Debate Tactics Quotes

Using insult instead of argument is the sign of a small mind.

You never win an argument until they attack your person.

Not all negativity is bad. In politics, it's a necessary clarifying tool.

... there were few forces willing to confront the neoconservative juggernaut and its drive towards war with Iraq. They had mastered the art of marketing their policy prescriptions and were aggressive and intimidating in debate. Their strategy, as I discovered, was to make an opening statement, interrupt the person making a different argument, and then filibuster to the end of a five-minute television segment. That domination of the available time, coupled with aggressively stated talking points and ad hominem attacks on the credibility and intelligence of their interlocutors, was designed to leave viewers with the impression these neocon experts were the only ones who knew what they were talking about. After a while, many of the genuine experts on the region, people who had spent their careers living and working in the Arab world, simply refused to subject themselves to such demeaning behavior and retired to the sidelines.

Those who, in debate, appeal to their qualifications, argue from memory, not from understanding.

I like Marco Rubio. But I don't know about as a vice-presidential candidate. He's a nice guy, and that role requires kicking the crap out of your opponents.

When a person's last response was Saumensch or Saukerl or Arschloch, you knew you had them beaten.

When Gold argues the cause, eloquence is impotant.

That's the beauty of argument, if you argue correctly, you're never wrong.

If you attempt an actual argument with a modern paper of opposite politics, you will have no answer except slanging or silence.

So you see how endlessly futile and fruitless it would be if we wanted to refute their objections every time they obstinately resolved not to think through what they say but merely to speak, just so long as they contradict our arguments in any way they can.

Your assignment,' he bellowed at Kelly, 'was to make a persuasive argument. Demanding to know whether detractors of your position are on crack is not arguing persuasively.

When it comes to Republican debates, fibs and fits come first; facts come last.

Democrats should run Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for president. He's more coherent than Dennis Kucinich, he dresses like their base, he's more macho than John Edwards, and he's willing to show up at a forum where he might get one hostile question - unlike the current Democratic candidates for president who won't debate on Fox News Channel. He's not married to an impeached president, and the name Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is surely no more frightening than B. Hussein Obama.

Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.

Most people argue over who's right, not about what the truth is.

Whoever in debate quotes authority uses not intellect, but memory.

It used to be in the Senate that if you were filibustering, you stood up. There was a physical dimension to it, that you - when you became exhausted you would have to leave the floor. That was the idea of the filibuster.

I want to show you how Stephen Miller is just good, folks. He's simply good. He needs to be doing more of these. The first time he went public as a spokesman for Donald Trump was on This Week with George Stephanopoulos. Stephen Miller was unflappable. He didn't lose his temper. He smiled. It appeared that Miller knew he was talking with somebody who didn't know what he was talking about and remained composed and polite.

I used to be a conservative and I watch these debates and I'm wondering, I don't think I've changed, but it's a little troubling sometimes when people are appealing to people's fears and emotion rather than trying to get them to look over the horizon for a broader perspective and that's kind of where we are.

He who frames the question wins the debate.

Al Gore adopted three utterly different personas in three national presidential debates.

I ceased in the year 1764 to believe that one can convince one’s opponents with arguments printed in books. It is not to do that, therefore, that I have taken up my pen, but merely so as to annoy them, and to bestow strength and courage on those on our own side, and to make it known to the others that they have not convinced us.

When I went up to Glasgow University in 1967, student life was dominated by 13-hour debates on Fridays, when one of the student political clubs would form the 'government' for the day and attempt to push through a piece of legislation, which the other clubs either supported or opposed.

If somebody tries to tell me the earth was created in 7 days I take a fossil and say "FOSSIL". If he still won't shut up I throw it at him.