Have a new op-ed piece at American Thinker

Continuing my commitment to write a new op-ed piece each week of 2025 (or aspiring to anyway), news and commentary website American Thinker - a site I can't recommend nearly enough - has just published my latest.

In 'It's Time to Cleans the White House Press Corps", arguments are laid out for why the gaggle of journalists assigned to cover the president and his affairs should be thoroughly pruned down.  Not just because too many of them have demonstrated they can't strive for impartiality either.  If for no other reason it's because "traditional" outlets like CNN and Washington Post have had their audiences wiped out over the course of recent years, while more "alternative" media has emerged as the inheritors of that mantle.

Here's a snippet:

When the Internet first came into widespread use, it was envisioned that it would bring with it the end of gatekeeping. Never more would the spread of information be controlled by a few “professional” outlets. Every individual could be his own publisher, and even become a live news broadcaster as the technology further evolved.

It has taken more than thirty years, but that time has come. Indeed, it has been with us for a while already. Now at last it is being fully engaged with. When online broadcasters like Joe Rogan command regular audiences in the tens of millions while longstanding network broadcasters struggle to maintain a hundred thousand viewers, there has been a dire sea change that cannot go unacknowledged.

Trump Administration 2.0 has a glorious opportunity before it. And that is to end the mainstream press’s influence as it has come to be known and reviled.

Mash down here for more.

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Some new writing this past week

I like to think that I'm getting my mojo back as a writer.  This past week saw four articles of mine getting published on a couple of outlets.  That's a bunch more than I'd previously been capable of writing.  Maybe I'm finally getting adjusted to both bipolar disorder and the medication to treat it.  Especially the meds.  Can't escape feeling like they've sapped a lot of ability out of me these past several years.

But for now I'm writing.  And I feel great.

First of all there's an article I turned in for The Western Journal about longtime Democrats fleeing their former party.

Then there's a piece for American Thinker about Barack Obama's warehouse in Chicago that almost certainly contains classified documents.

A few days ago Western Journal posted a lil' write-up about how electric powered aircraft still can't match what the Wright Brothers were doing after their historic first flight.

And then today, there's this humdinger of a story about a guy's brand new $115,000 electric Hummer that stopped working in the middle of a highway a few days after he drove it off the lot.

(The article about the Hummer has to be read to be believed.  Or watch the embedded YouTube video.  Heads should roll at General Motors for that kind of screw-up.)

So I'm on a hot streak right now.  How long can it last?  I'm hoping... forever.  Maybe I'll channel some of that spirit into working on my book this coming weekend.

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"Slouching Towards Fantasyland": My new article at American Thinker

American Thinker, a site I often go to for insight and commentary, this morning published my latest piece for them.  This essay addresses the leftist fantasies about so-called "green energy" and eliminating emissions.

From the article:

And then there are other considerations about the fallout from the failed fantasy.  Which would you rather have in an emergency, say, evacuating from a hurricane: a reliable car running on gasoline, or an electric vehicle without a ready charge available?  The potential loss of life from people unable to drive to safer ground would be enormous.  Or consider an electric-powered ambulance, that runs out of juice en route to the hospital with a stroke victim.

These are the realities that leftists are not acknowledging.  They refuse to accept that energy comes from something other than unicorn flatulence.  They are instead proverbially sticking their fingers in their ears while singing “La-La-La-Dee-Dah” when anyone broaches the impracticality of their intent.

Click here for the rest of the article.  And thank you to everyone who has written me e-mail about it!

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Mah Na Mah Na! New article at American Thinker

I might have broken whole new ground in op-ed writing by using the word "Pufnstuf".  But anyhoo, American Thinker this morning has published a new article by Yours Truly.  "And then they came for the Muppets..." delves into Disney's slapping an "offensive material" disclaimer on several episodes of The Muppet Show.

A sample from the piece:

These declaimers are micro-sermons about the virtues of inclusion. They are meant to “foster dialogue.” But anyone who sits the children down for a heart-to-heart discussion about Muppet morality probably doesn’t get the point of the Muppets anyway. These disclaimers, along with all the others that Disney is slapping onto Lady and the Tramp and Peter Pan and other films, accomplish nothing of the sort. They are nuisances at best. By the end of the show the average child will have forgotten all about them.

