The thing is, with some of these cases, when the papers and news report it they leave out some key elements that just totally make it seem bizarre. The McDonalds case for instance, my understanding is that the reason that case went that way was that the counsel for McDonalds was just a jackass, insulted the jury multiple times, basically telling them they were a bunch of dumbasses, etc. Also, McDonalds knew the coffee was at a temperature that was way above what other restaurants used and could cause severe burns in a much shorter time and in greater severity than one would expect and had settled cases like the Stella case in the past, paying for the medical bills, but this time decided to play hardball.
So all that went into the jury saying fine, you want to be the corporate giant and call us dumb a-holes, well, we'll fix you and they did. Of course the news and the papers usually don't add those sorts of facts to their reporting as it dilutes the shock factor.