In theory, I’m a professional writer.

In reality, I’m a published author of three non-fiction books and several novels (only one is currently for sale) that have received some decent reviews and even won a few awards, but my writing currently doesn’t generate enough income to even feed my dogs. Fortunately, I’m very stubborn and have quite a few more stories to tell, so I don’t let the current absence of book sales discourage me. The problem is that my goal is writing detective novels that produce income, yet I seem to spend much of my time writing nonfiction essays about religion, existential science, or politics.

My writing career sort of began by accident as my first book, Divine Evolution, later explained.  

When an (allegedly) brilliant academic explained on television that a computer was the product of an intelligent design but the human body was not, as a software developer with twenty years of experience producing applications that provided any sort of intelligence that an otherwise stupid, inanimate box contained, I instinctively knew his “academic” argument was utterly foolish. At the time I didn’t understand the foundation for his secular argument that every living organism on Earth is literally related by “descent with modification,” so I ended up spending months in the public library and producing over four hundred pages of detailed notes that ultimately evolved into my first (NOT self-) published book.

Once I realized I had become a professional writer, I decided that my dream of creating a stream of residual income that would make retirement more comfortable would be through writing detective novels, not nonfiction books with titles like Divine Evolution or Counterargument for God. And once I started having my work published, family and friends began to encourage me to keep my fiction and nonfiction work separate, and to hide my true identity as a conservative Christian to reduce the risk of alienating liberals or atheists who might otherwise purchase one of my novels or books.

The message was: Be timid. Be quiet. Don’t be yourself. Fear the liberal backlash. I must admit, thus far to some degree I believe my loved ones have a point.

I encourage readers to peruse what is by far the most scathing review my work has received to date, written by a college professor to whom I’ve given a free copy for discussion purposes.

After reading that brutal review, now please understand that in subsequent conversations and exchanges on social media, this professor revealed that he hadn’t actually read my book.

When the “good” professor asked me to explain a term that I’d devoted the first paragraph of the book to define, I must confess I lost my temper because I realized what he’d done. He’d cherrypicked what he could claim were stupid mistakes and amateurish errors about biology in a book that made references to scientific evidence in order to defend belief in a supernatural God. Naturally, every atheist who despises me for being a rather outspoken Christian on social media found the review “helpful,” making it the first review a potential buyer would see, and Amazon deleted all the other “five star” reviews that were generated by free copies given away during a promotion.

This is what we’re up against—Internet assassins and Amazon.

At times, it can get discouraging. Since I don’t even write books about politics, I’ve been concerned about drawing even more criticism to my professional work by expressing political opinions that might outrage liberals, especially since I seem to be doing enough damage to my career by pissing off the atheists.  

Recently on Facebook I posted a link to a satirical article by the Babylon Bee titled, “'We'll Take Good Care Of These,' Says Mitch McConnell While Placing Impeachment Articles In Special Rectangular Filing Bin” mostly because I thought it was funny.

It probably should have occurred to me that anything resembling a joke about impeachment would trigger my (humor-impaired) liberal friends on social media, and sure enough, it drew this reaction:

John, you're a good person. Do you honestly think Trump is a decent and ethical man? Are you willing to sacrifice your integrity to get some partisan traction? The democratic candidates are not great. But I believe we could get a good republican president if the party realized it's errors and decided to not support the incumbent. 

To which I replied:

You've never met me. How can you possibly say I'm a good person? What you're doing is actually patronizing me in the attempt to manipulate my thinking, as the Christianity Today and Christian Post editors seem to be doing. And you're assuming that I'm a gullible fool while trying to pretend you see me as an intellectual equal, or something. Are you willing to sacrifice the illusion of your intellectual (and presumably moral) superiority to fully engage in this conversation? That's what it will take, before I'm done. I'll let you consider whether you want to proceed, after I give unusually terse (for me) answers to your specific questions.

Do you honestly think Trump is a decent and ethical man? 

You don't know me, and I don't know Donald Trump. But I do know that morality was never the issue when the candidate was Bill Clinton, and if Donald Trump had lost the last election, who would be in the WH today? Bill and Hillary Clinton. Was DT the lesser of two evils? Is that even a serious question? If Trump is immoral, Bill Clinton was the epitome of immorality. BC was a friend of Jeffrey Epstein, and DT was not. So, attacking Trump on moral grounds is a non-starter, in my opinion. I voted for every "more ethical" Republican in the primaries last time around, and nobody else is winning. 

Not to mention, how I vote is really none of your business.

Are you willing to sacrifice your integrity to get some partisan traction? 

Hmmm. Do I support the candidate of a political party that currently supports not only abortion but pushes to legalize infanticide, and the party who literally voted to have any mention of "God" removed from them, or Donald Trump, who is by every media account, a moral reprobate. Frankly (no pun intended) I'm mildly surprised that anyone would try to use the issue of personal integrity to decide how we vote.

No, I'm not voting for Persia or the followers of Moloch.

Naturally, that wasn’t the end of the issue for the Trump haters. Inspired to more actively defend President Trump against his critics on my social media page, I posted a link to a more serious article from American Thinker written by J.B. Shurk titled, “What do Democrats fear in Donald Trump? Greatness” and made sure to highlight one especially powerful paragraph:

The world has noticed.  It is Donald Trump to whom Nigerian Christians turn for survival from Islamic terror.  It is Donald Trump who has strengthened Israel by keeping promises his predecessors lacked the fortitude to see through.  It is Donald Trump whose name is often whispered by freedom-fighters in Venezuela, whose American flag is respected by regime protesters in Iran, and whose image is waved by thousands demanding freedom in Hong Kong.  Nobody clamoring for freedom is waving pictures of Angela Merkel in the air, but in Hong Kong and Taiwan, a photoshopped image of Donald Trump as Rocky Balboa is easy to find.  At a time when the German chancellor argues for limiting free expression, those people most desperate to escape China's yoke see the American president as the only fighter who might help set them free.  He is our American president, but he belongs to the world now, too.

That triggered a second liberal friend who described President Trump as a “gutless turd” and an epic snowflake” as well as a “weak man child” with a fragile ego, all on my Facebook page.

My response to that disgusting diatribe was more pointed:

 I'm sure I said Bill Clinton was an adulterer and disgrace to the office of President, but I wouldn't have called him a gutless turd. Nor Obama, even if I thought it. We've been friends on social media for quite a while. It would be a real shame for it to end because of Trump, but there's only so much disrespect I'm willing to tolerate being shown to OUR President on my Facebook wall. Fragile ego? Are you serious? You're a very talented artist, but not so clever when it comes to politics, I'm afraid. When Obama didn't like one reporter, he had the FBI spy on the guy and get his phone records (James Rosen). Sheryl Attkisson had her computer hacked by the Obama DOJ. He wouldn't have lasted a week against the same effort he helped orchestrate against Trump.

Enough is enough. President Trump deserves a lot of credit for his efforts and my unwavering support despite any risk that might be posed to my professional career. If Robert DeNiro can viciously attack our president every time he steps in front of a microphone, I can certainly defend him to the best of my ability, as long as there is breath in my body.

Quite frankly, I’d rather be flipping burgers or cooking fries in a world run by Donald Trump than I’d like to be a bestselling author in a (divided) U.S. run by Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren. From this point forward, I shall not go gentle into that good night…I shall now rage and rage against the dying of the light. So help me God.

John Leonard writes novels, books, and occasional articles or blogs for American Thinker. You may follow him on Facebook or his website (and blog, which includes the AT “rejected” pieces) at southernprose.com.