Author Archive for Bill Knight

Eighty years ago next month, theaters premiered “Walt Disney’s Academy Award Revue,” a May 19, 1937, release including the Oscar-winning shorts “Flowers and Trees,” “The Country Cousin,” “Three Little Pigs,” “The Three Orphan Kittens” and “The Tortoise and the Hare”…

Protesting factory farms 

BY BILL KNIGHT Karen Hudson has had brushes with fame – and the law – but days after the 20th anniversary of her increased involvement with sustainable agriculture, the 61-year-old Peoria County resident stresses that she’s an everyday person and…

Few people reside on their ancestral land; few live where they believe their religious faith originally preferred. If they did, more Mormons would populate Illinois, and a lot more Native Americans would demand a return of property throughout the state…

As the nation prepares to cope with a Donald Trump administration that’s nominating a Ku Klux Klan sympathizer as Attorney General (Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions), it’s wise to recall recent history so that it’s not repeated – and to…

Nutty nattering about a “War on Christmas” should emerge anytime, the argument that everyday greetings such as “Happy holidays!” somehow diminish Christmas (implying it’s acceptable to ignore December’s holidays of Hanukkah (Judaism), Mawlid (Islam), Omisoka (Japanese New Year’s Eve), Kwanzaa…

Evangelicals haven’t really rallied around Trump In the next few weeks, many Americans will give thanks, and the fact that the election will be over will be a blessing to most of us – few more so than Evangelical Christians,…

The popularity of “Sesame Street” isn’t debatable. Still, when Bradley University’s former debate coach writes about the long-running program, one might expect persuasion, syllogistic reasoning, and rhetoric. Instead, Gary Dreibelbis in the new “Gospel According to Sesame Street” focuses on…

Justice delayed can be justice denied, and words matter As the Illinois State Fair wound down on Aug. 18, a libel suit linked to the fair and Central Illinois’ current and former Congressmen was about as active as a beer…