On A Clear Day, You Can See GM Going Broke...

Steve Larsen died, and that's a damn shame. It really is. Probably a good guy, had kids & a wife. The sort of Model Citizen Bend Needs.

Really. He's actually exactly what Bend needs and Wants.

We talk about the relentless selfishness of Bend PR & Marketing, drawing people in and selling them gobs of Bend bullshit, most of which they don't need.

And the whole "Work Hard, Play Hard" motif is a thread that runs throughout. Search "Olympic Athletes" on the Bully. "Olympic Athletes are everywhere you turn...", and so forth.

Then they get to the sticky business of a Bend Super-Athlete Posterchild Success... dying. And not just dying... Dying While Exercising. That's... not good... for business.

Hmmmm.... now what?

Is it possible all this Mad Pursuit of Exercise Excess is... gulp... Bad For You?

No. No, no, no, no, no. No. It's fine. It's STILL good for you. And as May West can attest, Too Much Of A Good Thing Is.... Wonderful.

And That is what Bend really stands for. Excess. Too Much.

But let's say you are John Costa, and you can't let the lemmings start to question The Message... what do you do? You obfuscate, of course.


39 years old, a pro athlete collapses and dies. How can this happen?

Larsen was declared dead at 7:05 p.m. Tuesday. He died from sudden cardiac arrest, but what caused the cardiac condition remains unknown.

“There’s a lot of things that can happen,” said Deschutes County Medical Examiner Steve Cross. “And the problem here is this very vigorous, healthy, relatively young 39-year-old who is a world-class athlete dies while exercising.

“It’s not supposed to happen. It’s not supposed to happen, and it did.”

“Did exercise cause it to happen? No. He has something that has yet to be explained,” Cross said.

Cross said an autopsy showed no obvious signs of coronary heart disease. Larsen’s heart has been sent to a laboratory in the Midwest where it will be analyzed.

...

“When you’re young and you’re healthy and you have potential underlying conditions, it’s challenging to find them,” he said.

Both Widmer and McLellan said heart conditions can lead to symptoms like shortness of breath, or even to sudden death.

“For some, the first symptom is sudden death,” McLellan said.

...

“Our vision of Steve is the healthiest, fittest guy you would ever know. He was an absolute specimen,” said Teague Hatfield, owner of FootZone, a local athletic store. “He’s always the guy who is faster and stronger than everyone else, and just a good guy.”

Michael Larsen, also an athlete, said he believes a grandfather died of a heart attack, and his father is in poor health. But he said he’s not aware of any family history of heart problems. He believes his brother did go to the family’s general practitioner once he had trouble breathing, but he wasn’t positive.

OK. Read that. He died from cardiac arrest, but What Caused His Cardiac Arrest remains "UNKNOWN"? What? Really?

It was his fucking HEART, you dumbfucks!

They're sending this guys HEART TO A LAB. THAT is how serious this shit is to Costa.

If I drop dead on a jog, will they send MY heart to a lab? Fuck no, they'll throw my fat ass in the nearest dumpster and call it good.

"He died from sudden cardiac arrest, but what caused the cardiac condition remains unknown."

WTF? That's like saying, "He died of a GUNSHOT wound, but the source of the gunshot is STILL UNKNOWN."

IT WAS A FUCKING GUN!

Holy shit, talk about Collateral Damage Control:

It’s not supposed to happen, and it did.

Did exercise cause it to happen? No.

This is the fucking CORONER! He hasn't even looked at the body, and the fucker ALREADY has a NEGATIVE DIAGNOSIS.

Q: "Did he die from exercise, Doc?"

A: "FUCK NO!"

Q: "Was he exercising when he died?"

A: "Bitch, I'm going to get my gun if you mention that again!"

Q: "Was it his heart, then?"

A: "WTF? How the fuck should I know, Bitch! I haven't even seen the body!"

Q: "But there's a quote in the paper where you say it wasn't exercise, it was 'something yet to be explained'. So do you know the cause or not?"

A: "FUCK YOU! I'm calling Costa, Hollern, and the fucking cops!"

If you EVER wonder just what the fuck is going on in this town, RE-READ the piece covering Larsen's DEATH WHILE EXERCISING. Read how many times they tell you how he died... then they tell you THEY HAVE NO IDEA HOW HE DIED. THEN they tell you confidently how he DID NOT DIE.

