Comments on: Torture of a different kind

By: rdb

rdb — Sun, 16 May 2004 14:39:27 +0000

Given the rules of the drinking game, did Turkey choose to be punish members of the coalition of the willing by choosing a Leonard Nimoy lookalike as a presenter? Did Tom Baker’s Doctor Who have a big Ukrainian following?

By: WJ Phillips

WJ Phillips — Sun, 16 May 2004 12:57:30 +0000

More hilariously rigged than ever: all the little Balkan states scratching each other’s backs, ditto Scandinavia, Germany giving Turkey max points, Greece-Cyprus, etc etc. Not to mention Britain buying its way into the final despite scoring zero last time. In short, a true cartoon of all “Euro” institutions: side deals, corruption, tails wagging dogs with Andorra voting at the same strength as Germany (why not just count the actual televotes?), grandiose sentiments being expressed through bad, outdated pop art, rampant mediocrity and worse tarted up with glitz… and hollow laughter, indifference or disgust from the “electorate” at home. At least Italy, the land of bel canto, has the taste to stay out of the Contest. How cross that must make Romano Prodi, the most headbanging federast of all.

By: John Isbell

John Isbell — Sat, 15 May 2004 15:38:34 +0000

I refuse to knock an event which brought us Israel’s “I Wanna Be A Polar Bear.”

By: Dan

Dan — Sat, 15 May 2004 00:32:11 +0000

Jason, do you have a citation—or even a vague memory where that comes from? It doesn’t strike me as intuitively obvious… I’d kind of expect, for example, the coasts to all bundle up together; for Austin to go hang out with San Francisco and New York and LA; and so on. I do agree that they would kind of casually cluster after a while

By: Nat Whilk

Nat Whilk — Fri, 14 May 2004 18:10:14 +0000

"Can’t help wondering what song . . . Bin Laden might enter" Mike Scott's "Malediction".

By: Rod

Rod — Fri, 14 May 2004 13:31:41 +0000

In the aftermath of last year’s ‘nul points’ debacle, there was a lot of discussion about the effect of UK support for the war. On reflection though, Gemini were just rubbish. Apparently, this year one of the entrants (I forget which) will include live wolves on stage during their act. Surely this could be incorporated into a drinking game…

By: kew

kew — Fri, 14 May 2004 04:43:32 +0000

Can’t help wondering what song the Iraqis or Bin Laden might enter: “Waterloo”

By: John Quiggin

John Quiggin — Fri, 14 May 2004 03:57:53 +0000

“Torture of a different kind” What Eurovision does to the viewers or what you’ve done to the data ?

By: Dan Drezner

Dan Drezner — Fri, 14 May 2004 02:54:29 +0000

But it was such an interesting correlation coefficient… Sniff.

By: Barry

Barry — Fri, 14 May 2004 02:16:06 +0000

“But also responsible for Michael Flatley and ‘Riverdance’, for which the Irish hosts have been saying Hail Marys in contrition ever since. Oh, and Celine Dion, representing Switzerland in 1998.” Posted by nick at May 13, 2004 11:22 PM Hey – there were seventeen invasions of the Earth called off by aliens who didn’t want to even orbit a planet which riverdance infested. So Ireland has done it’s part to save humanity.

By: Jason Kuznicki

Jason Kuznicki — Fri, 14 May 2004 01:35:08 +0000

I recall reading somewhere a long time ago that if you took several hundred people from the United States and put them in a large room together with no directions, they would show a strong tendency to self-sort into a map of the United States. There would be some reversals, inconsistencies, and the like, but still the sort would be far too much to be coincidental. It might be worth looking into this if you wanted to take the question any further.

By: djw

djw — Fri, 14 May 2004 00:48:39 +0000

The impact of telephone polling has resulted in some interesting networks, and no small amount of organized telephone campaigns. Watch in particular for the network Turkey-Germany-Spain. The large Turkish population in Germany, as well as the Teutonophile population in Turkey could well result in an exchange of first-place votes, and large numbers of portable-phone carrying German tourists in Spain may once again be organized to support the German entry, composed by the popular German television host Stefan Raab.

By: Nick B

Nick B — Thu, 13 May 2004 23:43:56 +0000

Ireland generally sends the worst we have to offer, but we went through a period of being unable to lose the damn thing for years at a time. Which, of course, had a greater benefit for humanity in leading to the 'My Lovely Horse' episode of Father Ted. I've got a post on Fistful of Euros about this as well (never let it be said that we ignore the really important European issues) and, as I noted there, while many countries really don't want to stage it, others are desperate to win, having realised that it gives them the chance to spend three or more hours telling the rest of Europe how wonderful they are. Hence the general joy of Estonia, Latvia and Turkey at winning the last three contests. It was pointed out in the comments that Estonia appointed a Cabinet-level Minister to take charge of the Eurovision arrangements, it being the largest event they've ever staged.

By: nick

nick — Thu, 13 May 2004 23:22:18 +0000

OK, how do we watch on the internet and simultaneously get your greatest countryman’s commentary (without which the whole thing is pointless)? It looks as if the BBC website will give you the choice of having Mr Wogan or Mr Bruce streamed into your homes. (At least, they’d better.) So buy yourself another computer, hope that the time delays sync up, and you’re there… Come on, isn’t this the competition which brought the blessings of ‘Abba’ to the world? Ahh, sweet memories… But also responsible for Michael Flatley and ‘Riverdance’, for which the Irish hosts have been saying Hail Marys in contrition ever since. Oh, and Celine Dion, representing Switzerland in 1998. Now. Which drinking games do you use? Ones built around Wogan’s commentary and the ineptitude of the performers/presenters/interval act.

By: Barry

Barry — Thu, 13 May 2004 21:10:33 +0000

Come on, isn’t this the competition which brought the blessings of ‘Abba’ to the world? Ahh, sweet memories…..