Ideally food and farming wouldn’t be political. Decisions about how food should be grown or raised, processed, and provided wouldn’t be left for politicians and citizens to cast votes. As consumers, decisions about how...
For the Stoa agriculture debate topic, and for the NSDA (public school) health insurance topic, understanding the Hidden Half of Nature is key. The invisible half of nature are the microbes underground, underwater, and...
Critics of welfare for the poor argue that too much “helping” creates dependency. Books like When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself explain that poverty...
Federal agriculture subsidies, taxes, and regulations confuse and distort farming and ranching across the country. This 2021 article in The New Republic Abolish the Department of Agriculture is subtitled: The USDA has become an...
Next year’s Stoa league policy topic calls for reforming federal agriculture policy. American industrial agriculture and aquaculture have long been blamed for heavy water, soil, and air pollution. Environmentalists have called for reforms to...
Here are Stoa policy debate resolution choices: intellectual property, infrastructure, or agriculture. Resolution wording and overview here. Economic principles and history provide insights for economic freedom reforms. Reforming IPEconomic Thinking talks on IP reform...
After judging many Central/South America debate rounds over the last few months, I appreciate the many challenges debaters face advancing meaningful reforms for USFG programs and policies. Everyday people in Central and South America...
Economies burn energy, and so do plants, animals, and people. Energy for homes, factories, and fisheries is big business, and so is food for animal and human energy. Students gain insight into energy policy...
Recent news stories highlight the damage Chinese distant fishing fleets are doing to South American fisheries: • China is the pariah of the seas (The Hill, December 18, 2025) Chinese fishing fleet off Chilean...
Economist Dave Hebert’s Wall Street Journal letter (Ditch the Debt Ceiling but Bring Back 1917, February 2, 2026) offers a powerful reform Congress case for NCFCA debaters: In his Jan. 30 [WSJ] op-ed “The...
