Alexis Goldstein
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alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Alexis Goldstein
@alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
1.5K followers 980 following 140 posts
Rank and file @nteu335.bsky.social.
Opinions expressed are my own. Newsletter: https://marketsweekly.ghost.io
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alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Join @fedworkersunited.bsky.social for a SPIRITED fundraiser @ Dew Drop Inn, this Thurs 11/20 6:30-8:30pm 🎉🪩

Federal workers will be donating all KINDS of services in a silent auction to benefit a DC/MD/VA federal worker solidarity fund!

(Guess which one is mine! 😇)

💘 bit.ly/FUNDMV1120
SILENT AUCTION (and noisy party!) FEDERAL WORKERS GOT SKILLS! Come bid on great trainings & services from our amazing federal worker colleagues, such as: Mending Lesson Expert Zoo Tour Baking Lesson Financial Apocalypse Prep Canva/CapCut Lesson DC Bike Tour Baked Goods Web Design Piano Lessons Fine Art Painting Writing Workshop Tutoring & More! THURSDAY, NOV. 20, 6:30 PM, DEW DROP INN RSVP: bit.ly/ FUNDMV1120 Can't make it? Visit givebutter.com/FedWorkers to donate! Paychecks are still weeks away. FUNDRAISER FOR THE DMV FEDERAL WORKER SOLIDARITY FUND COMMUNITY SERVICES AGENCY OF THE METROPOLITAN WASHINGTON COUNCIL, AFL-CIO THURSDAY, NOV. 20, 6:30-8:30 PM DEW DROP INN, 2801 8TH ST. NE RSVP: bit.ly/FUNDMV1120 Can't make it? Chip in at givebutter.com/FedWorkers
November 18, 2025 at 11:58 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
It would protect my sensitive data and never spy on me?
An ad by the software firm Salesforce hanging on a concrete balcony on the Washington DC metro with a smiling woman holding a disposable coffee cup and a phone. The advertisement reads: “What if government worked 🤝like your favorite app? With Agentforce, it can. sfdc.co/WhatlfDC”
November 14, 2025 at 1:23 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
At Grand Amry Plaza in Brooklyn, @naomiaklein.bsky.social says that Mamdani’s volunteer army is 100,000 strong, bigger than the standing army of her country Canada.
Naomi Klein speaking at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn, with a large crown in yellow Zohran hats and blue Zohran shirts
November 4, 2025 at 5:26 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
A still from Harry Potter of Minerva McGonagall asking Harry, the other one, and Hermione “why is it when something happens, it’s always you three?” But pasted over Harry’s face is the AWS logo, pasted over [Ron?]’s face is the Microsoft Azure logo, and pasted over Hermione’s face is the Google Cloud logo.
October 29, 2025 at 7:09 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
On Weds Oct 1, federal workers including Paul Osadebe joined @fairshareamerica.bsky.social for a rally to tell the country “it’s not business as usual when people’s rights are being taken from them.”

Rally summary at: substack.com/inbox/post/1...
/4
October 5, 2025 at 1:01 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
I really enjoyed this essay by Audrey Borowski on Günther Anders & his prescience on the impact of technology.

“The atom bomb…illuminates that the more ‘our’ technological power grows, the smaller we become… singled out as being expendable and inadequate.”

aeon.co/essays/gunth...
Excerpt from “Philosopher of the apocalypse” by Audrey Borowski about Gunter Anders, aeon NEWSLETTER “in this regard, which Anders hoped to make 'visible for the first time', lay in the transformation of the human condition, a transformation that had become as naturalised and imperceptible as it was destructive. 'The atom bomb,' he argued, was 'thus the ultimate emblem of an unearthly, unsettling and haunting force channelled by complex technological objects: it illuminates that the more "our" technological power grows, the smaller we become; the more unconditional and unlimited the capability of machines, the more conditional our existence; the more machines connect us by virtue of their very existence, the more we are also singled out as being expendable and inadequate!'” Excerpt from “Philosopher of the apocalypse” by Audrey Borowski about Gunter Anders: “‘Man is probably not a machine, but he behaves as such in a situation where the machines im se his operating rules. Indeed, the progress of technology should not be understood as necessarily being the progress of mankind: far from it, they are not accompanied by a progress of thought, reflection and responsibility, since they eliminate their intervention and even often make them impossible.’ [end quote by Gunter Anders.] Crucially, man increasingly found himself enlisted in the production of his own disappearance in the most natural manner possible.”
October 4, 2025 at 11:49 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Important explanation by @bettermarkets.bsky.social of how the crypto industry is reusing the same bogus “technological advancement” hype that Citigroup circa 1999 to gut key financial market protections.

