VLVL Brock and PREP

[Terrance]

> 
> Terrance:
> > Back in the book Vietnamese and Salvadorians are replacing the kids in
> > Brock's Camps. So many kids were joining the army of justice, the Reagan
> > administration did a study and  shut down the Camps. But the refugees
> > from Vietnam and El Salvador are flocking to the Camps. Why do the
> > refugees go to the Camps? Not a question most readers here want to
> > discuss. But there it is, in the book.
> 
> Hector tells Frenesi what happened to "Brock's own baby":
> 
>     "Yeah, PREP, the camp, everythín, they did a study, found
>     out since about '81 kids were comín in all on their own askín
>     about careers, no need for no separate facility any more, so
>     Brock's budget lines all went to the big Intimus shredder in
>     the sky, those ol' barracks are fillín up now with Vietnamese,
>     Salvadorians, all kinds of refugees, hard to say how they even
>     found the place. . . . " (347)
> 
> There's certainly dark irony in the fact that refugees from U.S. imperialist
> conquests are finding their way to Brock's camp (cf. Blood and Vato hooking
> up with "Vietnamese bitch" at Pendleton in 1975, p. 182), but more
> interesting is the way the kids are lining up to join the program, which is
> pretty much how Brock diagnosed the situation (269). It's a bit reminiscent
> of those "docile" students back at College of the Surf listening to Mike
> Curb Congregation records and running off to ring the police at the first
> whiff of marijuana (204-6).

The "kids" queuing up to join the program is one of the novel's major
themes.  The New Left is responsible for the defeat of the New Left. 
The kids are turing to the government because their parents have given
them nothing but bitter shit and lies to live with.  Obviously (Otto's
argument), the government's  abuse of power is paramount, but the novel
focus is on the personal abuse of power and the Turning of individuals
within organizations and movements and families. 

  
If I'm right about P being a conservative (and obviously I'm not talking
about a Nixon-Reagan-Bush republican party or political right wing
conservative of any stripe) his harsh critique of the limited success of
the New Left makes perfect sense. Doesn't it?  P's critique of
"political family" tells us quite a lot about his own political
attitudes. Doesn't it?    

Why are  refugees of US imperialism finding their way to Brock's
left-over Camps? 
How do they find them? How do they know that these CAMPS exist? Do they
have a map? Or is their some deeper (religious even) reason why they
want to be encamped inside the boarders of their imperialist masters? 

Dark Irony, indeed. 

T