Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

If you’re looking for someone who’s young and athletic, go watch a fucking movie.

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

If West Virginia and San Francisco had a love child.

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

Everybody saw this coming.

Trump’s legal defense is going to be a dumpster fire inside a clown car on a derailing train.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Another missed opportunity for Jamie Dimon to just shut the fuck up.

The lights are all blinking red.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. don’t touch it.”

In my day, never was longer.

If you are still in the gop, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

It’s easier to kill a dangerous animal than a man who just happens to have different thoughts/values than one’s own.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Conservatism: there are people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

You are here: Home / Politics / America / Here’s a Little Bit of Hope on What Seems to be a Hopeless Night

Here’s a Little Bit of Hope on What Seems to be a Hopeless Night

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Between the racks of canned beans and rolls of toilet paper in a bodega in Borough Park, Brooklyn, a staircase hides beside the shelves.

It leads to a cavern where, for the past 14 years, the bodega owner has quietly housed scores of homeless men, some with violent pasts and mental illness. He takes them in, from local park benches and street corners, unable to bear the idea of anyone out in the cold.

Here, beneath the shelves of instant soup and paper towels is an unauthorized shelter in its most primal form — a dank unfinished basement, cavelike and fetid, where the men sleep on pallets amid pools of dark water on the cement floor.

But there is real warmth, the men say. It comes from behind the deli counter, where seven days a week, stands the welcoming bodega owner, Candido Arcángel.

The shop is zoned for commercial use, and the basement does not have the required certificate of occupancy to permit people to live there. Mr. Arcángel has not made the necessary applications to the Department of Buildings to convert it into habitable space, which would require an inspection to determine if it is safe to do so.

The absence of permits has not deterred Mr. Arcángel, who says his reasoning for opening his basement to the homeless is simple. “Because they don’t have,” he said. “And I do.”

Mr. Arcángel recognizes the limitations of the crude shelter he provides; its rawness, he imagines, will prevent anyone from getting too comfortable. He aspires to be a way station for men who don’t get such things, but he fears his refuge becoming a crutch. “I tell them this: “Gentlemen, here, there’s no way out,” he said. “‘Take off like a dove, flying. You’ll learn to fly on your own. When I die, where will you go?’”
Here’s the kicker:

Mr. Arcángel grew up in the Dominican Republic, with dreams of becoming a baseball player. He played professionally on a Venezuelan team for one year, he said, before a shoulder injury ended his career and he left for America in 1989. It was his experience as a boy playing on teams — where children from working-class families like himself played alongside street children — that showed him how providing some structure, even in the form of uniforms, bats and gloves, transformed his teammates’ lives.

“These youths that were lost, you have to find them, and bring them in, so they could love God,” he said. “This is not a personal mission; it’s a mission for the good of society.”

That’s right, Mr. Arcángel immigrated from a country the President no doubt considers a shithole. Yet it is Mr. Arcángel who is doing his part to maintain and extend America’s civil society, not tear it down through petty bigotry.

Stay frosty (and warm)!

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

92Comments

  4. 4.

    Mary G

    That’s a lovely man. Of course the city and his business insurance carrier will both promptly shut him down, I imagine.

  8. 8.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Arcángel. A name almost Dickensian in its perfection.

    EBP: I see others have had the same thought.

  9. 9.

    efgoldman

    @Mary G:

    Of course the city and his business insurance carrier will both promptly shut him down, I imagine.

    The cynic in me expects they are already trying.

  17. 17.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Thank goodness Jared and Ivanka are in the White House to moderate daddy’s behavior.

  18. 18.

    Suzanne

    It was so surreal, seeing the word “shithole” on the splash pages and chyrons of major media outlets today. I never thought the president would be the one leading us into the era of swearing all the fucking time.

    And I fucking swear all the fucking time! And I was still offended!

    The only shitholes are the ones that A) from whence he crawled, and B) where his voters live.

