The Seahawks basically destroyed the Patriots to claim their second Super Bowl. Now comes the big question: Will the team visit the White House? Back in 2014, they made the trip and celebrated with the then president Barack Obama. But things are very different now. Trump is violently attacking cities and not even trying to hide his racism. The Seahawks have a lot Black players and the city it represents is considered a “Welcoming City.” How can this work out? Rumours recently circulated that the team had declined the standard invitation, but it’s now reported that the whole business is still very much up in the air. Also not verified is the rumor that the Seahawks haven’t received an invitation from Trump’s White House. Maybe both sides just want to keep their mouths shut and let this difficult matter quietly pass like two ships in the night.
Yesterday, at around 4:45 pm, we at the Stranger’s office saw through the windows something that had the likeness of snow. Was it the real stuff or not? We couldn’t tell. Maybe this was a collective hallucination. Today, expect a low of 31, a mostly cloudy morning, some rain in the afternoon, and, yet again, no snow.
KIRO Radio is popping the champagne because Seattle’s noble attempt to improve the labor standards of hyper-exploited gig workers has apparently backfired. Drivers are now earning “20 cents less per hour than before.” They blamed this drop on Seattle leaders who apparently have no contact with reality, with capitalist reality. And what the captains of this mode of accumulation never stop telling us is this: Labor rights and rising wages are the sole cause of rising costs and immiseration of the poor. Any other explanation is, according to them, not realistic. It’s just labor’s demand for more and more that’s the root of all evil, they say.
A quick thing about a book I’m currently reading. It’s called Capitalism: A Global History. It’s by German-born economist and historian Sven Beckert. It’s 1344 pages. I’m near page 900. But what I’ve learned from this book is that the natural rate for wages in capitalism is zero. And the rise of wages is, essentially, nothing but the resistance by labor to this natural tendency. Beckert doesn’t exactly say this, but he does make it clear that a capitalism without any regulation must lead to its form of slavery, which is the commodification of the body. Wages above zero result in the commodification of labor power. I will stop there and now turn to the robots of the 21st century.
The best story I’ve heard in a minute is that Waymo, which is basically Uber without drivers, is turning to gig workers, such as those who work for DoorDash, to close car doors left open by flakey or crafty customers. And how much does Waymo pay for what can only be called the human touch? $11.25. So the zero wage robot is not yet up to snuff.
Now, let’s turn to something that should really alarm Seattle’s leaders. Operation Metro Surge not only brought death, state-sanctioned lawbreaking, and general mayhem to Minneapolis; it also delivered a big blow to the city’s economy. The estimated cost so far of an operation that began on the first day of the present year and had nothing to do with protecting Americans from the “worst of the worst” is $203.1 million. The bulk of this cost is attributed to revenue small businesses lost ($82 million). The rest of the tab went to lost wages ($47 million), social services that experienced extraordinary stress ($17 million), overtime pay to police officers and other city officials ($4 million), and hotel cancellations ($4 million). The city thinks it will take years to regain ground from this complete waste of money.
Now that ICE is bringing its post-apocalyptic show in Minneapolis to an end, the border czar, Tom (Bribe Loving) Homan, is looking for the next theater. Homan: “I’ve said from day one that, you know, we need to flood the zone and sanctuary cities with additional agents.” That “sanctuary city” could be Seattle. And the cost of this performance, which is all it really is, will be terrific. The only thing that might protect us from this massive waste of time, lives, and money is our tech hub status, which means we play an important role in maintaining the only game in town, the gigantic AI bubble.
Minneapolis officials have released an estimated tab on what Operation Metro Surge has cost city residents so far.
bit.ly/4cqEfFq
— FOX 13 Seattle (@fox13seattle.bsky.social) February 15, 2026 at 6:00 AM
So, you still want to talk about how high wages always backfire. Well, what’s this in the Seattle Times? The pay ratio for Starbucks CEO, Brian Niccol, is an astounding 1,749 to 1. Meaning–he earns $30,992,773, and the average worker earns $17,279. My god. The pressure to reduce wages to zero is way too real in 2026. Again, nothing but labor’s resistance to the true nature of capitalism prevents this catastrophe. If we do nothing, the zero law will be, to use the words of Marx, like “the law of gravity [that] asserts itself when a house falls about our ears.”
Let’s end AM with an ‘80s tune that compares love-enthrallment with the condition of a robot, the Pointer Sister’s “Automatic.”
Charles Mudede
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