George W Bush once famously said, or mis-said: “They misunderestimated me”. Bushisms are easy to mock, but I agree with the novelist Philip Hensher that this time Dubya actually gave us a useful new word: meaning to mistakenly underestimate.
In that sense, perhaps no one in modern times has been so badly misunderestimated as Kim Jong Un. We all – me included – read him dead wrong, as recent events have amply proved.
George W Bush once famously said, or mis-said: “They misunderestimated me”. Bushisms are easy to mock, but I agree with the novelist Philip Hensher that this time Dubya actually gave us a useful new word: meaning to mistakenly underestimate.
In that sense, perhaps no one in modern times has been so badly misunderestimated as Kim Jong Un. We all – me included – read him dead wrong, as recent events have amply proved.
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