  19. 19.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Meanwhile:

    Megyn Kelly says fat-shaming works, asked stepfather to call her ‘fatass’

    cutting edge stuff

  21. 21.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Palmer Report @PalmerReport

    Donald Trump’s day so far:

    – Calls Haiti a “shithole”
    – Don Lemon: Trump is racist
    – Anderson Cooper: Trump is racist
    – Haiti demands answers
    – Trump’s visit to UK is called off
    – Bannon wants to talk to Mueller
    – Mike Pence wants to talk to Mueller
    – It’s still only 11pm

    255 replies 3,397 retweets 8,078 likes

  22. 22.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    C. Robert Cargill @Massawyrm

    The president has gone full racist grandpa, CNN is dropping “shithole” like they’re getting paid every time they say it, and Don Lemon just intimated that certain Americans can go fuck themselves…live on air.

    And it’s only January 11th.

    2018, you saucy minx.

    41 replies 668 retweets 2,127 likes

    but, but…… pivot

  23. 23.

    Yarrow

    @Suzanne: it was kind of shocking to see it right there on the chyron and hear people say it on TV. I thought “shit” was still a word you couldn’t say on TV.

    @David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Do Bannon and Pence really want to talk to Mueller? I’d guess he’s the one who wants to talk to them.

  24. 24.

    Mary G

    He’s tweeting early tonight, must be some bad news for him coming out soon:

    Reason I canceled my trip to London is that I am not a big fan of the Obama Administration having sold perhaps the best located and finest embassy in London for “peanuts,” only to build a new one in an off location for 1.2 billion dollars. Bad deal. Wanted me to cut ribbon-NO!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2018

    You’re not going to London because they will protest you, and they have good insults.

    ETA: And Elizabeth II won’t let you ride in her gold carriage. I saw on Twitter today that she has never given an interview in 91 years, but is having a conversation that is going to be aired on the Smithsonian channel. There will be jewels.

  25. 25.

    cthulhu

    @Mary G:

    That’s a lovely man. Of course the city and his business insurance carrier will both promptly shut him down, I imagine.

    That’s the inherent conflict, right? By his own admission, the basement is not safely livable and that is also his intention based upon the standard conservative assumption that charity begets dependence. But he is incrementally accomplishing something more than the city, with significant resources, has not been able to do. This is a never ending conundrum because the population of people in need is vastly complex where an institutionalized approach will fail some, where half measures help but seem incomplete from a rational view, where some can’t be rescued no matter how hard we work or how much money we spend.

    I realized some many years ago that human societies will always have a beggar/homeless class no matter how hard we work to eliminate it. It is a fact that we seen very resistant to accept. We can minimize it (and we always should do our best to do so!) but short of what I would argue are extreme compromises in the concept of personal freedom, it is an intractable issue.

    But much like how we experience politics, losing a given battle shouldn’t cause us to give up entirely.

  29. 29.

    ??‍? Martin

    Germaphobe Trump’s particular animus toward Haiti reaches all the way back to the AIDS epidemic and the 4 Hs – homosexual, heroin users, hemophiliacs, and Haitians as populations to avoid. That was all over NYC in the 80s. Trump got that in his head and it never got out.

  30. 30.

    Debbie(aussie)

    @Mary G:
    I may be wrong but I thought I read that it was W that sent the ball rolling on the embassy. So is Trump lying (of course he is) or was he lied to? Hmmm.

  32. 32.

    TriassicSands

    @debbie:
    Yes, it’s “nice” in a way, but also profoundly sad that people in the richest country in the world (for now, but probably not for long) have nowhere to sleep at night but a basement unfit for occupancy.

    We’re a country that has lost its way. Our most overtly religious people support a party that is devoid of human decency. Nearly half our voters elected a man who is utterly immoral or amoral, depending on the issue and your own perception.

    Thanks go out to Mr. Arcángel, but private charity is never going to be enough. The question is how to get tens of millions of Americans to regain* a sense of compassion and empathy.

    *”Regain” may be the wrong word. Many of these people have never had compassion or empathy. “Discover” might be a better choice.

