'Ignore the polls. They're stupid.'

'Presidential polls are useless. Will Trump win? Will Biden? Nobody has a crystal ball.'

Rex Huppke in USA Today

"Americans are political polling themselves to death," says Rex Huppke. Liberals are freaking out while the MAGA faithful celebrate recent swing-state surveys favoring Donald Trump over President Joe Biden. Given the "stakes of this election," we should be informing ourselves and others, not "standing open-mouthed in front of the firehose of "BREAKING PRESIDENTIAL POLLING NEWS." Who will win? "There are no crystal balls." Anyone suggesting polls can predict a November result this far out is "peddling nonsense."

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'A different way of seeing Justice Alito's blame-the-wife defense'

Jennifer Weiner in The New York Times

Justice Samuel Alito says his wife was the one who flew an upside-down flag (symbol of the "stop-the-steal" movement) at his house, says Jennifer Weiner. And Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) blames Mrs. Menendez for his alleged "financial chicanery." These dubious excuses add to a long history of "high-end wife-blaming in Washington." At least the men "blaming the missus" this time represent their wives as "their own people with their own independent agency." That's a "glimmer of progress."

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'The real reason for self-checkout bans'

C. Jarrett Dieterle at Reason

California Democrats are pushing for "banning self-checkout machines from stores in the name of fighting crime," says C. Jarrett Dieterle. But business owners already have incentive to phase out the machines if they are helping shoplifters. The bill would require stores to have at least one employee for every two checkout machines. That and other requirements make it clear this is really a "pro-union jobs bill inside the Trojan horse of crime prevention." 

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'70 years after Brown, we're fighting the same battles over again'

Svante Myrick in The Hill

It has been 70 years since the Supreme Court's landmark Brown v. Board of Education ruling, which not only desegregated public schools but also "cracked open doors" to courthouses and the White House, says Svante Myrick. So "it hurt" when, days before the anniversary, a Virginia school board restored the names of Confederate leaders at two schools, a sign of disrespect for Black progress. We clearly still have to "guard against backsliding from major civil rights victories." 

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