But anyway the whole use of the term "Pro" has become pretty much null and void recently.
I don't know why you think that.
Also you are taking the term "Pro" as if these laptops were only meant for professionals. Not that they just contain more higher end components (processors, video card, memory expandability, multi-monitors, etc). I.e. a higher level of components.
Yes apple had 2 lines. It wasn't per see a consumer line and and one for professionals. It is more like "student/consumer" and "Business" It was a lower end line with lower end components and a More expensive line "Pro" that had better components. The "Pro / Business User" at the time for Apple was mainly niche markets that required faster and better components to run the software and hardware. This hardware was overkill and unnecessary for the non-business user since the applications one would need to use did not require great processing power. Better video cards on a student/consumer grade laptop did not need to be high end either since the MAC was not a gaming platform and didn't have graphic intensive programs for this market.
Today and the past year or two this has more to do with capturing Windows users and especially windows "business" / "professional" user. Windows and many apps running under windows, especially business programs as well as games, need more processor power, memory and better quality video cards. They need more of these higher end components that are typically found in the "Pro" line. Apple has made great stride in converting PC users. Especially given the fact that Windows runs faster on MAC hardware and that you can also natively run windows apps on the MAC. Apple is making a huge push into this market and is more evident with bundling MS Exchange support in Snow Leopard.
Thus what was a typical "Pro" user years ago for Apple is not the same today. Thus the change in feature set and the price drop to attract a much larger customer base.
Plus they may have included a quicker CPU, but they've cheaped out on using one with half the L2 Cache on all but the higher end systems. It still baffles my brain that people seem to think that having solid and expandable features taken away can be a good thing, and arguing that it is saving costs is total rubbish when the cost has been reduced by using a cheaper CPU and/or loosing the dedicated GPU. So if anything Apples margins on these machines may actually increase.
There are cost savings even on the 2 higher end 15" systems compared to the previous 15" pro's processor & video card.