  35. 35.

    Yarrow

    @eclare: Well, yeah. And Bannon thinks he’s smarter than he is. But still, no one with either half a brain or competent legal representation wants to go talk to Mueller and his team.

  36. 36.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Debbie(aussie): Given how long it take government to do something like that, you’re probably correct. The US Embassy, London has been thought of as too small and ill suited for the neighborhood due to security concerns. Take a look at streetview on Google, it’s pretty obvious.

  37. 37.

    Mary G

    @Debbie(aussie): According to people on Twitter I follow, you are right. Also, the building has protected status, which in London makes it very hard to do any updating at all. That would also lower the price.

  38. 38.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Mary G:

    the building has protected status

    Maybe they did that to get us out of the neighborhood; it’s a fugly building, as the kids would say.

    ETA: The old Embassy is near Hyde Park, the new one is upstream and on the other side of the Thames from the Palace of Westminster(Parliament).

  39. 39.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    The Hill @thehill

    Trump accuses FBI agent who criticized him of “treason”

    64 replies 39 retweets 54 likes

    Actually working hostile foreign power to subvert democracy in return for money = not treason.

    Criticizing bankrupt racist = treason.

    amirite?

  40. 40.

    joel hanes

    What Seems to be a Hopeless Night

    for some reason, I’m allowing myself to feel hopeful
    for the first time since Nov last year
    do you not feel the tide ?
    now is the time when the great wheel turns at a touch

  43. 43.

    Fair Economist

    @joel hanes: I have also been feeling better of late. Not that we’re out of the tunnel, but I feel like I’m seeing the light at the end.

  44. 44.

    TriassicSands

    Having watched (yuck) and listened to (ick) Trump for the past nearly two years, my impression is that his real problem is not dementia. He strikes me as both stupid and ignorant, and it is those two qualities that dominate the idiocy we see and hear every day. He does have slips that look and sound like early dementia, but I think stupidity and ignorance — truly profound ignorance — are sufficient to explain most, if not al, of what we see and hear.

  45. 45.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    I go back to this again, I’m curious that [Trump supporters don’t] have any objection to Norwegian workers coming here to take high skilled high paying jobs. With a mysterous demographic characteristic I can’t put my finger on.

    But, you know, it goes back to a broader question, America is not a Volk, we are not a race of people. We are a proposition, we are an idea. We are a Constitution and a set of laws and principles and objectives that when you come here, if you buy into that system and play by the rules in that system, you are part of it. It is the American system, we are not based on a single demographic mix, and no matter what your flimsy economic excuses are about it.

    Rick Wilson

    This is why the economic anxiety apologists and racist deniers are so wrong. They have no problem with a foreign, white, christian face taking a job.

  46. 46.

    TriassicSands

    @David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:

    Actually working hostile foreign power to subvert democracy in return for money = not treason.

    Criticizing bankrupt racist = treason.

    amirite?

    No, you’re wrong. Why? Because treason is what the emperor says it is, not the Constitution. Treason is now a personal crime against a single individual. Needless to say, the penalty for libel will be greatly increased once the GOP rewrites the laws to make libel equal treason, a capital crime.

  49. 49.

    romeo24

    I’m sure that many have said this before, but people who work and save and scrape and do whatever they can to emigrate to a new country are in fact the best people to have. They are hard working and dedicated, and didn’t inherit millions and get things handed to them on a plate. America needs more hard-working resilient people from sh*thole countries, not fewer.

  50. 50.

    Mnemosyne

    @cthulhu:

    It is in large part a mental health crisis, as anyone who works in a public library can tell you. There are a lot of people with severe mental health problems who have nowhere to go, because they can’t hold down a job or an apartment, but they’re not a danger to themselves or others, so there’s no room for them at the few in-patient places that even have beds.