World-class athlete. Good guy. I feel very bad for his family, wife & kids. It's a loss.

But to MAGGOTS like Costa, it's an incursion into THE KOOL-AID MESSAGE. A chink in the fucking armor. Larsen's death was an EXTREME INCONVENIENCE to people like Costa.

People like Larsen are Marketing Piece #1 to the Wall-To-Wall Olympic Athlete image that has been crammed down our throats. And one of them DYING while doing Their Thing, is Bad, BAD news for Costa.

Re-read that piece. It ain't about Larsen. It's about preserving Bend PR & Marketing at all Cost - ahs.

---

So we got unemployment figures for Bend this week, and yawwwwwwwwwwwn they were absolutely awful.

Just another in a long line of nails in the Bend Miracle Coffin.

I don't know about you, but I saw U-Hauls this weekend as far as the eye could see. They are everywhere.

And this is it. The Big Weekend! Kids outta school in under 2 wks! Mommy & Daddy are outta work!

Time to LEAVE BEND! Yeah!!!!

This is it, folks. You won't hear it anywhere, except maybe on the Wandering Eye. The Great Gutting of Bend has begun.

I would bet that 5-10% of this great City will pack up & go in the next 90 days. That's between 4-8,000 people who are going to Abandon The Bend Dream.

No? Drive along Purcell, between Costco & the hospital. Drive to the base of Pilot Butte. That there is Rental Central, and that motherfucker has alone provided a Big Boost to the FOR RENT sign business. EVERYTHING is for rent up in there.

Drive around, look on craigslist. Bend is going to STD Rental Hell.

And there'll be no one to rent to. 4-8K are leaving in the next 90 days. And it ain't gonna be picked up in survey's of UNITED VAN LINES.

OK, that's for fuckers WITH MONEY. No one in this shithole, bled-dry town has a fucking cent.

No... people are leaving in U-Hauls and their fucking CARS. They are selling or abandoing their shit, and just driving away.

You watch: We'll see population signs on the outskirts of Bend that DO NOT read "80,995" in 8-10 years. It'll be back in the 60's.... or 50's...

---

So we're in the early stages of a recovery, right? We've got our Green Shoots, recovering DJIA, Spring is in the air, and such...

Market look fantastic! All my stuff is recovering nicely, thank you very much (except the stuff that went Chap 11, but let us not talk of trifles...). The market, the most dependable indicator we've got, is pointing to a nice bounce in The Real Economy... by the looks of it, probably later this year.

Right?

Wrong.

Sorry, but the market had this implosion Dead Fucking Wrong from The Word Go. Housing started crapping out starting in JULY 2006... and the DJIA didn't top out till OCTOBER 2007!

The market has done an abysmal job at discounting the effects of the complete destruction of about 1/3rd of this countries wealth. And the rest of the World did no better. Of course, NOWHERE is the prediction business WORSE than right here in Bend Oregon.

The Bully STILL maintains that the Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow... despite the fact that the sun has never really gone down. It's all in our heads. Have some Kool-Aid.

No, markets & media have done a disatrous job calling this Great Recession.

But BY GOD they feel 100% CONFIDENT calling it's end. And it's END IS NIGH MOTHERFUCKER!

Yeah, the exact same bitches who could not see this fucker coming a mile away, are confidently calling it OVER in Q3. Q4 at the latest. The Bully, in classic dumbfuck fashion, says that it all ended a year ago April 25, before it even started.

It's ain't over. Not by a mile.

What could possibly go wrong?

First, commercial RE. Commercial RE isn't even close to hitting bottom. Hell, it ain't even to the point of Maximum Decline.

Commercial RE default rates, based on "seasoning".

X-axis is months of seasoning, Y-axis is default rates. That real steep brown line is commercial RE deals done right at the Bubble's top, while the flat dark blue one is deals done years earlier.

Doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that commercial RE, a wealth storehouse rivaled only by residential housing (maybe), has yet to see the other shoe drop.

We're in a vicious deleveraging cycle, and this sort of thing doesn't just "stop". It grinds on and on and on... Look at the Japs: 20 years later and the fuckers are still mired in the World's longest Modern Day Depression. That's what's coming our way.

What's next? The future is plastics...

Credit card default rates ain't the problem, it's the amounts... Graph from LAST YEAR!

You're going to hear It Ain't So Bad Now, Cuz It Was Worse In 1991! Right.