Past is prologue. We should heed its lessons: bettermarkets.org/wp-content/u...
Groundhog Day There is a tragic throughline running through this long-running script: financial industry leaders blow past legal guardrails, citing that their technological innovations cannot possibly be cabined in by outmoded rules created by a previous generation. Regulatory and law enforcement officials are under-resourced and out-gunned even at times when they have the best intentions for fulfilling the public interest. Other times, these officials are captured by the very industries they're tasked to police. In either case, industries are too often able to establish economic power through their noncompliance with existing law and translate it into political power to rewrite the rules to bless their business models. This noncompliance in the face of clear existing legal precedent creates the very "uncertainty" that the industry points to as a justification to change the law. And the final rhetorical move is to invoke international competitiveness, hoping to scare lawmakers into believing that a failure to bend the law to an industry's favor will harm U.S. industries, jobs and growth. Crypto has memorized this script and is reading their lines in an Oscar-worthy performance to many policymakers. Congressional hearings bemoan the "legal uncertainty" caused by applying longstanding laws to arrangements that look a lot like pre-existing investment schemes but are digital or blockchain-based. Crypto industry petitions to federal agencies say that Great Depression-era laws "[prevent] market participants from leveraging the efficiencies new technology can offer."
September 25, 2025 at 7:44 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Trump’s abrupt H1B change impacts big tech and big finance the most:

www.ft.com/content/f6bf...
• AT&T VPN 8:39 PM 0a 7 三|I FINANCIAL TIMES Number of H-1B visas approved - Top 10 employers, FY 2025 Amazon Tata Consultancy Microsoft 5,505 5,189 Meta 5,123 Apple 4,202 Google Cognizant Technology... 2,493 JPMorgan Chase 2,440 4,181 Walmart 2,390 Deloitte 2,353 10,044 FINANCIAL TIMES 4,000 7,000 10,000 Source: US Department of Homeland Security.
September 20, 2025 at 12:40 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Alarming reports that the Trump admin is trying to silence history at the National Park at Harper’s Ferry—where abolitionist John Brown led a raid seeking to arm slaves for a revolt.

Signs being targeted include those that refer to “racial discrimination.”

archive.is/gGV2d
Washington Post: Following Trump's order, Interior Department officials issued policies ordering agency employees to report any information, including signage and gift shop items, that might be out of compliance. Trump officials also launched an effort asking park visitors to report offending material, but they mostly received criticisms of the administration and praise for the parks. The latest orders include removing information at Harpers Ferry National Historic Park in West Virginia, two people familiar with the matter said, where the abolitionist John Brown led a raid seeking to arm slaves for a revolt. Staff have also been told that information at the President's House Site in Philadelphia, where George Washington kept slaves, does not comply with the policy, according to a third individual. Following Trump's order, Interior Department officials issued policies ordering agency employees to report any information, including signage and gift shop items, that might be out of compliance. Trump officials also launched an effort asking park visitors to report offending material, but they mostly received criticisms of the administration and praise for the parks. The latest orders include removing information at Harpers Ferry National Historic Park in West Virginia, two people familiar with the matter said, where the abolitionist John Brown led a raid seeking to arm slaves for a revolt. Staff have also been told that information at the President's House Site in Philadelphia, where George Washington kept slaves, does not comply with the policy, according to a third individual.
September 19, 2025 at 12:23 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
What happened to Archegos?

