‘Mugwumps‘ are in the news today, after Boris Johnson used the term to describe Jeremy Corbyn. In the 2 October 1959 issue of The Spectator, Evelyn Waugh also used the term, when he wrote a piece entitled ‘Aspirations of a Mugwump’:
I hope to see the Conservative Party return with a substantial majority. I have bitter memories of the Attlee-Cripps regime when the kingdom seemed to be under enemy occupation. I recognise that individually some of the Liberal candidates are more worthy than many of the Conservatives, but any advantage to them can only produce deplorable instability. I have met, seen or heard very few leading politicians; of those I know the Conservatives seem altogether more competent than their opponents.
I have never voted in a parliamentary election.
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