Whimpering out.

Oh, the mighty roars of the iconoclasts. Bend is doomed! Doomed I tell you! Everyone who disagrees is an idiot! You'll see! Yoooouuu'lllll see! Just wait! ( Circa 2007.)

And then silence.

Thing is, most of those predictions were right.

H. Bruce has a column about the migration flows as of 2008, which seem to show an influx. I do think this is dated, but I also think it's a continuation of what's the natural flow toward what Bend will be -- vacation, retirement, and second homes. I still get people in the door my age or older who are talking about moving here, or have just moved here.

I also get a lot of younger, working age people say they are leaving.

Lots of brave talk about bringing in "living wage" jobs, but not much execution. Lots of talk about higher education, and training. Again, it isn't much happening.

These goals take a bunch of money which we don't have.

What we do have is tourism and retirement.

I don't really see housing coming back. 27 building permits in May would seem pretty pathetic since we'd normally be moving into prime building season. The Bulletin asks, Shadow Inventory? Hey, just look around you. Just look at the weed infested lots on the west side. Ask yourself how many homes were parked into 'rentals' until the market turned around.

Retail? Yes, downtown continues to fill up, but I kind of predicted that too. I thought the overflow of interest would continue for some time, maybe even long enough to bridge the gap between the bubble bursting and a real recovery. But you don't want to scratch too deep as to the real strength of all those retailers. A surge of consignment shops? Along with second-hand stores and antique stores, this is a negative indicator.

The biggest whimpering out, are the "Destination Resorts" which have quietly dropped most of their marketing campaigns, and/or put their plans into mothballs. They've made their "private" golf courses "public" and tried to make it sound like it was something they WANTED to do.

Or maybe the biggest whimpering out are the overreaches -- Juniper Ridge and the BAT. Quietly, behind the scenes, these are being off loaded.

So why aren't the iconoclasts pointing, and saying, "I told you so?"

The unwinding is slow and tedious. Plus, I gots to wonder if lots of these guys, who seemed so sure the downturn wasn't going to affect them, did indeed get hammered. A sinking ship takes everyone down.

There seemed to be a pretty steady drumbeat of "green shoot" news there for awhile. (Amazingly, the Bulletin has actually been a little restrained in their reporting -- as if realizing that Bend is a special case. They hint around the edges, that we're in for a whimpering rcovery, but also a whimpering bad time.)

I've said before, I miss the iconoclasts, but I think the poor dears are all worn out....

Whimper....