Rex: If councilmen can’t follow can they lead?

One of the strangest votes since this version of Metro Council was voted into office in 2007 took place at the Sept. 15 Council meeting.

That’s when Councilman Sam Coleman publicly lauded his alternate nondiscrimination bill as “more comprehensive” than the one pushed by Councilwoman Megan Barry. Rex could almost see the words ‘new and improved’ stamped on the resolution.

Coleman then proceeded to vote against the other, ‘less’ comprehensive bill, even though after being amended by Councilman Erik Cole, it listed the same two items — sexual orientation and gender identity — as protected classes.

Rex wonders: How can you be against a comprehensive bill, but then for one that only makes it better?

And Coleman wasn’t alone in causing this quandary.

Councilmen Charlie Tygard and Duane Dominy also voted for the more comprehensive bill and against the nondiscrimination ordinance, which was passed into law.

At least Councilman Phil Claiborne understood what was what. He voted against the alternative nondiscrimination ordinance …even though he was one of the bill’s primary sponsors.


Stay home and see ‘Friday Night Lights’

Rex couldn’t help but be bemused by the would-be theatergoer who was not allowed into a performance of Wicked at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center without a ticket.

Oh, she had a ticket for herself. It was her 12-week-old baby that was stubless.

Here’s where it gets a bit dicey for ol’ Rexy. It appears that TPAC folks wanted the new mom to buy a pricey ticket for the baby, although it’s seemingly more likely that ticket or not, nobody in the theater would have wanted a 12-week-old drooling on their programs or spitting up on their best sports coat.

Now this mom wrote to The City Paper, contending she was wrongly denied admittance, adding “many people are upset about this” besides her.

Rex thinks there are many more people quite happy about it.

First, the theater isn’t really a place for a newborn. Here, the dimming of house lights, not pacifiers, gets folks quiet. Noise is steadfastly discouraged.

Rex has been on many a plane flight where infants — without tickets and fastened to laps — turn a routine hop to Chi-town into Nightmare at 20,000 Feet. Talk about wicked!

Second, when parenthood strikes, the curtain falls on youth. A 7:30 p.m. performance of the loud and somewhat spicy Wicked is no place to drag an infant anyway. Rex has been quite perturbed seeing little ones at rock concerts and, even worse, after hours in a Wal-mart.

So next time Mom, grab a TV remote, click your heels and chant ‘There’s no place like home.’


Councilwoman pulls a Kanye

Facing a recall election to keep her District 5 Metro Council seat, Rex really believes that Pam Murray needs all the extra attention she can get.

That must be why, when Council was honoring the 100th birthday of the NAACP at its last meeting, Murray inexplicably bumped area Chapter President Marilyn Robinson away from the podium and gave a weird speech about the NAACP making her what she is today.

It didn’t help Kanye West when he snatched the microphone from Taylor Swift, and, if you ask Rex, the camera grab didn’t help Murray any either. It did make for equally uncomfortable television though.


Emotions flow equally on both sides of the stream

On a more serious note — but not too; Rex doesn’t do too serious — there was a spontaneous touching moment at the end of Tuesday’s Council meeting.

Eric Crafton has been roundly vilified across the county for his stand on English Only and other controversial issues. But the veteran councilman revealed a softer side at one point in the proceedings.

Fellow Councilman Mike Jameson’s memorializing resolution asking Metro departments to change their moniker to Nashville (i.e. the Nashville Water Department, instead of the Metro Water Department) was about to be read, when Crafton stood up to speak.

Jameson had pursued the resolution in honor of his mom, who always disliked the city’s government being called ‘Metro’ instead of Nashville.

Unprompted, Crafton requested a moment of silence to honor Jameson’s mother, who passed away just the week before. During the moment of silence, Crafton became choked up and cried a few tears. Jameson choked backed tears as well.

Despite the distance between them politically, the two elected officials bonded in that moment before the meeting resumed.

Rex believes what’s fair is fair, and even though Crafton has been the target of more than a few jokes in this space, the man deserved credit for the classy move.

Now who doesn’t want to call their momma to say ‘I love you.’