See, in 1991, we only had about $800 bills in CC debt. And we defaulted on 5.3%, or about $42 bill.

Today, we have over $2.6 TRILLION, and we're just getting started on the Default Train.

Look for banks to start folding again on commercial and unsecured (Credit card) debts AGAIN, Green Shoots BE DAMNED.

Finally, we'll see in HIGH RELIEF more of a symbolic failure than anything, this week. Our friend GM itself will die of CARDIAC ARREST.

Same shit, different day: There will be no end to stories of it's RESURRECTION, bigger & BETTER than ever. Nah... AmeriKKKa is still the World's Premier Manufacturing Location!

AMERIKKKHAN WORKER BEST IN WORLD!

"My husband is UAW Proud!"

AmeriKKKHAN workers, namely Union Tubs of Fucking Shit, are the most MINDLESS DUMBFUCKS THE WORLD HAS EVER KNOWN. Read it again, hbm.

Instead of actually realizing they were ass-fucking what used to be the Worlds Largest Company so fucking hard, that it DIED, these butt-wipes will now be equity partners, and own 17.5% of a BANKRUPT BEHEMOTH.

OK, the math: 17.5% of nothing is... NOTHING!

Right, right... New GM, Bigger, Stronger, Faster, we can rebuild him, yada, yada bullshit.

The fact of the matter is GM, Chrysler, Ford, and a shitload of other PROTON-based manufacturers are less relevant than ever. We've got our panties in a wad over the idea that Indians, Japs, Chinese, and Queersbekistanians could own our auto business, putting us on par with Greenland auto production, or some shit.

Fuck that. GM, if brought back to life, will NEVER EVER again be anything but a bit player. Did you hear the "UNITS REQUIRED FOR MINIMUM SAFE DISTANCE" quoted by the auto industry? It was 11 million units! We're doing 9 mill now!

These fuckers need 11 million units to even EAT, and that figure might as well be 10 billion, cuz we'll never hit it.

Ohhhh, GM is going to declare Chap 11. AT LEAST TWICE. This motherfucker is going to be like a Weekend At Bernies. The whole US manufacturing base is slowly going to erode away.

So RE isn't even close to being over. There has yet to be the aftershock of CC defaults. And US manufacturing is just going to die.

What's the "New Normal?".... it's a whole lot skinnier than it was.

I know you love my huge titties, AMERIKKKA!

All Signs Point To Deteriorating Bend Economy

I suppose the Big News of the week is that Oregon Unemployment seemed to "stablize" at 12.0% (adjusted). The unadjusted figure fell to 12.1% from 12.7%, but remember: the "adjusted" figure is the new Quoted Standard.

In 2008, Bend unemployment went from 7.8% in March to 6.6% in April (down 1.2%), while the adjusted stayed at 6.7% for both months.

So we can look forward to a rising "adjusted" unemployment rate even if our "real" rate falls as much as 1.1%.

Only 1 thing is for certain: Local Bend media, while not even acknowledging "unadjusted" unemployment will start touting the FALLING UNEMPLOYMENT rates contain therein, if they do indeed happen.

Watch for it this week: The Last Leading Indicator was MONTHS OF INVENTORY, and it did a pretty damn good job.

Months Inventory stands at 11.7 months for Bend residential.

Bend w/ Acreage stands at just over 5 years inventory.

Who is the LEADER (by LEADER, I mean LOSER)?

Sisters, my favorite PARIAH, has 101 residential homes for sale, and just a single sale in April, for a (fairly transient) pretty terrible 8.4 year supply of homes.

If you think that single sale is a Big Anomaly, Sisters also had a single sale in March as well.

Sisters w/ Acreage has had either zero or 1 sale in each of the first 4 months of this year. Months (Years?) Inventory has ranged from 6 years or so on the low side, to infinity on the high end.

Redmond has a 14.5 month supply of homes, and over 2 1/2 years of acreage properties.

LaPine has 10 months of homes, and just over 32 months of acreage properties.

Crook County has just under 2 years of home supply, and a fairly brutal 14 year supply of acreage property... that's a single sale out of 168 available properties.

Madras has about a year and a half of homes, and 2 years of farms for sale.

So the Leading Indicator of Economic Health for the region is still Very Poor. Damn Poor.

That tells me that the Best Concurrent Indicator, Unemployment, is not going to jump up soon.

