphasis on dropout prevention, meaning more resources thrown at those students who
often are least interested in taking advantage of them.
The timing couldn't be worse for school districts. Faced with massive budget cuts, they are being put in the position
of rationing education. It's not hard to figure where they will direct limited resources when they get more credit for
turning an F student into a D student, than an A student into an A+ student. Even before the financial crisis, this
dynamic was taking place. Last year, the Fordham Institute, an education research center, examined standardized
test scores between 2000 and 2007. No Child Left Behind was passed in 2002. The report revealed that schools did
increase math and reading scores for low-performers. But this came with a consequence.
"While the nation's lowest-achieving youngsters made rapid gains from 2000 to 2007, the performance of top
students was languid," the report states. The lowest 10 percent did a lot better; the highest 10 percent made "minimal
gains."The report noted that even before No Child Left Behind was passed, the pattern was evident in states using
standardized testing and accountability.I've had my own doubts about this. I once was a soccer coach of a very
bright group of third-grade girls. The evening after they took the FCAT for the first time, I asked them: "So how was
it?"They rolled their eyes. "Borrring!"How much time had these smart kids spent prepping for a test that basically is
designed to measure minimum standards? Is it relevant for them? Could that time be better spent on other pursuits?
Fordham shed more light on its study with a teacher survey. In it, a strong majority of teachers agreed that
"struggling students, not advanced students, are their top priority." The struggling students receive much more one-
on-one time in the classroom.

NCLB Bad – AT: Tests Prove it’s Good

NCLB fails – can’t even increase ELA and math scores
Eastman, 6/29 (A.M, “Real education reform: Start with a teardown,”
http://www.philly.com/dailynews/opinion/20090629_Real_education_reform__Start_with_a_teardown.html)
JOHN Chubb's recent op-ed "21st-century School Reform" failed to mention that while city schools have improved
overall in standardized test scores, 51 percent of 11th-graders still tested below basic proficiency in math and 41
percent were below in reading (2008 PSSA results).
These numbers hardly constitute the success Chubb claims for the Philadelphia school district or its private
management companies. The public schools in Philadelphia, as in just about every other big city, need more than
just reformation - they need a revolution.
Across the country, major school reforms have failed to yield astounding results. The guarantees of greater
accountability for student learning and for the improvement of sub-par public schools promised by the Bush
administration's No Child Left Behind legislation have created what has proved to be an insurmountable
challenge for federal and state governments, as well as for the educators charged with enforcing the NCLB policies.
Despite their best efforts, politicians, public schools, teachers, administrators and even private management
companies are still continuing to fail urban students and their families.
As the pendulum of blame for this failure swings back and forth from lawmakers and administrators to teachers,
from teachers to tests, and from claims of insufficient resources and funding to lack of parental involvement, the
children in our urban schools continue to languish, slipping further and further behind, victims of an education
system that has become not only broken but immobile.

NCLB Bad – AT: NAEP Worse

NAEP is much more accurate
Ravitch, 9 (Nonresident Senior Fellow, Government Studies, An education historian and former assistant secretary
of education for research, Diane Ravitch specializes in education policy issues such as standards and testing, and the
governance of education. July 9th, “50 States, 50 Standards: The Continuing Need for National Voluntary Standards
in Education” http://www.brookings.edu/articles/1996/summer_education_ravitch.aspx)
At the same time that we have low national standards in common use, we have high national standards at hand for
specific, important purposes. Even as we debate whether we should have any national standards, even as we fret
about our inability to figure out how to develop good ones, high national standards are already available. Questions
on the National Assessment of Educational Progress—the congressionally mandated, federally funded examination
of a national sample of students in the fourth, eighth, and twelfth grades—are based on rigorous, challenging content
standards in every subject area. NAEP's independent governing board has identified performance standards that it
calls "achievement levels" (advanced, proficient, basic, below basic). While the nation was in an uproar about the
proposed national history standards, NAEP assessed a broad cross-section of American students using its own
carefully developed curriculum framework, which is closely aligned with the core issues in the national history
standards. There is no doubt that NAEP's curriculum frameworks represent national content and performance
standards that are credible with educators and the public.

AT: Status Quo Solves (NGA)

NGA proposal is a joke
Darby, 6/16 – Duke University and Writer @ The New Republic
(Seyward, “Will the Push for National Education Standards Succeed?” The Plank – Official TNR Blog,
http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_plank/archive/2009/06/16/will-the-push-for-national-education-standards-
succeed.aspx)
Indeed, there's much to be excited about with regard to the project and Duncan's approach to it. But the question
remains: Will it actually work? Several people I spoke with aren't swooning just yet; and, it seems, some of the
biggest names in education are also skeptical. States have agreed to participate in the NGA-CCSSO project, in
part, because of very public, embarrassing evidence that current education standards don't work. "We've had seven
years of experience under No Child Left Behind with widely varying state standards. It's been a very public
demonstration that some states are asking more or less of kids," Jennings says. "The other thing that's different is the
economic crisis. ... It's clear to governors and business leaders that other countries are doing better than the United
States. There's an extra sense of urgency that we're slipping economically and that could be in part because we're
slipping academically."
But these factors don't mean the standards project will be a success. Not by a long shot. For one thing, says Mike
Petrilli, vice president for national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, the committee is
working behind closed doors and disconcerting some with its lack of transparency: The names of the experts haven't
been released, and there hasn't been a concerted effort to get input from education interest groups. Once the draft
standards are released, "you're going to be hearing from every corner of society," Petrilli explains. The standards
could meet their demise then, if the committee doesn't have a good mechanism for reviewing and incorporating
recommendations, or if it tries to split the difference by including what all or most parties want in the proposal--
making it too expansive. "You'll get standards that are impossible to teach," says Andrew Rotherham of
Education Sector (who has an interesting post about the standards push here). "It's the mush that is ineffective."
What's more, the committee will need to be clear about how a final proposal will be formulated--who exactly will
make the decision of what to send to the states.
Then, the states have to agree to adopt the standards. And that's where politics will really come in: Under NCLB ,
states are encouraged, in many ways, to keep their achievement standards weak because they don't want their
students and schools labeled as failing. "There are too many incentives to keep the bar low," Petrilli says. "The
politics are going to be in states with low standards that know if they sign on to high standards, they're going to have
a lot more kids failing and looking bad." He suggests--as many education experts do--that Congress reevaluate and
revise NCLB to make it a better law that doesn't support what Duncan calls "the race to the bottom."
Still, another problem could emerge among states that agreed to adopt the standards. They wouldn't be forced to
administer common tests. They could come up with myriad tests to assess how students are performing with regard
to the new standards. Among other problems, this would be costly--even with the $350 million available from the
Department of Education. "The reason for common standards and tests is that it's cheaper to do at once rather than
50 times," Jennings says. "If 20 or 40 states agree on a common test, it would seem you could develop it with that
kind of money. If states want an infinite number of tests based on common standards, who knows if it will be
enough money."
Needs federal money

succeed.aspx)
Several education experts I've spoken to this week say Duncan's support is needed. "He certainly shouldn't dictate
the content of standards, but he can help the states with finding the money to develop the tests, particularly because
they are in dire straits [because of the economic crisis]. He's removed a major obstacle," says Jack Jennings,
president and CEO of the Center for Education Policy. Jennings notes that Duncan should view the 1990s as a
cautionary tale: Both George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton kicked off efforts to define standards at the national level
and were cut off by Congress, which favored maintaining the autonomy of the states over education policy.

AT: Status Quo Solves (DOE Grants)

It’s the same thing as the NGA proposal and only for math and English
Crawford, 7/7 – Researcher for the Kiplinger Letters (Jonathan N, “Education Reform: Obama Ups the Ante,”
http://www.kiplinger.com/businessresource/forecast/archive/Obama_ups_ante_on_education_reform_090707.html)
The Education Department is committing $350 million of the $4.35 billion to help create common standards.
There’s also a push to benchmark the standards to international ones, giving educators a clear view of how U.S.
students stack up against those of other countries.
Advocates see common standards as key to bolstering school curricula and ensuring that education systems are
capable of producing a competitive workforce that must increasingly face off against workers in other countries.
“It is much more important for Americans to understand where we fall against other countries. We are not just
competing with the person next door or in the next state but with those in other countries. What has come with the
global economy is global competition,” says Lydia Logan, executive director of the Institute for a Competitive
Workforce, a nonprofit affiliate of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The effort to establish common standards for math and English is led by the National Governors Association , the
Council of Chief State School Officers and not-for-profits ACT (American College Test Program), the College
Board and Achieve. The college and career-ready standards will be based in part on input from major employers and
workforce development boards.