That's the second article in a row (counting the one about Gina Carano from last week) that's addressed Disney+. I'm not out to "get Disney", honest. But it has to be said: that company is pumping out some real fodder for opinion writing lately.

Anyway, cue the music, light the lights, and read my new article.  Do you think Statler and Waldorf would approve?

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New article at American Thinker: Disney's cancelling of Gina Carano

I have a new article up at American Thinker this morning.  "Cancelling Gina Carano: Work Worthy of an Evil Empire" addresses what happened last week in regard to Disney firing one of the lead actors of its series The Mandalorian (image: Disney).  Gina Carano made a post on social media that some allege was anti-Semitic and overly controversial.  But was it really?  Especially in light of the fact that others associated with the Star Wars franchise have made statements just as "controversial" and saw no repercussion.

In short: was Carano let go because she leans conservative?

As always, comments are welcome.

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To the young lady who came to the blog from the American Thinker article and asked if I was taken...

 Kindest miss,

Good lady, you make me blush furiously!

Sad to say, I am not taken.  But I would never stop thanking God if he did bring into my life some wonderful lass to court and woo and come to be joined in matrimony with.

Anyone wanting to inquire further can reach me by email at theknightshift@gmail.com

What I'm looking for in a lady is not much: someone who loves God more than she would love me, won't mind that I'm a Star Wars geek, loves to travel, and believes in ideas over ideologies.  Also must love dogs. I have a miniature dachshund.  Extra points if she enjoys the music of "Weird Al" Yankovic.

For the right person I'd be willing to relocate just about anywhere.

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New article at American Thinker: respect for a fraudulent president

American Thinker this morning published my latest article.  "Must We Respect a Fraudulent President" says what it means and means what it says: in light of the significant amount of evidence that chicanery most foul took place during the November 3rd election, how can anyone in Joseph Biden's position claim to have a mandate to be the leader of the free world?

Here's a clip:

The matter of unjust measures is brought up at least nine times in the Old Testament. “Divers weights are an abomination unto the Lord; and a false balance is not good,” reads Proverbs 20:23. Absent reverence for holy writings, it still is to be noted: the ballot box is sacred. To violate it is to breach the contract that countless Americans have fought and suffered and died for.

And so circumstance not seen for a century and more has come about. We are faced with someone who will be sworn in as President of the United States… but has not earned true authority.

As always, this blog and its eccentric master welcomes any and all newcomers.  And thank you for choosing to read my humble essay.  It means a lot to me :-)

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Look! Second article at American Thinker in 48 hours! Not kidding!

Just think: a few years later chunks of that wall were being sold at K-Mart. 

Friends, I have a secret to tell.  I've waited decades... decades... for the chance to use the word "perestroika" in a written piece.  Not even during college and my senior history thesis - about the Russian space program and how it had tracked with that country's politics since Nicholas II's reign - did "perestroika" get to be employed.

I guess "perestroika" on some weird level is for me, what "smock" was to Hobbes:

Credit: the peculiar genius of Bill Watterson

Anyway, the considerate curators of conservative-ish contemplation at American Thinker have published a second article from me in as many days, and I am extremely thankful for that.  "The Fall of the Deep State and 1989's Fall of Communism" relates some parallels between the events that transpired across Eastern Europe thirty years ago to our own "revolution".  Mainly, that the United States already had a political revolution in 2016, with the election of Trump sending a message to the entrenched system of Washington politics.  That's how it mostly went down in the fall of 1989 also: peacefully shaking off corrupt government throughout the Soviet Union's satellite states (the USSR itself would follow the same course two years later).  The so-called "resistance" symbolized by the "impeachment" however is almost like a slow-motion version of the counter-revolution in Romania that year.  And in case the kiddies need a history lesson...

That's the visage of Nicolae Ceausecu, a few minutes after he and his wife Elena were taken out back and shot.  On Christmas Day of 1989, no less.  He had tried to placate the people of Romania with goodies like higher wages and money to the college students.  Except the people of Bucharest had woken up feeling extra-pokey that morning, and they were justifiably angry at Ceausecu's lethal crackdown on the protests in Timiasora.

As you can see, having control of the media and throwing money at people didn't work quite as Ceausecu intended.

