Potential Affirmative CasesResolved: The United States federal government should substantially increase its economic engagement toward Cuba, Mexico or Venezuela.

CUBA AFFS

1. Remove the Economic EmbargoAdvantages–

Cuban Economy—Latin American Instability and terrorism

Cuban democracy reformU.S. EconomyU.S. Latin American relations // allows relation

with venezuelaRussian ExpansionismChinese ExpansionismU.S. Leadership/credibility

Critical Versions of affirmative– Critical examination of labeling Cuba a rogue or terrorist state as justification for embargo

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2. Facilitate private economic investment

a. Remove restrictions on family remittances (currently there is a $3,000 cap)– Would facilitate providing seed capital for micro enterprises in Cuba.

b. Allow NGO’s to finance micro businesses in Cuba

c. Remove restrictions on bilateral banking agreements

d. Expand commerce exceptions for investments in Cuban commerce

3. Expand tourism opportunities in CubaObama has reduced barriers to travel allowing unrestricted

travel for family members and establishing a “people to people” educational exchange program. There are massive paperwork restrictions on qualifying for the current exchanges that severely hamper its effectiveness.

AdvantagesCuban EconomyDemocratic reformRight to travelTerrorism (The Office of Foreign Assets Control is a division of the Treasury Dept that enforces travel restrictions and is also responsible for battling Al Qaeda’s money networks and fighting global terrorism.)

4. Increase Agricultural trade While the embargo was reduced for agricultural

products in 2000 they are currently limited to cash advance sales and must use third country banks which prevent long term contracts and limit U.S. agriculture sales in Cuba.

Advantages:Save U.S. agriculture sectorU.S. EconomyU.S. – Latin American relations

5. Promote Sugarcane Ethanol in CubaThe U.S. currently has a policy requiring an increasing amount

of gas sold in the U.S. to contain ethanol. The aff would assist and facilitate Cuban investment in sugar cane ethanol. //remove restrictions or facilitate Cuban investment

AdvantagesReduce U.S. corn based ethanol investment // no good politics links for cpReduce reliance on Brazilian based sugar ethanol which effects critical biodiversity in the Amazon // slavery in brazil – WarmingUS military biofuels

6. Facilitate Deep water oil developmentThe embargo limits use of U.S. technology for Cuban oil

exploration and development. And limits oil spill clean up technology from being provided to Cuba

THEY WILL DRILL – but have bad tech causing big problemsA – allow companies to get involved with techB – clean up stuff

AdvantagesU.S. Cuban relationsEnvironmental drilling (Drilling inevitable– U.S. technology is key to prevent environmental destruction)

7. Baseball engagementEmbargo restricts Cuban baseball players ability to play in

the U.S. The aff would faciliate ability of baseball players to work in the U.S.

Greller 00 (Matthew, JD from the American University Washington College of Law, “Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Fastball Pitchers Yearning for Strike Three: n1 How Baseball Diplomacy Can Revitalize Major League Baseball and United States-Cuba Relations,” 14 Am. U. Int'l L. Rev. 1647, Lexis)

AdvantagesU.S.-Cuban relations – Baseball Diplomacy (Oil spills)U.S. Latin American relations

Books on baseball diplomacy

8. Remove Cuba from terrorism listCritical Affirmative

8. Scientific cooperation

MEXICO AFFS

Mexico Affirmatives1. Increased energy oil cooperation with MexicoIncrease pipeline development

AdvantagesU.S. Mexico relationsU.S. leadership in Latin AmericaMexico economy and InstabilitySustain high domestic U.S. natural gas productionU.S. Middle East oil dependenceOil Spills in Gulf, Model for global cooperation,

Mexican biofuels

2. Increase environmental cooperationExpand environmental coop programs(Border Environmental Cooperation Commission)

AdvantagesU.S. Mexico relationsU.S. environmental leadership Mexico economy and InstabilityGlobal climate changeMexico environmental disasters

3. Increased Health Care cooperation with Mexico(Cross Border Health Insurance initiatives to assure health care access to Mexicans in U.S. and Americans in Mexico)

AdvantagesHealth crisis between countries in particular risk of a TB pandemic

4. Shift drug war from security to economic development strategyBeyond Merida initiativeWar against drug….4 prong strategy: 1 Disrupting the operational

capacity of organized criminal groups. 2 institutionalizing reforms to sustain the rule of law and respect for human rights. 3 Creating a 21st century border. 4. Building strong and resilient communities.

AdvantagesDrug CartelsTerrorismMexican instabilityU.S.-Mexican relationsPovertyStop immigration push

5. microfinancing

4. Student exchange

7. Immigration reform

There are a vast range of potential cases to reform immigration from opening the border to expanding guest worker programs to adding temporary visas etc

Helen V. Milner and Dustin Tingley no date (Milner is Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University, Tingley is Assistant Professor International Relations, Working paper, The Economic and Political Influences on Different Dimensions of United States Immigration Policy, http://www.princeton.edu/~hmilner/working%20papers/The%20Economic%20and%20Political%20Influences%20on%20Different%20Dimensions%20of%20United%20States%20Immigration%20Policy.pdf)

Our overall contributions to the literature are threefold. First, we highlight how widely the substantive content of legislation that is called “immigration policy” varies and thus point out the risk of obscuring important differences across policies if the analysis does not disaggregate the legislation. We show that different factors affect attitudes toward different policy dimensions. Hence we help adjudicate the important debate over economic versus ideological factors as influences on immigration policy. Second, we provide a critical test of public finance theory in the legislative setting. Hence as in the trade literature, which has examined both public opinion and legislative voting, our extension of public finance arguments helps provide a more complete picture of democratic representation by extending earlier public opinion work to the legislature. Third, this paper contributes to a larger research tradition that seeks to explain

preferences of both citizens and their elected representatives toward different types of international economic engagement, such as immigration, trade and foreign aid (Espenshade and Hempstead, 1996; Hainmueller and Hiscox, 2006; Hiscox, 2006; Huber and Espenshade, 1997; Milner and Tingley, 2011; Scheve and Slaughter, 2001b).

•8. Critical Narratives Aff.. Ciudad Juarez … Maquiladoras NAFTA “The us/mexican border is and open wound…” Gloria Anzaldua

•VENEZUELA AFFIRMATIVES

1. Increase U.S. investment in Venezuela oil infrastructureIf the US does not help them Russia or someone else will….Lack of external investment has left Venezuela’s oil infrastructure on brink of collapse

AdvantagesGlobal economy/oil shocksTrade off with Canada Tar Sands

developmentU.S. – Venezuela relations—(Iran)

2. Economic assistance to VenezuelaProvide non-conditonal non-democracy assistance

AdvantagesU.S. – Venezuela relationsU.S.-Latin American relationsVenezuela economy