presumptive
安倍総裁、選挙後初のポカです。時はすでに遅し、このうっかり発言は世界中を駆け巡りました。presumptiveは、an heir presumptive（「推定相続人）という小説（映画もあったかな?）でも知られるようになった表現で、もちろん時期首相を意味します。ヘンな言い方ですが、「相続する運命の人」を指すときに用いられます。今回のgaffeは可愛い方でしょうが、これからの日本の舵取りが不安になります。（UG）
Abe's first gaffe: Bush just called
Shinzo Abe, the presumptive prime minister, got his U.S. leaders mixed up Tuesday when he told business chiefs he had been speaking to "President Bush" after a phone call from Barack Obama.
The gaffe came in one of Abe's first speaking engagements since his Liberal Democratic Party won Sunday's Lower House election.
Abe, who was prime minister in 2006 and 2007 in the final years of George W. Bush's presidency, quickly realized his error when the assembled journalists and business leaders began chuckling.
The 58-year-old corrected his verbal misstep and told officials from Keidanren, the top business lobby, that he and Obama had agreed on the importance of the Japan-U.S. security alliance.
Abe is expected to be formally elected prime minister by fellow lawmakers on Dec. 26. Business chiefs had been kept waiting for Abe, who turned up around an hour late.