AT: Teachers Unions Bad

Evil teacher unions are a myth which sidetracks education reform and gives false perceptions of
good teachers
Macaray, 9 (March) - former labor union rep
(David, "The Myth of the "Powerful" Teachers' Union" http://www.counterpunch.org/macaray03202009.html)
There’s a myth circulating out there that not only threatens to ruin the reputation of America’s school teachers, but
has the potential to side-track any realistic hopes of education reform. It’s the assertion that “powerful” teachers’
unions are responsible for the decline of public education in the United States in general, and California in
particular. Propagators of this myth claim that the reason test scores of American children have sunk so low in
recent years is because our public school teachers are too incompetent and lazy to provide adequate instruction.
Moreover, because the teachers’ unions are so domineering and evil—because their leaders will do anything to
maintain union hegemony, including not allowing demonstrably inferior teachers to be fired—school administrators
are powerless to act. You hear these charges everywhere. Arianna Huffington, the late-to-the-party liberal and celebrity blogger,
has been echoing such claims for years. For Huffington to be riffing on the state of public education is, in itself, remarkable, given that she lives
in Brentwood, her daughters attend prestigious private schools, and the closest she’s ever come to an inner-city school was the day she
accidentally drove by one, causing her to hastily lock the doors and windows of her Prius and speed away. On Friday, March 13, comedian and
uber-liberal Bill Maher joined the attack on his HBO show. In one of his signature tirades, Maher, a California resident, railed against the
“powerful” California teachers’ union, accusing it of contributing to the crisis in public education by not allowing the school district to remove
incompetent teachers. Maher came armed with statistics. He noted with dismay that the U.S. ranked 35th in the world in math, 29th in science,
and that barely 50% of California’s public school pupils manage to graduate from high school. He blamed the teachers for this. Although every
teacher in the LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District), has a college degree and a teaching credential and managed to survive the scrutiny
of a lengthy probationary period, Maher piously maintained that these teachers were unqualified to run a classroom. Granted, Maher is a
professional comic trolling for laughs, and not a “social scientist” dispensing wisdom, so we shouldn’t be looking to this man for enlightenment.
Still, considering his liberal creds (from the environment to civil liberties to corporate mischief to drug law reform), it was demoralizing to hear
someone this hip say something so stupid and simplistic. Maher made a huge deal of the fact that, because of the union’s protective shield, less
than 1% of California’s tenured/post-probationary teachers get fired. Although this ratio clearly outraged him (he appeared visibly upset by it),
had he taken five minutes to research the subject, he’d have realized that this figure represents the national average—with or without unions. In
Georgia, where 92.5% of the teachers are non-union, only 0.5% of tenured/post-probationary teachers get fired. In South Carolina, where 100%
of the teachers are non-union, it’s 0.32%. And in North Carolina, where 97.7% are non-union, a miniscule .03% of tenured/post-probationary
teachers get fired—the exact same percentage as California. An even more startling comparison: In California, with its “powerful” teachers’
union, school administrators fire, on average, 6.91% of its probationary teachers. In non-union North Carolina, that figure is only 1.38%.
California is actually tougher on prospective candidates. So, despite Maher’s display of civic pride and self-righteous
indignation (“We need to bust this union,” he declared), he was utterly mistaken. The statistics not only don’t
support his argument, they contradict it. Fact: During the 1950s and 1960s, California’s public school system was
routinely ranked among the nation’s finest. You can look it up. More significantly, the teachers in those classrooms
were union members. The same teachers who were winning those awards for excellence belonged to the
“powerful” teachers’ union. Let that sink in a moment: Good schools, good teachers, big union. Which raises the
question: Has anything else changed in California (and the rest of the country, for that matter) in the last 40 years to lead one to
believe there might be causes other than labor unions to explain the drop in graduation rates? Have there been any significant
changes in, say, cultural attitudes or demographics? For openers, how about the disintegration of the American family and the
decline in parental supervision/involvement? Being a good student requires discipline, application and, perhaps, a certain level of
respect for authority. Have we witnessed any “breakdowns” in these areas over the last 40 years? Or how about the rise in urban
poverty? Or the hollowing-out of the middle-class (the average worker hasn’t received a pay increase, in real dollars, since
1973)? Or the assimilation of non-English-speaking immigrants? Or the decrease in per capita funding on California public
education? Or the chaos created by school boards arbitrarily mandating wholesale changes in “educational ideology” every two
years (LAUSD has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on consultants)? Ask any teacher, child psychologist, sociologist, or real
estate agent, and they’ll tell you the same thing: As a general rule, good schools are found in good neighborhoods, and bad
schools are found in bad neighborhoods. Simple as that. Moreover, people know this “formula” to be true. Not only is the
promise of good schools one reason why people with kids buy homes in good neighborhoods, it’s not uncommon for parents in
California to lie about their home addresses in order to get their children assigned to better schools. An experiment: Try moving
those “good” teachers from decent school districts—where the kids show up each day, on time, prepared, bright-eyed and
attentive, having completed their homework, having eaten a nutritious breakfast, etc.—to one of those South Central LA shit-
holes, where crime is rampant, neighborhoods are ravaged, families are in crisis, and 40% of the students live in foster care. See
if these “good” teachers, by virtue of their innate “classroom abilities,” are able to improve the test scores of these stunted,
overmatched and underprivileged kids. See if these “good” teachers can do what a generation of parents themselves, and society
itself, can’t seem to do; see if the graduation rates in these depressed communities rise significantly. And, as part of that same
experiment, move the “incompetent” teachers to these healthy, self-sustaining districts and see if the students in these schools
don’t continue to score significantly higher, even with the “bad” teachers now running the show. Fact: Oregon has a good public
school system. So do South Dakota, Vermont, Connecticut, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Maine and Washington, among others. Is

AT: Teachers Unions Bad

that because the folks living in these states are exceptionally bright? Is it because their teachers are extraordinarily talented? Or is
it because these school districts are stable, relatively homogeneous, and don’t face a fraction of the challenges facing California?
For the record, the teachers in these aforementioned good schools are overwhelmingly unionized. Oregon and Washington
teachers are 100% unionized; Wisconsin is 98%; Connecticut is 98%; etc. Also, comparing the scores of American students in
foreign countries is a bit misleading. The United States was not only the first nation in the world to offer free public education, it
was the first to make it compulsory. In the U.S., by law, you must attend school until at least age 16 (some states have even
higher age requirements). That means our national average is going to incorporate test scores of every kid from every
background in every neighborhood in the country. In India (where I once lived and worked), great emphasis is placed on
education; accordingly, India has a decent school system, one that scores well. But school attendance is not mandatory. Indeed,
India has 400 million people who are illiterate. One wonders what their national test scores would be if those many millions who
can’t read or write were factored in. Fact: Teachers can be fired. Who honestly believes a teachers’ union—whether in
California, Oregon or Connecticut—has the authority to insist that management keep unqualified teachers? Since
when does a labor union dictate to management? Since when does the hired help tell the bosses what to do? The
accusation is absurd on its face. Fact: During the first two years of employment, any teacher in the LAUSD can be
fired for any reason, with no recourse to union representation and no access to the grievance procedure. Two full
years. If the district doesn’t like you for any reason, they fire you. No union. No grievance. Nothing. Could any
arrangement be more favorable to management?

AT: States
Uniform state standards fail – they’ll try to keep the bar low and create impossible requirements
succeed.aspx)
Indeed, there's much to be excited about with regard to the project and Duncan's approach to it. But the question
remains: Will it actually work? Several people I spoke with aren't swooning just yet; and, it seems, some of the
biggest names in education are also skeptical. States have agreed to participate in the NGA-CCSSO project, in
part, because of very public, embarrassing evidence that current education standards don't work. "We've had seven
years of experience under No Child Left Behind with widely varying state standards. It's been a very public
demonstration that some states are asking more or less of kids," Jennings says. "The other thing that's different is the
economic crisis. ... It's clear to governors and business leaders that other countries are doing better than the United
States. There's an extra sense of urgency that we're slipping economically and that could be in part because we're
slipping academically."
But these factors don't mean the standards project will be a success. Not by a long shot. For one thing, says Mike
Petrilli, vice president for national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, the committee is
working behind closed doors and disconcerting some with its lack of transparency : The names of the experts haven't
been released, and there hasn't been a concerted effort to get input from education interest groups. Once the draft
standards are released, "you're going to be hearing from every corner of society," Petrilli explains. The standards
could meet their demise then, if the committee doesn't have a good mechanism for reviewing and incorporating
recommendations, or if it tries to split the difference by including what all or most parties want in the proposal--
making it too expansive. "You'll get standards that are impossible to teach," says Andrew Rotherham of
Education Sector (who has an interesting post about the standards push here). "It's the mush that is ineffective."
What's more, the committee will need to be clear about how a final proposal will be formulated--who exactly will
make the decision of what to send to the states.
Then, the states have to agree to adopt the standards. And that's where politics will really come in: Under NCLB,
states are encouraged, in many ways, to keep their achievement standards weak because they don't want their
students and schools labeled as failing. "There are too many incentives to keep the bar low," Petrilli says. "The
politics are going to be in states with low standards that know if they sign on to high standards, they're going to have
a lot more kids failing and looking bad." He suggests--as many education experts do--that Congress reevaluate and
revise NCLB to make it a better law that doesn't support what Duncan calls "the race to the bottom."
enough money."

AT: States
Most qualified sources agree – even attempts at uniformity would devolve into disparate standards
Goldstein, 6/10 – associate editor at The American Prospect; citing Randi Weingarten, American Federation of
Teachers President; Joel Klein, New York City schools Chancellor; and Michelle Rhee, D.C. schools Superintendent
(Dana, “RANDI, RHEE, AND KLEIN: WE DON'T TRUST STATE-LED STANDARDS PUSH,”
http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/tapped_archive?
month=06&year=2009&base_name=weingarten_rhee_and_klein_we_d -- Tapped is the group blog of The
American Prospect)
Despite the awkwardness, there was one topic about which Weingarten, Rhee, and Klein agreed: All are skeptical of
the Common Core Initiative announced last week by the National Governors' Association, in which 46 states and the
testing industry will work together to create high school reading and math standards. The consensus among these
urban educators was that state legislators have less than a stellar track record in implementing education reform
with teeth. Indeed, local politicians may not want to undo the years of work they've put into developing state-
specific standards and assessments, as they were required to do by No Child Left Behind.
We do need "fewer, richer, deeper, and clearer" national standards, Weingarten said, but at the state level, standards-
writing often leads to more complexity and confusion for teachers. "What we've done politically is that every time
something is important to anybody, it becomes part of the standards . ... Standard 4.3.2," she cautioned. "Will we be
able to call out if this effort doesn't mean anything more than it has to date?"
Rhee agreed that "we shouldn't be naive" about the NGA effort, which she regards as fairly toothless. And Klein
warned that low-performing states still have every incentive to maintain their own standards and assessments, so
they can obscure how far behind their students actually are. "It's very political," he said. "If a state can't control its
standards or assessments, then it can't control its outcomes. If America wanted to do something very smart,
tomorrow every state would adopt Massachusetts' standards," which are considered by many education experts to be
the strongest in the country.
So there you have it: Three of the most influential education leaders in the country, all supporters of national
standards, but all raising their eyebrows at the current state and testing-industry-led effort to get there.
Differences in standards means CP doesn’t solve

Dodd, 7 – Connecticut Senator ("Senator Dodd's Prepared Remarks at the Launch of the SPEAK Act"
http://dodd.senate.gov/?q=node/3699/print)
And now that I’ve brightened your day a little, I hope you parents in the audience will do me one favor in return.
Please—no questions. Don’t get close to those numbers, don’t touch them, don’t even sneeze at them! Don’t ask
what 50 different states mean by “proficient.” Don’t ask how they decide or who exactly gets to figure it out. Don’t
ask if proficiency in New Mexico is related at all to proficiency in New Hampshire. And most of all, when you come
across those numbers by which it is so tempting to paint a picture of excellence—don’t inquire too closely. Because
if you did, you’d find out you were being mislead—that that picture of excellence was an illusion. If parents asked
me how much confidence they can take home from their sons’ and daughters’ test scores, I would in all honesty
have to answer—“Not very much.” I’d have to tell them about a state where 90 percent of students passed the local
math test—but where six out of ten failed the “gold standard” test from the National Assessment of Educational
Progress (NAEP). I’d have to tell them about students in another state who passed the state-designed test at a rate of
85 percent—and then turned around and failed the NAEP test at a rate almost as high. And if parents held all 50 sets
of standards up to that kind of scrutiny, they would find the same kind of doubt and uncertainty in nearly every
state. They’d find it severely difficult to measure the success of their children’s education. And they would find that
the problem starts, in large part, because we have so many standards to begin with. Five years ago, when President
Bush brought No Child Left Behind before Congress, it passed with bipartisan acclaim. It mandated testing in
every state and brought greater accountability for all students to schools across the nation. It was a huge step
forward. But it was also a first step. It demanded proficiency but didn’t tell us what proficiency meant. It settled on
an approach of “50 states, 50 standards, 50 tests.” And it left each of those 50 tests dangerously open to meddling,
when political and educational leaders all too often found that the quickest way to raise scores wasn’t better teaching
—but easier tests or lower pass scores. Of course, there are notable exceptions, states that have made the right
choice instead of the easy one, states that have maintained or are working towards rigorous systems. But if you want

an explanation for those misleading figures I spoke of earlier, it starts with No Child Left Behind and its

AT: States
[Dodd Continues, no text omitted]
unfinished work. That’s the work we’ve come here to complete—to standardize our standards. I wish I could say,
“If we don’t work toward unified standards, somebody else will”—but unfortunately for us, everybody else already
has. Across the board, countries with national standards are outpacing us. “I’m telling you,” said one global
marketing expert, “[Asian countries] are making rapid progress, whereas we’re making miniscule progress. And I
don’t think the average American understands the impact of this for our future, because they’re going to have the
bulk of the intellectual and creative talent in the world, and that has devastating consequences for us.” The truth is
that we no longer live in the economy of old. It’s getting harder and harder to lift or dig or assemble your way to
success the way you once could. Today, you’ve got to think your way to success—and so, when public education
doesn’t work, when we fail to compete as one nation, our entire country will get left behind. Children here in
Washington are no longer just entering the job market with children in Dallas and Chicago. They’re entering with
children in Shanghai and Mumbai and Taipei who are receiving the kind of education today that you could once
only get in America. And I am sorry to report to my fellow parents that, from kindergarten through high school, our
students are losing ground to students overseas. In one international assessment of the reading and math skills of 15
year olds, the United States ranks 24th among 29 industrial and developing nations. In a study of fourth graders, we
rank 20th out of 25 nations. That may be fine for a while—a decade, maybe two. But at some point, if we do
nothing to address this decline, America is going to reach a tipping point. Lower scores and lower
expectations are going to translate to an America that is less competitive on the world stage. And if it happens,
we’re going to wonder why we didn’t do anything about it while we still had time.

