The Wandering Eye

There's a bombshell of a story in this morning's Oregonian describing the spectacular crash-and-burn of one of the Central Oregon real estate boom's high rollers who the paper reports is now under investigation by the FBI and the IRS.

The prolonged contest for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination has brought hundreds of thousands of new voters into the party's ranks. That could be bad news for Republicans seeking re-election in November - including, maybe, one Republican in Bend.

Steve Novick is seeing red over a remark by a Jeff Merkley aide comparing Novick's Portland supporters to old-line Soviet Communists.

The Eye likes to check in on right-wing gasbag Lars Larson every so often to make sure he's performing at his usual level of idiocy. We took a peek at his latest entry on the Oregon Catalyst blog this morning, and his fans can rest easy - he's still at the top of his game.

Everybody knows voters this year are looking for change, and every politician is trying to position himself as The Candidate of Change - even Oregon's Gordon Smith, who's been in the U.S. Senate since 1997.

Barack Obama will visit Bend for a "town hall meeting" at Summit High School on Saturday, his campaign headquarters announced less than an hour ago.

Oregon supporters of Barack Obama are hoping Hillary Clinton will drop out of the race - but not until after May 20.

For many years The EYE has been intrigued (and baffled) by the persistent claim that Bend has "300 days of sunshine a year." Where did it come from? How was that number arrived at?

The Hillary Clinton campaign has been trumpeting The Bulletin's Sunday endorsement of the New York senator - The EYE got an e-mail from them about it yesterday - but statewide, Barack Obama is clobbering Clinton in the newspaper endorsement race.

Bend's Only Daily Newspaper must be so flush with advertising dollars that it can afford to be really picky about what ads it accepts - at least if they come from the union representing Bend Area Transit bus drivers.