>>No matter how you slice it, the flaw in all these activities is the TIME it takes to settle these issues. The end objective is generally achievable during the time allowed for case presentation/decision.
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>Agreed. This is also standard practice in some legal circles - an article in the Atlantic monthly some years ago described how some large corporations (food chains, etc.) dissuaded personal injury lawsuits against them by dragging on proceedings until the complainents could no longer afford the legal costs (the injuries described in the article were real, serious claims, not the frivolous ones we so often hear about). The principle is the similar with GATT, except that it is whole industries that suffer.

Yup, and of course it is only the rich (or deep-pocketed in the case of corps) who can operate this way. That is why it will be ever so that there are two tiers of justice, criminal or civil. Sad, really.