AT: States – Standards Key

National is better – state results are corrupted
Finn, 5 (Chester E., Chester E. Finn Jr. is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and chairman of the Koret Task
Force on K–12 Education. He is also president and trustee of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation. Previously, he
was professor of education and public policy at Vanderbilt University, senior fellow of the Hudson Institute,
founding partner with the Edison Project and legislative director for Senator Daniel P. Moynihan. He served as
assistant U.S. education secretary for research and improvement from 1985 to 1988,
http://www.hoover.org/publications/digest/2905221.html)//HM
But there are perverse incentives at play here, too. No Child Left Behind seeks to help all students reach
“proficiency” by 2014 and requires states to develop tough accountability systems to ensure that their schools are
making progress toward that end. (If schools are not progressing, they face a cascade of interventions, exiting
students, and other consequences.) But here’s the catch: The states define “proficiency” however they like . So if
you’re a governor or education commissioner, and you want your state’s schools to look good, you have a
strong incentive to relax your definition of “proficiency” in reading and math and make your own state tests
easier. Last week’s good news is shadowed by early evidence that some states may be doing just that. We analyzed
data from state tests as well as the national assessment and looked at states’ progress on both over the past two
years. The result? Nineteen states (of the 29 with available and comparable data) reported their eighth-grade students
made progress on state reading exams. But only three of these states show any gains on NAEP and, even then,
only at the “basic” level. (Eighth-grade NAEP reading results were disappointing almost everywhere, and the
national average fell by a point.) Consider Arizona. Its own test results show the number of eighth graders
proficient in reading rose 8 points (from 55 percent to 63 percent) between 2003 and 2005. Yet the percentage of
Arizona eighth graders scoring at NAEP’s “proficient” level actually fell two points during the same biennium. (The
percentage of Arizona’s students reaching NAEP’s lower “basic” level also dropped by a point.) States may say that
such discrepancies merely reflect the different subject matter they test versus the content assessed by the feds.
California, for example, has laudably rejected “whole language” reading instruction and other faddish ideas that
have partially infected the national test. Perhaps this is why the Golden State posted gains of nine points in its
proportion of eighth graders reaching proficiency on reading, whereas its percentage of students reaching “basic”
and “proficient” on NAEP dropped a point each. But surely that’s not the case for all states. The larger trend line is
clear: The news is much rosier if you believe state reports than if you believe the national assessment.
Uniform standards and federal funding are key to top-level US scientists which is key to the
economy
Leshner and Roseman 6-22-09 - chief executive officer of the American Association for the Advancement of
Science (AAAS) and executive publisher of the journal AND Director of Project 2061 (the AAAS science-literacy
initiative)
(Alan I. and Jo Ellen, "Alan Leshner and Jo Ellen Roseman: U.S. students need shared science standards, too"
http://www.greenvilleonline.com/article/20090622/OPINION/906220304/Alan-Leshner-and-Jo-Ellen-Roseman--
U.S.-students-need-shared-science-standards--too)
Top-performing U.S. science students are still among the world's elite. But many other young people are lagging.
That's bad for the U.S. economy: McKinsey & Co. consulting firm say that closing the science gap between U.S.
and international students could have increased America's gross domestic product by $1.3 trillion to $2.3 trillion in
2008. Closing the racial gap in science scores among U.S. students might have added another half-trillion dollars , the
firm reported. A clear roadmap for improving science-learning standards has already been set forth. Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Connecticut, and Rep.
Vernon Ehlers, R-Michigan, just re-introduced their SPEAK Act (“Standards to Provide Educational Achievement for All Kids”). This bill would
provide incentives for states to adopt robust, well-tested national science standards developed by the National Assessment Governing Board.
Preparing a math- and science-literate workforce will of course require more than uniform standards. Adequate funding will also be essential.
America further must improve teacher pay and classroom support, provide consistently high-quality textbooks, and make science “cool” again.
President Barack Obama, his education secretary and bipartisan leaders in Congress are showing leadership, but they need encouragement and
support to persist. Voluntary, nationwide education standards in science, along with reading and math, are the next logical step, promising
dividends for tomorrow's workforce and for our economy. South Carolina should get on board.

AT: States – Uniformity Fails

No incentive for lasting participation, even with uniformity
Chicago Tribune, 5/19 (Tara Malone, "To better compare students, Illinois joins effort toward national
standards,” lexis)
States have long determined what schoolchildren should learn, and when, under a system of local oversight that is at
the core of the U.S. education system. But the new initiative would change that, experts say. The organizers of the
project, the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association, acknowledge that it’s
unlikely all 50 states will get onboard with the new approach because of long-standing support for state control of
education. Gene Wilhoit, the council’s executive director, said this month that he expected 25 to 35 states to join.

AT: States – Can’t Solves CTE

States can’t implement CTE – no linkages to industry and structural barriers
Wakelyn, 7 – Education Division @ NGA Center for Best Practices
(David, “Retooling Career Technical Education,” http://www.nga.org/Files/pdf/0706TECHED.PDF)
Although CTE programs are shifting away from an old voc-ed mentality to embrace the demands of the innovation
economy, several challenges remain. Too often, state education and economic systems have few linkages, making
the educational response to emerging growth industries slow or nonexistent. Deeply held ideological differences
about student capabilities and expectations further delay needed reforms.
Even when reforms occur, state leaders still confront structural challenges. State assessment systems rarely
measure the workplace and industry-specific skills that employers demand. These skills are largely absent from state
education standards as well. As a result, CTE curricula typically fit poorly with state standards and assessments.

AT: States – Spending DA

Costs tons of $$$
Darby, 9 (Seward, “Will the Push for National Education Standards Succeed?”,
succeed.aspx)///HM
enough money."

AT: States – Trade-off DA

State funded education trades off
Baicker and Gordon, 4 - Department of Economics at Dartmouth, and Department of Economics UC-San Diego
(Katherine, and Nora, "THE EFFECT OF MANDATED STATE EDUCATION SPENDING ON TOTAL LOCAL
RESOURCES" http://www.nber.org/papers/w10701.pdf?new_window=1)
We find that states did change their spending patterns in a way that partially offset the mandated increase in their
education spending (although not in a way that diminished their progressivity). Each dollar of increased education
funding a locality received from the state resulted in an average decline in funds from the state for other purposes of
about 20 cents. Localities, in turn, reacted to the increased state revenue-raising and spending by cutting back on
their own revenue-raising and their spending on both education and other programs. The greatest impacts were on
hospitals, highways, and welfare, but there were also significant declines in spending on police, public health, fire
protection, and public buildings. Thus, while mandated increases in state education aid did increase total spending
on education, they did so at the expense of drawing resources away from spending on other programs. These effects
were greater in higher-income counties.

AT: States – Cali Econ DA

Repealing No Child Left Behind would skyrocket California’s budget deficit
Boyarsky, 8 – lecturer in journalism at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for
Communication and is vice president of the Los Angeles City Ethics Commission
(Bill, "Banking Collapse Lands on America’s Schools"
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080929_banking_collapse_lands_on_americas_schools/)
Although the Bush administration and Congress took a hands-off attitude toward Wall Street—until the collapse—
Washington enthusiastically reached into the classrooms of every public school in the country with the No Child
Left Behind Act. This legislation, passed early in the Bush administration with bipartisan support, requires the states
to assess students before they receive high school diplomas. Without such testing—in California it is called the
California High School Exit Examination—schools could lose federal funding, which amounted to $24.4 billion last
year under the No Child Left Behind Act. The testing is the most controversial feature of No Child Left Behind. The
controversy reached into the Los Angeles High School faculty.

AT: States – AT: Deficit Spending

Most states passed laws prohibiting deficit spending—counterplan would get rolled back
Schifferes 7/2 – Economics reporter, BBC News
[Steve, "US states face budget meltdowns" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8130318.stm]
The 50 US states play a much more important role in the US system than local authorities do in a European context.
Together they make up about one-third of all public spending, or 10% of US GDP. Most spending on schools, roads
and welfare support is made at the state level. And the states also have an important constraint that the Federal
government does not - they have nearly all passed laws in the past 20 years requiring them to have a balanced
budget, and forbidding them to borrow money to pay for current spending. This has hit them very hard as the US
recession starts to bite. States rely on sales taxes and property taxes at the local level to fund much of their spending.
These revenues have plunged as the economy has gone into freefall. At the same time, they have faced higher bills
to pay for the casualties of the recession.
States have a limited ability to do deficit spending—means that funding to other areas are largely
impacted
Baicker and Gordon, 4 – Department of Economics at Dartmouth, and Department of Economics UC-San Diego
(Katherine, and Nora, "THE EFFECT OF MANDATED STATE EDUCATION SPENDING ON TOTAL LOCAL
RESOURCES" http://www.nber.org/papers/w10701.pdf?new_window=1)
We analyze primarily major revenue and expenditure categories, and for consistency we construct total revenue and
direct expenditure by aggregating up spending and revenues from these categories.12 The totals presented here are
therefore smaller than actual totals reported in the Census of Governments data and education spending as a share of
our total spending measure is a larger ratio than education spending as a share of the reported Census of
Governments total. Our totals are, however, consistently constructed over time to contain the largest sources of
revenues and expenditures. Real county-area revenues per capita in our sample grew from $1565 on average in 1982
to $2272 in 1997. Mean real per capita direct expenditures (excluding intergovernmental expenditures) grew from
$1345 in 1982 to $1919 in 1997. Most localities, unlike the federal government, have limited ability to run deficits
so it is not surprising that revenues exceed expenditures on average. In 1997, elementary and secondary education
expenditures comprised over 60 percent of our measure of total direct spending by local governments. Other major
categories of expenditures include hospitals, highways, police, and welfare. County-areas received just over 40
percent of their revenues as intergovernmental grants from the state, with three-quarters of those earmarked for
education – so changes to this funding stream are likely to have a substantial impact on other aspects of state
and local budgets.