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New article at American Thinker: My six months at Amazon

The days after Thanksgiving once signaled training season for Christmas caroling. Recent years have instead heralded the shrieks of entire choruses of Maynard G. Krebs: “Work?!?”

The past few weeks have been no different and once again the squalls of disdain have almost invariably diffused from those tan arcologies of Internet commerce: the Amazon Fulfillment Centers.

Well, for a good chunk of the past year I was an associate in one of those very centers.  I am not employed or affiliated with Amazon at present and don't foresee that changing anytime soon.  Nobody from the company is paying me or giving me some kind of perk (and I'd refuse free Amazon Prime on general principles if Mr. Bezos himself extended the offer).  I’m not trying to curry favor and I don’t cotton to anyone.

But I would have done this anyway: provide a perspective that may differ wildly from what a lot of people have remarked about working in one of Amazon's distribution warehouses.

So all that being said, my first published article in over a year is up at American Thinker today.  "Six Months at an Amazon Fulfillment Center" says what it means and means what it says.  Half of a year on the floor, and I ended up being involved in everything from stowing merchandise to loading outbound trucks.  It also meant being there throughout the entire "Peak Season": Black Friday through Christmas Eve.

A snippet from the article:

My primary mission was stowing. It means pushing a cart of merchandise around the warehouse, finding bin space that a product can fit in, using a laser scanner on the bar codes and then physically moving the item into the bin. The facility’s inventory system was at all times tracking the associate’s rate of work as well as accuracy. Several times during the night the rates were posted so that each employee could see how he or she was faring. And as many who have written about working at Amazon have already noted, the managers are looking hard at those rates… 

My stowing during those first few weeks? Abysmal. In fact, I was the very worst of the lot from our orientation group. Getting fired would be a decision born within the circuitry of the Amazon master computer somewhere in Seattle, not any human judgment. My career came a few steps too close to ending during that first month or so.

What happened next? Did the rates rise? Or did your friend and humble narrator get a pink slip from the Amazon cluster-processoring mainframe thingy?!  Mash down here and find out!

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Chris addresses the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation and declares war against hate at Elon University... with his FIFTH article for American Thinker!

Hmmm... let's see...

This past week has seen the writing of my second-ever work of short story fiction (while stranded in a motel room along with Tammy the Pup during Hurricane Florence) after trying for decades to crack that art, work begun on a one-act play, finally started plotting a children's book(?!?). And now, it's article #5 written for American Thinker!

Has the Muse roared back from her exile, or what? For awhile I thought she had gone sailing off the cliff in a convertible accompanied by Dignity a'la Thelma and Louise, but anyhoo...

"There's Poisoning the Well, and Then There's Borking the Well" is my take on the Brett Kavanaugh nomination for the United States Supreme Court. However, that's just the peripheral matter of a way bigger issue: that for sake of partisan power there are some - and I'm looking at you in particular, Senator Feinstein - who are enthusiastically willing to trample upon a millennia of legal tradition in abandoning the rule of law. And when that is allowed to transpire, all of us as a people suffer its consequences.

From the article:

The machinations currently deployed against Brett Kavanaugh stem from a heart of darkest cowardice. If his detractors cannot prevail on purely rational and intellectual grounds, then they will do so playing to the basest hysteria and hate. There will be no satisfying their bloodlust until Kavanaugh's haggard, weary face is up on the telescreens, accusing himself of crimes against Big Sister that he never committed. So it is that the yet to be substantiated claims of Ford and Ramirez are now enough, we are told, to override fair and due process. Strangely, this principle never seemed applicable to Juanita Broaddrick, but I digress.

But... that's not all, folks! Because something else gets touched on in my new article and this one is much more personal.

It is this: that in the article I'm calling attention to the fact that Elon University - the college I could once be proud to call myself an alumnus of - is now harboring, employing and celebrating someone who has been taking an active part in the harassment of many innocent people, for no reason other than their holding to political beliefs she does not agree with.

Megan Squire, an Elon computer sciences professor, was revealed earlier this year to be an Antifa activist. She is, for all intents and purposes, an enabler of domestic terrorism.

