Mightn't that possibly be a good thing? While I'm not in the legal profession and have no doubt that many of these lawyers are motivated by no more than visions of lots of legal fees, I nonetheless can appreciate how some of these class-actions have been an important check against abusive, overly deceptive and questionable corporate marketing practices.

To hear right-wingers tell it, all the litigation is frivolous and motivated by greed, which trial lawyers have in abundance but corporations somehow lack. Get rid of the lawsuits and the benevolent CEOs will pass on savings to consumers (rather than pad their own compensation!)

Bottom line: There's a balance of power here. While both sides have their bad actors, as a consumer it's my hope that they both box so hard they knock each other out. Class-actions are the only effective legal remedy when large numbers of people get cheated out of small amounts of money. Past cases and their deterrent effect are important protections for consumers from future abuses, even when the mechanism for distributing settlement dollars is faulty.

[This message has been edited by RustyC (edited 04-19-2003).]