AT: States – Evolution DA [1/2]

Texas’ science standards would cause a national shift to creationism teaching – their textbooks spill
over
AIP 3/31 – American Institute of Physics
("Science setback for Texas schools" http://www.physorg.com/news157728177.html)
The board majority amended the Earth and Space Science, and Biology standards (TEKS) with loopholes and
language that make it even easier for creationists to attack science textbooks. "The final vote was a triumph of
ideology and politics over science," says Dr. Eugenie Scott, Executive Director of the National Center for Science
Education (NCSE). "The board majority chose to satisfy creationist constituents and ignore the expertise of highly
qualified Texas scientists and scientists across the country." NCSE presented the board with a petition from 54
scientific and educational societies, urging the board to reject language that misrepresents or undermines the
teaching of evolution, which the board likewise ignored. Although the "strengths and weaknesses" wording that has
been part of the standards for over a decade was finally excised--wording that has been used to pressure science
textbook publishers to include creationist arguments--a number of amendments put the creationist-inspired wording
back in. "What we now have is Son of Strengths and Weaknesses," says Josh Rosenau, a project director for NCSE.
"Having students 'analyze and evaluate all sides of scientific evidence' is code that gives creationists a green light to
attack biology textbooks." For example, the revised biology standard (7B) reflects two discredited creationist
ideas--that "sudden appearance" and "stasis" in the fossil record somehow disprove evolution. The new standard
directs students to "analyze and evaluate the sufficiency of scientific explanations concerning any data of sudden
appearance, stasis and the sequential nature of groups in the fossil records." Other new standards include language
such as "is thought to", or "proposed transitional fossils" to make evolutionary concepts seem tentative when, in fact,
such concepts are well-documented and accepted by the scientific community. The changes will not immediately affect
curricula in Texas high schools, but "the standards will affect standardized tests and textbooks," says Rosenau. Thanks to such
laws as No Child Left Behind, ubiquitous standardized tests are central to measuring student progress and proficiency. Teachers
teach to the test, notes Rosenau, and textbooks have to reflect this. " Will publishers cave in to pressure from the Texas board to
include junk science in their textbooks? It has happened before," says Scott. "But textbooks that please the Texas board will be
rejected in other states. Publishers will have to choose between junk science and real science." "Let's be clear about this,"
cautioned Dr. Scott. "This is a setback for science education in Texas, not a draw, not a victory. The revised wording
opens the door to creationism in the classroom and in the textbooks. The decisions will not only affect Texas
students for the next ten years, but could result in watered-down science textbooks across the U.S. There's a
reason creationists are claiming victory."
Teaching creationism dooms American democracy and means they can’t solve the case
Salisbury, 8 – Evangelical minister for 14 years
(Lee, "The Creationist Buffoonery and Its Dangerous Implications", http://dissidentvoice.org/2008/01/the-
creationist-buffoonery-and-its-dangerous-implications/)
Make no mistake, creationism intends to redefine science, and replace it with a meaningless shell of supernatural speculation and
deceit. And why, you might ask? The answer is not hard to fathom. Religion has ever been a sanctuary of those who seek to
secure their eminence at the expense of others. History is unequivocal in teaching this lesson, and yet as blind as we are we seem
to have failed to learn it. The creationist attack on the teaching of evolution devalues science, cheapens theology as
well as condemning America’s students to an inferior education, ultimately hurting their professional
opportunities, not to mention diminishing America’s leadership in science and technology. Creationists aim to
not only destroy science in an effort to protect their creationist fairy tales, their mission is to redefine the United
States of America, eviscerate the Constitution, and effectively dismantle American democracy by instituting
religious indoctrination in the schools and halls of public policy making. They mean to supplant all of these things
with a form of oligarchy wrapped in the shrouds of a dumbed down science and legalistic religion. And if one
doubts this, one need only consult the web sites and publications of such notable creationist organizations as the the
Creation Museum, the Institute for Creation Research and the Discovery Institute. Creationists are quite explicit in
their stated goals, and there is little room for doubt their true intentions. The true mission of creationism is
theocracy. Thus exposed, the need to fight it on all fronts, scientific, philosophical, theological, administrative and
judicial, is made even more clear. There is no higher imperative if we mean to preserve America’s intellectual
freedom.


AT: States – Evolution DA [2/2]

Democracy prevents extinction
Diamond, 95 – professor, lecturer, adviser, and author on foreign policy, foreign aid, and democracy
(Larry, “Promoting Democracy in the 1990s: Actors and instruments, issues and imperatives : a report to the
Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict”, December 1995,
http://wwics.si.edu/subsites/ccpdc/pubs/di/di.htm)
This hardly exhausts the lists of threats to our security and well-being in the coming years and decades. In the
former Yugoslavia nationalist aggression tears at the stability of Europe and could easily spread. The flow of illegal
drugs intensifies through increasingly powerful international crime syndicates that have made common cause with
authoritarian regimes and have utterly corrupted the institutions of tenuous, democratic ones. Nuclear, chemical,
and biological weapons continue to proliferate. The very source of life on Earth, the global ecosystem, appears
increasingly endangered. Most of these new and unconventional threats to security are associated with or aggravated
by the weakness or absence of democracy, with its provisions for legality, accountability, popular sovereignty, and
openness.

Ext: Texas Spills Over

Texas spills over and kills solvency
Newton, 9 (Summer Issue) - Public Information Project Director, National Center for Science Education
(Steven, "Creationism in the New Texas Standards for Earth and Space Science"
http://www.nestanet.org/cms/sites/default/files/journal/Summer09.pdf)
The State of Texas is one of the nation’s largest buyers of K-12 textbooks. Because of Texas’ purchasing power, the
standards Texas uses to select textbooks have a major influence on national textbook content. The Texas State
Board of Education finalized its new science standards during a meeting in late March 2009. Although the new
Earth and Space Science standards crafted by an expert writing team mandated robust earth science instruction in
Texas high schools, a series of amendments weakened these standards and opened the door for creationist teachers
to bring non-scientific ideas into the science classroom.

AT: States – Links to Politics

Obama will take the blame – he is championing state cooperation
Las Vegas Sun, 9 (Educational patchwork: States should cooperate on ending the glaring inconsistencies among
academic standards, http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2009/feb/22/educational-patchwork/)/HM
A new study has confirmed what many critics of the No Child Left Behind federal education law have said all along,
that many school districts judged as failures would be judged as successes if only they were located in a different
state. This is because the Bush administration did not want to broach the divisive issue of national academic
standards. So states were allowed to continue setting their own standards, meaning that mediocre school districts
could continue to be mediocre if the state set low achievement standards — yet be rated as successes under the
federal law. Just as unfairly, school districts that had surpassed mediocre but were within states with high standards
could end up being labeled as failures. This obvious problem is receiving attention from President Barack Obama’s
administration, which is leaning toward encouraging states to cooperate on a plan to establish national academic
standards for core subjects.

AT: Repeal NCLB CP

No Child Left Behind is improving education—data proves—BUT a new national standard is key
Washington Post 5/10 ("What Test Results Suggest; This is no time for retreat on No Child Left Behind" lexis)
THE GOOD news that America's elementary and middle school students have made impressive improvements in
reading and math is unfortunately tempered by the dismal performance of high school students. After all, it doesn't
help much if a child does well in fourth grade but graduates ill prepared for college or the workplace. Educational
reforms that seem to be helping younger students must be strengthened and applied to the later grades, and, as the
latest results from federal tests show, there's not a minute to waste. According to the new long-term trend report on
the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), students at ages 9 and 13 did significantly better on 2008
tests than their counterparts of the early 1970s. Unfortunately, the scores of 17-year-olds stayed alarmingly flat over
35 years. There have been welcome gains in shrinking achievement gaps between white and minority students since
1971, although gaps did not change significantly from 2004 to 2008. NAEP officials report only the "what," not the
"whys" behind the scores. Improved performance of younger students, and particularly minorities, can be traced to
the standards-based reforms embodied in the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law and the state efforts that predated it.
Minority students who were long overlooked by the education system still trail their white counterparts, but it's
significant that black and Hispanic students of all age groups made greater gains in math than white students since
1973 and that black, white and Hispanic 9-year-olds all posted higher scores than in previous years. When the long-
term trend results are viewed in the context of other national assessments, an even stronger picture of NCLB's
benefits emerge. Consider, for instance, evidence that the emphasis on reading and math has -- contrary to the
hypothesis of some critics -- helped students to do well in other subjects such as science and history. NCLB is now
up for reauthorization, and the NAEP report is a clear prompt not to retreat from its principles. There is a need for
even more rigor in school curriculums, better efforts to improve teaching and, we hope, the adoption of
common, national standards.

AT: Higher Education CP

K-12 key to labor force and defense
&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf))
Given the education industry’s size, an in-depth assessment of all sectors is beyond the scope of this report. Instead,
this paper focuses on K-12 because it is most important to national security. K-12 sets the foundation for all
subsequent education and training and prepares citizens for entry into the labor force. Further, it is the largest sector
within the industry, has the biggest challenges, and is compulsory up to age 16. Brief assessments of the other key
sectors are provided in an essay on page 21. The K-12 system includes public (traditional, charter, and magnet) and
private (parochial and non-parochial) schools. Nearly 90 percent of K-12 students attend public schools.x Traditional
public schools are most common, offering a balanced curriculum to a broad student body. Charter schools represent
3.2 percent of the public schools and address specific community needs, often cater to a narrow student body, and
operate with more autonomy than traditional public schools. xi Magnet schools are more rare and offer concentrated
curriculums for students with specific interests and advanced talents. Private schools operate outside of government
control because government funding is not normally provided. However, private schools receive public funds in at
least five states and the District of Columbia, but only with state and local government approval.
Plan is a prerequisite – lack of K-12 STEM education kills potential for higher-level STEM
Lips et al. 6/16 – Senior Policy Analyst in Education in the Domestic Policy Studies Department
(Dan, "Improving U.S. Competitiveness with K–12 STEM Education and Training"Ethel Machi, an independent
researcher, Jena Baker McNeill is Policy Analyst for Homeland Security in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center
for Foreign Policy Studies, a division of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies;
Jennifer A. Marshall is Director of Domestic Policy Studies; and James Jay Carafano, Ph.D., is Assistant Director of
the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies and Senior Research Fellow for National
Security and Homeland Security in the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies, at The
Heritage Foundation http://www.heritage.org/Research/Education/upload/SR_57.pdf)
In today’s schools, the majority of math and science teachers do not have math or science degrees. Elementary
school teachers in particular are often not as passionate or trained in STEM subjects as they are in the arts. An
unfortunate consequence is that many students mirror their teachers’ preferences and acquire a lifelong disinterest
in STEM by the time they reach middle school. This result is the problem of the “leaky pipeline.” In the education
pipeline from elementary to graduate education, not enough students are making it to the advanced levels of STEM
studies. In many cases, this is due to the poor-quality education at early levels that leaves students ill equipped
to pursue higher levels of STEM education. High school students are not being trained at a high enough level to
compete with international students once they reach college. Too few freshmen who declare a STEM major graduate
with a degree in STEM. Many STEM students migrate to liberal arts, but very few liberal arts majors migrate to
STEM.

