#Winners and #Losers: Orwell Redux

The Week in Politics on Planes

Winner: United Airlines—announced this week it’s donating flights to help reunite families separated at the border by Trump immigration policy. Almost makes you forget about the whole dragging-bloodied-passengers-off-planes thing. #Almost 

Loser: Swedish student activist Elin Ersson—to prevent the deportation of an Afghan man seeking asylum in Sweden, the social work student refused to sit down on a flight from Gothenburg to Istanbul to prevent it taking off, and livestreamed the whole thing from her phone. She succeeded in getting the man removed from the flight… but Swedish authorities say he’s getting deported anyway. And while Ersson’s heart was in the right place, she’s now liable to face fines or jail time for disobeying a pilot’s instructions. #FightAndFlight 

The Week in Currency Troubles

Winner: Zimbabwe—after years of economic mismanagement, the African nation gave up its own currency in February 2009. Nearly a decade later, it still doesn’t have one, which is turning into a major election issue. On the plus side, elections next week will be the first ones since 1980 not to feature Robert Mugabe as a candidate, so that’s something. #CanYouSpareSomeChange

Loser: Venezuela—the IMF announced this week that it expects the country’s inflation rate to top 1 million percent this year. Meanwhile, Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro also announced this week that the country will print new currency (which will be called the “Sovereign Bolivar”) with 5 fewer zeros and will link it to the Petro cryptocurrency. Problem solved, then. #CurrencyCryptonite  

The Week in Orwellian Nonsense

Winner: China—remember when White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders called Beijing’s demand that American airlines stop listing Taiwan as separate from China on their websites “Orwellian nonsense?” Because American Airlines, Delta and United capitulated to that demand just this week. #ChinaWonHuckZero 

Loser: The US—at a speech this week to the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention, Trump told listeners that when it comes to news reports, “What you’re seeing and what you’re reading is not what’s happening.” Social media had a field day with the line, comparing it to Orwell’s famed line: “The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” #PartyLikeIts1984

The Week in Bounties

Winner: EU—realizing that an appeal to humanity, law and order and common European values just wasn’t cutting it, the European Commission this week offered €6,000 to each European member state that takes in a migrant. #CommonCents

Loser: Sombra the dog—a Colombian drug-sniffing dog is so good at her job that gangs have now put a $70,000 price on her head. #RuffStuff #DontHateThePlaya 

Be sure to sign up for Signal, arriving in your inbox first thing every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday morning: gzeromedia.com

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.