At least I don't think.

Because I have a sneaking suspicion that all the Job Seekers are starting to see the Wizard behind The Curtain isn't all he's cracked up to be (Hollern, Smith, Costa). And a lot of people make their forward-looking plans at this time of the year (Brucey).

Many will say "No".

I am seeing a HUGE number of For rent signs sprouting up. I've been here 8 years, and haven't seen this many. Usually they go up, and are down in a week... not so this year.

People are leaving Bend in DROVES and I don't give a shit what anyone else is saying.

I'm SEEING IT.

So here's the Low Down: We may have reached the seasonal low in real unemployment for the season (I thought this last month & was proved wrong), but Inventory is still HUGE. Dark matter is suddenly seeing the light of day. Gray matter is coming out of the woodwork.

But there is no money here to buy it. There's no money because there are no jobs. There are no jobs because we squandered the largest lottery payout this place has ever seen, by distributing the money back to developers via reduced and now eliminated SDC charges, and other perks such as free land distributions (Putnam Pointe).

We might start to reach the Self Healing Point: People leaving having had their Bend Dream Crushed via 401K 100% losses on amenity business black hole, and so the unemployment rate starts to ease because there are fewer job seekers.

Maybe?

---

I hate to keep saying I Told You So (that's a lie), but...

San Fran leads the pack with the largest absolute dollar losses in housing prices, with a crushing loss of $444,800.

It's also 3rd on the depreciation list of Big Cities (over 1 mill population), with a nut-crushing loss of 52.5%

And that's the loss on the MEDIAN home, not the average. The average is probably a lot higher.

I think SanFran is much like Bend, and still has yet to deal with the real repercussions of losing that much net worth.

By my calculations, Bend has lost $13 billion in net worth, from a peak of $24 billion. And the population has actually gone up over this time. So we've individually gotten a lot poorer.

But SanFran has lost several HUNDRED BILLION in net worth.

SanFran won't change as much as Cent OR (we will have it MUCH WORSE), but it will suffer immensely, and the fundamental character of the place will transform over the next 10-20 years.

All these Cut In Half markets, like Bend, SanFran, San Bernnie, Phoenix, Vagas, LA... will all take 15-20 years to recoup the bubble losses.

I don't know about you, but in 20 years I will be an old motherfucker.

My kids will be grown & married. And probably have kids.

Folks, 20 years is a Long Ass Time.

These places won't recover in any relevant time period.

Well, I actually have to get to work, so I'll leave it at that...

hbm, you wanna float the river, big boy?
BendBubble2 makes me wanna take off my shirt!

BB2's a pretty toxic place. I don't go there.

Funny thing happened on the way to April 2009... we became Fairly Valued.

Remember, back last August, when Brucey was still riding atop his Perpetual Filing Machine (Perpetual Flying Machine?), hbm had sworn off BB2 for the 122nd time, which we celebrated as it coincided with his age... and National City had stated that Bend was still tops in overvaluation.

We had $285K medians, which Nat City said was 46% too high.

So... that brings us to $195K medians... which... is... where.... we... are. Back to 2003 levels.

Yup folks, we are no longer exceptional. We are average. Well, sorta.

We are actually far above average in unemployment & the rate of housing price depreciation.

That's the unfortunate part. We're in a Bad Way. 17% unemployment doesn't just vanish. In fact, with Cessna & the Multiplier Effect, we're probably going to lose several thousand jobs from that source alone.

Bend is in Collapse Mode. The Virtuous Circle is now a Vicious Cycle. All will be undone, and then some.

People will soon start making arguments that prices in Bend have reached IRRATIONAL LEVELS. And they will be right, in one regard.

You will be able to buy cheaper than owning.

It really won't make ANY SENSE to rent. But prices will go below that parity. They will because there is no money here. There is unemployment, there is no money, and there are no jobs. And when that happens, price doesn't matter.

Bums can't buy houses.

I think there are some touting that now is an INCREDIBLE time to buy a home in Bend. This is just indicative of someone who has no idea about the repercussions of a Black Swan.

Black Swans don't make sense. Medians are headed towards the low $100's. Buying will be cheaper than renting soon. Believe it.

---

Speaking of crazy old cooters, hbm found a good piece in Business Week about the implosion of Bend.

“It boggles my mind how we’re going to get out of this,” Erik Kancler, executive director of Central Oregon LandWatch, told The Bulletin.

