Confederacy of Dunces
Weed be goneWarning: If you’re going to grow copious amounts of marijuana, don’t do it across the street from an elementary school. Also, try not to piss off anyone who’s likely to rat you out. Unfortunately for Ari S. Williams, this advice comes after Metro police received an anonymous tip leading them to a large-scale grow operation in the suspect’s Hillsboro Village home, located across the street from Eakin Elementary School. Undercover officers searched the residence at 2505 Fairfax Ave. and found the mother lode of marijuana, including 228 plants, an intricate indoor lighting system and seven pounds of pot ready to be sold. Although there’s no indication the 36-year-old suspect was peddling his product to kiddies, he faces enhanced charges for his unfortunate proximity to hundreds of children. Because Williams was not home at the time of the raid, he was not immediately arrested, although on Monday police said, “Detectives have received word that he intends to surrender.”
Walker, Nashville RangerJust when we thought things couldn’t get much worse on The Tennessean’s website, what with the kitten slideshows and hordes of moms talking about junior’s loose stool, comes blogger Jack Walker in the “Community Opinions” section. It’s fine by us if Walker wants to share his insight on vaginal yeast infections (a riveting post, we assure you). But last week’s piece about the alleged rape of a 14-year-old girl on a Rutherford County school bus is where we draw the line. Walker didn’t find any injustice in the report of a student enduring a 15-minute sexual assault on her ride home—or that videotape shows that no one stopped the 18-year-old suspect, even though the girl repeatedly cried for help. Murfreesboro police called the video footage of the incident, which shows the boy trapping the girl inside her seat and rubbing his hands all over her body and putting his hands down her pants, shocking and disturbing. But Walker says the real “SHAME” (his emphasis) is how the boy has been treated after the incident. He rants about how the media protected the victim’s identity yet reported the boy’s name. And he’s peeved that the boy was arrested and kicked out of school and that the incident was categorized as rape. But the clincher comes in the comments section, where Walker asks, “Still what did the girl say to the boy that led him to think he could act that way?” The real question is why Walker has so much beef with a girl who says she was raped on a school bus—and why The Tennessean didn’t yank Walker’s post.
Party pooperState Rep. Dolores Gresham has a little to learn before becoming an effective legislator. Lobbying a House subcommittee for her resolution to strip abortion rights from the state constitution, she referred to being “pro-life or pro-death.” That’s the way to win friends. Before that, the Somerville Republican caused a flap by refusing to let pro-life Democrat Rep. Nathan Vaughn sign on as a sponsor. In fact, according to Vaughn, when he tried to sign the resolution, Gresham snatched it right out of his hand. That gave Democrats new ammo for their claims that Republicans were bringing up the issue only as an election-year stunt. On a party-line vote, the subcommittee killed Gresham’s resolution, which had been approved by the Senate.