    I still remember the huge saga of our bloghost trying to get in-patient substance abuse treatment, and he has pretty good insurance. Multiply that by at least a thousand for someone who’s on Medicaid, assuming his/her state even lets an “able-bodied” adult get Medicaid and/or that s/he was able to apply for it.

    Note that I’m not saying we should go back to the days of involuntary treatment. We would have to work hard to even get to a spot where people could get voluntary in-patient treatment.

  51. 51.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Mr. Trump: I don’t have to because the wall is the same wall I’ve always talked about. I can understand why I have to have see-through.

    WSJ: OK.

    Mr. Trump: If I’m standing here, I want to be able to see 200 yards out. I want to be able to see, I don’t want to have a piece of concrete that I can’t see.

    WSJ: Yes.

    Mr. Trump: Now on the wall we have cameras and we have highly sophisticated equipment, but the wall – the Border Patrol tells me the other way’s more expensive. It’s not less expensive. We have to have vision through the wall.

    WSJ: But…

    Mr. Trump: This is going to be state of the art wall; this will be state of the art. But, I can fully understand why you’d have to have vision. I’d like to be able to see three or four hundred yards instead of we’re at a wall we have no idea who’s on the other side. Does this make sense or am I just wasting my time?

    Hope Hicks: It’s what you’ve always talked; it’s consistent with what you’ve always said.

    Mr. Trump: No, this is the same. I hope I don’t read tomorrow, Trump is going to make the wall, I always said, we need a wall.

    A “see through” wall?

    Hope Hicks chiming in to help confused dotard who’s flailing with friendly outlet.

  52. 52.

    Mnemosyne

    @TriassicSands:

    He is a classic toxic narcissist. We have one in my family. They are absolutely fucking maddening to deal with because every goddamned thing is a power struggle and because they are absolutely shameless and will pull shit that normal people can’t even contemplate doing to another person.

    The only way to deal with one is to set up firm boundaries that you never let them breach, not even once, because if you make what you think is a one-time exception to the rule, you have to start over again at square one. Narcissists think that other people’s boundaries = other people trying to control them, and they will maliciously destroy the other person’s life just to show that person who’s boss.

  53. 53.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Mr. Trump: Look, nobody gets more false press than I do. Nobody – nobody gets – nobody comes close. In history – in the history of this country nobody’s gotten more false press and you guys all know it.

    but her emails?

  54. 54.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Mr. Trump: Just – and so – so I was successful, successful, successful. I was always the best athlete, people don’t know that.

    He was such a great athlete, until he was felled by a bone spur.

  57. 57.

    seaboogie

    Thank you, Adam. I have been unusually het up on Twitter tonight, and this is a balm. I try to stay kind of Zen these days, but today broke all the evens that I couldn’t.

  58. 58.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Mr. Trump: How could there be obstruction on firing Comey? When the man who’s in charge of it wrote a letter that was far stronger than anything I would have written. He was in charge — Deputy Rosenstein. He wrote a letter that’s far stronger than even what I say.

    And here’s another thing. A friend of mine brought this up the other day. Comey. Comey has proven to be a liar and a leaker. Proven. He tries to act like a choir boy. What he did with Hillary Clinton is outrageous. He saved her life, because all of those charges — I call it “Comey one, two, and three,” all of those charges and Comey won, she was guilty of. She should have been taken out of the campaign and been on trial.

    Mr. Trump: When he announced the Hillary Clinton fiasco where she was guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty and then where they did the interview with no tape recorder, with no swearing in, with no this, with no that – you know the story.

    But take a look at all of these people that became critics of my firing, they all wanted him fired. And they wanted him fired until I said, “he’s fired.” But the deputy, Rosenstein, who is in charge, he wrote a letter that was possibly or probably stronger than anything I would have written or did write.

    Mr. Trump: The other thing is, everybody wanted Comey fired. And, another thing, and this is just a few, Comey has proven to be a leaker and a liar and, if anything, I should get credit for firing him because it turned out I was right because many thing have been found out about Comey that – I mean, I should be given credit for having great insight because many things have been found out about Comey that would never have been found out if I didn’t fire him.

    Comey is living rent free in his cavernous mind.

  60. 60.

    opiejeanne

    Thank you Adam. That was a good story to read on an otherwise infuriating day.

    I was so annoyed today that I donated a desk to Malawi (one of those shithole countries) through KIND

  61. 61.

    Debbie(aussie)

    @David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: It must get a tad crowded in there, what with Obama & Hillary showing up so often, and I imagine every other person who has ever slighted him. I just can’t believe it all and I am so very far away from the epicentre.
    ETA: Bill beat me to it ?

  62. 62.

    opiejeanne

    @joel hanes: I have been feeling it since about the first week of December. Not sure why, maybe it was just the anticipation having almost everyone I love in the house on Christmas Eve. (And then, wonder of wonders, it started snowing during supper and we went out and played in it before dessert, and it continued all night.)
    Or maybe it was because we can see the wheels coming off of the bus just a little.

  63. 63.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Even long time GOP bootlicker Jeff Greenfield:

    Jeff Greenfield ✔ @greenfield64

    When Maj. Leader Sen.Trent Lott suggested the US would have been better off if a segregationist had been elected POTUS, GWBush and the GOP pushed him out of his job. When David Duke won a GOP nomination, whole party disavowed him. When Trump said what he said today…(???)

    3:50 PM – Jan 11, 2018

    122 122 Replies
    714 714 Retweets

  68. 68.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Even the liberal Bill Kristol:

    Bill Kristol @BillKristol

    Two weeks ago a 26-year old soldier raced repeatedly into a burning Bronx apartment building, saving four people before he died in the flames. His name was Pvt. Emmanuel Mensah and he immigrated from Ghana, a country Donald Trump apparently thinks produces very subpar immigrants.

    2,360 replies 61,929 retweets 129,727 likes

    Bill Kristol @BillKristol

    Oprah would not, in an Oval Office meeting with senators, use the term “shithole counties.” Oprah also would not to go to Davos.
    #JustSaying

    193 replies 283 retweets 1,669 likes

  71. 71.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Mnemosyne:

    It is in large part a mental health crisis, as anyone who works in a public library can tell you. There are a lot of people with severe mental health problems who have nowhere to go, because

    Because Reagan closed the mental hospitals, thereby creating the homelessness problem

  72. 72.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Even the liberal CIA:

    John Brennan @JohnBrennan

    Lady Liberty, our founding fathers, and generations of right-thinking Americans are all weeping tonight over the atrocious comments attributed to Donald Trump, who continues to demonstrate daily that he is a deeply flawed person.

    3:51 PM – 11 Jan 2018

    894 replies 4,976 retweets 10,993 likes

  74. 74.

    opiejeanne

    @eclare: Yes. $55 buys a desk with attached bench for two, but you can give any amount. I’m eyeing the tuition for a girl for a year of school, for when I have some more loose cash. $177 funds an entire school year including books and supplies, tuition, room and board, and uniform. It won’t be in February because I have a large expense coming up, but maybe March. April may be ugly, won’t know until our CPA tells us but we’ve had it set up for years that we always get a refund. That will probably change after this go-round, but maybe not right away.

  80. 80.

    SRW1

    @Mary G:

    If Trump is also snubbed by not being invited to the upcoming royal wedding while Obama gets an invite, is it entirely excluded that His Trumpiness is going to order the bombing of Buckingham Palace?

  81. 81.

    Amir Khalid

    @Debbie(aussie):
    For den Scheißgibbon justice is never about doing right by others, it’s only ever about getting even with them that done him wrong. And he has a very broad definition of “done me wrong”.

  84. 84.

    eclare

    @SRW1: I’m not convinced POS wouldn’t bomb CA or NY just for spite. Or hell, he could get pissed off at Wisconsin for some insane reason….

  92. 92.

    Jim

    Didn’t Trump run something like this? Except charged rent, and paid off inspectors to ignore conditions? Asking for a friend.

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