scarecrow
n.— «The NYPD is using unmanned police cars on major highways as a deterrent to speeders, the Daily News has learned. The vacant vehicles—derisively referred to as scarecrows by some cops—were blasted by the city’s police union chief as a “symptom of drastic short-staffing.”» —“ Brass grasp at straw” by William Sherman New York Daily News (New York City) Apr. 30, 2007. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Asthenosphere, a geologist’s term for the molten layer beneath the earth’s crust, sparks a journey that stretches all the way from ancient Greece to the author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Plus: What the heck is a dogberg? It’s when...
In 1971, when a new public library opened in Troy, Michigan, famous authors and artists were invited to write letters to the city’s youngest readers, extolling the many benefits of libraries. One of the loveliest was from E.B. White, author of...