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A house of cards built on greed is starting to tumble. While tort reform advances by fits and starts (in Oklahoma, it's mostly by fits), some of the nation's most prominent trial lawyers have been dealt some deserved justice:

•The king of torts in this country has been Richard F. "Dickie” Scruggs, as true a model for John Grisham's "King of Torts” as possible. Scruggs pleaded guilty in mid-March to a federal charge that he conspired to bribe a judge.

•Five days after Scruggs pleaded out, Melvyn I. Weiss admitted that he conspired to pay off plaintiffs in class-action lawsuits alleging corporate misconduct. If Scruggs was the king of torts, Weiss was the ace of class-action securities litigation.

The joker's on us in this tale of high crimes and misdealings. According to one admittedly biased source, the tort system costs the U.S. economy $865 billion per year, for an annual "tort tax” of $9,827 for a family of four. Even at just one-fourth that listed amount, we're being dunned $615 apiece per year to support the lavish lifestyles of Scruggs, Weiss and a full deck of other usual suspects.

Before he antes up further resistance to reasonable tort reform in Oklahoma, Gov. Brad Henry ought to consider that the real beneficiaries of the tort tax aren't the little people he seeks to protect from damage caps but the Dickie Scruggs of the world.

Another high-profile lawyer who folded in recent days was Eliot Spitzer, the former New York attorney general whose greed manifested itself in the acquisition of power rather than cash. For Scruggs and Weiss, it was all about the winnings.

Only a poker face could keep straight in view of the fact that trial lawyers have fostered a system of legalized extortion. Sometimes they overplay their hand and are asked to leave the game.