Cartoon : Fall Colors

Cartoon by Joe Heller of the The Green Bay Press-Gazette (Wisconsin) published 16 October 2009.

- If you say that you are tickled pink, you are very pleased or entertained. I was tickled pink to have you visit us. We were tickled pink when your flowers arrived.

- If your anger or other emotion is white-hot, this means it is marked by very exceedingly strong feelings and enthusiasm. a fierce, white-hot loyalty to the king. See other examples HERE

- A scarlet woman is an expression that comes from the novel A Scarlet Letter by Nathanial Hawthorne, where a woman in 17th century Puritan Massachusetts who had committed adultery was forced to wear a scarlet-colored letter “A” on her clothes to mark her sin. A scarlet woman is an archaic term for a woman who is unfaithful or has a lot of sex with men; it also refers to a prostitute. Here the cartoonist is making fun of how Republicans view Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine because she was the only Republican to vote in favor of the Democrat health care bill that came out of the Senate Finance Committee and is therefore considered to be unfaithful to the Republican Party.

- A blue dog is an American political name given to moderate-to-conservative Democrats committed to financial and national security, favoring compromise and bipartisanship over ideology and party discipline. In 2006, many Blue Dog Democrats were elected in conservative-leaning districts ending the Republican majority in the House of Representatives.

- A red herring is a piece of information or suggestion introduced to draw attention away from the real facts of a situation. (A red herring is a type of strong-smelling smoked fish that was once drawn across the trail of a scent to mislead hunting dogs and put them off the scent.) The detectives were following a red herring, but they're on the right track now. The mystery novel has a couple of red herrings that keep readers off guard.

- If you are black and blue, this means you are covered in bruises caused by being hit. In the cartoon, the cartoonist wants to say that the health care fight is living the consumer black and blue. He’d been beaten black and blue by a street gang.