knife.rb is ignored

[kplimack]

Unless I specify that I want chef/debian-7:latest when i knife container docker init...., it uses the default ubuntu image. the berksfile source is also ignored. this is what i've got in my knife.rb

# Docker
knife[:docker_image] = 'chef/debian-7:latest'
# Berkshelf
knife[:berksfile_source] = 'https://berkshelf.myorg.com'

[kplimack]

╰─➤  knife config -a    
availability_zone:       us-east-1d
aws_access_key_id:       balls
aws_secret_access_key:   balls
aws_ssh_key_id:          Jake-Work-iMac
berkshelf_source:        https://berkshelf.derpderp.com
chef_repo_path:          .
chef_server_url:         https://chef.derpderp.com:443
client_key:              /Users/eulipion/.chef/jplimack.pem
color:                   true
config_file:             /Users/eulipion/.chef/knife.rb
cookbook_copyright:      Jake Plimack Photography, LLC
cookbook_email:          jake.plimack@gmail.com
cookbook_path:           ~/chef/cookbooks
cookook_license:         apachev2
docker_image:            chef/debian-7:latest
dockerfiles_path:        /Users/eulipion/.chef/cookbooks/dockerfiles
driver:                  fog:AWS
flavor:                  m1.medium
image:                   ami-asdasdf
log_level:               error
log_location:            #<IO:0x007fa6540babd8>
node_name:               jplimack
region:                  us-east-1
secret_file:             ~/.chef/encrypted_data_bag_secret
subnet:                  subnet=asdfasdf
syntax_check_cache_path: ~/.chef/syntax_check_cache
validation_client_name:  chef-validator
validation_key:          /Users/eulipion/.chef/chef-validator.pem
verbosity: