Hey it's not just the evil people that take your miles away.
It's also the evil people that devalue them.
I lost quite a bit of money when MBNA decided to devalue the elite rewards points from 1 cent to .66 cents. One day, a 33% devaluation. Multiply that times a couple hundred thousand, you see something.
The sad thing is that I'd probably give all my MBNA points back just to get MBNA back from BOFA.