AT: Liberal Arts CP

Only STEM education solves the aff – our evidence is comparative
Education is the foundation of America’s future. Quality education in the humanities and social sciences is essential
in a world made increasingly “smaller” by advances in communication and in global commerce. But education in
science, mathematics, and engineering has special relevance for the future of U.S. national security , for America’s
ability to lead depends particularly on the depth and breadth of its scientific and technical communities. At the base
of American national security, clearly, is the strength of the American economy. High-quality preparation of
Americans for the working world is more important than ever. The technology-driven economy will add twenty
million jobs in the next decade, many of them requiring significant technical expertise . The United States will need
sharply growing numbers of competent knowledge workers, many of them in information sciences, an area in which
there are already significant shortages. 34 But it is misleading to equate “information science” with “science” itself. It
was basic science and engineering excellence that brought about the information revolution in the first place and,
over the next quarter century, the interplay of bioscience, nanotechnology, and information science will combine to
reshape most existing technologies. The health of the U.S. economy, therefore, will depend not only on
professionals that can produce and direct innovation in a few key areas, but also on a populace that can effectively
assimilate a wide range of new tools and technologies. This is critical not just for the U.S. economy in general, but
specifically for the defense industry, which must simultaneously develop and defend against these same
technologies.

AT: Disads
Disads non-unique – math and English funding
Crawford, 7/7 – Researcher for the Kiplinger Letters (Jonathan N, “Education Reform: Obama Ups the Ante,”
http://www.kiplinger.com/businessresource/forecast/archive/Obama_ups_ante_on_education_reform_090707.html)
The Obama administration is zeroing in on improving the nation’s schools by providing states with an
unprecedented $4.35-billion pot of federal money. The White House wants states to use the funds for programs and
methods that will better prepare K-12 students for college and the workforce.
The Department of Education will issue grants to states that demonstrate innovative ideas for improving
performance and a track record of successful implementation. An open competition will determine grant winners.
Some of the money will also go to charter schools and teacher pay-for-performance programs.
A chunk of the federal education money will help states establish rigorous testing programs to gauge whether
students are ready for work or college. Nearly all states have agreed to develop common academic standards for
math and English, rather than choosing to go it alone.

AT: Recruitment Trade-off DA

Retired US Generals agree- A successful education system is the key to maintain national security
and military readiness
Doster, 6/3 (Steven, Reuters Reporter, Retired Military Brass Say Early Education Key to National Security,
http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS162605+03-Jun-2009+PRN20090603)
Retired military leaders from across Pennsylvania held a news conference at the State Capitol today, calling for
increased investment in early childhood education to improve school success and preserve military readiness for the
future.
Retired Major General William Burns, former Deputy Commandant of the US Army War College in Carlisle, PA; as
well as major generals Wesley Craig, Dan O'Neill, and Joe Perugino -- all former commanders of Pennsylvania's
28th Infantry Division of the Army National Guard -- released a new report called "Ready, Willing, and Unable to
Serve," which cites new statistics from the Pentagon showing that 75 percent of young people ages 17 to 24 are
unable to enlist because they lack a high school diploma, have a criminal background, or are physically unfit, among
other reasons. The retired generals said that investments in early childhood education will increase the number of
young Americans who graduate and qualify to serve. The group highlighted research showing that quality early
education programs significantly increase graduation rates and reduce later crime among at-risk children who
participate.
"Make no mistake about it -- America's men and women in uniform stand ready to keep the country safe. But we
need to make sure our recruits in the future are educated, responsible and top-notch. We cannot begin just
with basic training: we have to start early," Craig said.
The generals cited a 40-year study of Michigan's Perry Preschool, a groundbreaking early education program.
Researchers tracked the progress of at-risk children who participated in the program together with similar children
who did not participate. They found that the at-risk children who attended were 44 percent more likely to complete
high school than the children who did not attend. By age 27, the at-risk children who did not benefit from the early
learning were five times more likely to be chronic offenders, with five or more arrests.
"We know from the research that investing in early education will help us build a stronger military and a
stronger country. With that knowledge, it's our duty to make these early opportunities available to more kids who
need them," Burns said.
"Our national security 20 years from now is dependent on the investment our country makes in young people
today. Pennsylvania leads the nation in our forward thinking, so we would like our legislators to be at the forefront
of a program so critical to national security and the success of our children and youth: early childhood education,"
Perugino said. (…) Joining the Pennsylvania generals for the event was Lancaster County resident and Silver Star
recipient Specialist Jason Harrington. Harrington served in Ramadi, Iraq with the Pennsylvania National Guard's
28th Infantry from June 2005 to June 2006. He was awarded the Silver Star when he successfully coordinated a
rescue of his wounded sergeant, members of his company and of himself after being stranded by an IED attack.
"It is disturbing for me to learn that so many young Americans are ineligible to serve in the military. This is a
threat to national security," said Harrington. "Given all the threats that this nation faces around the world -- we
must do everything possible to invest in the most important component of any military -- its fighting men and
women."

Plan Popular – Teachers Unions

Teachers Unions support national standards
Weingarten 2/16 – president of the American Federation of Teachers
(Randi, "The Case for National Standards" http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/story/2009/02/15/ST2009021502025.html)
From my office in Washington, I can see beyond the Capitol to Virginia. I can ride a few stops on the Metro and be
in Maryland. These three jurisdictions are so close in miles yet have very different standards for what their students
should know and be able to do -- just as every state in the union has its own standards. The result is 51 benchmarks
of varying content and quality. There are many areas in education around which we need to build consensus. A
good place to start would be revisiting the issue of national standards. Abundant evidence suggests that common,
rigorous standards lead to more students reaching higher levels of achievement. The countries that consistently
outperform the United States on international assessments all have national standards, with core curriculum,
assessments and time for professional development for teachers based on those standards. Here in the United States,
students in Massachusetts, which has been recognized for setting high standards, scored on a par with the highest-
performing countries in both math and science on a recent international assessment. After Minnesota adopted
rigorous math standards, students there ranked fifth in the world on the mathematics portion of that assessment.
Academic standards for students in the rest of the country, unfortunately, are a mixed bag.
The American Federation of Teachers is the most powerful lobby in congress—they control the
agenda at all times
Carney 2/26 – senior reporter for the Evans-Novak Political Report and Washington Examiner columnist
(Timothy P., "Teachers unions say 'jump,' Congress says 'how high?'"
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columns/TimothyCarney/Teachers-unions-say-jump-Congress-says-
how-high-40384837.html)
Teachers unions, through their allies in the Democrat-controlled Congress, are on the verge of demolishing the chief
threat to their monopoly—school vouchers for low-income families in the District of Columbia. If they win in the
end and kill this program, it will be another triumph for a near-monopoly that has lined the coffers of nearly every
member of Congress and deployed an army of lobbyists throughout Washington. When the House passed the $410 billion
omnibus appropriations bill this week—funding the normal operations of government for the next seven months—it included a provision that
effectively would end the D.C. school voucher program after next school year. While there are legitimate doubts about the educational results of
the D.C. voucher program, which provides $7,500 in federal taxpayer money to some low-income district parents to use on private or religious
schools, the voucher program is in Congress’s crosshairs because of the lobbying efforts and campaign contributions
of the teachers’ unions, which don’t want competition from private schools. Public school teachers, for the most
part, are not well paid. Theirs is a noble undertaking, and in places like D.C. they do dangerous and difficult work
with inadequate support. But the image of the hard-working self-sacrificing teacher is not the proper symbol for the
teachers unions in this country. They are more like huge corporations with high-powered lobbying arms and cozy
connections with important politicians. Beltway bandits, defense contractors, influential industries—most of them
pale in their influence efforts compared to the teachers unions, according to data from the Center for Responsive
Politics. Take defense contractors. Lockheed Martin, the top recipient of military contracts most years, spent more
on politics than any other defense firm in the 2008 elections. They still spent less than the American Federation of
Teachers, which shelled out $2.8 million in the last cycle—with nearly every AFT dime going to Democrats. The top two teachers unions—
AFT and the National Education Association—spent more combined, $5.27 million, than the top two defense contractors. The top five
lobbying firms, combined, didn’t equal the AFT and the NEA in federal contributions in the 2008 cycle. Both
of the teachers unions gave more than any oil company, and the NEA and AFT combined gave more than the top
four oil companies combined. These contributions give the unions clout, and federal lobbying records show they use
this clout. Again, on closer inspection, the teachers unions look an awful lot like those corporate special interests Democrats supposedly
oppose. The NEA employs four different lobbying firms in Washington, in addition to their in-house lobbying arm, which includes at least six
lobbyists. Over the past two years, the NEA spent $10.7 million on lobbying. Reviewing the filings of the NEA, the AFT, and their K Street hires
reveals that lobbying to kill DC vouchers was a priority.

Plan Popular – Ext: Teachers Unions Like Plan

Education reform popular among teacher unions
Iannuzzi 4/2 – president of New York State United Teachers, the state’s largest union representing over 600,000
professionals in education and healthcare. NYSUT is affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers and the
National Education Association (Richard C., "Richard C. Iannuzzi: Teachers unions embracing reform"
http://www.buffalonews.com/149/story/626941.html)
Reform is a challenge teachers unions embrace. Yes, that’s right. The record clearly demonstrates the commitment
of teachers unions to improving public education. Union leaders understand we have a responsibility to make
schools work, especially in our cities where the achievement gap and all its ramifications threaten the vibrancy of
local economies. This deeply held belief in reform is why NYSUT was an early advocate for smaller classes, higher
academic standards, strict discipline, quality early childhood education programs and the professional development
necessary to provide every child with the most qualified teachers possible. Obama recently pushed for even more reform — rewarding teacher
excellence, holding teachers more accountable and promoting innovation, such as charter schools. Rather than considering those subjects taboo,
we have been speaking of the same things. Dozens of teachers unions in New York have negotiated innovative compensation models — from
stipends for those who earn national certification to New York City’s bold experiment in school-based performance pay. NYSUT proudly
represents teachers in more than a dozen charter schools, including five here in Buffalo. Charter schools can provide opportunities for innovation
and experimentation. We also believe charters must be accountable for the tax money they receive and transparent in how they spend it, and urge
caution so that a proliferation of charters does not undermine full support for traditional public schools. Under the leadership of Randi
Weingarten, the American Federation of Teachers has launched a $1 million innovation fund to implement sustainable
reform efforts developed by union members. And local unions in Dunkirk and Fredonia have begun taking part in a
National Education Association- funded program to develop “learning communities” that focus on ending the
achievement gap.