Maybe the only way to get out of it is to follow the example of other Bendites, load up the U-Haul and get the hell out of Dodge.

Funny that hbm & I have what appears to be similar "agendas". Or at least similar conclusions about what people should do if they are down & out in Bend, OR.

We don't see eye-to-wandering-eye on much, but we certainly share the belief that Bend is a crumbling edifice of Greed & Corruption & Crushed Dreams.

And all we hear, is that our beloved City Leaders SAW IT COMING, all along.

Bull shit. None of these dumbfucks saw anything coming.

Go read the Bully archives. Not a single City or Business Leader was predicting ANYTHING except a BRIEF SLOWDOWN, and then off to the races, harder, faster, and HIGHER than ever before.

Everyone "running" Bend wanted you to buy, buy, BUY.

And they believed it. Sawyer & hundreds like her (and him) bought after the top, when we were down just 10%... not the near 50% we are down now.

And still they tell you to buy. Why? It's actually starting to be a "Good Deal".

OK, I'll go along with that. IF, you can pull of positive cash flow from Day 1, and IF you have absolutely NO PLANS of ever selling. THEN, it can work.

But why? It'll work FAR BETTER in 1 year. And FAR, FAR better in 2.

In a couple of years, when all have lost hope, Bend will be a nice little spot for making money. NOT the CAP APP days of yore. But just positive cash flow each month. Regular place, with an OK RE market.

It's getting there, but it's not there yet. We have $195K medians, the rest of the country is $165K, or so. We are STILL too high, and will ultimately go 20-30% below national medians.

---

This crazy fucking blog, attracts your standard garden variety lunatic. And that repels quite a few. Can't stand the heat, I suppose. Saw this over at BendBB:

by popgoesbend on Thu Apr 09, 2009 9:10 am

Marge sometimes posts that info over at BB2...

by Jack_Elliott on Thu Apr 09, 2009 1:35 pm

BB2's a pretty toxic place. I don't go there.

The guy wants info on RE, someone suggests coming here... but WE'RE TOO TOXIC. AHHH! Stay away! You'll catch BB2 Swine Flu AIDS!

Oh geez. I don't think Jack Elliott has heard about the New, Kinder, Gentler BB2, with 1/100th the FUCK YOU IN YOUR SMELLY CUNT factor, now that Buster has curled up in LaPine, and is giving hand-jobs to goats.

Sorry, but I read this sort of thing and realize that this Jack Elliott guy is like Oran Teater in hbm's piece: They will fucking deluded themselves into things at all costs that serve their own purposes.

This place is "toxic"? Really? WTF does that mean? And it's actually true for many on BendBB, they just won't come here. Too rough-N-tumble, too Wild West.

I just think that's sorta funny. If I want info, I will go anywhere on the web to get it. I don't think anywhere is "TOXIC". That's just weird. "TOXIC" is harvesting IP's, and that is done on BendBB, not here. "TOXIC" is moderating & deleting comments... again, not done here. "TOXIC" is having some sort of Trusted Registration process, when no such thing is possible, which is done... well, you get the point.

---

Finally, I figure I will throw hbm, Dunc, and other lib's a bone. I had a chance to watch CNBC over the past week... I do not have cable here at my house.

Ummmmm... when did they become an almost Zombie Force For Repugs?

I last saw that station 10 years ago, and they were relatively neutral. What happened?

They had the odd position of blaming the economic problems on Barack, but somehow saying the huge stock market rally was happening despite all the awful things he was doing.

When did this happen? I see OPB leaning towards the dreadlocks & granola crowd, but this is ridiculous. It was so BLATANT.

I did not watch Fox News, so hold all cat calls of YOU SHOULD WATCH FOX NEWS!

Anyway, I guess I am back to the obvious slanted view of KTVZ, but man.... they don't hold a candle to CNBC. that was just ridiculous.

---

Finally, just a note on Social Costs.

Social Costs are borne by all people, when a small number choose to (usually unilaterally) impose them on everyone else.

I usually illustrate this with littering. I HATE littering. It's SO EASY to avoid, and is just a direct transfer of costs onto everyone. I HATE IT.

But that seems what this country is becoming. SOCIALISM. The costs of a few are imposed on the masses. Very few benefit, but the costs they impose are HUGE.

