When Politics Get Personal: Politicians’ Most Insulting Slurs & Feuds

Nothing’s Worse Than Being Called A “Mutton-Headed Old Mugwump”

In 2017, U.K. foreign minister Boris Johnson called opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn a “mutton-headed old mugwump.” We give him credit for his creativity. But this phrase confused a lot of Americans, who had no idea what the word “mugwump” meant. It actually has its roots in America and is a Native American term from Massachusetts that means “war leader.” It’s been jokingly used to describe someone who is a bit finicky. One particularly funny 1930s humorist defined the word mugwump as “a bird who sits with its mug on one side of the fence and its wump on the other.”