Friday, February 20, 2009

Putin' on the Politics

EDU expected Georgia to blackban this year's contest in Russia, after they decided to taunt the lion from the wrong side of the zoo cage (in the military sense). We were non-plussed when they announced they would withdraw from Moscow 2009. We were kind of surprised they re-entered only a few weeks later.

Now it becomes clearer. It is hard to flip the bird on an international level if your country's only international relations are at Eurovision. So, EDU is delighted to hear Georgia is sending Stefane & 3G to Moscow with the song '(We Don't Wanna) Put In.' Opting against more challenging puns on the name Medvedev, the Georgians swear the song is not a swipe at Vladimir Putin. Which is a good thing... we're not sure the same rules apply to singers as they do to journalists - but we hope Stefane & co have better exit strategy for Moscow than Saakashvili did.