That's what we are. It is everywhere. We are a nation of Narcissitic Paris Hiltons. Every little thing MUST BE indulged NOW. If we can make $1 while costing society $20, so be it.

I know everyone is reviling the Socialist Movement of Barack, but to me it is less about the $1 being given to the Free Wheelers. It is about the $20 that I, my kids, and my kids kids will have to bear.

Capitalism may not be perfect, but Socialism is a disaster. It's nothing but the masses trying to impose costs on everyone else. In a social context, it's rampant littering with no garbage pickup.

That is where we are headed.

Siyonara Brucey (and Cessna), We Hardly Knew Ye

Well, I have Good News and Bad News:

The Good News is, if you can survive in Bend, you can survive anywhere.

The Bad News is, You Can't Survive In Bend.

Yes, yes. Brucey, like Cessna, most homebuilders, graphic artists, PR freelancers, RE brokers & mortgage bankers and a raft of other amenity business owners cannot survive in Bend.

And, I guess I could say I share tim's sentiment with respect to the passing of Olde Brucey:

tim said...

Bruce, If you were tempted here by the PR, that is indeed a good reason to be mad. I didn't even know Bend was supposed to be special when I moved here.

Of course, I didn't know the paper was lousy, the Realtors were in control, or the local gov't was silly. But my expectations were clearly lower than yours. Good luck to you.

I do like to see people make fun of you, but only because your reactions are so priceless.

Having said that, I like you a lot.

I agree Bruce, you and thousands of others were sold a Bill of Goods. A load of Shit. You were suckered in by the Bend Grifting Machine. And Bend takes no prisoners.

But rest assured Bruce, you're doing the Right Thing. This place is all smoke & mirrors. On a Good Day. On a Bad Day, it's suicides, mob hits, and losing your house & job.

You're catching flak Brucey, cuz I think you walked in like a lot of people declaring, "I'm going to run this shithole in 90 days!"

And then you slowly found out that living in Bend is like living on the Moon. The middle of nowhere, and precious little time left to Get Out after your blood starts to boil...

So I have to give the bad with the good:

tim said...

>>Some of you have to man up.

I hope you're joking when you say that. You, after all, are the poster boy for how much energy can be expended while effecting so little change.

I guess this is more of a life lesson than anything.

1) You talk about Anonymouses, and I understand what you're saying. But this is Bend, dude. Look what all the publicly ID'd commenters got: Bile & Loathing. Even Dunc, who is fairly highly regarded, got his share of ass beatings.

2) Combine #1 with the aforementioned "megolamania" about changing the World, and you're going to get roundly assailed. Anywhere. But on this blog, it will be relentless.

My own philosophy is to NEVER say I'm going to do something publicly, UNLESS it is for precisely the reason of motivating myself to do it knowing I will be lambasted if I do not succeed.

That's what happened here.

But, Dear Brucey, take solace in the fact that you are leaving for a better place. A lot of the cat calls are veiled shrieks of envy. Really. A lot of people are angry that you, someone they have beat on mercilessly, actually has the good sense to leave this imploding shithole.

All these cries of "Good Riddance", are tainted with envy. You can't survive in Bend. And neither can they, and they know it.

It's gotten so bad, Buster has regressed into a fetal ball in La Pine, fantasizing over Malay sex slaves.

No Brucey, you are leaving to a better place. Bend will implode into a firey ball of shit, taking most of us with it.

Bend IS exceptional: Highest 1% unemployment in the land. But we are actually The Top for how fast we got there. Bend has the single largest INCREASE in unemployment in the USA over the past year. Blew away Flint MI, that's for damn sure.

I salute you, Brucey. And wish you well. You WILL have the last laugh. Check in occasionally, while you watch Rome Burn from afar. And believe me, it will burn. Your own example of futilely trying to effect change from outside the Good Old Boy Beltway ensures that. You can't change Bend, and that will be it's downfall.

Really, do check in. Especially when unemployment hits 20%+. And laugh your ass off. This place is tearing itself to pieces, and will catastrophically explode.

Lot of people staying based on the idea that you can rise a souflette twice. Can't. Bend is 100% doomed.

And your example will lead the way Brucey. There is going to be a mass exodus the likes of which has never been seen. This Summer. 1 in 6 unemployed, and getting worse. That can't stand. People yank their kids and move ASAP in places like that.

