Asymptotics of the best polynomial approximation of |x|^p and of the best Laurent polynomial approximation of sgn(x) on two symmetric intervals

We present a new method that allows us to get a direct proof of the classical Bernstein asymptotics for the error of the best uniform polynomial approximation of $|x|^p$ on two symmetric intervals. Note, that in addition, we get asymptotics for the polynomials themselves under a certain renormalization. Also, we solve a problem on asymptotics of the best approximation of $\sgn(x)$ on $[-1,-a]\cup[a,1]$ by Laurent polynomials.