I agree it would be good to find a better method to debate politics. Maybe we should have a meta-rule that anyone who starts a political debate must specify rules how the topic should be debated. (So now the burden is on the people who want to debate politics here.)

It seems to me that in political topics most of updating happens between the conversation. It's not like you say something and the other person is "oh, you totally convinced me, I am changing my mind now". Instead, you say something, the other person looks at you very suspiciously and walks away. Later they keep thinking about it, maybe google some data, maybe talk with other people, and the next time you meet them, their position is different from the last time.

For example, I have updated, from mildly pro-NR to anti-NR. I admit they have a few good points. But this is generally my experience with political movements: they are often very good at pointing out the obvious flaws of their competitors; the problem is that their own case is usually not much better, only different. I appreciate the few insights, they made me update, and I still keep thinking about some stuff. I just didn't come to the same conclusion; I separated the stuff that makes sense to me from the stuff that doesn't. Just like I try to draw good ideas e.g. from religion, without becoming religious. Instead of buying the whole package, I take a few bricks and add them to my model of the world. There are a few bricks in my model now that an outside observer could call "neoreactionary", although that would probably depend on the exact words I would use to describe them (because they are not unique for NR). The other bricks I have judged separately, and I was unimpressed. That's where I am now.

There is also this irritating fact that NRs keep associating themselves with LW. I consider that a huge dishonesty and in a way an attack on this community. If people are impressed by LW, this can make them more open towards NR. If people are disgusted by NR, this can make them dislike LW by association. They gain, we lose. It never goes the other way round; no one is going to debate overcoming their cognitive biases just because they fell in love with NR. To put it bluntly, we are used as a recruitment tool for some guy's cult, and all his shit falls on our heads. Why should we tolerate that? (This, especially #1 should be a required reading for every nerd.) That alone makes me completely unwilling to debate with them, because such debates are then used as further evidence that "LW supports NR". (As an analogy, imagine how much would you want to have a polite debate with a politician you dislike, if you know that the reason he debates with you is that he can take a photo of you two having a conversation, put it on his personal webpage, and claim that you are one of his supporters, to impress people who know you.) I refuse to ignore this context, because I am strongly convinced that NRs are fully aware of what they are doing here.

So even if we try having rational debates about politics, I would prefer to try them on some other political topics.