Yeah, I said it. I went there. And from where I'm sitting it's plenty enough cause for myself and other alumni to withhold our contributions to Elon.

Again from the article:

The ol' alma mater already lost my contributions earlier this year – a consequence of Wired revealing that one of Elon's computer professors is Antifa activist who has been compiling a massive database of anyone she deems Lebensunwertes Leben.  That means "Republicans," "conservatives," "Alt-Right," "white supremacists," and pretty much everyone listing starboard of Friedrich Engels.

Megan Squire is not only still employed at Elon, but applauded.  Last week Squire delivered a "Distinguished Scholar Lecture" about her work supplying the Southern Poverty Law Center with information about their common enemies.  This is the same Southern Poverty Law Center whose "hate list" has been used to target innocent people for assassination.  Curiously, Squire's work is totally absent any analogues from the left of the political spectrum.  A "scholarly oversight," no doubt.

Once upon a time, Elon University was a place that encouraged freedom of ideas and vigorous debate. But as ideological homogeneity has prevailed upon "the most beautiful campus in America," that time is now past. The school that welcomed Margaret Thatcher to dedicate its student center in 1995 would probably have the Iron Lady arrested for trespassing were she still with us.

In good conscience, I can no longer contribute to a school that has embraced intellectual intolerance and has abandoned reason for capricious "feelings." Neither can I endorse my college when it continues to have among its staff a gleeful provider of resources for domestic terrorism. But still, I held out hope that sanity there might yet prevail.

As ever, in conveying my thoughts for publication I do my best to steer away from partisan labels and identity politics. As I told a colleague today: "I deal in ideas, not ideologies."

But regardless of where you're coming from on the political spectrum, I like to believe that very, very few of us are comfortable with the knowledge that anyone is being targetted for harassment, intimidation and much worse because of their opinions.


Does Megan Squire believe herself justified in painting her enemies in such broad strokes?  Is she a fitting representative of the Elon University community in doing so?

Regardless of whether she does, well... I've no other way to put this. At times I have encountered truly hate-filled people. Like neo-Nazis (got shot at by a gang of them) and the Westboro Baptist Church (had to spent several hours with them one hot summer night in a small television studio).

From where I'm sitting, there is not a shred of difference between the "God Hates Fags" idiots and Megan Squire. One just happens to have a computer science education and a better web page.  And also potentially has had her work lead to the injury of others if not worse.

When the objective is hatred, the semantics matter none. And there can be no excuse or justifying that hatred.


So, President Connie Ledoux Book and the trustees of Elon University: in keeping with the school's expressed beliefs in diversity of ideas and backgrounds and that the school should be a safe environment... when are you going to dismiss Dr. Megan Squire from the computer sciences department?

Because having a hate-filled extremist in your faculty, and one so enthusiastically applying her work toward damaging and destroying the lives of others, is the kind of thing that - not to put too fine a point on it - might dry up the alumni contributions. It sure has mine. Having seen some of Dr. Squire's Twitter account, I cannot understand how anyone's life can contain so much anger and hatred. Much less that of a Ph.D.

As far as Squire's work from a purely academic perspective is concerned: she may be brilliant at Python databases but the bias factor of the data itself is so irredeemably out of whack that it's utterly useless beyond a political agenda. Raw data is supposed to be neutral, impartial, agnostic... and Squire's methodology is a betrayal of all of that and more. In short: she is not a serious scholar. That alone would merit reconsidering her status as a member of the faculty.

Having such a malicious person intent upon causing grief to others certainly does not reflect well at all on whatever vestige of Christian values remain from the college's founding under the oaks in 1889.

Which is more important: the reputation and integrity of an institution that many of us still hold dear in our hearts and memories? Or protecting an enabler of domestic terrorism out of some passing fad of "resistance"?

So... "Long live Elon"?

What is it going to be?

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New article at American Thinker: "The Pursuit of Happiness in the Trump Economy" PLUS: Photos of my knife-making father!

To those of you arriving at my blog today from American Thinker, greetings!  And I have something to show y'all a bit further down.

Yup, my fourth article (so far) for American Thinker is published today.  "The Pursuit of Happiness in the Trump Economy" is some musing about how the biggest payoff from the decreased taxes and rebounding manufacturing is that more Americans are already enjoying more money and just as important more time for leisure activities.  Which can mean their families or their hobbies... or activities toward improving their circumstances.  And that is where the true progress of our culture comes from in great part.