Plan Popular – Ext: Teachers Unions Key to Agenda

Plan popular – liberal education lobbies overwhelm conservative opposition and build pol cap
Kurtz, 8 – adjunct fellow of the Hudson Institute and a Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center
(Stanley, “Conservatives Dropped the Ball,” The Corner, a blog of The National Review, 2/5/2008,
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NmMxMGMxYzc5YjdiNGRiZmE4YmVkN2JmNWRmNDA3ZTA=)
The NEA and the higher education lobby are massive, and far more influential on the Hill than most people
realize. Yet when it comes to higher education, for example, there are simply no conservative lobbying
organizations to counter them. Conservatives rarely even show up for most legislative battles over education, and
when they do, they are vastly outspent and outgunned. And again, such education battles as the Bush administration
has chosen to fight intentionally avoid precisely the "culture war" issues that might make a real difference.
The Bush administration’s attitude was that Bill Bennett/Lynn Cheney-type culture war issues sap political capital
that could more profitably be put toward the war effort or social security reform. This was a huge mistake. Fighting
the education culture war would have accumulated political capital. When it comes to the left-leaning craziness of
the education system, the public is with us. The Lawrence Summers dispute, for example, was a disaster for the
academy in the public eye. Linking the Democrats with their crazy leftist pals in the academy is the best way to beat
them. The public is with us on this. The problem is that we haven’t developed any institutional way of harnessing
public antipathy to educational bias.
What we need is a mass-membership organization, modeled on, say, People for the American Way, able to rally
folks who want to do something about our education system — or perhaps separate organizations, one for K-12 and
one for higher education. Without an large, broad-based lobby group, we can’t effectively counter-balance the
massive teacher-professor-based education lobbies. Democrats are completely in the pocket of these liberal lobby
groups, and even Republicans legislators have little reason to oppose them and plenty of reason to fear them.

Plan Popular – Moderate Democrats

Moderate Dems love the plan – letter to Obama proves
AC, 6/25 (American Chronicle, http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/107638)
Washington—Ten moderate Senate Democrats today sent a letter to President Barack Obama voicing support for his
key education goals and pledging to "lend our voices to the debate as proponents of education reform."
The letter was initiated by Senators Evan Bayh (D-IN), Tom Carper (D-DE), and Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), leaders
of the Senate Moderate Dems Working Group, and signed by seven of their moderate colleagues.
"As legislators, we believe we must embrace promising new approaches to education policy if we are to prepare our
children to fill the jobs of the future," they wrote to President Obama. "By 2016, four out of every 10 new American
jobs will require at least some advanced education or training. To retain our global economic leadership, we share
your sense of urgency in moving an education reform agenda through Congress."
Saying that "now is the time to explore new paths and reject stale thinking," the moderate Democrats commended
President Obama for his focus on teacher quality and noted a recent report by McKinsey and Company that
highlights the achievement gaps that persist among various economic, regional and racial backgrounds in the United
States and the gaps between American students and their peers in other industrialized nations. Based on this report,
the senators noted that "had the United States closed the gap in education achievement with better-performing
nations like Finland, Iceland, and Poland, our GDP could have been up to $2.3 trillion higher last year."
The senators expressed support for new pay-for-performance teacher incentives and expansions of effective public
charter schools. They also endorsed the Obama administration´s desire to extend student learning time to stay
globally competitive and called for investments in state-of-the-art data systems so school systems can track student
performance across grades, schools, towns and teachers.
Other signatories on the letter include Senators Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Joseph Lieberman
(ID-CT), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Mark Warner (D-VA) and Herb Kohl (D-WI).

Plan Popular – AT: Link Turns

No opposition to nationalized education standards
Cary 6/11 – frequent contributor to American Thinker (Lee, "Nationalizing Public Education Comes After Health
Care" http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/06/nationalizing_public_education.html)
So we come to the point where the financial markets, the auto industry and eventually the health care industry will
function under the aegis of the federal government. It's clear from his campaign rhetoric what will come next --
America's public education system. Candidate Obama's language about reforming public education was more
emphatic and detailed than his discussion of health care. And, making a case for nationalizing public education will
attract broader support than the three previous venues (banking, autos, and health care). President Obama will
proclaim public education K-12 as too crucial to the future of the nation to be left in the hands of volunteer citizen
committees, also known as School Boards and Independent School Districts. And, the distribution of school
financing is, Obama will say, too dependent on the varying affluence levels among the states, and within their
divergent communities. All of America's youth are entitled to an equal opportunity to receive a world class
education. Anything less is unfair. Equal opportunity demands equal funding. It doesn't take a crystal ball to see this
coming. The pragmatic case for uniform public education will cite economy-of-scale advantages whereby the
federal government will eliminate multiple duplications of effort in a currently over-staffed management equation
where every school district constructs its own buildings, buys its own materials, hires its own staff, and manages its
own curriculum to its own state's standards. Why not centralize all those processes and save time, effort and money?
will be the argument. Works for Wal-Mart. Large metropolitan school districts that are almost all dismal failures
will gladly turn over their responsibility to the federal government. Most teachers and administrators will welcome
the opportunity to become GS workers and enjoy the benefits of greater and more equitable pay, plus relocation
opportunities without compensation penalties. Many will welcome the end of the politico-educational fiefdoms
called school districts. Compared to the complexity of redesigning the American health care system, rationalizing
the nationalizing of public education K-12 will be a snap. Most citizens will see no inherent danger in bringing
central planning to public education. After all, central equals public, public equals central. So the argument will go.
Obama will claim that taxpayers will pay less for nationalized education since the increase in their federal taxes will
be less than what they're now paying in local school taxes, which will go away. Lower taxes - that'll sell. What
groups will oppose this? Besides home schoolers, that is. They'll be required to meet the same certification
standards as national teachers, and jump through bureaucratic hoops that'll eventually dissuade many from being
their child's teacher as well as their parent.

Plan Popular – AT: Historical Examples

Last decade irrelevant – future will be bipartisan
Education Weekly, 5 (“Nationwide Standards Eyed Anew,” 12/7, lexis)
"I think the lesson from the last 10 to 15 years," said Michael Cohen, the president of the Washington-based
Achieve Inc., who as an Education Department official helped lead the Clinton administration's work on voluntary
national tests, "is that it's difficult to separate any of the substantive issues around national standards and testing
from the politics of education at the federal level, regardless of which party is in office."
But Mr. Cohen and others argue that the context is different now . When the debate came up during the 1990s, says
Ms. Ravitch, the public was not engaged. Thanks to the NCLB law, she says, 50 states are now involved in the effort
to decide what standards are most important and how to measure them.
All states also now participate in NAEP reading and math tests in grades 4 and 8, a situation that was not the case 15
years ago.
"I think a lot of conversation, a lot of public discussion needs to take place, but today there's far greater public
knowledge and understanding than there was in 1992," Ms. Ravitch said.
"It's just a different context now, with a deeper understanding among the public of what's at stake," agreed Ms.
Brown, the director of education policy at the Center for American Progress. "And, therefore, politicians can take a
second look at this and, I think, consider it more deeply in a bipartisan fashion."
Proponents also argue that during the 1990s, far less attention was focused on the question of performance
standards--or how good is good enough--because the content standards themselves were still under development.

Plan Unpopular
Reforms are unpopular – Congress prefers inertia on NCLB
Hoff, 8 - Education Week (David J., "Darling-Hammond report calls for moving away from K-12 tests and
sanctions" http://ed.stanford.edu/suse/news-bureau/displayRecord.php?tablename=susenews&id=436)
Federal policymakers almost certainly will be ready to do a thorough review of the NCLB law and other K-12
legislation, according to Washington observers. But Congress and the new president—Democrat or Republican—
would be unlikely to be interested in making the dramatic changes recommended in the forum's report, one
experienced policy hand said. "The tendency of policy is toward inertia, to maintain the same policy or add on to it
incrementally," said Jack Jennings, the president of the Center on Education Policy, a Washington group that has
tracked implementation of the NCLB law. In K-12 education, for example, Congress has changed direction only
twice in the past 50 years, according to Mr. Jennings, who worked as an aide to House Democrats on education
issues from 1967 through 1994. The first was when it passed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act in 1965,
during the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson. The ESEA created the Title I program for disadvantaged
students—the largest federal K-12 program. The next time was when Congress required states to adopt standards for
student performance in the 1994 version of the ESEA, Mr. Jennings said. In passing the latest version of the ESEA,
the No Child Left Behind law—championed by President Bush—in 2001, Congress put more teeth into the law by
requiring states to hold schools accountable for meeting goals for student performance in reading and mathematics.
Mr. Jennings' organization has convened a group of researchers to evaluate federal efforts to improve schools and
recommend whether the federal law should be just tinkered with or totally overhauled. One staunch supporter of the
NCLB law said major changes are unlikely. Congress may be ready to amend the accountability rules and add
efforts to improve states’ curricula, but it is unlikely to rewrite the law or add major new provisions, said Kati
Haycock, the director of the Education Trust, a Washington nonprofit that lobbies for improving the educational
opportunities of disadvantaged children
NCLB debates create partisan fights

Kafer, 4 – Senior Education Policy Analyst @ Heritage
(Krista, “No Child Left Behind: Where Do We Go From Here?” Heritage Foundation Report 7/6/04,
http://www.heritage.org/research/education/bg1775.cfm)
Will Rogers once said, "If you ever injected truth into politics, you would have no politics." This is especially true
when it comes to education and the federal law known as the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). But truth--always
a rare commodity--is growing rarer still as the nation approaches November, and discussion about this complex and
bipartisan law is deteriorating into a partisan mud fight.

Plan Unpopular – Political Capital

Drains political capital – election proves
Lemann, 8 (Nicholas, “What No Child Left Behind Left Behind,” Writer @ The Washington Monthly,
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2008/0808.lemann.html)
Both presidential candidates have left themselves some room to maneuver on No Child Left Behind, partly just by
not talking about it very much. John McCain could conceivably have come all out for vouchers, and abandoned No
Child Left Behind as an unwarranted exercise of federal power. He didn’t. Barack Obama could have called for
eliminating No Child Left Behind, as Hillary Clinton did (although she voted for it in 2001), for liberal reasons: too
much testing and teaching to the test; too little funding and teacher autonomy. He didn’t. It’s safe to assume that no
matter who wins the election, No Child Left Behind will not be going away.
But to fix it—really fix it—will require dramatic changes and considerable investment of political capital. Neither
candidate has indicated that he has that in mind. There isn’t any good way to ensure that students have basic skills,
which they desperately need in order not to be left behind in the twenty-first-century economy, without testing. But
to start with tests is to go at the problem backward. What schools need is, first, a national standard of what
proficiency in reading and math means; second, a curriculum that gets students to that level; and finally, tests
tailored specifically to that curriculum. That way teaching the class and "teaching to the test" are the same thing.
And the schools with students farthest from proficiency are going to need a lot of extra resources to get them there.
Obama has tons of pol cap, but the plan drains it

Stickings, 9 – Assistant Editor, The Moderate Voice
(Michael, “Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Here We Are Back in Culture War Hell,” The Moderate Voice, 1/16/09, lexis)
First, how is it œstartling. The œpronouncement was blunt, to be sure, but, as Fox admits, Obama has long been
opposed to the policy. Second, its not like the policy is extremely popular, whereas Obama is. He’ll need to spend
much of his political capital on the stimulus package, of course, and then on health care, energy, and education
reform, among other initiatives, but the good thing is, he has a lot of capital to spend. There would certainly be
opposition both from within the military and from without, and it could become a minor distraction, but Obama
would no doubt be able to handle it while making a strong case for doing away with the policy. Third, it is the right
that wants to, and intends to, reopen the culture wars, as Palin and others tried to do during the presidential
campaign, and it will go there regardless. Yes, this would give them an opening, but standing up for the rights of
gays and lesbians to serve their country against bigots who want them to keep quiet about who they are or, better, to
get the hell out of the military altogether is a fight Obama and the opponents of the policy should be willing to have.
(more¦) Newstex ID: MODV-0001-31100840