One of the “hot” stocks (ViacomCBS)
Hwang was propping up tried to take advantage of their soaring stock price: they isssued new shares.

But Hwang didn’t buy any. Not many others did either.

The stock tanked.
At the end of March, ViacomCBS sought to capitalize on a blistering four-month stretch that saw its stock triple, issuing new shares. ViacomCBS didn't know that its growth was mostly a byproduct of Mr. Hwang's giant swaps bets. Mr. Hwang didn't participate in the ViacomCBS issuance, even after initially expressing interest: Reporting suggests he may have been so leveraged that he simply didn't have money left to buy any shares. As a result, ViacomCBS's offering finished well short of its target. In just a week, the stock lost half its value. Because of how total return swaps are structured, Archegos had agreed to pay for any losses on the stock. When it couldn't pay, it defaulted. Without Mr. Hwang propping up these stocks, their recovery would be tough. Meanwhile, the banks needed to liquidate the stocks the swaps were based on and discussed creating a plan to do so without disrupting the market.
September 18, 2025 at 7:27 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Why is there secrecy over the assets of the world’s richest & most powerful?

Because following the 2008 financial crisis, when Democrats had their moment to pass Wall Street reform, they decided to give billionaire family offices a complete pass.

www.openmarketsinstitute.org/publications...
Congress carved out family offices from transparency measures the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act brought to hedge funds and private equity firms. Unlike these other private funds, family offices do not have to register with the SEC, file public reports on their positions, or report to the regulators details about the leverage they employ.
September 18, 2025 at 7:22 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
The folks at @openmarkets.bsky.social rang the alarm in 2021.

Did you know Bill Gates is the largest private owner of farmland in the USA, with over 200,000 acres?

What else is he and other billionaires invested in?

Because family offices file no disclosures, we do not know.
Family offices owned by tech titans raise particular concerns of systemic risk given their size and concentration of investments. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos' family office, Bezos Expeditions, is estimated to have over $200 billion in assets— ten times larger than Archegos was at its most leveraged. Microsoft founder Bill Gates' family office, Cascade Investment, L.L.C., has amassed the largest private ownership of farmland in the United States: 262,000 acres of farmland.
September 18, 2025 at 7:18 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
I went to Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History (NMAAH) yesterday. It was at least three times more crowded than I’ve ever seen it.

Book a visit or make a donation here: event.etix.com/ticket/e/101...
A portion of a timeline at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History of laws in Virginian regarding restrictions on and exploitation of enslaved and free Blacks and American Indians: 1680 No black person (whether slave or free) may carry weapons, travel without a pass, or lift a hand against a white person. 1691 Free blacks and white persons married to blacks are banished from the colony. 1705 The law states, "All negro, mulatto, and Indian slaves are considered real estate." 1705 It is legal to dismember an unruly slave. 1715 Virginia abolishes voting rights for free Negroes and Indians. A photo at NHAAM of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party delegates at the 1964 Democractic National Convention, with Fannie Lou Hamer in the foreground worth a microphone. Still from a film on Black women activists at the National Museum of African American History of Gloria Richardson fending off a National Guardsman holding a bayonet in Caimbridge, MD. Subtitle reads “but Richardson would not be moved.” Several pictures of Shirley Chisholm from the NHAAM’s third floor exhibits. This panel is entitled SHIRLEY CHISHOLM: SHAKING UP THE SYSTEM. It includes a video of Shirley Chisolm declaring her candidacy for President in the 1972 presidential election. A quote reads: “People had to know that it was possible for someone with decency and a fighting spirit to overcome the system by beating it with its own weapons.” SHIRLEY CHISHOLM 1970
August 30, 2025 at 5:15 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Nothing has enriched Trump more than crypto grifts.

