Editor's notebook

THE MAGIC WORD - We still think the flap over the wording of the slot machine ballot item was overblown. In any case, it now seems to be over.

The state Court of Appeals has affirmed a one-word change ordered by the Anne Arundel County Circuit Court. The ballot item will now say that the "primary purpose" of slots would be to raise revenue for education. Slots opponents argued that the original wording, without "primary," misleadingly implied that all the revenue would go to education. In fact, a healthy chunk of it - a maximum of $40 million a year - would go to the ailing horse-racing industry.

We...