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Annual maintenance contract for Wilkes-Barre’s camera system dropped

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‘Long and painful death’ endured by Bear Creek man killed by drill, lawsuit says

During his recently completed first 100 days in office, President Donald Trump has been attacked by his critics for his frequent trips to his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida.Trump has spent roughly a quarter of his time as president either traveling to or staying at the swanky property, USA Today recently reported.Certainly, the optics of that aren&#8217;t good. It makes it seem like Trump is more interested in rest and relaxation than running the country.A report by ABC News last weekend only served to further that impression. It said Trump has already made 21 visits to golf clubs &#8212; we&#8217;re assuming he owns most of them &#8212; during his first three-and-a-half months in office. While the White House has refused to confirm if Trump played golf during those visits, again it&#8217;s the optics causing the problem. For comparison purposes, ABC News noted The Donald&#8217;s predecessor, Barack Obama, played golf 29 times during all of 2009, his first year in the Oval Office.So, needless to say, Trump is on pace to beat Obama badly when it comes to time spent hanging out near or on a golf course.Amid all this talk of the president&#8217;s leisure time, we recently saw sitting on a co-worker&#8217;s desk a very worn and brittle copy of a Times Leader edition from Nov. 23, 1959.Back then, almost 60 years ago, national hero Dwight Eisenhower was the president, and he was and still is beloved by the American public. (Although we shudder to think how many current high school students could even name Eisenhower as a president. That&#8217;s a topic for another column, though.)Now, you might be asking what Eisenhower has to do with Trump and his golf-resort trips.Well, students of history would know Eisenhower was quite the golf lover as well, and he played a lot out on the links.And by &#8220;a lot,&#8221; we mean Ike would never get away with some of the stuff he got away with way back when he was in charge &#8212; no matter his highly revered status.That Nov. 23, 1959, edition included a brief report on the lower left side of its front page, entitled &#8220;Ike Ends Georgia Vacation.&#8221;It tells you all you need to know about how the public&#8217;s expectations of its commander-in-chief have changed, and how Trump&#8217;s vacation time pales in comparison.Here are some of the pertinent paragraphs from that long-lost report, detailing the general&#8217;s daily doings on his trip:&#8220;The President turned up in his temporary office at Augusta National Golf Club at 8:30 this morning, worked for an hour on routine, and was on the first tee of the course at 10:25. This was his twelfth round of golf in 12 days.&#8220;The President&#8217;s three-continent swing to 11 nations starts Dec. 3. To try to get government affairs and himself into shape for the journey, Eisenhower holed up from Nov. 12 on in the Augusta National Golf Club. The pattern has been work in his office above the pro shop in the morning at (sic) 18 holes of golf in the afternoon.&#8221;Now, could you imagine the uproar if Trump took about two weeks at Mar-a-Lago so he could rest up for a big trip! And while there, work only a few hours per day before getting in his usual round of golf! It would be on the level of a scandal, we dare say!And this was hardly a one-time occurrence for Eisenhower. According to a 2009 story in Golfweek, he visited the world-famous Augusta club a whopping 29 times during his eight years in office.We&#8217;ll say it again: Could you imagine if this happened today!The 1959 dispatch from the annals of presidential history &#8212; like all history usually does &#8212; provides us with perspective that can be applied to better understand a present-day issue.Presidential leisure time has been written about for decades now, maybe even longer.But at the end of the day, it matters little and few recall it.Trump might want to rein in his travel costs &#8212; reportedly a few million for each Florida trip &#8212; but we would not hold it against him for continuing to take time away from the White House.After all, almost everybody still likes Ike. &#8212; Times Leader<style>
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Our view: Trump travel tame next to Ike golf trips