Plan Unpopular – AT: Link Turns

Plan can’t be popular – no constituency for reform
Saba, 8 - president of the American Board for Certification of Teacher Excellence
(Dave, “Student Success Strategy,” American Board for Certification of Teacher Excellence blog, December 3 rd,
http://www.abcte.org/blog/2008/12/student-success-strategy)
It has been incredibly difficult to gain momentum for the systemic change necessary for success in all of America’s
schools. True change requires a comprehensive strategy that focuses on the many variables that affect student
performance. While many individual programs are working toward this goal, those organizations working alone will
not produce the education our students deserve and require in order to be competitive in the world market.
The politics of education overshadows the merits of education change in America. The two camps have become so
entrenched that many politicians determine which side they need to be on by who supports or fights against any
given program. While conservatives usually focus on working toward education reform, that reform is perceived as
principally revolving around school choice. As Andy Rotherham opined in a recent blog, conservatives are seen as
“reflexively hostile to public schools.”
On the other side, there are powerful groups that want to maintain the status quo. They have been very effective in
positioning themselves as the student advocate through a comprehensive strategy to push for smaller class sizes,
universal pre-k, more spending on education in general, higher salaries for teachers and reduced testing for students.
These have the appearance of advocating for students when they really benefit the adults. A state group will work at
the state level toward these goals, often with the advice and additional resources of a national group.
Meanwhile, education reform groups operate in a single silo with national leadership and maybe a state group that is
advocating for a single item in the reform agenda. Each state represents a win or lose scenario for each group. But
each silo really only impacts a small number of students so it is too easy to marginalize that group when compared
to the entire system. Reaching a small number of students has not, and will not, induce systemic change to provide
better opportunities for all students. The position from the defenders of the status quo is that each education reform
does not address the larger need of all students so we should continue to stay with the current and implement their
strategy.

2AC Layne Thumper [1/5]

1. Education is a social-service – job-training
Baillie, 72 [Susan PhD, MS in Education from Indiana University and PhD in Social Services from Syracuse
University, Adjunct Associate Professor, and Director of Graduate Medical Education at the David Geffen School of
Medicine, “The Potential Role of the School as a Site for Integrating Social Services. A Report.”, Educational Policy
Research Center and Office of Education (DHEW), Washington DC, EBSCO]//VIJAY
Finally, it would appear that education could play a vital and central role in an integrated social service program.
First, there are educational facilities in virtually every community: they are reasonably accessible. Second, these
facilities are primarily utilized during the daytime hours of nine—to—three. And most of these school buildings
currently are used only sparingly during other hours. Third, educational services are an integral element of social
services. That is, they address a very important felt need of a large number of individuals. Aside from the core
educational program of kindergarten through twelfth grade, there are a number of other educational needs which are
intimately related to other social services: day care——early childhood education centers, vocational education,
prenatal and nutritional education, job training and re—training, and so forth. The integration of social services with
education offers an obvious potential for improving the quality and nature of the services which are provided. At the
same time, it also appears to present some possibilities for reducing costs. The problem with all of this, of course, is
that the claims made on behalf of social service integration are largely a priori in nature. That is, they make a
considerable amount of rational sense, but leave unanswered the question: Will it work? The notions in our heads of
how things “ought to” work so often collide with what actually happens.
2. Counter-interpretation – social services include education in vocational training

USDVA, 7 [“Social Services, Except Child Care,” March 23 http://www.vetsuccess.gov/resources/industries/profile?id=47]
Careers in social services appeal to persons with a strong desire to make lives better and easier for others . Workers in this
industry usually are good communicators and enjoy interacting with people. Social services workers assist the homeless, housebound,
and infirm to cope with circumstances of daily living; counsel troubled and emotionally disturbed individuals; train or retrain the
unemployed or underemployed; care for the elderly, and physically and mentally disabled; help the needy obtain financial
assistance; and solicit contributions for various social services organizations . About 102,000 establishments in the private
sector provided social services in 1998. Thousands of other establishments, mainly in State and local government, provided many additional
social services. For information about government social services, see the Career Guide statements on Federal Government, and State and local
government, excluding education and hospitals.
Social services contain four segments—individual and family services, residential care, job training and vocational rehabilitation
services, and miscellaneous social services. (The child-care services industry, including day care and preschool care centers, is covered in a
separate Career Guide statement.)
Individual and family social services establishments provide counseling and welfare services including refugee, disaster, and
temporary relief services. Government offices distribute welfare aid, rent supplements, and food stamps. Some agencies provide adult day care,
home-delivered meals, and home health and personal care services. Other services concentrate on children, such as big brother and sister
organizations, youth centers, and adoption services. Workers in crisis centers may focus on individual, marriage, child, or family counseling.
Residential care facilities provide around-the-clock social and personal care to children, the elderly, and others who
have limited ability to care for themselves . Workers care for residents of alcohol and drug rehabilitation centers, group homes, and
halfway houses. Nursing and medical care, however, is not the main focus of establishments providing residential care, as it is in nursing or
personal care facilities (see the statement on health services, elsewhere in the Career Guide).
Job training and related services establishments train the unemployed, underemployed, disabled, and others with job
market disadvantages. Vocational specialists and counselors work with clients to overcome deficient education,
job skills, or experience. Often industrial psychologists or career counselors will assess the job skills of a client
and, working with both the employer and the client, decide whether the client would be better served by taking
additional job training, by being placed in a different job with his or her current skills, or by restructuring the job to
accommodate any skill deficiency. Miscellaneous social services include many different kinds of establishments, such as advocacy
groups, antipoverty boards, community development groups, and health and welfare councils. Many miscellaneous social services organizations
are concerned with community improvement and social change. They may solicit contributions, administer appropriations, and allocate funds
among other agencies engaged in social welfare services.


3. Bureacracy Disad
A. No Child Left Behind is victim to bureaucratic constraints

Payzant et al, 9 ( Tom, professor of practice at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, ex- assistant secretary
for Elementary and Secondary Education with the United States Department of Education. Helen F. Ladd (Duke
University, Ph. D from Harvard, prof of econ and public policy), Pedro Noguera (PhD, is a professor in the
Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development at New York University)).//LAURA
June 25 “A Broader, Bolder Approach To Education” http://www.boldapproach.org/statement.html
The Challenge
More than a half century of research, both here and abroad, has documented a powerful association between social
and economic disadvantage and low student achievement. Weakening that association is the fundamental challenge
facing America’s education policy makers. Education policy in this nation has typically been crafted around the
expectation that schools alone can offset the full impact of low socioeconomic status on learning. Schools can—and
have—ameliorated some of the impact of social and economic disadvantage on achievement. Improving our
schools, therefore, continues to be a vitally important strategy for promoting upward mobility and for working
toward equal opportunity and overall educational excellence. Evidence demonstrates, however, that achievement
gaps based on socioeconomic status are present before children even begin formal schooling. Despite the impressive
academic gains registered by some schools serving disadvantaged students, there is no evidence that school
improvement strategies by themselves can close these gaps in a substantial, consistent, and sustainable manner.
Nevertheless, there is solid evidence that policies aimed directly at education-related social and economic
disadvantages can improve school performance and student achievement. The persistent failure of policy makers to
act on that evidence—in tandem with a school-improvement agenda—is a major reason why the association
between social and economic disadvantage and low student achievement remains so strong.
The No Child Left Behind (NCLB)
Framework Cannot by Itself Meet the Challenge
Through its disaggregated reporting requirements, No Child Left Behind and the public discussion it has supported
have cast a bright light on the achievement gap, on underachieving disadvantaged children, and on persistently
underachieving schools. The potential effectiveness of NCLB has been seriously undermined, however, by its
acceptance of the popular assumptions that bad schools are the major reason for low achievement, and that an
academic program revolving around standards, testing, teacher training, and accountability can, in and of itself,
offset the full impact of low socioeconomic status on achievement. The effectiveness of NCLB has also been
weakened by its unintended side effects, such as a narrowing of the curriculum, and by the incentives that NCLB
generates for schools to focus instruction on students who are just below the passing point, at the expense of both
lower-performing and higher-performing students. NCLB also requires a rate of achievement growth that exceeds
the results of even the most effective school improvement measures, alone or in combination, either here or abroad.
A Broader, Bolder Approach for Education
Given the limitations of conventional policy, including NCLB, we believe that the time has come for U.S. policy
makers to rethink their assumptions and adopt a broader, bolder approach for education—one that is powerful
enough to produce a large reduction in the current association between social and economic disadvantage and low
student achievement. This broader, bolder approach breaks with the past by embracing an expanded concept of
education in two respects. First, conventional education policy making focuses on learning that occurs in formal school settings during the
years from kindergarten through high school. The new approach recognizes the centrality of formal schooling, but it also recognizes the
importance of high-quality early childhood and pre-school programs, after-school and summer programs, and programs that develop parents’
capacity to support their children’s education. It seeks to build working relationships between schools and surrounding community institutions.
Second, the broader, bolder approach pays attention not only to basic academic skills and cognitive growth narrowly defined, but to development
of the whole person, including physical health, character, social development, and non-academic skills, from birth through the end of formal
schooling. It assigns value to the new knowledge and skills that young people need to become effective participants in a global environment,
including citizenship, creativity, and the ability to respect and work with persons from different backgrounds. The broader, bolder approach we
support is also informed by research. While recognizing that the relations between cause and effect in education are often ambiguous, the new
approach incorporates policies and practices whose effectiveness is reinforced by the preponderance of evidence presently available from serious
research. In particular, the approach is informed by a large and powerful body of literature from researchers over the years who have examined
the powerful impact on student achievement of numerous contextual and environmental factors such as early learning, parenting, health, poverty,
and the cognitive, cultural, and character development that occurs outside schools.