It’s political malpractice that Democrats aren’t treating crypto as the scam-ridden, corrupt toxic waste it is. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
Chart displaying the various ways Trump has cashed in on the presidency. Crypto is the largest by far, at 2.37 billion American Bitcoin $13 M N.F.T.s $14.4 M $10 M The crypto Gulf $243 M Token investments $412.5 M $TRUMP - $385 M Trump Media goes crypto $1.3 B The Persian Gulf $320 M 1789 Capital $19.6 M Private jet $150 M Legal fees and Trump merch $127.7 M Mar-a-Lago $125 M More Saudi deals $105.8 M Trump Hotel Hanoi $40 M The corporate squeeze $91 M Truth Social $25 M CRYPTO $2.37 B FINANCE OTHER $339.6 M $277.7 M HOSPITALITY MEDIA $270.8 M $116 M Chart by Francesco Muzzi $2.5B $2B $1.5B $1B $0.5B $O
August 13, 2025 at 9:36 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
20-30% interest crypto loans to fruit vendors who scan their eyeballs in case of default.
Crypto lenders dial up risk with 'microfinance on steroids' Digital asset price boom inspires new ventures making precarious loans despite painful wipeout three years ago = FINANCIAL TIMES "We're loaning to average folks like high-school teachers, fruit vendors... basically anyone with access to the internet can get access to our funds," Divine's founder Diego Estevez told the Financial Times. "This is microfinance on steroids." Divine offers loans of less than $1,000 worth of Circle's stablecoin USDC - a crypto asset that matches the value of the US dollar - to cash-strapped consumers, mostly overseas. It describes its borrowers as underserved by "traditional institutions" = FINANCIAL TIMES It uses Altman's iris-scanning system to make sure borrowers who default on their loans cannot create a new account. The loans mostly come with fixed interest rates of between 20 and 30 per cent. Among Divine's peers is crypto group 3Jane, which in June received $5.2mn in seed funding from venture group Paradigm - which previously invested in FTX.
July 27, 2025 at 10:23 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
je téléphone a la @pressley.house.gov

pressley.house.gov/2023/02/15/p...
QT from Sam Altman highlighting the Invest America Act. Altman’s QT reads: “this is very cool; every U.S. child gets a $1k S&P account at birth. [M]ore stuff like this please!”
July 5, 2025 at 9:25 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
WOW. Thank you @ztameez.bsky.social and @jamellebouie.net for introducing me to one of history’s most righteous haters, Charles Sumner.

Is Summer why there are decorum rules in the Senate? www.nytimes.com/2025/07/05/o...
as "rape of a virgin territory." Then he starts to single out his colleagues. He describes David Atchison as a Roman traitor. He compares President Franklin Pierce to a Roman dictator. He basically calls Stephen Douglas Lucifer incarnate. And then he targets Senator Andrew Pickens Butler of South Carolina. Butler is a slaveholder. Butler also has a speech impediment because he was recovering from a stroke. Sumner makes fun of his speech impediment, makes fun of Butler's hair, makes fun of Butler's home state by saying the state of South Carolina could be blotted out of existence and civilization would look the same. And then he targets Butler by saying that Butler had a mistress, pure in his sight but ugly in the sight of the world: "the harlot, Slavery." What Sumner is doing is he's pointing out the reality that Southern slaveholders were often engaging in rape. I found evidence that's not been reported in any previous Sumner biography that one of Butler's former slaves was interviewed in the 1930s, many decades later, and that enslaved person, now free, recalled that Butler did, in fact, have a - quote, unquote - mistress and sired two children by her. So Sumner is telling the world about Butler's activities as he's pointing out this antidemocratic, treasonous activity in Kansas. The Senate is appalled by this speech. One senator said that Butler should come back and basically beat the crap out of Sumner. A congressman said that Sumner should be hanged.
July 5, 2025 at 5:38 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
➕! “We’d better listen to what voters are screaming in our faces,” says @alyssacass.bsky.social, “which is that they want real, authentic voices… leaders who bear no resemblance to the status quo & they want people who are fighting on the issues that are close to them”

