Arguments often take two distinct forms: ones that have strong merits, reasoning and evidence, and others that are arguments for the sake of having an argument. Defending the former to the death typically works, but defending the latter to the death often digs a person into an even bigger hole.

Back in my debating days, I took on an Arab opponent in one round who would not back off his argument. He did so even as the flaws I pointed out would force him to advocate racial profiling while I, a white person, took a stand against discrimination. Needless to say, it was an easy call for any judge to make, much less the elderly black women that was judging the round.

Likewise, a pair of my colleagues once took on two opponents who had an overly broad definition of a terrorist as “one who rules with force.” They refused to admit any problems with their definition, so my colleagues eventually got them to admit, with their own definition, that George Bush qualifies as a terrorist and thus the United States is probably losing the war on terror. We also won that round.

In short, if you have a bad argument, just drop it and move on. The same logic can apply to Alex Latella ’10 and Jon Rau ’12, two elected members of the Student Assembly. These two recently published a letter in The Sun defending their opposition to Resolution 4, which would have granted unelected students or gallery members voting rights under certain conditions and eligibility requirements.

To quote this letter, Resolution 4 is “lacking substance,” the Student Assembly’s veto power “renders the student vote ineffective” and the whole thing is a “publicity stunt.” On the other hand, even though it does nearly nothing, passing Resolution 4 “disincentivizes running for elected position and joining committees.”

So Resolution 4 simultaneously gives students not enough power and too much power. S.A. debates can lack substance at times, but this may be the first time an elected member has debated with himself.

Nonetheless, both of them do seem to share a concern for increasing student involvement — if you narrowly define the level of involvement by the size of the S.A.’s committees.

Yet, perhaps I am wrong. The students did have a chance to vote, and as Alex and Jon would say, “They have already spoken.” Now replace the S.A. elections with the 2004 elections, which also had an increased turnout, replace Alex Latella and Jon Rau with George Bush and Dick Cheney, and imagine Bush and Cheney justifying their favorite ideas by saying that the people have already spoken.

Turnout for the last round of elections was high, but let us consider why. For one, the president and vice president were directly elected by the people, not by S.A. members. Furthermore, the winning ticket, Rammy Salem ’10 and Ola Williams ’10, ran on a platform which included giving gallery members voting rights.

Therefore, we can conclude that the people have elected Alex and Jon to the Student Assembly so that they can achieve their grandiose vision for S.A. committees.

“They have already spoken.”

Perhaps instead of increasing committee sizes, one should revive an old version of Resolution 4, which would have given eligible gallery members the collective power of two votes.

Some elected members have expressed concerns that if only one gallery member were eligible to vote, that this person would then have two votes while each elected member would have one. While there are ways to work around this (for example, giving the gallery the collective power of only one vote if their numbers are too small), I actually prefer the proposal as is.

You see, if S.A. meetings are so boring and worthless (or if the qualifications to becoming a voting gallery member are set so high) that only one person qualifies as a voting gallery member, then that one person deserves to have more power than an elected member.

However, if the Student Assembly actually gets waves of students to become voting gallery members, then each one would only own a small sliver of the two votes while elected members would own a whole, undivided vote.

If the S.A. does a horrible job, then each member has half as much power as that one gallery member, who is probably more competent than them anyway. If the S.A. actually does their job in terms of student involvement, an elected member’s voting power remains quite high relative to a gallery member’s power.

And at least it accomplishes more than the status quo. While Alex and Jon probably do not fear the masses, one still must wonder why they so vigilantly defend the status quo even to the point of running contradictory arguments against any new proposal. Likewise, one must wonder why they offer no alternative unless that alternative conveniently repackages the status quo.

At debate tournaments, when one mistakenly defends a hackneyed argument to the death, it just costs them that round, and afterwards they may even laugh at their mistakes. But Alex and Jon are not participants in a debate tournament — they are elected members of the Student Assembly who have tangible power.

Perhaps it is time to give these two elected members a more thorough cross-examination.

Mike Wacker, a senior in the College of Engineering, is a former Sun Assistant Web Editor. He may be reached at mwacker@cornellsun.com. Wack Attack appears alternate Wednesdays this semester.