Come back Brucey, when this place has hit rock-ass bottom, and medians are under $100K, and you can buy you a nice little shit-shack downtown for 100% cash, and live off your royalties. You'll be the last one laughing.

Everyone who decides to stay will be destitute.

You are doing the right thing Brucey, if only a little late. You drank the Kool-Aid, and then saw the Emperor wears no clothes. This place is a 100% grift scam. Nothing is real. How could it be 200 miles from anywhere? Again, it's a moonbase.

Good luck to you Brucey.

---

Cessna Closes

OK, it's hard not to gloat a little on this one. I called this before Cessna even bought the remains of Columbia Air. It seemed clear that Bend Oregon as an assembly point was catatonicly stupid. Moon FUCKING Base. Gat Damn.

We got the obligatory "We knew it was coming" bullshit from every corner, including the founder. Seems EVERYONE KNEW it was coming. No biggie. Uh huh.

That's how EVERY SURPRISE CLOSING is unveiled.

"Yeah, we knew it was coming."

What is left out, as usual, is the Reverse Synergy Angle.

Right? Yeah, the Bully, and every single interviewee (typically Roger Lee), categorically states that when these businesses are on the upswing (like CESSNA WAS IN 2007), that the synergies will spread out throughout the land.

For every hire done by Cessna, there will be 10 new hires by other companies.

600 hires at Cessna? 6,000 teritiary hires elsewhere, and $6 billion in new growth throughout Central Oregon.

Standard Op Procedure. Alana Audette does this daily. $600 bazillion in "tourist" economy dollars spent yearly here.

Audette & Lee are the masters of taking something ridiculously small and multiplying it by 7,000,000,000,000 to make themselves look important.

Funny though, that the same MULTIPLICATION is never unwound on the way down.

Now that Cessna is gone, there will not be an UNWINDING of 6,000 jobs, nor an UNWINDING of the $6 bazilion dollars they brought to our doorstep.

This is Bend. Everything is PR'd to 100X it's size on the way up, but never downsized when it explodes.

Rest assured Central Oregon, those 6,000 teritiary jobs Cessna brought here will NEVER GO AWAY.

---

This is the web that caught our Young Brucey, and THOUSANDS of other just like him.

Lies, and More Gat Damn Lies. Audette & Lee. All funded by our dear City Council & local government.

You are here to be bilked of EVERYTHING. Everything you've ever worked for.

Folks, if you arrived here in the past 5 years, it's time RIGHT NOW, to take a hard look at the facts. Many, MANY of you reading this blog are either UNEMPLOYED, horrifically UNDER-EMPLOYED, or about to be UNEMPLOYED. And if you bought a house, you have lost an average of $1,000/week. And that is not going to stop.

And Summer is coming. And the kids are getting out of school. THIS IS IT. THIS IS GO TIME.

Take a serious hard-nosed look at things.

CAN YOU afford to stay in a place that has NO HOPE of getting a Real Economy? This is a MOON BASE, light years form anything REAL.

CAN YOU afford to lose $1,000/week for the next year? Or even $500/week? This is more than many people make here.

CAN YOU afford to bet it all on your employer surviving a complete collapse of this place?

CAN YOU afford NOT to leave this Summer, and find a place that isn't completely falling apart at the seams?

This place is DOOMED. It is deteriorating at a rate FASTER THAN ANYWHERE IN THE USA. Housing WILL NOT GET BETTER. The JOB MARKET WILL NOT GET BETTER.

Don't believe me? Go talk to ANYONE who used to work for Cessna. Go to the Redmond School District, where they are talking about 4 day school weeks. THAT is on it's way here.

Redmond is just like Brucey; They have simply woke up & smelled the coffee before Bend, and are doing something about the problem.

This place will start hemorhagging people and jobs starting in ONE MONTH. Well, the jobs has already got a good start, people will now follow. Before we had RUMORS of exodus. Folks, at 17% unemployment, not even the mightiest PR efforts this place has to offer will be able to put down THE FACTS. People will leave Bend in DROVES.

There will be huge swaths of empty, decaying STD's ALL OVER. My God, Hollern has marked down Yarrow 80%! And still he won't sell anything...

It's time to MAN UP, and follow Brucey's example. LEAVE. Seriously. If you do not have a job, could get fired at anytime, are barely scrapping by, or own a house and aren't making $3K/week to make up for your losses, LEAVE THIS PLACE. You will not survive.