thick blue line
n.— «A new report from the national police academy points to such a lack of intellectual rigour among new recruits that the force is now unflatteringly being referred to as New Zealand’s “thick blue line.”» —“NZ police labelled ‘thick blue line’” by Peter Lewis in New Zealand ABC News (Australia) June 27, 2007. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Barbara Kingsolver’s book Demon Copperhead is a retelling of Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield set in today’s Appalachia. Martha shares memories of a long-ago visit to Kingsolver’s family farm in Virginia, where they...
Mark in Scranton, Pennsylvania, calls about a phrase he heard on an old detective show: drop a dime. It means “to inform on someone” or “tip off the police,” and comes from the practice of literally dropping a dime into a...