And if you've read it already, you know how much I share about my late father, Robert Knight.  And how he found his true calling as a knifemaker.  Since he's written about so much in the piece, I thought it would be neat to share some photos of him and his handiwork...

Dad in his shop.
Smoking his pipe and contemplating
his next project

The knives Dad made from railroad spikes were his favorite to make.  Also the ones of his most in demand.  He also made knives from horseshoes and industrial ball bearings.  If it was metal, he found a way to make it malleable and given a good sharp edge. And made to look pretty darn elegant, too.

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Look! New article on American Thinker! Word you've never heard before within! Free toy inside!

Okay so truth be told, I lied about the free toy.  Maybe I was driven to madness by the bowl of Lucky Charms that I am currently enjoying.  Along with the orange juice and banana, everything that a growing boy... errrr, grown man(??) needs.  Anyhoo...

I am very grateful and honored that American Thinker, a commentary site that I have long admired and respected, has published the third article that I have written and submitted for their consideration.  "The Inthinkables" (I looked for that word on Google and couldn't find it already, honest) is about how too much of our society has yielded over its capacity for rational and critical thought and in its place has chosen an almost visceral and hair-trigger instinct toward reacting on the basis of "feelings" unfounded in logic and knowledge.

In short: too many aren't using the minds they were born with.  The rest of us are surrendering too much to them.  The real thinkers are being harassed from public venues and good people like John Schnatter are being driven from the very businesses they founded and nurtured through their own effort and initiative.

Excerpt!

Critical and rational thought is being vanquished.  In its place is a Randian horror of mental surrender.  Orwell described Eastasia's dominant philosophy as "death worship," better translated as "obliteration of the self."  I can conceive of no more fitting phrase.  The academic world and the realms of entertainment and media have nurtured and encouraged too many to offer their minds as sacrifice to convenience and their souls to mass approval.  Most have happily complied if they have been cognizant of having a choice at all. 

Nature abhors a vacuum, and so it is that the obligation for reason is abdicated for the intoxication of emotion.  At last, there is no logic whatsoever.  There is only an instinctive response to sounds and sights that seduce or offend.  For some, the condition may be irreversible. 

So kindly allow me to introduce a new word into the English lexicon: "inthinkable."

If you're on the fence about clicking on over to read it, the op-ed invokes Blazing Saddles and Pat Sajak.  Among other things.  But you'll just have to find out yourself.

"The Inthinkables", only at American Thinker.  Load your copy today!

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Got a new article up at American Thinker

"Frankenstein's Body Politic" is about something I've been pondering for some time: that the two major parties have each in their own way been self-destructing these past few years. Except in contrast to my prognostication four years ago, the Republicans have avoided that fate (for now), while the Democratic Party is coming apart in drastic fashion.

An excerpt from the article:

Strangely, the bicentennial of the novel Frankenstein is witnessing a practical demonstration of Shelley's tale of promethean horror. A mishmash assemblage, long on borrowed time, is ripping itself to shreds at the seams. We will never know what agonies might have erupted from the throat of Frankenstein's creation as it struggled to rise. But of the vaster Democratic Party and its fellow travelers in media and entertainment, the death throes prevail across our screens. Those silicon bindings may not be enough to contain the rising lust for wrath.

I am very grateful to and honored by American Thinker for their publishing my second op-ed piece in a month.  Here's the previous article: "The Revolution Will Not Be Finalized".

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My new op-ed piece is up at American Thinker (and about Star Wars and Kelly Marie Tran...)

The last time I wrote an op-ed for publishing other than on my own blog was more than ten years ago.  Certainly hasn't been for lack of wanting to.  This is a kind of writing that I first attempted on the cusp of my senior year of high school and it's a craft I devoted myself to developing further in college and beyond.  Then all of the general wackiness of the past decade transpired and that threw everything out of kilter.  Especially being able to engage all the gears required to really feel like I could be the writer that I needed to be to give this my very best.  And now, well... maybe this is an indication that the time for that has come at last.

