#Winners and #Losers: IKEA'nt Believe It's Not Swedish

The Week in Telegram Shutdowns

Winner: Russia—protests erupted this week in Moscow over the Kremlin’s recent (and bungled) attempt to shut down the encrypted messaging service Telegram, with people taking to the streets and shouting “down with the czar!” It was all for naught—as of this writing, Vladimir Putin is still in power and preparing for his inauguration next week. #ItsGoodToBeTheCzar

Loser: Iran—by most accounts, Iran’s shutdown of Telegram went much better than Russia’s, and with minimal public outcry. But given that Iran’s reformist president Hassan Rouhani campaigned against the shutdown, it’s a troubling sign of things to come between Rouhani and the country’s hardliners. #MakeDealsNotWar

The Week in Misappropriating Cultures

Winner: Turkey—Sweden’s official twitter account admits this week that Swedish meatballs are actually Turkish. This might be the most significant concession Turkey is going to get from Europe all year. #TurkishDelight

Loser: P.C. culture—A girl going to prom in Utah picked out a pretty dress in a Chinese-style, and got raked over the coals for it by the internet. She wasn’t disrespecting Asian culture, she was honoring it; kind of the whole point of globalization, no? #DressingDown

The Week in Trump-Related Fires

Winner: Azerbaijan—A former Trump-branded high-rise in Azerbaijan caught fire this week; thankfully, the name had been changed, or else we’d have an international incident on our hands. #BulletDodged

Loser: Fox—Fox keeps inviting Trump and his people on, and they keep shooting themselves in the foot while Fox anchors helplessly look on. At some point, Fox will need to realize that Trump’s own worst enemy is himself. #WithFoxAndFriendsLikeThese

The Week in Getting Caught in The Middle

Winner: Paul Manafort—revealed this week that Ukraine has stopped cooperating with the Mueller investigation because they need anti-tank missiles from the US. #SavedByTheRussians

Loser: Taiwan—the Dominican Republic buckles and rescinds its diplomatic ties to Taiwan, leaving it with just 19 diplomatic allies. And all it cost China was $3.1 billion. #ChumpChange

The Week in Nobel Prizes

Winner: South Korean President Moon Jae-In—when the widow of a late South Korean president messaged Moon that he should get a Nobel prize for his efforts to bring peace to the Korean peninsula, Moon smartly deflected and said Trump should get the award. Moon came to play, people. #EyesOnThePrize

Loser: The Swedish Academy—I thought they hit their nadir when they awarded the prize to “author” Bob Dylan a couple years ago. I had no idea how much lower they could go, as a continuing sex abuse scandal forces them to cancel the prize this year. #DontThinkTwiceItsNotRight

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Ian Bremmer is president of Eurasia Group, foreign affairs columnist at TIME and Global Research Professor at New York University. You can follow him on Twitter and Facebook.