The Oregon Business Magazine has an article entitled: "Bend's Economy Is Coming Back To Life."
Too bad they didn't have the smarts to put a question mark behind that title.
How do we know that Bend's economy is coming back to life? Because the real estate agents, and economic development people, and the city officials, and the new entreprenuers in town tell us so.
You know, the Usual Suspects.
Why on earth would they tell a reporter anything different?
From the first page, we get the usual B.S. A tone of --" the crash just all happened at once, who could have foreseen it? "is established, and the reporter -- who has apparently never heard these excuses repeated ad nauseam in the last three years, repeats it all with a straight face.
Did you know that aviation was supposed to be the diversifying element in Bend? Well, now that its gone, it turns out we were betting on it. Huh.
The reporter acknowledges that Bend topped the list of "most overvalued" property in the nation, but immediately dismisses it because of Bend's exceptionalism...
"...not take into account the value of the rapids of the Deschutes River flowing through downtown, or the view of the Sisters, Smith Rock, Mount Jefferson and more from the many available homes in the west side..."
Where have we heard that before? Proof is in the pudding. Housing prices DID drop precipitously, and somehow the river and the downtown and the rocks and the mountains didn't stop it from happening... (Besides which, there are many western towns with just as gorgeous of scenery -- I wonder if the reporter has ever visited, oh, you know -- Washington, Idaho, Colorado, Utah, and on and on. I think they have rivers and mountains, too.)
A series of small business start-ups are interviewed, and they put the best face on it all, as you would expect. (see comments in previous posts about what I think new startups mean...)
But mostly it's puffery, and I don't have the heart to go on.
P.R. isn't going to bring Bend back. It's just P.R.
Basically, the reporter could have just stayed home and written his article from Bend's press releases....
Too bad they didn't have the smarts to put a question mark behind that title.
How do we know that Bend's economy is coming back to life? Because the real estate agents, and economic development people, and the city officials, and the new entreprenuers in town tell us so.
You know, the Usual Suspects.
Why on earth would they tell a reporter anything different?
From the first page, we get the usual B.S. A tone of --" the crash just all happened at once, who could have foreseen it? "is established, and the reporter -- who has apparently never heard these excuses repeated ad nauseam in the last three years, repeats it all with a straight face.
Did you know that aviation was supposed to be the diversifying element in Bend? Well, now that its gone, it turns out we were betting on it. Huh.
The reporter acknowledges that Bend topped the list of "most overvalued" property in the nation, but immediately dismisses it because of Bend's exceptionalism...
"...not take into account the value of the rapids of the Deschutes River flowing through downtown, or the view of the Sisters, Smith Rock, Mount Jefferson and more from the many available homes in the west side..."
Where have we heard that before? Proof is in the pudding. Housing prices DID drop precipitously, and somehow the river and the downtown and the rocks and the mountains didn't stop it from happening... (Besides which, there are many western towns with just as gorgeous of scenery -- I wonder if the reporter has ever visited, oh, you know -- Washington, Idaho, Colorado, Utah, and on and on. I think they have rivers and mountains, too.)
A series of small business start-ups are interviewed, and they put the best face on it all, as you would expect. (see comments in previous posts about what I think new startups mean...)
But mostly it's puffery, and I don't have the heart to go on.
P.R. isn't going to bring Bend back. It's just P.R.
Basically, the reporter could have just stayed home and written his article from Bend's press releases....