I offer up 40 years of my life as a counter example. Maybe it's a bit city thing, idk, but this is not the norm where I'm from. You get the bill, put your card in it, they take it and run it, bring it back, and you sign the receipt.

Right, and while they're away, they take a photo of both sides of your card and then sell that to someone, who uses it for credit-card fraud.

Has never happened to me or anyone I know. And if it did, it's easy to prove it wasn't you and charge it back.