Not everyone on the defense side is as fatalistic as Schwartz. Thomas Bezanson of New York's Chadbourne & Parke, who has defended tobacco, alcohol, and pharmaceutical companies, thinks that what happened to the tobacco industry was unique. "You had a very powerful attack made by the plaintiffs bar, the press, the politicians, and the state attorneys general," he says. "That only works if you are able to use all of those in a coordinated way to persuade society that the object of attack is some kind of pariah. I doubt that kind of attack can be lodged against food companies."