back to IVing IV: "What", Doc wondered aloud, "the fuck, is going on here?"

[alice wellintown]

On Wed, Dec 2, 2009 at 10:24 PM, Richard Fiero <rfiero at gmail.com> wrote:
> alice wellintown wrote:
>>
>> >Mark Kohut wrote:
>> > p. 283 Doc's  'first thought' was for Penny's safety after looking at
>> > this
>> > folder. Doc is presented as a tender-hearted type---outside of a
>> > one-on-one with some Badasses--once again. P shows us steady thoughts of
>> > others, especially his women "friends".
>>
>> Again, I'm reading a very different Larry. The text doesn't say his
>> first thought was FOR her safety. He understands that she might have
>> put herself in grave danger by treating the file as any other sealed
>> ancient history file when it is in fact a very special file; it's a
>> file that people she works with and people she works for, as well as
>> other dangerous people, don't want her reading or slipping to people
>> like Larry.
>
> If the people who owned the file did not want Penny to have access to it,
> she would not have access to it. As she said, "we do this all the time."

So she took no risk at all? The people who own the file (can you
identify them?) don't care who reads it? Or do they want her to read
it, maybe share it with Larry? I can't follow this. Who owns it?
Please explain or direct me to a page. Thanks.

As far as I can tell, no one owns it in this sense of controlling it.
It's like millions of other files, sealed, but still in a file draw or
basement archive where government employees can read it and if they
choose to, and if they have a certain level of access, steal it, or
leak it. Happens all the time. In 1970 it happened all the time.
Penny has access to information, a file in this case, as so many
government employees do, that is sealed from public view. That people
in Penny's office read and share information in sealed files all the
time doesn't mean it's without risk. Moreover, this file is not just
any old sealed and ancient history file, but one that has information
in it that puts Penny, as a co-worker and subordinate of men who are
murdering other men in her office, at considerable risk.  Penny
doesn't suspect that the file carries this kind of danger and that is
why she is in more danger. Had Larry told her that the file was not
any "ancient history" file, she may have decided not to take the risk.
But Larry puts her at risk and she puts him in danger because they are
not friends but people who use people, even people they make free love
with, to get information.
>
>>  Now, Larry only realizes the super grave nature of this
>> file after he starts reading it, but he knew that it was no typical
>> sealed ancient history file. He knew she was putting herself at risk.
>
> Perps are released all the time "in the furtherance of justice." The people
> who own the file also own Adrian Prussia, not the other way around.

Who are they and why are they so sloppy? Why didn't they destroy or at
least, take control of the file?


>> He only now realizes how much risk. Penny, it seems has no clue. Not a
>> fair trade.
>
> They are both professionals and have assessed the risks. If not, they can go
> down like our bankers didn't.

But there are, even in their business, rules of engagement. My point
is that they are both breaking those rules and I see that as
cowardice. This ain't no James Bond movie. Right?


>
> It's a fair exchange of information with each getting what was wanted.
> I don't go along with either reading.

Larry gets a lot more in the bargain. More than he bargained for too.

>
>> He traded a wall paper penny stock for a bundle of blue
>> chips. As they say, it's another day and every dog will have one. This
>> one belongs to Larry. But let's not confuse one good trade with a
>> positive year. Penny is not his friend. No definition of friendship
>> allows that one can shop one's friends or put them in serious harm to
>> satisfy one's curiosity or get a job done or keep one. No, put it in
>> quotes, but it ain't even close to a friend. An enemy is more like it.
>> And Larry is a coward. What Penny did is fairly low on the courage
>> scale because she didn't know the danger she was in. If she knew how
>> dangerous that file was when she took it and gave it to Larry, we
>> might call her fairly courageous, but not a hero because she didn't
>> take that risk for her friends or brothers and sisters, but in
>> exchange for information. What Larry did is cowardice. He downplayed
>> the risk and sent her in harms way to satisfy his own needs and
>> desires.
>
> No, the organization only severely punishes its own, not outsiders.


This organization, as you call it, what and where is it in the text?
Golden Fang? Mafia. CIA? THEM?  Seems to me, this kind of paranoia is
not operational, but destructive. THEY are like a Puritan God. A
little enlightenment might kill THEM.