on.ft.com/44qUwFX
FINANCIAL TIMES headline: Andrew Cuomo vs Zohran Mamdani: New York mayoral race showcases Democratic party rift Former governor and 33-year-old progressive represent two poles of the party Andrew Cuomo, left, and Zohran Mamdani are duelling in FINANCIAL TIMES Alyssa Cass, a Democratic strategist, said the message of Mamdani's popularity has lessons for Democrats across the country. "We'd better listen to what voters are screaming in our faces, which is that they want real, authentic voices, they want leaders who bear no resemblance to the status quo and they want people who are fighting on the issues that are close to them, not those that are dear to the elite intelligentsia."
June 24, 2025 at 10:42 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
GENIUS passes 67-30, with 50 GOP yes and 16 Dem yes.

Ds voting yes:
Alsobrooks
Booker
Cortez Masto
Fetterman
Gillibrand
Hassan
Heinrich
Hickenlooper
Kelly
Kim
Lujan
Rosen
Schiff
Slotkin
Warner
Warnock

Rs voting no:
Hawley
Rand

Grassley voted Yes

www.senate.gov/legislative/...
Grouped By Vote Position YEAS ---67 Alsobrooks (D-MD) | Banks (R-IN) Barrasso (R-WY)| Blackburn (R-TN) Booker (D-NJ) Boozman (R-AR) Britt (R-AL) Budd (R-NC) Capito (R-WV) Cassidy (R-LA) Collins (R-ME) Cornyn (R-TX) Cortez Masto (D-NV) Cotton (R-AR) Cramer (R-ND) | Crapo (R-ID) Cruz (R-TX) | Curtis (R-UT) Daines (R-MT) Ernst (R-IA) Fetterman (D-PA) Fischer (R-NE) Gillibrand (D-NY) Graham (R-SC) Grassley (R-IA) Hagerty (R-TN) Hassan (D-NH) Heinrich (D-NM) Hickenlooper (D-CO)| Hoeven (R-ND)| Husted (R-OH) Hyde-Smith (R-MS) Johnson (R-WI) Justice (R-WV) Kelly (D-AZ) Kennedy (R-LA) Kim (D-NJ) Lankford (R-OK) Lee (R-UT) Lujan (D-NM) Lummis (R-WY) Marshall (R-KS) McConnell (R-KY) McCormick (R-PA) Moody (R-FL) Moran (R-KS) Moreno (R-OH) Mullin (R-OK) Murkowski (R-AK) Ricketts (R-NE) Risch (R-ID) Rosen (D-NV) Rounds (R-SD) Schiff (D-CA) Schmitt (R-MO) Scott (R-FL) Scott (R-SC) Scott (R-SC) Sheehy (R-MT) Slotkin (D-MI) Sullivan (R-AK) Thune (R-SD) Tillis (R-NC) Tuberville (R-AL) Warner (D-VA) Warnock (D-GA) Wicker (R-MS) Young (R-IN) NAYS ---30 Baldwin (D-WI) Bennet (D-CO) Blumenthal (D-CT) Blunt Rochester (D-DE) Cantwell (D-WA) Coons (D-DE) Duckworth (D-IL) Durbin (D-IL) Hawley (R-MO) Hirono (D-HI) Kaine (D-VA) King (I-ME) Klobuchar (D-MN) Markey (D-MA) Merkley (D-OR) Murphy (D-CT) Murray (D-WA) Paul (R-KY) Peters (D-MI) Reed (D-RI) Paul (R-KY) Peters (D-MI) Reed (D-RI) Sanders (I-VT) Schatz (D-HI) Schumer (D-NY) Shaheen (D-NH) Smith (D-MN) Van Hollen (D-MD) Warren (D-MA) Welch (D-VT) Whitehouse (D-RI) Wyden (D-OR) Gallego (D-AZ) Ossoff (D-GA) Padilla (D-CA) Vote Summary By Vote Position Not Voting - 3 By Senator Name By Home State
June 17, 2025 at 10:16 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Another bleak juxtoposition:

- Today, Sen Grassley held a hearing on scams targeting seniors. FBI says 60+ yos are the *most affected* by crypto-related fraud, lost $2.8 billion in 2024: bettermarkets.org/wp-content/u...

