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Let's get all the ducks in a row. A huge swath of America sees themselves as conservatives. As a liberal, I am seen as someone out in leftfield and a non-thinking dreamer. A liberal, in our society today, equals an unrealistic person.

On the other hand, a conservative is seen as the very backbone of America. I have all my life seen that as problematic at best. I have four years of liberal arts education in college, three years of post-graduate work in history and theology, one year of grad school in Scotland in history and medical ethics, and three years of a doctorate in organization psychology. I think that while in academia I have covered a vast Weltanschauung of history, philosophy, psychology, and sociology. Within my educational background, I have taught at four different universities and presently a visiting professor at DeVry University. Not surprisingly, I teach classes in history, ethics, psychology and sociology.

While philosophy/theology runs through my entire academic background and professional work, I haven't often employed that method. If someone challenges me on some philosophical issue, I will merely respond with all the facts and data at my disposal. For the example, talk to me about healthcare reform. The opposition to Obama's healthcare reform is merely 21st century contemporary Luddites. We are the only country in the Western world without universal healthcare. Forty or fifty million are without insurance and 45,000 die annually do in part to not having healthcare insurance. We rank 34th in the world when it comes to infant mortality according to the United Nations Population Division. Cubans out rank us with less lives of infants lost. The CIA's World Factbook ranks us at 49th, which places us ahead of Croatia at 50th and Belarus at 51st. That is about 3.5 times higher than the top of the list in avoiding infant deaths. This is a link to the infant mortality data.

At the other end of the scale, Americans are 38th when it comes to longevity. Again, Cubans live longer than we do. Again, these stats were taken from the United Nations data. American males live 75.6 and females 80.8 years, which averages 78.2 years. The difference between us and the Japanese is that the Japanese males live to 79, females to 86.1 or an average of 82.6 years. There is a difference of 4.4 years between the two average of the longevity of Japanese and Americans.

Our infant mortality and longevity puts us way behind several dozen other countries. Healthcare in the United States until Obama was previously a means for insurance companies to make money not to care for Americans. The three top CEO's of American health care companies made $21.76 to $30.16 million each plus other perks. They got those wages for making money for their investors but not due to saving lives.

Still, having said that in articles and in class, many Americans live in the bliss of ignorance and cannot refute any of the above facts. Also, my attack along with many others does not seem to resonate very well with a good 40% of the country. Therefore, I will attempt the Socratic Method in discussion with Romney and the conservatives in America. Let us define the word, conservative. Since I do not know of a more conservative dictionary in the entire world, I went online to the Oxford English Dictionary. This is what I found:

noun

• a person who is averse to change and holds to traditional values and attitudes, typically in relation to politics.
• (Conservative) a supporter or member of the Conservative Party of Great Britain or a similar party in another country.

With that as our definition of conservative, I will go Socratic. Here are Campbell's Socratic Questions:

1. If you were living in the US prior to the Civil War what would conservatives say about the abolition of slavery in the South?
2. If you were living in the early 1960s what would conservatives say about the elimination of segregation?
3. If you were living anytime over the past 250,000 years what would conservatives say about the equality of women?
4. If you were living in 1912 in Norway what would conservatives say about universal health care?
5. If you were living in 1920 prior to 19th amendment what would conservative position be on woman's voting rights?
6. If you were living in America in 1935, what would conservatives say about Social Security?
7. If you were living in America in the early 1960s, what would conservatives say about the environmental movement?
8. If you were living in America prior to the early 1950s, what would conservatives say about global warming?
9. If you were living prior to the 1970s, what would conservatives say about gay rights and gay marriage?
10. If you were living in America prior to 1964, what would conservatives say about the war on poverty?
11. If you were living in America prior to 1964, what would conservatives say about the war in Vietnam?

That list of Socratic Method questions goes on and on. Nevertheless, pick any of the dozen questions and address my Socratic question:

1. Can you name a conservative that was attempting to abolish slavery/segregation?
2. Can you name a conservative that fought for total equality of the sexes?
3. Can you name a conservative that pushed for healthcare reform?
4. Can you name a conservative that wanted women to vote?
5. Can you name a conservative that wanted to see Social Security?
6. Can you name a conservative that spoke out to protect the environment?
7. Can you name a conservative that warned the world about global warming?
8. Can you name a conservative that fought to end the war in Iraq?
9. Can you name a conservative that declared war on poverty?
10. Can you name a conservative that attempted to end the war in Vietnam?
11. Can you name a conservative that fought for gay rights?
12. Or even better, can you name any social movement in the past 250,000 years of human history that originated because of a conservative raising the issue? Name one.

The flipside of the Campbell's version of the Socratic Method is this: name any social movement in the past 250,000 years of human history that did not originate because of a liberal?

Finally, which of those dozen social movements, from abolition of slavery to the abolition of the dissing of gays, does the majority of American not agree with? Am I correct that it seems like conservatives are merely modern-day Luddites? Perhaps Socrates was correct with his method of making people think and that I should use that technique. What do you think? From either methodology, a conservative is "a person who is averse to change and holds to traditional values and attitudes, typically in relation to politics." While that is true, historically, is it not historically true that conservatives were dead wrong on all social issues during the entire history of human beings? Were they not merely attempting to keep the old way alive and well even though they knew that they were wrong? I cannot name a human freedom for which conservatives have commenced the fight. Can you? I know that it is a critical question, but why not think about it?

Obama Signing the Affordable Care Act

Visit the Obamacare page to read more about this topic.

Forrest Gump, "Stupid is as stupid does."

Visit the Stupid is As Stupid Does page to read more about this topic.