If you have ever opened up one of those tools you'd see that the first reply to your post by JR Sutton is correct. With the three prong plugs they would only go in one way, unless you broke off the ground prong. When tools had alot of exposed, or solid metal cases, they had to have a true grounded plug to be safe. When they went to plastic cases, the chance of getting zapped by stray current in the tools metal casing was gone, but they still needed a way to insure the hot wire was broken. By polorizing the plug it assures that when a two prong plug is inserted into the outlet that it too goes in the right way. Properly inserted the switch on the tool actually breakes the positive wire to the tool, as it should, and not the neutral. If something bad were to happen, and the plug was in backwards, the tool would still be electrically 'hot'. As has been discussed on here ad infinitium over the years, you can still complete a 120 volt circuit between a positive wire and pretty much any ground, and by doing so, potentially make you the path the current choses to get there.
Governmental involvment or not, some things are safe, and some aren't. While plugging one in either way might be just fine 99.9999999999% of the time, that .0000000001% of the time it's not could very well kill you.
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