- Will Grassley vote for the GENIUS Act, which will exacerbate the problem?
LIVE U.S. Senate 2025-06-17 The Senate will vote on final passage of legislation aimed at creating a federal framework for regulating payment stablecoins in the cryptocurrency market. TODAY - Judiciary Cmte - Hearing on Scams Targeting Seniors C•SPAN2 bettermarkets.org May 6, 2025 The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Internet Crime Report is perhaps the best source of data on cyber crime. The 2024 report, released on April 23, 2025, found: • $16.6 billion of cyber crime in 2024, 56% of which involved crypto; • $9.3 billion in total cryptocurrency-related losses in 2024, a 66% increase from 2023; • 140,000 complaints referencing cryptocurrency came to the FBI from harmed individuals 2024, a more than doubling of complaints versus 2023; • Individuals over the age of 60 were most affected by crypto-related fraud, with roughly 33,000 complaints and $2.8 billion in losses: • Complaints related to cryptocurrency ATMs…iosks increased 99% in 2024 compared to 2023, with losses increasing 31%; and • Complaints related to extortion or "sextortion" (manipulating photos/videos to intimidate victims) increased by 59% in 2024 versus 2023, with losses increasing 9%. ①
June 17, 2025 at 9:31 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Today, ICE detained @bradlander.bsky.social as he walked a NYer out of an immigration hearing.

Last week, DHS arrested @padilla.senate.gov as he asked DHS Sec. Noem a Q.

The Senate today:
1) Sen. Padilla describing his arrest
2) Senate vote on…Trump’s crypto stablecoin bill. With Dem support?

🤔
Senate Floor EVENT PROGRAMS for 6/16/2025: Senate Session, Part 1 • Sen. Padilla (D-CA) on Being Removed from DHS Press Conference 21:33 U.S. Senate: 2025-06-17 JUNE 17, 2025 U.S. Senate 2025-06-17 The Senate will vote on final passage of legislation [the GENIUS Act] aimed at creating a federal framework for regulating payment stablecoins in the cryptocurrency market [weeks after Trump launched his own crypto stablecoin. The bill does not currently have anti-corruption protections in it].
June 17, 2025 at 8:57 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
How do we repair the mess Trump & the tech titan have made? Public servants who know how to build things can tell us.

Here’s @merici.bsky.social, who built IRS Direct File AND helped launched the beloved CFPB on @cnn.com with @philmattingly.bsky.social

transcripts.cnn.com/show/cg/date...
June 6, 2025 at 1:06 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Rep @ivey.house.gov tells Vought he was “shocked” to hear he wants to talk to career workers, when USAID workers come out of their offices crying and had only 15 minutes to get their things.
June 4, 2025 at 7:26 PM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
Michael Steele also pointed out that of the lower income Americans who purchased crypto in the past, a majority of them no longer own it. www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/...
Majority of Americans who've ever used crypto still have it, but it varies by household income Among U.S. adults who say they have ever invested in, traded or used cryptocurrency, % who ... Currently do NOT have any crypto Currently do have any crypto Total 39 61 Upper income 36 64 Middle income 32 67 Lower income 51 49 Note: Family income tiers are based on adjusted 2022 earnings. Those who did not give an answer are not shown. Source: Survey of U.S. adults conducted Feb. 7-11, 2024. PEW RESEARCH CENTER
May 29, 2025 at 3:10 AM
alexisgoldstein.bsky.social
“Crypto is a rich man’s game” says Michael Steele on @theweeknightmsnbc.bsky.social, in a segment on Trump’s pay to play crypto corruption: www.msnbc.com/the-weeknigh...
MSNBC graphic of Cyptocurrency investors by income level 23% of Upper-income people have ever bought crypto, versus 18% of middle income people and only 14% of Lower-income people SOURCE LEVERCH CENTER | FEBRUARY 2024
May 29, 2025 at 3:03 AM