Whatever you may think of the Easleys' first-class visits to Europe, the timing was simply awful.

News that Gov. Mike Easley's entourage cost taxpayers $170,000 to tour Italy broke a few weeks ago – just as a lot of working-class North Carolinians began wondering how to pay for gas to vacation at a nearby beach. Stories about Mary Easley's $109,000 visits to France, Russia and Estonia broke last week, and there's some question as to whether her travels would have been disclosed at all, had the News & Observer of Raleigh not filed a public records request.

Happy Independence Day, North Carolina.

None of the extravagances – the Mercedes rentals, the $1,100 ballet tickets, the first-class restaurant and hotel flings – sit well in a state where too many people count every penny just to make ends meet.

Were the visits pro-business "cultural exchanges," as the governor declared last week? If so, where are the tangible results? And why not announce Mary Easley's mission in advance of the trip, rather than wait for a reporter to fish it out of a bunch of paperwork?

Easley is wrapping up his last year in the Governor's mansion and apparently is doing so in high style.

Unless the governor has a pending announcement of new jobs and economic opportunity as a result of his family's travels on the state's dime, it's hard to argue that North Carolina really needed that kind of business trip.