American Thinker is a commentary site that I've come to appreciate and visit often, and I am very grateful that it has published "The Revolution Will Not Be Finalized".  An excerpt:

Social revolution has no such finite end.  The civil rights movement of the fifties and sixties was not a "social" revolution.  There was no grand upheaval of the common order – only an assertion of what had long been codified in American heart if not law: that all men are created equal.  It began with acts of conscience, and it ended with acts of conscience. 

There are many in our era who speak unceasingly of bringing about "social justice."  They never describe what a "socially justified culture" will look like.  Why should they want to?  Because for big-P Progressivism to be consistent, it must be progressing toward something.  To state conditions for victory?  That would be aborting Progressivism.  That is not part of the plan.

Maybe it's a persistent pattern in my life but this piece does begin with a bit about the state of the Star Wars "social justice" mess going on right now.  That's kind of what precipitated it being written to begin with.  Well, when one is asking the Muse for inspiration then one takes what one can get.  Anyhoo if you want to check it out here's that link again.

Speaking of Star Wars, I've been out of the loop on stuff the past several days but I did hear about what's been going on regarding Kelly Marie Tran.  "Star Wars fandom terrorist organization" is a phrase that I never imagined would telegraph across my synapses no matter how fevered and delirious they might get.  It was easy to sincerely wonder if it was for real or a satire or a covert "false flag operation".  But apparently it's real.  And if you hadn't heard already, the reports are that Tran unhooked herself from Instagram and maybe all the rest of her social media as a result of brutal harassment because some didn't like The Last Jedi or, more darkly, that they think she was cast to fill a "racial quota" or something.

How has this come about?  What has happened to us?  Star Wars fans have been divided on issues before but NEVER like this.  And it is not the result of the 2016 U.S. election (I may forever be shaking my head in disbelief that someone wrote that on a website devoted to this franchise).

I'll try to maintain brevity here.  Personally, I liked The Last Jedi including Tran's character Rose.  There have been a number of "Rose"-es in my life.  That conscientious young lady with spunk and tenacity and she holds everyone around her accountable to themselves whether they want it or not... or realize that they do want it.  There needs to be more like Rose in the real world.  She was a sweet character and Kelly Marie Tran played her wonderfully.

Reiterating what is in the essay on American Thinker, I do believe that Disney and especially Kathleen Kennedy have done a ginormous dis-service and act of destruction against the Star Wars brand by using it as a platform for their own ideologies as opposed to what it's supposed to be: a realm of ideas common to the human condition.  And in the past few days especially we are seeing the horrible fruits of that error in judgment... though obviously Kennedy and her associates are not the ones to be held responsible for the cyber-bullying against Tran.  That's strictly the fault of the "Legends losers" or whatever they're calling themselves.

That being said, I have not seen before and I do not see now how having the cast reflect a wider range of ethnic backgrounds is part of that at all.  Indeed, I wish there had been this much variety from the very beginning.  But George Lucas pretty much used what there was to work with on a then-limited budget and an available pool compromised of mostly classical English actors and American expatriates like Phil Brown and William Hootkins.  As far as I'm concerned, those are NOT "whites" or "blacks" or "Asians" or "Aleutian Islanders" or whatever in that galaxy far, far away.  Those are humans and whatever geography their ancestors hailed from is long forgotten about.  It shouldn't matter at ALL who plays the roles in these movies!  Just find whoever is right for the part and trust him or her to do his or her best.

Miss Tran, if you happen to read this, please know that you are a very lovely and talented young lady and that you provided much-appreciated shine and sparkle in The Last Jedi and I hope you have an even bigger role in Episode IX.  So far as I'm concerned, you weren't doing anything other than play a human of good character.  And that's something that none of these real-life trolls can ever claim to be.  Hope you come back, kind miss!

Okay, that's 'nuff for now.  It's Sunday morning.  Go back to sleep or eat your corn flakes and get ready for church or watch your re-runs of Land Of The Lost or whatever.  At least sometime today look at the outside world and hug your loved ones or just stop and smile and say hello to someone you've never met before.

Know what you believe.  Know why you believe it.  Know how to stand for it.  But also know that there's more to life than that.  We are as but a vapor.  Don't let a moment go by looking for reasons to be bitter and filled with rancor.

And to those discovering this blog: greetings!

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