B. Crushes policy debate
Walker, 81 (Dr Alan Walker joined the Department in 1977 and has been a Lecturer, Senior Lecturer and Reader
in Social Policy. He was appointed Professor of Social Policy in 1985 and was Head of Department from 1988 to
1996. He directed the £3.5 million ESRC Growing Older Programme, 1999-2004, and the UK National
Collaboration on Ageing Research, 2001-2004. He is currently Director of the £20 million ESRC, EPSRC, BBSRC,
MRC and AHRC New Dynamics of Ageing Programme and is also Director of the European Research Area in
Ageing and is spending most of his time on research. Nonetheless he still supervises a large number of postgraduate
students and was until recently the Research Director for the Social Sciences Division in the University. “Social
Policy, Social Administration and the Social Construction of Welfare”, ebsco)
Abstract Teaching and research in social administration have been dominated by the study of the public social
services. Some of the limitations of this approach have been exposed by the perpetuation and growth of inequality in
welfare state societies. Existing conceptions of social policy do not provide an adequate framework for the
study of the social production and exploitation of inequality. The tendency to equate social policy with the institutionalized
welfare state has reinforced the insular tendencies in British social administration, overemphasized the importance of government in the
distribution of resources and fostered a false image of the benevolent state as the embodiment of welfare principles. Alternative definitions
of social policy are needed to ensure that the analysis of welfare is more comprehensive than that carried out so far
within the framework of social administration. It is argued that the essential aspect of social policies are their
distributional implications or outcomes. Social policies may be made implicitly or explicitly, by a wide range of
social institutions and groups, including the state. The task of social policy analysis is to evaluate the distributional
impact of existing policies and proposals and the rationales underlying them. In such analyses attention will be
focused less on the problems of individuals or clients, than on the behavior of organizations, professions and classes
in order to balance descriptions of the institutional framework through which the welfare state is administered with
analysis of the social production and maintenance of inequality. Unless social policy teaching and research adapts
its tools and methods to take account of these social factors it is likely to become increasingly detached from
the real world of social welfare. Whether or not the welfare state is in or on the brink of a crisis, the fact that
thirty years of institutionalized social service provision has not produced a major change in the unequal
structure of British society is now, surely, firmly established.2 The evolution of this realization has been
accompanied by periodic expressions of dissatisfaction about the limitations of the definition of ‘social policy’,
both as an activity or practice and as an academic subject; social administration. Recent analyses of the
political economy of welfare have, like their famous predecessors, exposed some short-comings in the current
conceptions of social policy, and have succeeded in sowing the seeds of alternative and more sociological
approaches.3 However, these critiques have usually remained implicit, and the need for a reassessment of the
scope of social policy teaching and research has not been openly and consistently recognized . There are signs
that, as a result, the boundaries of the subject are becoming increasingly blurred, with a split emerging
between what some social policy analysts do and what is traditionally defined as being the concern of social
administration. This is not only confusing for students and others but more importantly this division may be
exploited by those whose interests would be harmed by alternative analyses of social policy . Furthermore, there
are signs hat important social developments which affect welfare fundamentally, arc not receiving critical attention
from social administrators because they fall outside of the compass of the subject as it has developed since the
Second World War. Social administration, as the amalgam of disciplines within which social policy is studied is anachronistically called, is
a relatively young and developing subject and it is not surprising, therefore, if its scope is questioned from time to time. However, despite the
pioneering work of Titmuss in outlining the three divisions of welfare and Townsend in formulating the basis of a sociological approach to social
policy, traditional conceptions oldie subject have proved to be remarkably resilient. 4 Whilst the coverage of welfare provisions in the
private sector, such as health insurance and employers fringe benefits. has increased in recent years. social
administration has continued to concentrate its attention on government action through the five social services:
health, education, social security, housing and personal social services. As a result, social administration has not yet
succeeded in providing a systematic framework for the analysis of the perpetuation and growth inequalities in
‘welfare state’ societies; choosing instead, for the most part, to remain passive, at best describing them and at worst
ignoring them. For example. the impact of inflation and income policies on stratification are rarely considered by social administrators. and
far from being incorporated into a theory of social policy, they are too often seen as being the province of economists alone. ’ This, of course,
partly reflects the fact that economists and sociologists, by and large, have also failed to provide the necessary
framework within which to study social development. It is not intended to lay claim to large sections of disciplines
such as economics and politics, nor to attempt to define precisely the boundaries of social policy. These aims would


[Walker Continues, no text omitted]
be presumptuous and. I think, fruitless tasks for a subject that. is by definition. inter-disciplinary. As Donnison has
argued: ‘The distinctive feature of our subject is neither its body of knowledge (for most of this could be incorporated into other disciplines) nor
its theoretical structure (for it has very little), and we arc not interested in methodology for its own sake.’ Neither is it my intention to attempt to
re-open the discussion on the shopping-list of ‘social’ as opposed to other policies. which Slack has dismissed as neither profitable nor
interesting.7 Rather, this paper attempts to tackle some of the issues surrounding the continuing difficulty of
studying social welfare within the framework of existing definitions of social policy as social administration.
Although a definition of social policy is proposed. this is not posited as a final answer, but as a tentative suggestion, which it is hoped might play
some part in an ongoing and fruitful discussion. Despite some well-known exceptions, the study of social administration has focused its attention
almost exclusively on the public welfare activities of government. One important reason for this is the successful social construction of ‘welfare’
as ‘the welfare state’ or government intervention in welfare. Social administration has, in turn, reinforced this stereotype
through research and teaching. But while they continue to concentrate on government and its legislation, social
administrators are in danger of ignoring the distributional outcomes of decisions made by other powerful social
institutions and groups, including other sectors of the state as well as financial and business concerns. If social
administration is to encompass adequately the analysis of welfare or dis-welfare, as the result of the distributional outcomes of various
institutionalized social policies, it must at some stage re-examine its definition and scope. This process of re-examination
assumes, of course, that it is possible and desirable to arrive at a single definition of social policy or social
administration. Titmuss referred to this as the ‘unsoluble problem’.8 However, the problem is not so much a lack of
alternative and untainted terms, as an absence of clear agreement amongst analysts on the meaning of concepts that
arc generally held to be central to the subject. Existing consensus appears to be confined to the study of certain
parts of the policy system. When this lack of agreement, therefore, is translated into a reluctance to investigate
some integral pans of the institutionalized policy process, then some discussion of the nature of the subject is
clearly called for. This need is further emphasized by the implications for the study of social policy of the failure of the welfare state
significantly to affect either the prevailing distribution of resources and power in society. or the social differentiation of welfare . The fact that
social administration is a field rather than a discipline’ should not be allowed to inhibit attempts at the clearer
definition of the scope and meaning of social policy, if this will facilitate the study of welfare as a whole.


4. Limits Disad
A. Job-training – they limit all affs that train people for jobs they don’t already have – means the
unemployed couldn’t get jobs because they didn’t have one before – bad for the topic because it
eliminates most poverty job-training affs
B. No limits explosion – we’re the only educational policy that’s topical – even exclusive defs include
job training
S.1321, 5 [A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to repeal the excise tax on telephone and other
communications, http://finance.senate.gov/sitepages/leg/091506leg1.pdf]
For this purpose, social services is defined as services directed at helping people in need, reducing poverty , improving
outcomes of low-income children, revitalizing low-income communities, and empowering low-income families and low-
income individuals to become self-sufficient, including:
(1) child care services, protective services for children and adults, services for children and adults in foster care, adoption
services, services related to the management and maintenance of the home, day care services for adults, and services to meet the
special needs of children, older individuals, and individuals with disabilities (including physical, mental, or emotional
disabilities);
(2) transportation services;
(3) job training and related services, and employment services;
(4) information, referral, and counseling services;
(5) the preparation and delivery of meals, and services related to soup kitchens or food banks;
(6) health support services;
(7) literacy and mentoring programs;
(8) services for the prevention and treatment of juvenile delinquency and substance abuse, services for the prevention of
crime and the provision of assistance to the victims and the families of criminal offenders, and services related to the intervention
in, and prevention of, domestic violence; and
(9) services related to the provision of assistance for housing under Federal law.
5. Integrated social services – education is key to comprehensive social services – critical to

effectiveness of all social services
Baillie, 72 [Susan PhD, MS in Education from Indiana University and PhD in Social Services from Syracuse
University, Adjunct Associate Professor, and Director of Graduate Medical Education at the David Geffen School of
Medicine, “The Potential Role of the School as a Site for Integrating Social Services. A Report.”, Educational Policy
Research Center and Office of Education (DHEW), Washington DC, EBSCO]
There wou1d appear to be two rationales for examining the feasibility of integrating social services with schools.
First, it might be a way for providing social services at a lower cost. Second, it might lead to some manner of
improved social services. In either case, we are talking about increased “efficiency” or “effectiveness,” broadly
defined. It should be made clear at the outset, however, that we are also dealing with something other than the
“logical—semantic” sorts of considerations just described. The term “integrated social services” (with or without
education) has acquired particular meanings and connotations. For instance, it is intimately related——though it
need not be——to various notions of community involvement, participation, or control. For many it also suggests
making social services more accessible to potential clients. Finally, “integrated social services” is often a code—
word for a fairly well articulated approach to the provision or delivery of social services. It is based on the
undeniable fact that different people have differing requirements for social services. The current practice is to have
an independent set of services, with each addressing a particular aspect of an individual’s needs ——physical health,
mental health, welfare, job training, recreation, and so forth. With this organization of social services no attention is
‘paid to the unique set of needs, of the individual. Nor is there any assurance that he will be made aware of or
receive all the services to which he is legally entitled.

Neg Bonus – Nuclear War Outweighs Education

Nuclear war outweighs education
The scale and nature of the ongoing revolution in science and technology, and what this implies for the quality of
human capital in the 21st century, pose critical national security challenges for the United States. Second only to a
weapon of mass destruction detonating in an American city, we can think of nothing more dangerous than a failure
to manage properly science, technology, and education for the common good over the next quarter century.

Education/Jobs Affirmative: Northwestern Markoff, Mehta, Astead, Kostrinsky Education/Jobs Aff Wave One

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Northwestern Markoff, Mehta, Astead, Kostrinsky

Education/Jobs Aff Wave One

Peace through superior firepower. / 1

**No Child Left Behind

**2AC -- Case Arguments

Peace through superior firepower. / 2

AT: Teachers Unions Bad.............................................................92

Peace through superior firepower. / 3

1AC – Plan Text

Peace through superior firepower. / 4

Peace through superior firepower. / 5

Peace through superior firepower. / 6

No Child Left Behind is destroying focus on STEM education – overvalues ELA

Peace through superior firepower. / 7

Peace through superior firepower. / 8

Peace through superior firepower. / 9

Peace through superior firepower. / 10

Peace through superior firepower. / 11

Peace through superior firepower. / 12

Peace through superior firepower. / 13

Peace through superior firepower. / 14

Absent effective CTE, green sustainability movements will collapse

Peace through superior firepower. / 15

Peace through superior firepower. / 16

Peace through superior firepower. / 17

Timeframe is irrelevant – must stop irreversible chain reactions

Peace through superior firepower. / 18

And, sustainability is key to maintaining a competitive chemical industry

Peace through superior firepower. / 19

Peace through superior firepower. / 20

goals, as well as those of society, are being advanced.

Peace through superior firepower. / 21

1AC – Defense-Industrial Base

STEM education in K-12 is key to competitiveness and a strong defense-industrial base

Peace through superior firepower. / 22

1AC – Defense-Industrial Base

Peace through superior firepower. / 23

1AC – Defense-Industrial Base

Peace through superior firepower. / 24

1AC – Defense-Industrial Base

War with Russia is the highest magnitude impact

Peace through superior firepower. / 25

1AC – Defense-Industrial Base

Peace through superior firepower. / 26

Peace through superior firepower. / 27

Peace through superior firepower. / 28

Peace through superior firepower. / 29

Peace through superior firepower. / 30

Peace through superior firepower. / 31

Peace through superior firepower. / 32

Peace through superior firepower. / 33

Peace through superior firepower. / 34

Economy – Ext: No Jobs  Protectionism

Peace through superior firepower. / 35

Economy – Protectionism Uniqueness

Peace through superior firepower. / 36

Economy – AT: Buy America  Protectionism

Buy American was watered down in the stimulus

Peace through superior firepower. / 37

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Chinese Econ

World War Three

Peace through superior firepower. / 38

Economy – Protectionism Impact: Japanese Econ [1/2]